Phil, nice going and maybe we will hook up for C W Q S O.  Good luck.
Ed  K7UC
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Phil Scovell" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, December 09, 2008 9:16 PM
Subject: Close to calling CQ


> Well, I am almost on the air.  Over the nice weather this weekend,
> my son, who builds draperies and blinds, and installs them for a
> living, in other words, he is a crackerjack man when it comes to
> making exact measurements, put my R7 vertical back together.  It
> was over at a friends house but to save several hundreds of
> dollars for a new R8 vertical, I bought my old R7 back from my
> friend who gave up on HF operations.  Plus, I'll be hanging an 80
> meter inverted V from 50 feet and putting up a 40 meter rotatable
> dipole and a 3 element 6 meter beam at 55 feet so the vertical is
> sort of an extra backup antenna.  Anyhow, as I was saying, my son
> followed the measurements and assembly instructions to the letter
> and got it back up on a three foot tripod on the roof that I
> hadn't removed.  Based upon SWR readings I remember from having it
> in the same spot before, everything is about right.  40 Meters is
> generally a little higher for SWR even when you set it for the CW
> band but the auto tuner LDG AT1000pro will have no problem tuning
> all the readings I took down to 1 to one.  It snowed here in
> Denver over the last couple of days, about 6 inches, so when the
> weather warms up, we are going to try and lengthen the vertical a
> little to get, perhaps, a little better, or lower, reading at the
> bottom of 40 meters but as I said, the auto tuner won't have any
> problems tuning it just about any place on the bands as it stands
> now.  I used it in the AM mode to put a 30 watt carrier on the air
> so I could get SWR and power readings because I don't have the
> line made up yet from the MFJ CW keyboard to the Icom 7000 input
> for CW operations.  Plus, if you want to raise and lower your
> power output, you switch into what they refer to as a "Quick Set"
> mode and then by tuning the VFO knob, you can adjust the power
> output to what ever you desire.  This same method, using the VFO
> knob and the Quick Set mode, along with the function keys at the
> bottom of the front panel, is used to adjust microphone gain, vox
> delay, CW delay, and a number of other settings.  The absolute two
> most important pieces of equipment I have ever purchased are the
> TW1 and TW2 W4RT HF and VHF watt meters and the Millennium keypad
> from John Hansen.  Well, I guess that makes three and not two.
> The watt meters work perfectly and for those who aren't familiar
> with them, you only have a volume control knob on the front to
> adjust the voice volume and three quick press buttons to read
> power output, reflected power, and SWR and all with a human
> quality voice.  The only thing I wish would be different about the
> watt meters is that they would have used a naked female voice, at
> least I think she is naked, she sounds like it to me, like the
> Icom and Kenwoods do, haw.  Very cool, to say the least,
> regardless.  So far, I have been spending all my spare time
> learning the radio, which has been no easy task, but once you get
> the basic functionality down, it begins to make sense
> collectively.  I keep notes of entry functions, however, because
> although many settings are the same, at my age it is easy to
> forget.  I'm not suggesting that this is the case when you change
> modes, which is not a difficult thing to do with the radio nor
> with the Millennium keypad, because you can easily, and quickly,
> drop into whatever mode you have dialed up with the buttons by
> pressing and holding the key for a second until you hear a second
> beep, or often it is a double beep.  Nearly all buttons beep which
> helps.  Functions key one or two often are used to move up and
> down in a menu structure.  Function three, for example, when held
> for a double beep, deletes a signal memorized channel you are
> presently sitting on or listening to.  Function key four is used
> for swapping channel frequencies to a VFO, or conversely,
> transferring a VFO frequency into a memory channel.  Function key
> 4 also is used for splitting frequencies in the VFO modes.  In
> short, the function keys are standards, for the most part, for
> each operating mode you may be in.  The speech compressor, if you
> are into using such things, is set just as the microphone gain is,
> and that is, by using the Quick Set mode and tuning the VFO knob.
