so i finally just did it, stopped overthinking and built a half wave dipole for 40m out of some 14 gauge stranded wire i had in the garage. used a so-239 chassis connector for the feedpoint and just soldered the two legs directly to it, center conductor on one side and the shield braid on the other. hung it in an inverted V config off a painters pole i strapped to the fence.

swr came out around 1.4:1 at the frequency i wanted which i was pretty happy with for a first attempt, trimmed a bit off each leg to get there. but im wondering about the feedpoint connection itself because i didnt do any weatherproofing yet and also didnt use a balun. ive read a bunch of conflicting stuff about whether you really need a balun on a dipole fed with coax or if its one of those things people argue about forever. my rig is an IC-7300 and the antenna is about 25 feet up at the apex.

also curious if anyone has opinions on using stranded vs solid wire for a permanent outdoor install, this one is kind of temporary but if it works well id like to make it more permanent.

the balun debate is one of those things that will go on forever yeah. practically speaking for a backyard dipole at modest power you'll probably be fine without one, common mode current can cause some RFI issues or affect your pattern but honestly a lot of guys run coax fed dipoles without baluns their whole lives and never notice a problem. where it starts to matter more is if youre seeing RF in the shack or your swr is doing weird things when you touch the coax.

for weatherproofing i just use self amalgamating tape over the feedpoint, wrap it good and it keeps water out for years. on the stranded vs solid question — stranded is actually fine outdoors, some people prefer it because it flexes better in wind without work hardening and eventually cracking the way solid can. solid holds its shape better if youre doing something like a fan dipole where the geometry matters. for a simple inverted V stranded is probably fine long term, just make sure whatever you use at the connection points is tinned well so it doesnt corrode and go high resistance on you.

1.4:1 on a first build is honestly pretty good. i think mine was like 2.8 the first time and i had no idea why lol. ended up being the coax i used was ancient and had water in it but thats a whole other story.