Related hobbies?

[Rastus]

How is that 5BRV doing?  What did you use for ground radials? 

My 80 Meter loop is down at one corner for now.  I need to fix that and the Force 12 yagi together which isn't up yet.  I gotta lot to do...including putting up the 4BTV or 5BTV I have never put together. 

Museum Ships Weekend is just two months away.

[alfsauve]

Considering it's mounted 16' off the ground with no radials it's doing quite well.   I seem to have a null toward the NW and have trouble getting into Italy and surrounding areas.  I've reached a point where I'm not making as many new, towards awards, contacts but hanging in there.  Got a 10m state and a new country today.    I'm scheming how to add radials.   I might try to splay a set around the  2 sides (180d) just laying on the roof, but we'll see.    I may recheck and tweak the tuning since it's been up for a while now.


I need AK and HI on 40m and 20m, and 7 nearby states on 15m. 

[Rastus]

All voice contacts on sideband?  How much power are you running?

[alfsauve]

Only working FT-8 @ 50W for the time being.

ive tried a foray into voice, but didn't feel motivated to actually talk w/ people.  I may try again with ships and field day to do Ssb

[Rastus]

Museum Ships Weekend begins Friday!!!  I started using dxsummit.fi for locating active stations a couple of years ago.  It has a search function that allows you to put in a callsign that then goes over to the filters section.  The good thing about that is you can 1) input all of the callsigns you are looking for and only those will pop up when someone reports them and 2) you can delete them individually from the filter list as you make a contact...which is really helpful.  Another good thing is that you can set up the individual callsign filter and it becomes a part of the website address which you can bookmark.

So...there you go guys.  Here's the bookmark with all current ships for MSWE 2022 down below.


http://www.dxsummit.fi/#/?dx_calls=K1USN,NB6GC,WA4USN,W5LEX,NI6IW,WW2CV,N0P,NJ2BB,K4DSR,NE1PL,N4WIS,KH6BB,NI4BK,NI6BB,WW2OK,K8E,DL0MFM,NE6JP,NR4DL,W4NNK,KN4RAM,WA3BAT,WW2IND,N1SLM,N7C,W2PE,NT4HI,W5KID,NS7DD,WW2DD,K2EAG,DL0MFX,N5FKP,WW2DEM,W1E,R1LK,W8AGB,K6JOB,DL0CUX,W2AQ,DL0BRF,7S0SFJ,ON9BD,NM8GS,N8LST,WW2LST,W1WCC,W5MSQ,K0FPO,N6MSO,DL0MFN,K3SAV,OEX6XMF,W6RO,PI4HAL,VK4GLA,WD4PBR,OE6XMF,N5E,W2C,K5RMD,NJ4DU,W8COD,N1S,NB9QV,DL0DMB,EH5SUB,NJ6VT,IINS,TMWFLO,N8SUM,WW2MAN,VAWGNQ,N5R,KH6SP,WW2SUB,N7P,NS6OI,DM3G,RU3AWK,N4HLH,K5ZRO,W5STR,K2VTT,W4AVM,K6YVM,IY4ELE

[Sponsor]

[alfsauve]

I'll give this a try.   Still stuck on Ft8 for the time being, motavational-wise.

[alfsauve]

Couldn't hear any of them on 20m or 40m and got tired of trying to chase the DXSummit postings, so I just camped on on 20m FT8 and started calling CQ MSW.  The Lexington, W5LEX eventually answered.  Also have several QSOs from those who don't know what MSW was. 

[Rastus]

I was sidelined much of the event.  I managed to get 23 contacts though.  One each on 15 meters and 40 meters.  The remainder on 20 meters. 

20 went "dead" for a while which is when I got most of my contacts.  I swapped between a 6 meter dipole (useless on HF), the 20 meter vertical loop and the 80 meter vertical loop antennas.  The 80 meter loop pulled out signal and put me through most of the pileups with 90-95 watts on USB.  The more wire the merrier....

[Rastus]

I really need to see the 20 meter vertical loop to you.  Using insulated wire and a fishing pole you can snake it through a tree and voila'...you're done.  With a tuner you can work multiple bands easily.  Now...this is with the 440 or 450 ladder line feed in parallel to the ground at the middle of the side between highest and lowest points.  That feed gives you vertical polarization AND the antenna works great just 3' off the ground....which way outperformed the dipoles I had up30-40'. 

About 74' of wire fed by ladder line EXCEPT you're going to need a tuner (or baluns) to work 10, 12, 15 and 40.  I have an ATAK 4 tuner good for 2,500 watts....which easily tuned in 40 meters and 80 meters....all on that 20M vertical loop.