> Not very helpful in this case for a blind operator.  I have a
> separate receiver, on the other hand, so will be able to hear my
> own output signal when desired.  This same feature, for that
> matter, may be built into the 7000 but I haven't found it
> specifically in the manual as of yet.  I've found and read what I
> think might be a reference to it and I'd be very surprised it that
> feature is not built into the radio, listening, that is, to your
> own output audio phone signal because it is a common feature in
> lots of radios these days.  Selecting semi break in CW or full
> Break in CW is chosen, for example, by entering the Quick Set
> mode and pressing Function key one once or twice.  I should
> purchase the software to see how speech friendly it is but
> frankly, I have run ham rigs with computers before and although it
> is pretty neat, I often grew tired of firing up the software just
> to change bands and the like.  In my case, I'd have to come up
> with a laptop because my ham gear is around the corner and in
> another room from my main computer stations.  On the other hand,
> if that software for the Icom 7000 is speech friendly, I can see
> where it might be a lot easier to make changes and settings
> because you wouldn't have to remember anything in particular.  The
> last software program I had to run the Yaesu FT767G wasn't all
> that speech friendly and was slow.  I have so many wires and
> cables running around on my bookshelves to connect everything to
> the power supplies and equipment, dragging a computer in there,
> and I do have an extra one I could use specifically for ham radio,
> might push me off the deep end.  I hate wires running all over the
> place.  I have discovered over the years, I don't find the need to
> move around the bands as much either.  This includes 2 meters,
> where I work one repeater, and on 430 MHz I have one simplex
> frequency I used to run remote base operations from a small 70 CM
> 100 MW tiny handie talkie back to my Kenwood V7a when I'm on my
> back deck watching my grandchildren, or dogs, which ever the case
> may be at the time.  I sometimes get the two mixed up.  Even then,
> I ain't what you call your most dedicated 2 meter ham any more.  I
> used to work nothing but FM simplex years ago with big beams and
> amplifiers and all and am tempted to go back to it except the
> friends I do keep in touch with are mobile most of the time,
> driving truck and the like, 95 percent of the time and a repeater
> and echo link works great for that type of thing.  In the next day
> or two, I will make my first CW contact on 40, 30, or probably 20
> meters and I'll get to try out the full break in which I'm
> guessing I won't like as well as the Ten Tec way of doing it.  Ten
> Tec spoiled me over the years with their full break in system.  By
> the way, the Icom 7000 is literally the size of a cigar box so if
> you got um, smoke um.  It is one royal pain in the butt trying to
> screw two separate coax leads into the back, external speaker,
> quarter inch code key line, half inch ground braid, and if you
> connected all the other externals in the back, the radio might
> just fall over backwards.  I reached up today to do something with
> the radio, heard a beep, and the radio went dead.  No sound; no
> nothing.  It was on but I couldn't figure out what I did and I
> tried everything for about 30 minutes.  I did a hard reset,
> because I only had a few memory channels set and didn't care, but
> I had forgotten already how to access the sub submenu, no, I
> didn't stutter just then, to set the beep level and voice
> synthesizer level to high volume.  I had to wait till my son came
> home for lunch, he eats with us most days for lunch because his
> kids are here and he brings his kindergartner home who stays the
> afternoon with us, and without the manual, he showed me how to
> make the needed changes for better ease of operation.  By the way,
> it was a good thing this happened because during reset, and my son
> pointing out how to access the menu I needed, I learned a couple
> of new things about where I want things set.  I'd be crying, on
> the other hand, if I had foolishly programmed all 500 memories with
> frequencies and then had to do a hard reset.  Of course I wrote it
> down this time, silly, but it isn't something you do every day,
> unless you are green as apples like me, but this time I wrote down
> all the individual steps because the voice synthesizer volume is
> number 20 on the sub submenu list of 51 items you can choose from.
> Nobody said it would be easy.  If you want easy, I'll give you my
> DX20 and a single 40 meter crystal and we'll find you a sky buddy
> to receive on.  Don't come crying to me, though, if you reach
> behind the radio and touch the wrong spot on the dalkey relay.
>
> Phil.
> K0NX
>