Yup I ran them both!
I spent Friday and Saturday night running the 160M contest. I ran low power with my umbrella vertical. As compared to last year with about the same amount of effort, I was able to complete about 50% more QSO's in about 13 hours operating time total. Quite an accomplishment for me at 346 total. I had added another 8 radials to my radial field so I am up to 18 now and about 2000' of copper on the ground. The efficiency of the antenna has improved for sure. I am pretty pleased at the performance.
Unfortunately, I am not happy with my receiving loop. Not the antenna itself but the placement of the antenna. Right now it is in my back yard about 3 feet above the ground. It allows me to hear well but not well enough. I am able to hear local stations work DX that I can barely hear above the noise floor. The Flex 5K hears very well on other bands so I am pretty sure my loop needs some elevation to function better. I could switch over to the umbrella for receive but the noise is horrendous with that vertical in my suburban location. Even during the contest, I felt that I was being heard better than I could hear. So back to the testing grounds with the loop.
Sunday morning was spent on the 10 Meter RTTY contest. Quite a contest, but with the conditions it felt like I was operating in the contest that no one bothered to participate in!! The morning started with a YL from ZS land that I monitored rag chewing with someone from W5 land. The band was open to South Africa to be sure. Shortly there after, stations started popping up here and there in the RTTY section of the band. There was quite a few DX stations on the air and they were fairly easy to work. Several state side stations as well. The contest was fun, any time I am pounding on the RTTY keyboard I am having fun!! Maybe next year the conditions will be better.
What the heck is with people? Why do they insist on jumping on the DXpedition transmit frequency just to agitate people? Sending UP UP UP and LID and ASS to the poor sole that forget to set his split the first time he transmits is not helpful to any one. PT0S was an atrocious display of behavior both on the internet and on the air by the self appointed Band Cops. The same old game of on the air jamming and the internet cluster comments were the worst I have ever seen. These people should be ashamed of themselves. The guys from PT0S did a fantastic job with the circumstances they were dealt. Get over it band cop and please go away.
Until next time
73
Ron
WM9Q
Saturday, December 8, 2012
Saturday, November 3, 2012
New 3 element Steppir and CW Sweepstakes.
The Steppir is in the air. After several hours of reading and interpreting what turned out to be some pretty simple instructions, the antenna of all antennas is in the air. The assembly was not difficult, it was just time consuming.
A month ago, the job would have been simple. However, we are seeing temperatures right at freezing in the mornings. It does get warmer in the afternoons averaging about 45 F but with the shorter days, waiting to get an already time consuming job done is not possible. I did get to do a great deal of assembly indoors - no small feat with 18 foot long fiberglass poles and a 16 foot boom. Of course all of the tower work had to be done once the temperature was above freezing.
Part of the tower upgrade included adding an 8 ft. section of tower. I purchased a tower jack from Champion radio and it was the best investment ever. I already own a gin pole so pulling the tower section in the air was simple. Aligning the third foot on the tower section was a simple matter of tweaking the misaligned foot with the tower jack and everything fell into place.
Pulling up the antenna proved to be a bit more than my poor wife could handle. It was almost more than 3 people could handle. At 58 pounds, the Steppir is no light weight. To think, I almost considered buying a 4 element version that tips the scale at 99 pounds!! Part of the issue was the dynamic rope we used to pull the antenna into place. If you should try this yourself, consider a no stretch rope or even a cable and winch to get the job done.
So what about performance? The first station I worked was Togo!! Third call!! Full gallon and a half for power and the Steppir!! I noticed a much reduced noise floor when I first turned on the Flex. It just seemed to be more stable without the pulsing and crashes that I have grown accustomed to with the Cushcraft A3. Could be conditions, could be the antenna but I am impressed so far.
I was really hoping to have this weekend for the CW Sweepstakes. I wanted to have the new antenna in the air in time to try my hand at this great contest. Unfortunately, I sort of spent all of my Kitchen Pass minutes with the wife building and installing the antenna. I even had her take the day off with me on Thursday this past week to help me get the antenna installed. She is a great XYL but I figured it would be pressing my luck hiding in the basement all weekend after I put her through the trials of putting the Steppir up. God Bless her, she may not always understand me but she puts up with me.
Until next time,
73
Ron
WM9Q
Saturday, October 13, 2012
3 Element Steppir update and Random Equipment Ramblings
The Steppir is on its way from the factory. I should see it some time next week. I am looking forward to the upgrade. I have the elevated guy support poles installed, and painted. The are a bit obtrusive in the front yard and have raised some ire from the XYL. I will need to beautify them in the near future to keep my hobby safe!!! I am hoping that the cold weather holds off long enough to get the job completed this fall. I would hate to have a great antenna sitting in the basement all winter while I struggle with the old one.
