Homemade ACARS Antenna

[Mikla]

I've had my SBS-3 for a few weeks but needed an antenna to get ACARS messages so I built my own based on the design at:
http://chrusion.com/BJ7/InvVeeAntenna4ULs.pdf
I modified the design to be centered around 131MHz using MMANA-GAL software for ACARS reception. Knowing little about RF and nothing about this software... it was an excellent learning experience. Here is the file for MMANA-Gal and here are a couple of pics:





I made a 50ohm cable with a Balun and also used 75ohm RG-6 and did not see much of a difference. Antenna specs are:
R=60.4 Ohms, Ga: 1.97, SWR=1.2 (50ohm)

Te atenna is n the office on the first floor of a two story house and I am getting data continuous messages.   plan on putting it up in the attic this weekend to see what I get. Will post more info as I update.

Software
Base Station
Planeplotter
acarsd
Peak Level Meter 1.76
Home Grown Google Maps Server

Hardware
Lenovo IdeaCentre K330B 77472BU (8G Ram)
OS: VMWare ESXi 5 Server
Virtual Machine: Windows XP, 60G HD, 1G mem
USB Sound Card (needed for ACARS decoding since ESXi does not recognize internal sound card)
SBS-3
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