Category Archives: Antenna Stuff

Nov 28

New beam

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A month ago during the 2011 CQ Worldwide Phone contest I lost my roof-top hexbeam to wind. Areas around me would not only suffer damage from the wind but also record snowfalls. I got off lucky, altough my hexbeam did not. Also to note, this was a homebrew antenna and not one commercially made. The hex is an excellent design and definately gets the job done, so no complaints here.

With that out of the way, I was on a search for some aluminum and recently encountered a Hy-Gain Explorer 14 (EXP-14) that was in the attic of a local ham. I knew nothing of this Hy-Gain model, but the specs seemed to be right in line of what I was looking to accomplish. The price was right and it was in excellent condition. In speaking with the seller, the beam used to belong to a local club who unfortunately lost access to put up towers for field day and this beam was one of the casualties.

The Hy-Gain EXP-14 has a unique feed point (as they even state in the manual) with parasitic driven elements on 10m. It weighs approximately 45lbs, 14ft boom with a 17ft turning radius, perfect for my rooftop mount.

I had to beam built, tuned and installed in what seemed to be record time, only taking 3 1/2 hours. Part of that time included running out to Home Depot for a 12″ mast (above the rotor) and prepping the coax with ring terminals.

Once the beam was up, I could hear a drastic difference compared to my temporary bob-tail curtain on 20m. The first stations I heard were from India and Oman. Keep in mind, all of this was going on during the CQ Worldwide CW contest that I unfortunately could not commit a serious amount of time in due to the holiday, but ended up being a good time to test the new antenna and tweak the station.

The antenna is only sitting about 25ft off the ground, 6ft from rooftop. I was concerned with takeoff angle with the antenna being so close to the ground, but the fact that I was able to work into the Middle East, India and Asiatic Russia all while barefoot, says something.

In the photo, it may look like the antenna is mounted to the chimney, which it is not. The mount is a modified non-penetrating roof mount for DirecTV-type satellite dishes with 8 low-profile concrete blocks acting as ballast. The lower mast is guyed to the plate that holds the blocks. The mast is then guyed to the 4 corners of the house and attached just below the rotor.

Apr 12

ARRL Trip – 2011

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On Monday a number of us from DLARC (Delaware-Lehigh Amateur Radio Club) took a field trip to the ARRL Headquarters in Newington, CT and also work the W1AW station.

During the 4 hour trip, I worked a number of DX stations on 17 and 20m including Russia and Belgium. Having HF in the car definitely makes the time go quick, but logging becomes the difficult and hazardous part.

Once on-site, our tour guide took us around league headquarters where we visited the Logbook of the world (LoTW) and certificate department as well as Product Test Lab, Marketing & Advertising, and VEC departments. While there Laurie (KB3SIK) was able to find out the status to her recent upgrade, which happened to arrive in the mail that day. In the outgoing QSL card bureau, we found cards destined for NE3F, the local contest station in Reading, PA, which I found rather funny.

We also had a tour of the ARRL employee station, W1HQ which had a decent amount of gear including a SteppIR beam and 6 meter King Conversion amplifier. I’ll be adding W1HQ to my rare DX list.

It was nice to be put faces and names to the ARRL and see what they do from their perspective. They do alot with what they have and make use of every piece of equipment they have; Something quite apparent in the Lab and Art departments.
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After lunch at a local pizza place, we put in some operating time at W1AW, their visitor operator station. W1AW is also the station that provides the on-air ARRL bulletins as well as qualifying Morse code runs. I ended up running their Yaesu FTDX-9000D on 15m for a bit. The station has alot of different gear and operates a number of modes.
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The remainder of the photos and video can be found here.

Mar 28

Timonium hamfest 2011 and antenna work

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Another Timonium hamfest has come and gone.
Buyer turnout seemed pretty good, vendor turnout was slightly thinner than last year, although there seems to have been more tailgating than years past. Most likely due to better weather. I didn’t see too many capital expenses being made although I heard someone talking on the local repeater net saying he sold an entire silent key’s vintage Collins station. Laurie got a chance to use her new HT, which I was sure she really enjoyed keeping up with everyone. No large purchases this year, simple odds and ends and new antennas for our HT’s, but we got a chance to meet up with the 1900 guys from as far out as Pittsburgh and South NJ. Overall another successful hamfest! Can’t wait till next year![simage=464,576,n,center,][simage=465,576,n,center,]

The following day, Laurie and I made some adjustments to our 2 meter stack by adding a tilt-over base which allowed me to change the polarity on the cubical quad. Now I can get into N2KEJ’s repeater in South Jersey.[simage=463,576,n,center,][simage=462,576,n,center,]