so ive been on HF for about 8 years and done a fair bit of weak signal VHF stuff, mostly 2m meteor scatter and some tropo when conditions cooperate, but EME has always been this thing in the back of my head that i keep telling myself ill get around to eventually. well im finally doing it.

problem is every time i start researching the antenna requirements i kind of spiral and dont know where to land. ive been looking at 4x yagi arrays on 2m as kind of the minimum viable setup for single-polarization work, and i know guys have done it with a single big yagi using JT65B or Q65 but the link budget just seems brutal with one antenna. my lot isnt huge but i could probably fit a 2x2 array of like 10-11 element yagis with decent stacking distances if i plan it right. is that actually workable for making EME contacts or am i still going to be frustrated most of the time?

also the feedline situation is stressing me out. i know you want the losses as low as possible obviously but running hardline out to an array thats going to be maybe 80 feet from the shack adds up fast on cost. is 7/8 heliax overkill for this, would LDF4-50A be reasonable for that run? im running a 500w amp, an IC-9700 as the radio, and i have a fairly low noise preamp i pulled off a surplus tower a couple years ago but honestly i dont even know the noise figure on it anymore i need to actually measure it.

any pointers from people who actually do EME regularly would be huge. i feel like im close to having the pieces but i need someone to sanity check this before i start spending money on phasing harnesses and mast hardware.

the 2x2 array on 2m is a solid starting point honestly, i ran that configuration for about two years before i went to 4x4 and i made contacts, it wasnt instant gratification but it worked. the key thing is getting your system noise figure sorted before you worry too much about anything else because a mediocre preamp will kill you more than a slightly smaller antenna. what preamp is that you pulled from the tower? if you dont know the NF you really should measure it or just swap it for something known, a good mast-mounted LNA like the SSB Electronics or a Kuhne is going to be around 0.3-0.5dB NF which makes a real difference on EME.

on the feedline question, LDF4-50A at 80 feet on 2m is fine, you dont need 7/8 for that run. youre looking at maybe 1.5-2dB of loss which isnt great but with 500w and a proper array you can work with it, especially running Q65 which has even more coding gain than JT65B. just make sure your preamp is actually mast mounted and not in the shack or those 2dB suddenly matter a lot more.

yeah what he said about the preamp location is critical, i learned that the hard way. i had my first setup with the LNA in the shack and i was totally confused why my receive was so bad compared to what the math said it should be. moved it to the mast and it was like a completely different radio.

one thing i'd add is dont underestimate how much the software side matters for first contacts. get WSJT-X configured properly, make sure your clock sync is solid like GPS disciplined or at least chrony against a good NTP source, and spend some time just listening before you transmit. there are nights where the moon is in a decent window and you can hear EU stations pretty easily even on a modest setup, that'll tell you a lot about whether your receive chain is working before you start calling CQ. i remember the first time i copied a W6 on EME and i just sat there staring at the screen for a second, still a cool feeling.