What did you do in the shack today?

[Uzi2]

Been cleaning up a few pieces of equipment from an estate of a friend whose family knows nothing about radio and asked me to liquidate the stuff since nobody was interested.

A pretty nice Hallicrafters SX-101 receiver. The switches and pots all need cleaning but the thing still works like a champ.
A couple of Icom 718's, an Icom 737, a few old Heathkit transmitters, a four piece Drake C line setup with T4XC/R4C, Speaker/power supply, and tuner, a bunch of spare tubes.
Two Ameritron AL-811H amplifiers, a few old pieces of test equipment, and a 60 year old homebrew multi band dual 813 amplifier. The thing weighs about 300 lbs. with the HV transformer and Variac in the power supply. Kind of crude build but thinking of refining it a bit and rebuilding it in a different cabinet.

 

[ToddDubya]

I ordered the external display for my "new" FT-857. I think I'm still going to play around with the CAT interface with an Arduino because I'm suddenly fascinated with that. I don't know what for, but that's never stopped me before. Just gotta get my hands on the right cable to plug into the CAT port.

 

[timbo]

Well, as I threatened to do in a couple posts above, yesterday and today I tore my shack down and redid almost everything. It took me way longer than I thought it was going to take. I'm just moving a lot slower than I used to. I moved things around so, to me, it seems a lot more efficient to use. I like it. There's a few things I still need to do...Fabricate a cable that was too short that goes between my TS-850s mic input and my W2IHY iPLUS station control box...it is just 2" too short... No way to make it work. I need a "cable stretcher"...LOL.

I'll pop some pics in here tomorrow. I'm tired....gonna hit the rack.

Pics...somewhat potato quality...

Kenwood TS-850SAT with DSP100 (quite a rare piece, pretty much unobtanium these days, bought when I bought the 850) and to it's right is my TS-520s I've had since I was a Johnny Novice. Mic to left of 850 is a Kenwood MC-60. Mic on top of 520 is an EV 664 which I bought when I bought the 520 in 1983. I love that mic...nicknamed the "Buchanan Hammer", due to it's inherent ruggedness and where it was made, Buchanan, MI. I think it weighs about 2 pounds.

This little box to the left of the TS-850 on the desk top is a wired remote controller (RM-1) for the 850...actually quite rare. I'm glad I bought it when I bought my 850 back in 91. Then it was (I think) $49. Now, if you can find them they are well over $100. Box under the Mic is the power supply for the 850. The cord from my Astron wouldn't reach the 850 .



Top shelf, Palstar AT2K tuner, Kenwood TL-922 amplifier, Uniden BCD996P2 scanner
Middle shelf, Mic Pre on top of iPlus station controller, ARB-704 amp interface, Kenwood TS-590SG, Icom 910H VHF/UHF all-mode transceiver
Bottom shelf, HF transceivers speaker, Bencher BY-1 Iambic paddles, Daiwa NS-660PA HF SWR meter, Daiwa NS-663B VHF/UHF SWR Meter, IC-910 speaker
Mic on boom is an Electro-Voice RE-20



The shelf to the right has a couple of other mics on it and hanging under it are a few headsets which I rarely use.



After I took these pics, I realized I hadn't set the time on my LED BCD clock (under the monitor). I had to disconnect power and antennas last night because we had pretty severe T-Storms come through. The clock doesn't have a back up battery to keep time when it's removed from power...oh well.

Oh, and the bands suck today!

 

[ToddDubya]

Those pics have to be shopped. Either that or there's a mountain of shit behind you.

 

[timbo]

Those pics have to be shopped. Either that or there's a mountain of shit behind you.

Just my music stuff behind me...12 basses , 3 guitars, a synth keyboard and a bass and guitar amp...LOL. Two of my many favorite past times...music and radio

 

[ToddDubya]

I got some LiPo batteries today and after some rewiring I put one in my Morserino. It's going to be so much nicer using it without having to plug it into an external battery or my laptop or something.

I got six 600mAh LiPo batteries, 10 LiPo charge control boards that will charge/power off of USB, and maybe 20 pairs of wired connectors so I can run some lower power things off the LiPos. I picked up a couple 12v regulators that take 2.6-6v input, so I can make little batteries that charge off USB and output 12v. They won't last super long, but they'll run the Mountain Topper and/or my 40m QRP CW kit for a decent length of time.

It looks like LiPo batteries are very particular about their voltage. They don't like to be stored full, so if you're going to leave them more than a day or so you should discharge them to a storage voltage. That sounds like a drag. I don't have a fancy discharge capable charger.

