Attempt at a loading coil at the bottom of the mast

A few nice Antenna tuner images I found:

Attempt at a loading coil at the bottom of the mast

Image by Richard Corfield (M0RJC)
Adding inductance lowers the resonant frequency of the antenna – great! It also increases the Q or sharpness, so reducing the frequency range it can be tuned over – not so great. This worked quite well on 6m, but I had better luck on HF without the coil.

Kenwood TS-430 Amateur Radio Setup

Image by mrbill
Kenwood TS-430S amateur radio transceiver along with the AT-250 automatic antenna tuner (on the left) and PS-430 power supply (on the right). This equipment dates from the early to mid 1980s.

I got it for cost-of-shipping from a friend; having a minor problem fixed and a full tuneup done will cost me around 0 but I’m still out out less money than if I’d bought a new radio.