Colin, LF,
Thanks for the QSO. Sorry about the ropey
CW...I had the key balanced on my knee. Your signals were peaking 579, and quite
a bit stronger than this afternoon. (Screenshot attached, showing your sigs 20
dB above the noise floor)
Your rig seems similar to the "Para Set"
that G3VA likes so much! I'm running 10W from a single FET PA to a 20m long
"Tee" (not 60m as I sent) at 5m, which is resonated with a 20cm dia loading
coil which includes a variometer. The ERP is estimated to be between
25 and 50 mW, and the RX is an ICOM IC-R1000 with a tuned
pre-amp.
CW seems to be the main mode on this band,
and most people seem to be able to work up and down the country with no
problems. I can also run QRSS and DFCW, but these modes are more suited to long
distance DX work, and as Mal G3KEV has observed, these modes don't work too well
on 500 kHz becaue of the relatively rapid and deep QSB.
73 and good luck on the band
Dave G3WCB IO91RM Iver Nr
Slough/Windsor.
'afternoon all,
I had the NoV arrive today and got on the air at 1520z with G3KEV. I've
since worked G3UNT. The statio here is simple, just a 6L6 c/o at 2w and a
two valve 6SK7 regen receiver. Kindly do not laugh, it works well. The
receiver is stunning to say the least.
I have a new three stage transmitter on the stocks and an upconverter
using 'fire fet' technology. The antenna is a 20m dipole at 30 ft with the
feeders strapped and an ex navy variometer. My garden is tiny, only 35ft by 45
ft, although I have an extensive radial system stretching out into the field
and under the new driveway.
Hopefully I will work many of you before too long. I would like to thank
GI3PDN and G3ROO for their encouragement in getting on the band. Hopefully the
operations on '5 ton' will remain as in true amateur radio form with homebrew,
low power, self training and, at last, not a contest in sight. As I was told
by GI3PDN -'there are no pot hunters around'.
73
Colin G3VTT
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