so ive been going back and forth on this for like two months now and i need to just make a decision. currently running a 40m half wave dipole up about 25 feet, fed with coax, center at maybe 25 feet with the ends drooping a bit cause i ran out of real estate. its working okay but i keep reading about verticals and how they have a lower takeoff angle for dx and i got bit by the dx bug pretty hard lately.

thing is i live on a small lot, maybe 60x100 feet, and the dipole is already kind of crammed in there. a vertical might actually be easier to fit physically. but then i read all the stuff about ground radials and how you need like 60 of them to make it work right and my yard just isnt set up for that. i could do elevated radials maybe.

anyway is the vertical actually going to do better for dx or is 25 feet just too low for the dipole to be competitive at all. feel like im going in circles reading antenna modeling threads

honest answer — at 25 feet your dipole is basically an NVIS antenna for 40m. like its great for regional stuff, talking to guys within a few hundred miles, but the takeoff angle is going to be pretty high and the dx is going to suffer for it. that said ive worked plenty of dx on a dipole at that height, it just takes more patience.

the vertical thing is real but the radial situation matters a lot. elevated radials you dont need as many, 4 good radials at a consistent height does a decent job, way better than a crappy ground mounted one with only a handful of buried radials. the difference between a proper vertical and a compromised one is bigger than the difference between a good vertical and a good dipole at decent height imo.

if i were in your shoes id try the elevated vertical with like 4-8 radials first before tearing everything down. cheap to experiment with

same boat here, tiny lot in a suburb. what i ended up doing was just putting the dipole as high as i could get it and accepting the limitations. tried a vertical for a while and the local noise floor was way worse on it, all the switching supplies and junk in the neighborhood just killed me. dipoles are a bit more directional so you can at least null some of that stuff out depending on orientation.

not saying the vertical wont work for you but worth factoring in if you're in a noisy neighborhood