Matroids with no U2,nU_{2,n}-minor and many hyperplanes

We construct, for every $r \ge 3$ and every prime power $q > 10$, a rank-$r$ matroid with no $U_{2,q+2}$-minor, having more hyperplanes than the rank-$r$ projective geometry over $\mathrm{GF}(q)$

The number of lines in a matroid with no U2,nU_{2,n}-minor

We show that, if $q$ is a prime power at most 5, then every rank-$r$ matroid with no $U_{2,q+2}$-minor has no more lines than a rank-$r$ projective geometry over GF$(q)$. We also give examples showing that for every other prime power this bound does not hold