Almost no wind...

The major problem with a kite antenna... no wind no antenna.

It got to about 10 feet AGL (no antenna connected) but came down again.

Still it looked good and the angle was steep.

Need a constant wind.

Wil go to beach tomorrow with 'normal' antenna too.

Expect to be qrv 15m, 20m and maybe other bands if the antenna goes up.

unun for the kite

Made up a unun for the kite.

I am afraid not terribly scientific just a current balun. I just grabbed two colours of 18swg enameled wire (the enamel comes off under extreme heat) and a T200-2 and bifilar wound about 23 turns on it. I known that the more turns then 40m and below 'likes it'. I wrapped the T200-2 with electrical tape first.

There are loads of circuits on the web for an unun so I'll not repeat it here.

RG58 was used and I had to fiddle a bit to get it to fit, without prodding it about. I used some random terminals.

The RF ground side is bonded to the tin in several locations.

I'll have a separate antenna wire to ground lead, croc clip with some megohm resistors in as a static bleed.

The tin is a Swiss lozenge tin from 2007, yum finished thee sweets first then washed out the tine with acetone. I like these they are same size as an altoid but twice the depth so a T200-2 will fit. The card on the base is from Starbucks one of the olympic 2012 cards they had at the time I pick up a few every time I visit as they are useful for all sorts of insulation tasks and they fit the bottom of the tin.

As I expect will get a bit of use/abuse I have hot melt glued stuff together.

The matches an unbalanced antenna to an unbalanced feed no transformations.

Kite

It has arrived, it has arrived.... try to imagine jumping about all excited. Who said grown ups cannot act like a kid from time to time...

I have been messing about with flying antennas on the beach from a  kite for a bit with mixed success and though it was time to get something a bit better and bought one of these. It has a 6 foot span and seems to be a decent single line kite.

I have also taken advise and bought some Superbraid electric fence braid (keeps sheep in the field type) which is 6 x 0.2mm tinned copper conductors within  a monofil polyethylene rope. So it is strong AND it doubles up as the kite antenna. Must remember leather gloves though.

Easter w/e so I am sure I'll get up to The Goggs close to where I live or maybe the beach near Kings lynn and have a play.

I might even take the KX3 along.

Going to solder a series of 1Mohm resistors across a piece of PCB in a small box with some terminals to act as the earth leak circuit between the antenna wire and ground BEFORE it goes near the KX3 to provide a static discharge.


Where did I get it...

http://www.kites4you.co.uk/contents/en-uk/d45.html

Old valve bases

I recently asked on GQRP if anyone had some old (1920/1930) 4pin or 5 pin valve bases.... I was asked why...

http://members.shaw.ca/ve7sl/tnt.html

I am building a 1929 replica TNT TX but will be shunt fed for safety so will not have 500V on the coils so not quite 1920 style :-)

The tubes are early triodes type 10, 27 or 45 the 1st and last are 4 pin the 27 is 5 pin. The full numbers should be UX-210, UY-227, UX-245 the sockets I think were known later as UX4, UX5... the 'correct ones' I need (saw them at Dayton 2008 in flea market for 25 cents and  I could kick myself now for not buying them) are about 1 1/2" square base with a black central cylinder that the valve plugs into.

Finding a tube let along a working one from 1920's is hard enough, and I have someone from US that has found some of each for me... old globe style not shoulder ST so it should have the vintage feel :-) I have some '27 arriving soon.

I have the sprague lozenge capacitors, 1/4" copper tube, resistors (fabricated something) and the variable capacitors (I think they might be WWII  vintage so a bit new but they are the right sort hihi)... but cannot seem to locate the valve bases or a couple of beehive insulators for the coils so I will fabricate some from a block of PTFE and paint brown until I can find originals.

I even have some vintage 1920's style QSL cards using the same orange/red, card stock.

 

Even though I have a modern call they 'look' like from an old experimental station. Power should be c2W so perfect for qrp and perhaps GQRP winter sports or one of Colin's G3VTT valve days.


The power supply will be a simply transformer with another type 27 valve used in it.

Makes a change from all the silicon stuff in the shack and workshop.

Telepocket 600 6m poles

I was sent an email that asked for some more details on these ...

I showed a pair of these at Rishworth 2012 as I use them /P and on trips. The interesting bit is that they are only 580g and collapse to 0.58m so they fit in normal airplane carry on luggage (OK you have to put them diagonally in your bag but so what! I fit them into the Aluminum case I use for my /P radio kit on trips)

http://www.decathlon.co.uk/telepocket-s-600-id_8044451.html

They seem to have gone up a bit since I bought mine at £9.99 each now at £12.99.

The manufacturer website is http://www.caperlan-fishing.com/EN/telepocket-s-600-54683455/

They are great for 20m-10m verticals and can be used and this starts to become a compromise antenna from 30m, 40m and on down to 80m with base loading  and can take a dipole or long wire (I use a W3EDP with mine) if the wires are not heavy the top sections will bend a lot otherwise!

Check out http://www.nonstopsystems.com/radio/frank_radio_antenna_80m_vertical.htm whose webpage put me onto using for 80m intially. My base loading is a lot less elegant and is usually using whatever plastic drinks bottle I can find and a KD1JV Deluxe Antenna Tuner http://www.qrpkits.com/deluxetennadipper.html and a couple of tap points to get the vertical approximately resonant.

You will need a tuner (AMU) to operate and a couple of radials. I use a couple that are made from two sections of about 11m flat ribbon cable which have the wire left in situ but cut out for 10cm or so for resonance at the CW end of 40, 30, 20, 17, 15 and 10m). The ribbon cables are 8 wire I have the outer two resonant at 14.275 and 21.275 (The later was using to good effect in 6W on AF-045).

If you can it is better to have the radials RAISED at the feed point and the ends tapering to ground. Not 100% sure of ther theory but experience says this does make a difference. The RX signals and reports tend to be better in the direction of the radials. I often do not put them out 180 degrees apart and the antenna is more of an L with two legs if that makes sense.

The two radials could (but I have never used them for this) be used as dipoles.

I was asked how I secured them... well I have become a fan of some plastic ground screws but I have also found that you can use patio table parasol bases. Beaches often have these somewhere.

RSGB BERU Antenna farm :-)

I will only be having a go today so not even a 12 hour entry and qrp with kx3 but I have put up a few antennas.
The two vertical dipoles from KH8 on 15m and 20m along with my qth vertical 10-80m and thee 140ft long wire that will tune most bands.

The antennas all come into the shack though the window with coax balun on the two dipoles.

The 140ft long wire comes down over the 4" pipe off cut into the window.

Not huge number of contacts 15 (11 on 15m, 4 on 20m) in first 2 hours all uniques 2 HQ stations and 11 DXCC. I have heard some VU, VK and ZF2XF but have not worked them yet.

On hour lunch break :-)

Given up on RSGB BERU... sat in queue waiting to work VY2SS for 30 minutes no fun!

poles I brought back from KH8 that were busted

This is just the base sections.