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Comment by JED on November 17, 2009 at 12:23am

Interesting design. I saved the page for future reference, and also put the link in my favorites.

The power supply I am waiting for is the 45 Amp MFJ we talked about. I'd rather have too much power than not enough. MFJ does make a more powerful supply, but this will do for the foreseeable future.

Now all I need to do is get an MC60A for my Kenwood, and get my antenna up!

Comment by Minuteman on November 16, 2009 at 10:34pm

Congrats on the supply. One more piece of the puzzle down and closer to the QSO's. Is it the MFJ we were speaking of?

The hike went well yesterday. It turned to good weather in the afternoon after hiking up above the cloud cover. Loads of people out trying to grab the last of the otherwise soggy weekend. Several came over and took interest in the tiny pocketsized rig. A young cub scout said he's talked on his dads 817.

It took an hour or so for me to figure it out with the manual, atleast the scenery was nice for it. It has an exceptional receiver but i made no contacts. It is a bone stock unit and would benefit from an SSB Filter, Speech Compressor and aftermarket DSP.....those are fairly big buck upgrades in total. Battery life was suficient for a 3 hour run with some to spare. Mostly listening but transmitting moderately as well trying for some QSO's. I also have the extended run 2900Mah pack but didn't need it.

Here's where I think it needs improvement:

The W4RT Collins SSB filter
The BHI DSP
The OBP compressor
Annnnd yessss a better QRP antenna than the TW2010.....

I do believe the TW2010 is at ~60% Radiation efficiency on 20 meters. So doing the math...4W (internal battery packed 817 on high) times .6 (60% eff) = 2.5 W out....now that's true QRP lol! Made me want to hike down to the truck and yank the IC-7000 and car battery out, then hike back up but I resisted for obvious reasons. I went from driving to the mountain chatting with Italy at S5/8 to no one could here me after the 30 minute hike up the hill....grrrr lol

I need a good QRP antenna that utilizes no power robbing tuning circuit, is small and compact, is light and quickly deployable for a better result. Am considering building this one:

http://www.qsl.net/ka1ddb/20meterhalfsquare.html

I don't want to spend too much as it's not my rig....yet.

The 817.....very small....very light..... full tx coverage rig that needs some TLC and about 400 dollars to be an excellent SSB QRP rig.

Comment by JED on November 16, 2009 at 11:41am

Minuteman, I wish you luck with your QRP experiment. I just got the ARRL book on QRP and think it should be interesting. Less power required, lower tech, should be a real good alternative for SHTF situations.

My power supply is on the way so my 2 meter base will be up and running, and now I can concentrate on getting the HF antenna up so I can at least monitor on HF. When I find a good mic to work with the Kenwood HF rig I'll be able to use a small piece of the 10 meter band, till I get my General.

Let me know how your QRP works out.

KE5ZTA

Comment by Minuteman on November 15, 2009 at 12:30am

I got a little story to tell. It speaks volumes about our society today, atleast where I live in the land of Barney Frank, Kerry and Kennedy. Some people just take the cake and I fear the consequences from them and their total domestication...

Last winter we had a large ice storm up here. Entire neighborhoods, districts, towns and cities were crippled for up to 10 days without power. Tree drops in the roads making them unpassable for days. Elderly and weak in jeopardy. Emergency services crippled. It seemed as though residents were concerned with their own properties and the roads were for others to clear out namely the municipalities. Hills unpassable because of the slick ice formation on them. People calling the town barns demanding something be done while they waited for help....instead of doing it themselves. What a sorry testament to our area it was I feel.

I own and operate a residential service business. I hooked up an inverter to our second car to run the rice stoker and a couple lights. I was called out at 5:30 am on day one to start going to houses and get people out of their homes. I chained-up the tires and hit the road non-stop for 32 hours, slept for 4 and back out after for another 19 hours. Never got stuck but got turned around several times with the E250.

Here's what takes the cake:

A week or so after the storm when talking with people I heard dozens of times about how much food they lost. A hundred here, 2 hundred there, others running out to buy ice only to find none available for sale. I also heard how creative they were with regards to heating rooms in their homes with propane space heaters, BBQ grills (don't try this one at home kiddies heh) and such.

