I used Nylon rod turned on my lathe to mount the mast to the ground plate. I may switch to fiberglass later, but cheap is my goal and I had the Nylon and PVC pipe for the vertical. I used 14 gauge Romex stripped out for the conductors. At the top of the PVC I’ll add a plastic compression fitting to seal the copper that extends just beyond the pipe.
I’m working on a 10 meter vertical antenna for the roof of my house. It’s a quarter wave ground plane centered on 28.8 MHz, so it will be 97.5″ tall with 4 97.5″ radials. I used the formula Length of Dipole (feet) = 468 / Frequency (MHz). Since the radials comprise one half of the dipole and the vertical is the other half, you divide the length by 2.
I’m looking for some 1/4″ diameter fiberglass rod for the vertical. We get a lot of wind in Colorado so it needs to be tough. The base is a 1/4″ thick aluminum plate with a SO-239 bulkhead connector. I will weld on a round piece of stock on the top side, then turn it on my lathe as a receiver for the fiberglass rod. A length of 14 gauge stranded copper will live inside the fiberglass tube.
Here are some pictures of the base that I started on today:
http://4wdx.com/
Banjo Hangout