24-07-2024, 01:28 PM
(This post was last modified: 24-07-2024, 01:34 PM by Mike Watterson.)
The RSGB is useful to exchange QSL cards. Radcom used to be very good (not had it for years, but kept all the back issues), which is why I joined for a year, but it's expensive outside the UK.
The FT-480 is quite old, but almost no vehicle / portable 2m only rigs now do SSB. DX VHF (which can be remarkable in a high pressure) often is SSB. Repeaters are usually FM, but some newer ones do any mode (inc digital).
A great find if the price was right and far better than any of the 2m only rigs I had. You can make a yagi for 2m SSB (usually horizontal). A watson 300 or similar ready to go vertical is best for FM repeaters, though in theory a 1/4 wave wire vertical in the attic can be easy to make and work well. The wire lengths will be about 90% of 1/4 wave at 145 MHz.
Essex area sounds good for Amateur activity. I've got as far as Belfast, Devon and Nottingham with 20W SSB on 2m on a horizontal 10 element Yagi from my QTH 9 km west of Limerick city centre. A small amp on the FT817ND, but in the attic near aerial on gable so as to not lose power in the long feed cable.
Aerial array nearly 20 years ago now gone due to failure of TV aerial rotater.
Originally only the vertical 10 element was on the pole, and horizontal. The 3rd aerial is 70cm.
You can just see the top of the Watson 300 on a pole on garden wall. It's dead now. Investigation revealed the internal ceramic cap had fractured. I've used the housing to make a 4m band whip, which with the FC40 remote "ATU" works on 14 MHz to 50 MHz for TX. I fitted a remote relay on the FC-40 o/p to select whip or long wire manually.
View from house some years ago
The council chopped down a lot of the trees on the edge of the field citing safety. We are just at the edge of the village and that view is across Limerick toward Tipperary, where those hills/mountains are. Keepers Hill is just behind. On a clear day you can see the edge of the Galties to the South East, and the Shannon makes a gap to the North East. Poor VHF to West as the ground and houses rise just behind.
I have plans to put up a S/H rebuilt bigger X yagi intended for circular polarisation only, but with two feeds so a box stuffed with 50 and 75 Ohm lengths and a six way switch can do | — \ and / as well as LH and RH circular.
Vertical or horizontal can switch polarisation on a very long path or a reflection. The | or — can become closer to \ or / on a long tropospheric path.
I'm not as young as I was so waiting for an assistant! I have also a stronger refurbished rotater.
The FT-480 is quite old, but almost no vehicle / portable 2m only rigs now do SSB. DX VHF (which can be remarkable in a high pressure) often is SSB. Repeaters are usually FM, but some newer ones do any mode (inc digital).
A great find if the price was right and far better than any of the 2m only rigs I had. You can make a yagi for 2m SSB (usually horizontal). A watson 300 or similar ready to go vertical is best for FM repeaters, though in theory a 1/4 wave wire vertical in the attic can be easy to make and work well. The wire lengths will be about 90% of 1/4 wave at 145 MHz.
Essex area sounds good for Amateur activity. I've got as far as Belfast, Devon and Nottingham with 20W SSB on 2m on a horizontal 10 element Yagi from my QTH 9 km west of Limerick city centre. A small amp on the FT817ND, but in the attic near aerial on gable so as to not lose power in the long feed cable.
Aerial array nearly 20 years ago now gone due to failure of TV aerial rotater.
Originally only the vertical 10 element was on the pole, and horizontal. The 3rd aerial is 70cm.
You can just see the top of the Watson 300 on a pole on garden wall. It's dead now. Investigation revealed the internal ceramic cap had fractured. I've used the housing to make a 4m band whip, which with the FC40 remote "ATU" works on 14 MHz to 50 MHz for TX. I fitted a remote relay on the FC-40 o/p to select whip or long wire manually.
View from house some years ago
The council chopped down a lot of the trees on the edge of the field citing safety. We are just at the edge of the village and that view is across Limerick toward Tipperary, where those hills/mountains are. Keepers Hill is just behind. On a clear day you can see the edge of the Galties to the South East, and the Shannon makes a gap to the North East. Poor VHF to West as the ground and houses rise just behind.
I have plans to put up a S/H rebuilt bigger X yagi intended for circular polarisation only, but with two feeds so a box stuffed with 50 and 75 Ohm lengths and a six way switch can do | — \ and / as well as LH and RH circular.
Vertical or horizontal can switch polarisation on a very long path or a reflection. The | or — can become closer to \ or / on a long tropospheric path.
I'm not as young as I was so waiting for an assistant! I have also a stronger refurbished rotater.
