EFHW Problems

I have recently been installing some reflective bubble-foil insulation in the loft and had to move my antenna so that all the wire is outside of the building. This meant losing a good few metres of wire as I am constrained with my available space. I had to run the wire vertically down the gable wall up to the level of the garage roof and then a horizontal run to the garden. This still wasn't enough space so I passed the wire around a tree at the top of the garden before heading for the support pole at the bottom of the garden. Major problems then ensued! I lost my decent SWR readings across all the bands except the 40m target band which was perfect. I then set about shortening the antenna and adding different counterpoises until I got something near workable. Still not very good. I think I have screwed everything up! What I can't understand is the near perfect match on 40m whilst the rest was a shambles!

So, decision made, I ordered a new 20m length of wire. I figured that if I start with a known quantity, I could work from there. I intend to 'steal' a few feet and put the supporting pole at the very extreme South East corner of the garden. (Hope the neighbours don't complain!)

Conclusions:

The new wire run did not improve things. This makes me think that the wire doesn't like the things it is coming into contact with, mainly, the wall. The wire is clipped to the wall vertically downwards. I am going to re-route this so it goes over the flat roof before going to the tree, keeping it mainly in free space. I am also going to lengthen the wire by about a metre or so. Looking at the VNA readings it looks like the wire is too short because the peaks and dips are low by about 1MHz on all bands, but I will do the re-route first and check again.

Update:

Nothing I was doing seemed to improve the situation. Although the EFHW still works, I have serious doubts about its efficiency and high SWR readings. My decision is to scrap the antenna altogether and start again with something different.