I'll be on for a little more than half an hour. Other than sporadic E, the
F2 layer skip has been rather long, as far as I can tell. I worked someone
in Louisiana on six meters this morning, using my 80 dipole, but this
sporadic-E opening didn't last very long. See you all tomorrow.
73,
Lloyd Rasmussen, W3IUU, Kensington, Maryland
Home: http://lras.home.sprynet.com
Work: http://www.loc.gov/nls
> -----Original Message-----
> From: For blind ham radio operators [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
> On Behalf Of Junior Lolley
> Sent: Saturday, December 18, 2010 9:00 PM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: So, I'll do anything to get on 160 meters: Check this out
>
> I hope to get on the net tomorrow.
> I had my nephew come in today and we checked out the radio.
> To my surprise I found out the radio somehow was on 20 watts instead of
> 100
> watts.
> All this time I thought I was running high power.
> I still have no idea how the radio's power got turned down.
> Hope to talk to you on the net.
> I kind of thought at first my antennas were giving me trouble.
> But it wasn't that.
>
>
> Junior Lolley KG4itd
> Liberty County E. C.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: For blind ham radio operators [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
> On Behalf Of tom behler
> Sent: Saturday, December 18, 2010 6:46 PM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: So, I'll do anything to get on 160 meters: Check this out
>
> Well, Gary, some of this continues to be a mystery, but that is what
> makes it all a bit intriguing.
>
> My help came today, and after some systematic SWR checks, we decided to
> leave well enough alone for the time being, and test things out in more
> detail.
>
> Actually, I now have two antennas up--the DXCC which is good from 40
> through
>
> 10 meters, and the Carolina Windom 160 compact, which is good on 80
> through
> 10 meters, and, with my 100-foot coax fix, now works on 160.
>
> In about 15 minutes here, I'm going to jump on a mid-west net on 160
> meters,
>
> and see what kind of signal reports I can get.
>
> The antenna tunes on 160 with the Tentec tuner, and my help says the rig
> doesn't seem to fold back, since it likes the 1.1 to 1 SWR, but we'll see
> how the thing actually performs shortly.
>
> One thing I can say for sure is that this whole turn of events has been a
> pleasant surprise to me.
>
> Hope to talk to many of you on the blind ops net tomorrow. Maybe I'll do
> a
> comparison between the DXCC and the Windom, to see which works best on 20
> meters.
>
> 73 from Tom Behler: KB8TYJ
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Gary Tillinghast" <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Saturday, December 18, 2010 11:00 AM
> Subject: Re: So, I'll do anything to get on 160 meters: Check this out
>
>
> Hi Tom,
> Your trials with your antenna reminded me of a 6m dipole antenna that we
> had
> here. We checked the match before we put it up in the air. A sighted
> friend had his antenna matcher on it and got the SWR down to 1:1. This
> was
> about 5 ft off the ground. We moved it to the tower for more height. It
> was strung between to cords to prevent grounding out. The height it was
> moved to was about roof height and strung between two points. The SWR
> rose
> up to 4:1 and we hadn't changed anything. The only thing we could figure
> on
> what had changed was the distance from the ground. So the 6m antenna
> stayed
> at the 5ft level and made several contacts to Fla. on it. So I appreciate
> the stories of others it may get us to figure these antennas out. Merry
> Christmas. Gary KB2YAA
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "tom behler" <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Saturday, December 18, 2010 7:58 AM
> Subject: Re: So, I'll do anything to get on 160 meters: Check this out
>
>
> Well, Barb, such are the mysteries, trials, tribulations, and even
> small
> victories at times associated with RF! (smile)
>
> 73 from Tom Behler: KB8TYJ
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Barbara Lombardi" <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Saturday, December 18, 2010 12:08 AM
> Subject: Re: So, I'll do anything to get on 160 meters: Check this out
>
>
> Well my antenna has a higher swr on 40 but for some reason, it works hi
> hi.
> Good luck.
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: For blind ham radio operators [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
> On Behalf Of tom behler
> Sent: Friday, December 17, 2010 9:53 PM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: So, I'll do anything to get on 160 meters: Check this out
>
> Hi, all.
>
> As some of you know, I have been struggling witha Carolina Windom 160
> Compact installation over the past few weeks, with little success,
> especially when it has come to getting on 160 meters.
>
> The lowest SWR I could get on the band was about 8.0 to 1.
>
> Jim Thompson from RadioWorks (the company who makes the antenna), is
> trying
> to help me troubleshoot the situation, and he has some ideas which a ham
> friend and I are going to try tomorrow, weather permitting.
>
> Anyway, one quick suggestion he made to me was to take a coil of about 100
> feet of RG8X coax, and put it between the transmitter and my Tentech 238A
> manual tuner. He said that this length is about a quarter wave on 160
> meters, and might get my sWR down some.
>
> Well, I did this, and it took the SWR down to about 5 to 1 in the center
> of
> the band--around 1.850 MHZ.
>
> The antenna still wouldn't tune with the auto tuner in the TS480, but it
> actually tuned with the Tentech 238 manual tuner.
>
> I realize that all I was doing was reducing the SWR by introducing loss
> into
> the antenna, but I thought I'd try to make a few contacts anyway, just to
> see if it would be possible.
>
> The Canadian RAC contest is going on this week-end, so I made 2 CW
> contacts
> with no trouble at all. Then, for the heck of it, I went to the SSB
> portion
> of 160, and made a contact with an Ontario station using only 100 watts.
> I
> asked for an honest signal report, and he says I was 10 over S9 into
> Ontario.
>
> This surprised the heck out of me, since I know the antenna can't be that
> efficient, but if nothing else, I can now say I've been on 160 meters for
> the first time in my ham career.
>
> Now, if I can get the antenna itself to perform better, without taking
> such
> crazy measures, I'll be in good shape for the NAQP contests in January.
>
> I know that I have reached this milestone in a rather unorthadox way, but
> I
> just felt the need to share it with my fellow list members.
>
> I'll let you know how things go tomorrow when we get back to some real
> antenna tweaking.
>
> 73 from Tom Behler: KB8TYJ, Big Rapids, MI
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