My com is on top, about where Marty's is, and the ground plane for that is stuck to the inside of the turtle deck. We are using copper tape. I may do what you did and put a ground plane of copper tape on top of the longeron cross pieces, and put a piece of skin plywood on first to give something to put the antenna on. I discussed this with AmeriKing via email today and they said that it did not have to be 3 feet from the com an it didn't have to be 36" in diameter, that 24" would do. As I told Larry earlier, my ACK antenna was just like a hand held and it worked fine. Since the ground plane for the com is only made of strips of copper, I don't suppose that it will interfere too much with the ELT signal and I really don't see why the antenna would matter as the power in the plane should be off if I am going to crash.
I also found out something else very interesting on the AmeriKing web site. Experimentals "technically" don't require an ELT at all. I was always told that if it had more than one seat, it had to have one, but their site states that experimentals are not required to have one. Don't start flaming on that please, I have one and am installing it and don t suggest that anyone do without one. I am just passing on the information. "There is a time for building and a time for GOING TO THE GATHERING, and the time for building has long since expired." See you in Mt. Vernon - 2004 - KR Gathering http://KRGathering.org See N64KR at http://KR-Builder.org - Then click on the pics Daniel R. Heath - Columbia, SC
