ok so ive been running a half wave dipole for 40m for about two years now, center fed with some old 450 ohm ladder line into a tuner, works pretty well, no complaints really. but my neighbor just put up one of those GAP Titan verticals and hes consistently getting better signal reports than me on 40 especially to the west and i cant figure out why. his feedline situation looks like a nightmare honestly, just a bunch of RG8X running along the fence, and i dont think he has a very good ground radial system either, maybe 8 or 10 radials he laid on the ground last spring.

my dipole is oriented more or less north-south, broadside east-west, its up about 35 feet which i know isnt ideal but its what the trees allow. i keep reading that a dipole at that height on 40 is basically a cloud warmer, like its putting most of its energy straight up. so maybe thats the issue? like is my dipole just doing NVIS and his vertical is getting more low angle radiation toward the west?

im not really looking to tear everything down and start over, just trying to understand whats happening. anyone run both and noticed this kind of difference on 40?

yeah that tracks. 35 feet on 40m is something like 0.27 wavelengths above ground, which pushes the main radiation lobe up pretty high. you're probably doing great on regional stuff, anything within 500 miles or so, but for the longer haul paths you're sending most of your power up at like 60-70 degrees and that doesnt really work out past maybe 1000 miles depending on conditions. the vertical, even with a mediocre radial system, is going to have a lower angle lobe and thats whats making the difference to the west.

if you want to keep the dipole the classic fix is just get it higher, but i know thats easier said than done. alternatively you could try inverting it into a vee which lowers the angle a bit, or honestly just add a second antenna. a simple quarter wave vertical with even 16 or 20 radials will outperform that GAP on DX paths most days once you have a decent ground plane under it.

so anyway i had almost this exact same situation a few years back. had my 40m dipole broadside east-west too and was scratching my head why a guy down the street with a vertical kept beating me to JA and west coast. turns out angle of radiation was exactly the culprit like the previous reply says. i did end up building a simple quarter wave vertical, used about 30 radials cut to roughly 33 feet, elevated them about 6 inches off the ground on little stakes, and the difference was honestly night and day on 40 toward the pacific. kept the dipole up because its great for 80m NVIS and local rag chew stuff, just use both now depending on what im trying to work. the GAP Titans look cool but from what ive seen they really need a solid ground to shine and a lot of people just dont put in the work on the radials.