WB0SMX

  WAS (Worked All States) from the Ranch Filed in Contests on Mar.24, 2011   QSL Finished Product I’ve been a ham since 1976, and never gone through the trouble of collecting the cards to apply for a Worked All States Award. While I was at the ranch in March, I was tuning around 80 meters and came across the Geratol Net on 3.668 Mhz.  This is a WAS net, with the main purpose being to increase activity in the Extra Class band segment of 80 meters.  I found myself logging in and participating on the next 3 nights.  Hey, it beats going to bed early when it’s dark. Anyway, I worked 30 states in 3 days, and combined with what I have logged over the last two years at the Ranch during Field Day, I have worked all states from there.  I don’t have confirmations from everywhere yet, though.  It may take a few more trips to gather the required cards, but it should be pretty easy. I was surprised at the area easily covered by 80 meters with an anten...

  Portable Power Filed in Station on Mar.23, 2011 I like operating from the Ranch, because I have some decent antennas there, and the background noise is nearly nonexistent.  But in the past, that has involved packing all my radio stuff up, including the old Astron 20-Amp linear power supply (= heavy). I decided to make things a little more convenient.  I got a 115 amp-hour marine battery from Walmart, and a cheap 2amp/6amp battery charger from Harbor Freight.   Harbor Freight Charger With these hooked up at the ranch, I can now have the battery charging while the generator is running for other stuff (like construction or cooking).  Then I can turn the generator off and run off battery for a long time.  It’s really nice at night, when I can set the TS-480 up to automatically shut off after 60 minutes (or 120, or 180).  That allows me to go to bed listening to the gents on 80 meters or 160 meters, and not have to worry about running dow...

  Quick Disconnect for Doublet Antenna Filed in Antennas on Mar.23, 2011 To finish the job we started in January, I got a 2″x4″ weathertight plastic electrical box from Home Depot.  This was used to mount a permanent set of banana jacks to the house so the doublet could be quickly attached or detached.   Doublet Disconnect To make the box ready, I cut two slots in the hole on the bottom to allow the ladder line to pass easily into it.   Slots in Electrical Box Next, I passed the window line through the slots to make sure it fit.   Window Line in box After that, I mounted the box to the side of the house with some 1-1/2″ screws to the trim.  The window line was fitted with ring terminals and attached to the two banana jacks on the inside.   Connections Finally, a snap ring was attached to a loop of rope to serve as a strain relief.  This is easily snapped to the eye ring at the bottom of the box.  It works pretty well.  ...

  Doublet Maintenance at the Ranch Filed in Antennas on Feb.07, 2011 John, his son Dan and I met up at the Ranch in late December as they were passing through on the way to California.  When we arrived on Friday afternoon, it was apparent that the 135′ doublet antenna had broken away from the mast on the west end.  We had used some Blue and White rope from the insulator at the end of the antenna to the mast.  That rope lasted about 1-1/2 years in the elements of Northern Arizona.  We decided to fix it on Saturday. First, we lowered the mast on the east end by pulling the pin at the bottom, and tilting it over.  While it was down, we used some clothes line that I had left over from another project to reconnect the antenna to the mast.  We also cut the guy ropes in the middle, where they had been sliding back & forth through an eyelet at the top of the mast.  To prevent fraying, we tied each guy rope separately to the mast eyelet....

  First Mobile VHF Rig Filed in Station on Dec.10, 2010 In July of 1981, Mom gave me a nice birthday gift. A Kenwood TR-7800 2-meter mobile rig.  It had 25 watts out, and a synthesizer to eliminate the need for crystals.  There was no tone board installed, but you really didn’t need one in the midwest back then, as few of the repeaters had tone access. It was nice to have the touchtone pad on the front.  It allowed for direct frequency entry and for using the telephone autopatch that was installed on some of the repeaters.  That’s what we used before everyone had cellphones.  I remember dialing up a number, and having to tell the people on the other end right away that we were on the radio, so they would not say something inappropriate over the air. I still have the rig.  It is mounted in my Nissan Frontier behind the seat, and is used as an APRS transmitter when I remember to turn it on.   TR-7800 when new   Migrated Comments...

  Ham Shack 1985 Filed in Station on Dec.08, 2010 In 1985, we lived in Garden City, Kansas. I was scanning in some old negatives today, and came across these.  Nice looking shack back then…   Hamshack 1985 I was a member of Navy/Marine Corps MARS back then (NNN0AFM). The equipment was: Top Shelf: TH-21 2 Meter HT, Antenna Switch, Navy OS-8C Monitor Scope (For RTTY Tuning) Middle Shelf: MFJ-949 Antenna Tuner, Homebrew Audio Switchbox, IRL-FSK500 RTTY MODEM Bottom Shelf: Astron RS-20A Power Supply, Yaesu SP-107 Speaker, Kenwood TS-430 Behind me is a TRS-80 Model 4, with single 5-1/4″ floppy (360K) and built in Green Screen 80×50 character monitor.  This was a big upgrade from the TRS-80 Color Computer that used a cassette recorder to store data. Shack w/o me blocking view

  43′ Vertical Matching Network Debugging – con’t Filed in Antennas on Nov.02, 2010 I got the matching network back on the bench tonight.  I started by confirming that the Unun leads are as I expected. I hooked a 220 ohm resistor across what I thought was the high impedance side, and connected the Rx Noise Bridge across the low impedance side.  I read very close to 50 ohms with zero reactance on the low impedance side.  So the Unun is working correctly. Next, I wired the Unun back into the matching network.  Again, hooking the 220 ohm resistor across the output, I measured the input: Nearly ZERO ohms!  (This was with the relays de-energized, so the coils were out of the circuit. So I suspected either the caps between the input and the Unun, or the choke for the relay power.  I disconnected both, and temporarily hooked up only the caps on the input to the Unun.  Aha! back to very close to 50 ohms through the caps to the low side of th...