I clipped this from another message because I didn't want to drag the discussion off course. It's a question I've been wondering about since getting into this a few short weeks ago.

I've also read (but haven't tried yet) about the trick of rotating the antenna 90 degrees on transmit, once you've established the best receive orientation.

73 de Bill, KG5FQX

So far, with SO-20 I have rotated my Arrow antenna for best reception of the downlink and don't think I've had too much trouble being heard. At the same time I have wondered whether I should twist the antenna when transmitting to orient the 2m elements to give the same polarization as in receive. I don't know if this is a good idea or not, and frankly I have enough trouble remembering calls and grids, tracking the satellite, adjusting frequency and switching back to the correct VFO to worry about one more thing.

I've seen that some commercial OSCAR antennas use circular polarization. The antennas I see in the photos of satellites we work are whips. Is the polarization becoming "circularized" as it re-enters earth's atmosphere or something?

Comments and observations would be most welcome!

73,

Ken Alexander VE3HLS, FN03