Hi, all.

 

Well, this past week-end, I made much progress on getting my antennas set up
for the new trailer out at our camp site.

 

My new Alpha Delta DXCC HF antenna is up at a height of about 30 feet, and
seems to play fairly well with my TS480 on 10, 15, 20, and 40 meters.  The
SWR's are all within the tuning range for the TS480's auto tuner, which is
encouraging.  I am slightly concerned about the 3 to 1 SWR that I get at the
very bottom of 20 meters, so may try to address that at some point.  It
should be kept in mind, though, that the DXCC is only 82 feet long, and is a
compromise multi-band dipole antenna.  As many of you know, I have one of
these up at the home QTH, and the results I am getting are very similar.

 

I also put up a dual-band antenna for VHF/UHF, which seems to be working
well, with all SWR's below 2 to 1 on both bands.

 

I did notice something with my LDG TW2 watt meter that surprised me, though.
When transmitting on 2 meters with my TMV71A on the high power setting, on
one of our main local 2-meter repeater frequencies, I get a 1.2 to 1 SWR,
with a forward power of 45 watts, and a reflected power of .5 watts.  This
is about what I would expect.  On our local 440 repeater frequency, though,
I discovered something very interesting.  The TW2 gives me  a 1.1 to 1 SWR
reading, but on high power I get a forward power reading of 122 watts, with
a reflected power of .8 watts.

 

Since my SWR on 440 is ok, and since my reflected power is quite low, I
think I'm still ok, but can anyone explain why the TW2 forward power reading
seems so far off?

 

Not trying to borrow trouble here. . Just trying to be sure I'm ok, and am
not missing any issues with my RV setup.

 

Tom Behler: KB8TYJ