so ive been running an inverted V dipole for 40m for about two years now, apex at maybe 35 feet off the ground with the ends drooping down to about 10 feet on each side. works ok-ish but ive always felt like something was off with the low angle radiation especially when guys on the west coast are booming in and im barely making it through the noise on their end.

been thinking about switching to a vertical, maybe a quarter wave with a decent radial field under it. i know verticals are noisy but my noise floor is already pretty bad out here (suburban lot, neighbors with solar inverters and all kinds of junk) so i dont know if itd actually be worse. the thing is i only have maybe 60-70 feet of usable space in the back yard so putting down a proper radial field is gonna be a squeeze and ill probably have to fold some of them.

has anyone actually done a side by side comparison between an inverted V and a quarter wave vertical on 40? like real world not just modeling software. because the models always make it look like the vertical wins hands down on DX paths but thats assuming a perfect ground and i definitely dont have that. just trying to figure out if its worth tearing down what i have.

yeah i went through almost exactly this same thing a few years back. had a similar inverted V and put up a vertical just to compare, ran them both for about six months switching back and forth on the same QSOs when i could. honest answer is it depends way more on your specific ground conductivity than anything else. out here in the midwest my vertical with about 32 radials averaging 25 feet long ended up being noticeably better on DX, like 2-3 S units on some paths. but a buddy of mine in new england tried the same thing and barely noticed a difference because his ground is basically rock and gravel.

the noise thing is real though. my vertical picks up every bit of garbage on the band, the inverted V was quieter by a fair amount. what i ended up doing was keeping the dipole for receiving and using the vertical for transmit only when i wanted to push signal out. bit of a pain to switch but it worked. if you're running barefoot the extra gain on transmit probably matters more than you think.

also 60-70 feet is plenty for radials honestly. folded radials are fine, theyre not ideal but the difference between folded and straight is way smaller than the difference between having them and not having them. i wouldnt stress too much about that part.

my two cents - the inverted V at 35 feet is never gonna be great for DX on 40, the angle is just too high. that said i wouldnt necessarily jump straight to a vertical if noise is already killing you. have you thought about a horizontal loop? full wave loop up as high as you can get it, works way better than people expect and its a lot quieter than a vertical. i put one up last spring and honestly wish i had done it years ago instead of messing around with verticals.

not saying a vertical is wrong just that it isnt the only option between what you have and tearing everything up.