Speaking of antennas, I ran my dipole as a Marconi antenna ( t vertical) on 80 meters during the CQWW RTTY contest. I was running about 700 watts out of the SB220 when suddenly I heard a loud thunk and was rewarded with a massive internal arc in the SB220. Smoke poured from the tuner shortly there after and it refused to tune on any band. I removed the Palstar AT-Auto from serrvice and carefully removed the top to access the damage. It seems that a current sense transformer had given up on me by burning off its insulation and cracking the torrroidial core. DOWN FOR THE COUNT!! A new box annd $65 later the tuner was on its way to Palstar. Fast forward to yesterday (about a week later), UPS delivers a Palstar box to my front door. The tuner was repaired!! The invoice was markedd warranty repair and even the return shipping was covered. I was impressed. Buy quality equipment and get quality service!! What a great experience.
With respect to quality equipment. I had some pretty bad experiences with some equipment I purchased based on price alone from a particular manufactured with a 3 letter name that starts with M and ends with J. Basically I purcahsed 9 items to rebuild my shack and wound up repairing 8 out of 9 before use. I was not impressed. Don't get me wrong, the equipment I purchased worked as expected once repaired but I never should have had to lift the lid on any of it when purchased new. Since that experience, I made it a point to look at reviews on eHam before I purchased anything. Unfortunately, I learned to late that most of the reviews you see on the gear on eHam are positive because many of the manufacturers contact the writers of the negative reviews to get them removed.... THIS IS NO HELP!! What I do now and what I suggest to anyone moving forward, subscribe to the yahoo support group for the equipment you are about to buy. Read the forum posts, if the problems you are seeing are not to your liking, you will be able to save yourself some grief. Be mindful of the fact that some of the forum posts come from users that are new to the equipment and sometimes cause themselves problems. After you have monitored the posts for a while and get a feel for the issues you may encounter, then you can make an informed decision and purchase with confidence.
Until next time
73,
Ron
WM9Q
Speaking of antennas, I ran my dipole as a Marconi antenna ( t vertical) on 80 meters during the CQWW RTTY contest. I was running about 700 watts out of the SB220 when suddenly I heard a loud thunk and was rewarded with a massive internal arc in the SB220. Smoke poured from the tuner shortly there after and it refused to tune on any band. I removed the Palstar AT-Auto from serrvice and carefully removed the top to access the damage. It seems that a current sense transformer had given up on me by burning off its insulation and cracking the torrroidial core. DOWN FOR THE COUNT!! A new box annd $65 later the tuner was on its way to Palstar. Fast forward to yesterday (about a week later), UPS delivers a Palstar box to my front door. The tuner was repaired!! The invoice was markedd warranty repair and even the return shipping was covered. I was impressed. Buy quality equipment and get quality service!! What a great experience.
With respect to quality equipment. I had some pretty bad experiences with some equipment I purchased based on price alone from a particular manufactured with a 3 letter name that starts with M and ends with J. Basically I purcahsed 9 items to rebuild my shack and wound up repairing 8 out of 9 before use. I was not impressed. Don't get me wrong, the equipment I purchased worked as expected once repaired but I never should have had to lift the lid on any of it when purchased new. Since that experience, I made it a point to look at reviews on eHam before I purchased anything. Unfortunately, I learned to late that most of the reviews you see on the gear on eHam are positive because many of the manufacturers contact the writers of the negative reviews to get them removed.... THIS IS NO HELP!! What I do now and what I suggest to anyone moving forward, subscribe to the yahoo support group for the equipment you are about to buy. Read the forum posts, if the problems you are seeing are not to your liking, you will be able to save yourself some grief. Be mindful of the fact that some of the forum posts come from users that are new to the equipment and sometimes cause themselves problems. After you have monitored the posts for a while and get a feel for the issues you may encounter, then you can make an informed decision and purchase with confidence.
Until next time
73,
Ron
WM9Q
Thursday, September 13, 2012
Dxpeditions, W9DXCC and New Software
So tomorrow is W9DXCC. This will be my first ever attendance. I have signed up to go to the DX Basics class. From the looks of it, should be interesting. I am always looking for an edge with my contesting and dxing.
I hear a lot of local call signs in the pile ups and they are getting through to the dx stations way before I do. Could be equipment could be luck or (most likely) could be skill. My CW Skimmer usage has certainly helped with the CW pileups and I am usually within 10 calls of talking to the DX when I sit down to work them. I have been spending more time with the propagation charts of late and I know that I have been able to utilize my time better on the air because of it. I have been working NH8S over the past few days. As of right now I have 10 slots worked, mostly on CW. I really have not spent a lot of time trying. I have, however, spent a lot of time sitting in front of the radio listening. I have been told that listening is the key. So I will continue reading, and listening, and learning.
