Everyone complains about the cost of wire for a decent antenna radial system.
If it weren't for shipping cost, DX Engineering (which is within driving distance for me) has 500 feet of 14 awg insulated radial wire for $75. Free shipping over $99 so buy two.
A check of our local building supply store (Home Depot) finds insulated stranded 14 awg THHN suitable for outdoor use at around $45 for 500 feet.
Not to expensive is RG-6 coax at around $36 for 500 feet. Any reason the coax shield couldn't serve as radial wire? That's gettin' the price down there too.
500 feet of 18 awg bare copper grounding wire is around $32.
500 feet would give you 25-20 foot radials which might fit a typical back yard city lot.
I read about a ham that buys up scrap wire from hamfests, thrift stores, yard sales etc. All different gauges and lengths and places them under his ground mounted vertical. He says he has literally miles under his antenna and has spent very little.
About a year or so ago I replaced about 2 dozen copper 4x4 fence post with solar light caps, I flattend out the copper and put them in a box intending to nail them down on the flat roof beneath where my xmtr is to see if it would make any difference.. I forgot I even had them till you metioned the scrap.. now that you're comment has reminded me, I'll need to give it a try, it certainly can't hurt!
Hmm... now what did I do with that box?....
We have several recycle centers in the islands. They consistantly have, literally, barrels of scrap wire, mostly RG-6 or 300 ohm TV flat wire, 1000's of ft. I'm sure I could pick up 500 ft usable as ground radials for $10.
Back on February 2, 2013, about a year ago, PhilB posted valuable information as part of a discussion on ground radials.
After telling us the radials don't need to be buried, but can simply be laid on the surface of the ground where grass will eventually grow over them, Phil told us about landscape pins, also called lawn pins or sod clips. He provided these two links:
http://www.eham.net/reviews/detail/8163
On top of that, Phil mentioned that similar pins can be found at Home Depot for laying out dog perimeter wires.
I happened to enter the last 12-minutes of a discounted bag of pins from Ross Radio on eBay and now have enough pins to go big time in the back yard once the polar vortex leaves town.
Phil, if you don't already list or link these pins on your website then you should.
Another inexpensive source of radial wire is ladder line (if you can find it) and it has the added bonus of giving you 2 radial wires in each length.
Zipcord or speaker wire is another source. Just split it up but keep one end together for connection to the transmitter.
TV Twinlead
Abandoned parts from the junk heap have X-amount of coiled wire inside, like transformers, chokes, motors and electro-magnets...
How much wire is in them, and would it be practical to get it un-wound for use as radials?
There is also "N" the missing number. Has anyone found "N" yet?