But when I asked them why they didn't simply place the food outside in a box I got the deer in the headlights look....a bell went off....It's cold outside....rrriiight???? doh!.....lol. It was most enlightening to say the least. This mentality can only come from a combined overdose of "Friends", "NipTuck", "South Park" (all good enough shows in moderation heh heh heh) and the gimme gimme boy entitlement attitude of our most wonderful "Commonwealth" citizenry.

So the generator is a must have from now on. The car worked but idling there it used a lot of fuel. I'm gonna buy the 13HP Harbor Freight one for $599 and stock 50 gallons of fuel. This should keep us comfortably OK for a few days anyway. The generator has 12v out too so the boat battery will be setting there charging as well...it'll also be used to start the thing.

Jonesey 300 gallons is sure an expense I'd like to forego. You are ready now and that's what counts the most. I think I'd be against fire regs storing even 50 gallons without a permit here. I won't be sharing that knowledge with any locals that's for sure. Those Hondas are real expensive but are top of the line and quiet so I'm told. Some of them are suitcase sized and are respectable output wise. I'd like a Honda but they are really up there....thousands for 5Kw. I hope this cheap one holds up OK. Hopefully it won't get much use.

There a lots of stations using Antrons here, as well as Shakespeare Big Sticks and Radio Shack CB base antennas modified for 10 meters. Radio Shack has just discontinued their 11 meter base antennas and sold out quickly here. They liquidated them at $9.99 and the 10 foot steel masts for $9.99. I got 3 of the masts but missed out on the antennas. Such is life.

I have a Woodchuck wood central heat system in the basement all piped in. I used it for 2 years then quit. It still needs power for the air intake fan and the circulating blower. I had a chimney fire on year 2 and the YL said no more wood. It smoked like a mother and I could smokescreen the streets around here in 10 minutes if I tried. Not efficient at all but made for excellent satillite cover on a still day heh.... For $50 it works well enough if needed though. It'll burn anything.

Jed, I am in a real bad location for the horizontal wire approach. I'd bet you will have better luck. I live on a corner lot at the bottom of a hill, with 3 sides being street frontage. On all 3 sides there are power, cable and phone lines. They are all running about 10' lower than my horizontal dipole. I think my main problem is the polarization of the G5RV being near enough to the horizontal power lines. This I believe is why the TW2010 vertical has a much lower noise floor. If I had to choose the vertical it would be only because of the noise performance. I know the G5RV is truely the better antenna of the two. It all comes down to placement at hand here I feel..... You will like it alot I'm sure and I'll be the first to still recommend it.

I am ready for comms here across the spectrum and modes.

I've been loaned an FT-817ND QRP rig to play with. Thing is real neat and small. We'll see what 5 Watts portable can do! It ought to be a hoot. I'm gonna pack it up Mount Wachusett tomorrow and try some DX'n. The Tropical storm should be gone by then. The TW2010, a tent, a Thermos and the 817 fully charged.

On the EMP thing, there are weapons being developed to focus and administer it close range style. Supposedly drive up, thump and bump type weapon. Using airspace as the delivery medium. That's freakin' incredible..... Right now there is also in existence a tool being tested by some law enforcement agencies that are a front bumper mounted (on cruiser) remote control vehicle that is released in pursuit. It is launched from the cruiser in motion and controlled by the passenger side officer. It zooms underneath the perps vehicle and pops off...stalling the car irreverseably.

Maybe the bad guys could use a 3KW kicker to throw the remote control signal off?...lol

The weapons of tomorrow are being tested today. Let's hope the good guys get 'em....

Later...KB1TDQ

Comment by JED on November 14, 2009 at 10:18pm

Minuteman, when the G5RV goes up it will go up as an inverted V which should give better takeoff angle. Otherwise it's too big for this lot anyway. I hadn't thought about it being too sensitive but will have to experiment to see if changing the configuration will alleviate that. I should have my 2 meter rig running soon and perhaps we can try and contact on simplex. Would be an interesting experiment.

Your generator could remain operable in an EMP attack if it had a magneto ignition system. Remember, one suborbital nuke exploded over the center of the CONUS would effectively disable the entire country. No physical damage to infrastructure aside from the death of any unprotected solid state electronics, and no fallout to worry about either.

I've got one radio in storage right now, just 2 meter, and hope to find a suitable HF rig for storage as well. I think the flexible solar panels will work well, and my voltmeter is analog so might still be useful.

I'll let y'all know when the 2 meter is running and we can see what's possible from there. I'll be pushing 65 watts.