I just downloaded CMSK63. I am planning on playing with it very soon. I will be doing my first write up on it after I am comfortable with it. I know it is still in beta but the first issue I see with it is use of the default sound card only. On the Flex 5K I have VAC's that will need to be defined as the default sound card each time I use the program. More on that at a later date.
I have also been working with SARTRACK. I have been doing some testing of the AWGPE multi port capability with the author. Folks, the maps in this program are awesome. The author has done a fantastic job and is continuing to improve it.
Until next time,
73
Ron
WM9Q
I hear a lot of local call signs in the pile ups and they are getting through to the dx stations way before I do. Could be equipment could be luck or (most likely) could be skill. My CW Skimmer usage has certainly helped with the CW pileups and I am usually within 10 calls of talking to the DX when I sit down to work them. I have been spending more time with the propagation charts of late and I know that I have been able to utilize my time better on the air because of it. I have been working NH8S over the past few days. As of right now I have 10 slots worked, mostly on CW. I really have not spent a lot of time trying. I have, however, spent a lot of time sitting in front of the radio listening. I have been told that listening is the key. So I will continue reading, and listening, and learning.
I just downloaded CMSK63. I am planning on playing with it very soon. I will be doing my first write up on it after I am comfortable with it. I know it is still in beta but the first issue I see with it is use of the default sound card only. On the Flex 5K I have VAC's that will need to be defined as the default sound card each time I use the program. More on that at a later date.
I have also been working with SARTRACK. I have been doing some testing of the AWGPE multi port capability with the author. Folks, the maps in this program are awesome. The author has done a fantastic job and is continuing to improve it.
Until next time,
73
Ron
WM9Q
Sunday, September 2, 2012
CW Skimmer, Airplane Cockpits and Ham Radio
Since I was rained out for my antenna work this weekend, I decided to do some DXing. I am sitting here with CW Simmer running on the Flex 5000. I just finished working KH8/DL3DXX after about 3 hours of watching the pileup build and the propagation improve. Funny thing is I only made about 6 calls to get in his log book once I started CW Skimmer.
I have CW Skimmer tied to the second receiver (RX2) in the Flex 5000. CW Skimmer from Afreet Software (www.dxatlas.com) is a program designed for Software Defined Radios to decode cw signals across a wide bandwidth. In my case about 10 KHz of bandwidth. The Flex sends its audio and IQ signals to the controlling computer on what is refered to as virual audio cables (VAC's). These VAC's can be connected to any kind of digital demod software currently available. A specific feature of the VAC is its ability to be routed as an in phase and quadrature (IQ) pair of signals. CW skimmer takes advantage of these bradband IQ signals to allow for decode of a swath of signals instead of the narrow band signal that we are used to.
SO WHAT!!!
OK I'll tell you. With CW Skimmer and my second receiver, I can watch an entire CW DX pile up as it progresses. I can see the DX station, and decode what he is sending while simultaneously watching the signals of the answering stations(and decode their responses). By doing so, I can observe how the DX op is progressing through the pile up and plan my attack. I like to watch the OP to see how far he tends to tune before answering the next station. This gives me an idea of where to place my station in my waterfall so that evenually he tunes across me. This method has proven to be HIGHLY effective. I won't say that I always get the QSO within 6 calls but I don't send for hours and hours trying to work the guy. It is akin to making a reservation rather than standing in line. The wait is much less.
I started off this morning just calling peiodically to see if he would answer. I sent my call at least 3 dozen times and decided enough was enough.. I kicked off CW Skimmer and started monitoring. irst thing I learned was propagation was not good enough to hear most of who he was answering. I monitored until I could see both sides of the QSO and then stalked his responses. Once I learned how he tended to tune, I put my signal a few signal widths above the last guy he called and sent. After about the 5th time through, he sent "Q?". I sent my call again and he responded with my full call and 599. I sent my response and got "TU" back. QSO complete!!! He's in the log!!
So where did the title for this come from? I have DXlabs running across 2 monitors, PowerSDR and DDutil running in a third and CW skimmer on top. There are at least a dozen programs and 500 buttons on the screen. There are 3 waterfalls including CW Skimmer! I think back to the old DX60 days and wonder how the heck did I used to make contacts. It is a different world.
When you are a Little Gun, you can use all the help you can get!!
Until next time
73,
Ron
WM9Q
I have CW Skimmer tied to the second receiver (RX2) in the Flex 5000. CW Skimmer from Afreet Software (www.dxatlas.com) is a program designed for Software Defined Radios to decode cw signals across a wide bandwidth. In my case about 10 KHz of bandwidth. The Flex sends its audio and IQ signals to the controlling computer on what is refered to as virual audio cables (VAC's). These VAC's can be connected to any kind of digital demod software currently available. A specific feature of the VAC is its ability to be routed as an in phase and quadrature (IQ) pair of signals. CW skimmer takes advantage of these bradband IQ signals to allow for decode of a swath of signals instead of the narrow band signal that we are used to. SO WHAT!!!
