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Jay, thanks very
much for this!
The night before one wire had fallen off
the topload again, and so I decided to refurbish the antenna yesterday.
The PE insulation of the wire ("NVA-Litze", originally for
battlefield telephones) had become worn and brittle over the years,
and the parts where it had come off near the ends were prone to
partial discharges. I replaced the whole topload (42 m total) with fresh
wire, using the original double wire instead of single ones. At the top
half of each leg, the two wires were split and spaced by 25 cm to increase
capacitance a bit. Driving it with about 400W, I was then able to
reach 1.0 W ERP for the first time, with no visible corona at 4.6A /
20kV. During the night, WSPR-15 was then sent with 4.3A (0.9W ERP) and 25%
duty. At the end of a 15 minute transmission, the temperature at the
inside of the litzwire loading coil had gone up to 80°C, so I seem to be limited
by current rather than voltage now. Anyway it looks like the 2 dB ERP increase
has indeed helped ;-)
Unfortunately the mast, which cannot be guyed from
the east from our plot, now heavily bends under the increased weight and wind
load. Today I have attempted to install a temporary auxiliary pole which
apparently helps to stabilize the mast:
This adventurous construction seems to do the
job but will not last - it surely won't pass neighbours' visual acceptance
criteria, and I will anyway have to close the roof window as soon as it starts
to rain ;-)
BTW Jay, on WSPRnet there were spots from
both WD2XNS and W1VD - are you using two different receivers in
parallel?
Best 73,
Markus (DF6NM)
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Saturday, March 30, 2013 12:23 PM
Subject: LF: DF6NM DK7FC in CT
Markus
Glad to see Markus
make it across the pond last night ... despite less than favorable DST.
2013-03-30 05:30 DK7FC 0.137610 -30 0
JN49ik 1 W1VD FN31ls 6099
2013-03-30 05:00
DK7FC 0.137610 -33 0 JN49ik 1 W1VD
FN31ls 6099
2013-03-30 04:30 DK7FC 0.137610 -32
0 JN49ik 1 W1VD FN31ls 6099
2013-03-30
04:00 DK7FC 0.137610 -30 0 JN49ik 1
W1VD FN31ls 6099
2013-03-30 03:30 DK7FC
0.137610 -31 0 JN49ik 1 W1VD FN31ls
6099
2013-03-30 03:00 DK7FC 0.137610 -26 0
JN49ik 1 W1VD FN31ls 6099
2013-03-30 02:30
DK7FC 0.137610 -34 0 JN49ik 1 W1VD
FN31ls 6099
2013-03-30 02:00 DK7FC 0.137610 -26
0 JN49ik 1 W1VD FN31ls 6099
2013-03-30
02:00 DF6NM 0.137616 -38 0 JN59nj 0.5
W1VD FN31ls 6258
2013-03-30 01:30 DK7FC
0.137610 -28 0 JN49ik 1 W1VD FN31ls
6099
Jay W1VD WD2XNS WE2XGR/2
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