Comment by David A Jones on November 14, 2009 at 12:23pm

Just my nickel's worth here.

Although EMP is something to be taken into consideration, if and when the nukes have started flying, there will be more pressing things at hand than the electric starter on a generator.

I think your idea of getting a 6500 gennie is great. As you have seen with the past...recently past...ice storms, there are things that can jump up to bite us in the butt when we least expect it, and from strange directions.

I have a 4000W Kohler in an old motorhome, but have not run it in a while. The MH is pretty much junk. I should pull the gennie out and get it mounted somewhere to use if the need arises. I have a small 500 watt Honda for some small things. The only item I am concerned about in a long-term outage is my freezer. The refrigerator can be emptied and used over the 1-3 day period of total cool down. My water system is a 12 volt system, and heater is propane non-dependent on electricity. And of course the good old wood stove.

I've often thought about getting some sort of protection from EMP for a couple of stored radios, but as with all things in life, time moves on and other things take priority.

My roof climbing friend went to Georgia while his daughter has a baby. When he gets back, I am hoping to get the 13 el 2 meter beam up. And maybe try to get the Solarcon A99 up another 15-20 feet. I have read good reviews on the A99 for 10 meter use.

Getting a net going among our group would be a nice thing, I think. I have some radio buddies around here, but they are main streamers, and would look at me cross-eyed if I brought up some of the subjects discussed here.

Enough of my long wind. Good luck with the gennie. Are you in a location where you can store more than 10-20 gallons. Fortunately, I am rural...very rural...and have a 300 gal. tank. That was a treat getting that thing filled last month, let me tell ya'.

KC0OUF

Comment by Minuteman on November 14, 2009 at 9:31am

Jed, when you get it up there we will talk.

I had my first action on 10 meters 2 nights ago while A/B comparing the TW2010 and G5RV Jr. on the Pro III base. The TW2010 made a weak copy and the G5RV Jr. could not copy at all because of noise it attracts. No amount of filtering, NR or attenuation made the G5RV Jr. work there on that contact. I knew the TW2010 was lower in noise but didn't think it would outperform the G5RV Jr....ever. Just goes to show me that sometimes the more sensitive antenna can be a hinderance. Figured I'd share that is all.. I don't feel the TW2010 is 300 dollars better though.

Yes the generator would be suceptable to EMP. I think the ignition system in the engine would certainly be toasted if electronic. I'd loose the radio in that event as well many other devices. Solar is the best solution in the ready mode with a transceiver protected from EMP standing by to be pressed into service. Makes me feel that the most expensive flexible panels are truely the best choice for this. Although pricey and small there would be less chance of "boiling the batteries", out like Jonesey said, without a charge controller. Just manual mode monitored with a voltmeter......non-digital of course.

It really takes both solar and a generator here to allow for all possible combinations of disaster. Generator first to protect us from mother nature this winter and solar to protect us from "man made disasters" as the new administration likes to call it instead of "acts of terrorism"....lol.

KB1TDQ...QRT

Comment by JED on November 13, 2009 at 2:21pm

Minuteman, congrats on your contacts. Still waiting for my power supply, and of course need to get the G5RV put up, will be an inverted V to get better take off angle, plus it won't fit our lot otherwise. Regarding the generator, hope you can find one without modern electronics to control it, otherwise you'll still be SOL after an EMP event.

Comment by Minuteman on November 11, 2009 at 9:12pm

Jonesey good luck with the search. Atleast the 6 meter beam antenna can be manageable size wise. Here's what I'm using for all the 6/2/70 stuff. It's 28' off ground. It is a fine performer although it is a dated design.

http://www.universal-radio.com/catalog/hamants/1333.html

Jed, I'm sure the G5RV will work out ok well enough for you on 10 meters. The General will help out with the coverage issue, there is always action somewhere down low in the bands no matter the conditions. I need to improve my 40 80 and 160 antennas....

Croatia and Italy today on 20m with the G5RV Jr. Good folk in Amateur Radio....

Decided to abort the solar idea in leiu of a 6500W generator. Portable solar can wait till spring.

KB1TDQ

Comment by JED on November 11, 2009 at 12:46pm

I have a G5RV that I want to set up in an inverted V and hoping I can use it on 6 and 10 meters without losing too much gain. Just got the ARRL book on low power but haven't started reading it yet. I have enough to do to find time to study for the General test. Hoping to have that ticket some time this winter.

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