OK I'll tell you. With CW Skimmer and my second receiver, I can watch an entire CW DX pile up as it progresses. I can see the DX station, and decode what he is sending while simultaneously watching the signals of the answering stations(and decode their responses). By doing so, I can observe how the DX op is progressing through the pile up and plan my attack. I like to watch the OP to see how far he tends to tune before answering the next station. This gives me an idea of where to place my station in my waterfall so that evenually he tunes across me. This method has proven to be HIGHLY effective. I won't say that I always get the QSO within 6 calls but I don't send for hours and hours trying to work the guy. It is akin to making a reservation rather than standing in line. The wait is much less.
I started off this morning just calling peiodically to see if he would answer. I sent my call at least 3 dozen times and decided enough was enough.. I kicked off CW Skimmer and started monitoring. irst thing I learned was propagation was not good enough to hear most of who he was answering. I monitored until I could see both sides of the QSO and then stalked his responses. Once I learned how he tended to tune, I put my signal a few signal widths above the last guy he called and sent. After about the 5th time through, he sent "Q?". I sent my call again and he responded with my full call and 599. I sent my response and got "TU" back. QSO complete!!! He's in the log!!
So where did the title for this come from? I have DXlabs running across 2 monitors, PowerSDR and DDutil running in a third and CW skimmer on top. There are at least a dozen programs and 500 buttons on the screen. There are 3 waterfalls including CW Skimmer! I think back to the old DX60 days and wonder how the heck did I used to make contacts. It is a different world.
When you are a Little Gun, you can use all the help you can get!!
Until next time
73,
Ron
WM9Q
Wednesday, August 29, 2012
RAIN, RAIN GO AWAY... Come again another day!!
So the utility companies have aprroved my dig sites. The auger rental is set for Saturday Sept 1. Now I understand it is supposed to rain on Saturday. Just great. All summer, drought conditions. Now when I plan to get some REAL work done in the yard, Hurricane Issac comes along.
Oh well, part of the purpose of the tower and antenna systems is EMCOMM. If my mods are delayed due to weather, so be it. God bless the people in the affected area of the hurricane. I hope that damage is minimal and that they can get back to their regular lives as soon as possible.
Until next time,
73
WM9Q
Oh well, part of the purpose of the tower and antenna systems is EMCOMM. If my mods are delayed due to weather, so be it. God bless the people in the affected area of the hurricane. I hope that damage is minimal and that they can get back to their regular lives as soon as possible.
Until next time,
73
WM9Q
Sunday, August 26, 2012
The Great Tower Upgrade of 2012
The antenna has worked well but was damaged in a wind storm about 2 weeks after installation. The repairs to the antenna have kept it in the air and functional but I just have not been happy with the performance.
The Hazer tram is a great device for the ability to maintain the antenna system. It has worked well for me but tends to be a bit noisy in the wind (it clanks and bangs a bit). The tram is being removed in this antenna upgrade. It will be placed up for sale at the very next available hamfest/swapmeet. Believe me, I like these trams. I installed one on my fathers tower and it has been a god send at his QTH. They are perfect for the older ham that can no longer climb his tower. I am planning a slightly bigger load on this tower than the H2 can handle. It can simply not handle the new load.
I have purchased a new 3 element Steppir beam for installation on the tower. I will be extending the tower by 8 feet. The tower will be a total of 48 feet high. This should put me slightly above the tree line on my property. I will be adding a new elevated guy system as well.
The Steppir is due to arrive October 5. In addition to the antenna, I have purchased the 6 meter parasitic element and the SDA100 auto tune kit for my Flex 5000. I am looking forward to the enhanced performance of the new antenna.
The elevated guy system will be installed on the sides of my home. I have purchased 2 ea 6.625" diameter 10 foot long pipes. They have 0.28" thick walls and are 197 lbs each! I am burying them in cement in a hole that will be dug 18" by 5 feet deep. The pipes will extend 5 feet above my property grade and will attach to the guy lines at that point. Once they are vertical in the cement I am planning to fill them with cement. This will enhance the stiffness of the pipes. The guys themselves are 4000lb test Phillystran. The stiff pipes were important because Phillystran tend to stretch a bit. The tower will be guyed at the 45 foot level. The whole system was simulated with Grape Finite Element Analysis and appears to be well with in design spec for the tower up to about 90 MPH winds.
The tower extension is to be accomplished with a new section of Rohn 25AG4. I am putting a new rotator plate inside the 25AG4 section and will be mounting my HAM IV to it at about the midpoint. I already have a 10 foot mast that is currently in use on the old antenna.
I will be adding posts to this blog as the work progresses. This should be fun.
73 and CU on the air!!!
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