Tag: wire antenna
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Sandwich Hamfest, and the answer to a question
Going to Sandwich is a brief but major upheaval in life: go to bed early, get up at midnight and drive until dawn. Shop till ya drop. Drive home. (to read about this process in detail, see last years post) Does that make it sound awful? It’s really a lot of fun. People I only…
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An October retrospective, and a November omnibus
Soup weather It drizzled all morning, but as the temperature dropped it has turned into snow. Big, healthy flakes, coming down ever heavier. My most urgent project at the moment is outdoors, so it’s a chance to catch up with the blog, while enjoying a bowl of sausage-and-lentil soup. Lots of little items, in no…
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“five-two”
I’ve been thinking of a few emcomm-related posts to put up, emphasizing some of the basic-basics of being prepared for the unexpected. Here’s another one: Today’s brief excursion into emcomm is about the importance of the 2 meter calling frequency, 146.52 MHz. If there is no communications plan, then the plan is “five-two”. I have…
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Found-materials antenna challenge
It might have been 2 weeks ago that I stopped in a wayside and saw a tangle of something orange-ish laying on the blacktop as I was leaving; naturally I stopped to pick it up just for the sake of keeping the area clean. It proved to be two lengths of something like 24 gauge…
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Hung a new antenna today!
It seems like just yesterday I was thinking about getting an antenna up in the trees at home … Now, as the sun sets, I have one! The day started sunny and cold, but after noon sunny was winning and the temperature got up to around 30. I had all the necessary stuff handy (I’ve…
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A post about many things
re: Field Day 2023 The December issue of QST arrived a while ago and I invested maybe 15 minutes looking through the fine print for my score: 440 points. I think that my claimed bonus for Public Information Display was rejected; not unfairly mind you, it was a bit skimpy. Eh, surest way to fail…
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A day at Wildcat Mountain
I mainly went out to Wildcat Mountain to test and adjust my wire antennas, so I brought a couple of radios, all of my antennas, and a variety of test equipment. I set up just off the upper parking area near one of the trailheads of Old Settler’s Trail, which is one of my favorite…
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Homebrew EFHW from scratch
I have been thinking about making a couple of minimalist EFHW antennas with SMA connections for use with the (tr)uSDX. After weeks and weeks of out-of-stock conditions for my preferred kit, I ordered up some parts and started to make one from scratch. Starting with an FT50-43 toroid core, I wound the 49:1 unun: The…
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projects, projects, projects… so many projects …
Since I finished off those half-built kits a few weeks ago I have been purchasing a variety of electronic parts to start a new round of projects; here is a representative collection of them, tastefully arrayed in a cardboard flat (which is one of my favored containers for organizing projects on the workbench). I have…
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A gear bag post
All winter, and well into the spring, I was operating from the car; only rarely was my radio pack used for anything but carrying to and from it. I wasn’t entirely satisfied with either of the existing packs, they exemplified the old saying about “the two standard sizes; too big and too small”. Operating portable…
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Field Day, Day 1
My planning for Field Day was kind of sketchy, and not at all ambitious, so I grabbed my radio pack after lunch and arrived at Wildcat Mountain State Park a bit before 2:00, or already almost an hour into the event. It took me about 20 minutes to set up the X6100 and the 20…
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If it’s mid-June, then Field Day is right around the corner
is the thought that occurred to me this morning. Fourth weekend in June, yup, 24th and 25th, okay; I think I’m going to try for something a bit more organized than last year. But what, exactly? Well … weather permitting, definitely QRP, definitely carried in the pack (see the upcoming post about my current station-in-a-bag),…