 

[CatSnoutSoup]

Pics...somewhat potato quality...

Kenwood TS-850SAT with DSP100 (quite a rare piece, pretty much unobtanium these days, bought when I bought the 850) and to it's right is my TS-520s I've had since I was a Johnny Novice. Mic to left of 850 is a Kenwood MC-60. Mic on top of 520 is an EV 664 which I bought when I bought the 520 in 1983. I love that mic...nicknamed the "Buchanan Hammer", due to it's inherent ruggedness and where it was made, Buchanan, MI. I think it weighs about 2 pounds.

This little box to the left of the TS-850 on the desk top is a wired remote controller (RM-1) for the 850...actually quite rare. I'm glad I bought it when I bought my 850 back in 91. Then it was (I think) $49. Now, if you can find them they are well over $100. Box under the Mic is the power supply for the 850. The cord from my Astron wouldn't reach the 850 .

View attachment 785584

Top shelf, Palstar AT2K tuner, Kenwood TL-922 amplifier, Uniden BCD996P2 scanner
Middle shelf, Mic Pre on top of iPlus station controller, ARB-704 amp interface, Kenwood TS-590SG, Icom 910H VHF/UHF all-mode transceiver
Bottom shelf, HF transceivers speaker, Bencher BY-1 Iambic paddles, Daiwa NS-660PA HF SWR meter, Daiwa NS-663B VHF/UHF SWR Meter, IC-910 speaker
Mic on boom is an Electro-Voice RE-20

View attachment 785585

The shelf to the right has a couple of other mics on it and hanging under it are a few headsets which I rarely use.

View attachment 785586

After I took these pics, I realized I hadn't set the time on my LED BCD clock (under the monitor). I had to disconnect power and antennas last night because we had pretty severe T-Storms come through. The clock doesn't have a back up battery to keep time when it's removed from power...oh well.

Oh, and the bands suck today!

Looks very sharp, a classy looking arrangement.

 

[timbo]

Looks very sharp, a classy looking arrangement.

Thanks...I need to keep it presentable because for the time being, it's in our front room. It's the agreement my wife and I had although my wife really doesn't mind it when it gets a little messy. I'm really the OCD one between the two of us.

It took me almost three days to tear it all down and re-do it. I like it much better now than the way it was previously.

Previous setup ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓

 

[ToddDubya]

I built up a little power supply for QRP rigs. It has a LiPo charge controller that takes in USB and charges the LiPo battery. It also controls the output of the battery to the output pins, which I have connected to a 12v boost converter. The output of that board goes to PowerPoles.

The controller limits output current to 3A, which translates to ~1A at 12v. My RockMite kit draws about 200mA on Tx, and the Mountain Topper draws about 750mA on Tx, so I think it should work for both. I also intend to power the audio filter board along with the RockMite, another 15mA.

I need to figure out the packaging and how to protect these chips from shorts. And I need to put a switch inline with the battery. I may just use the same connectors so I can easily swap out the battery.

A brief charge cycle worked just fine with no smoke or battery explosion. That red light turns blue once the battery is charged.



Ultimately the audio board and this power supply will go into an "Altoids" tin. I found this disgusting shit at Walmart for $1.50 that'll make a nice case for the "Ear Candy" audio filter and power supply.

 

[Evtide]

I haven't done this for over a year, but today I set up my military surplus 32' vertical and worked some FT8 with the Icom IC-705 and the SDR-Control iPad app. Getting things set up took some time but I feel a little better about being ready to set up on the fly for digital or SSB voice. I did OK for 10 watts but definitly heard more stations than were hearing me.

 

[ToddDubya]

I finally got all the parts I needed for my Ear Candy audio filter/amp and QRP power supply. Last night I got all the mounting holes drilled (more on that later), and started connecting everything up. In a moment of boldness I soldered wires to the board during the test phase and had a bitch of a time replacing some of the connections. If the weather stays bad I'll get it finished up tonight.

Today the external display I ordered for the tiger striped 857 came. Followed all the directions I could find online and no dice. Turns out there's an internal fuse on the power from the CAT port that may be blown. I'll have to investigate that tonight too. Unfortunately it's a surface mount fuse, so it may call for desperate measures. It works with my 857D and 818, but doesn't even try to power up with the 857, so no power is the likely culprit.

Drilling holes in Altoids tins:
I've seen a lot of people online struggle with this. They get some holes drilled just fine, then one just rips the whole side of the tin open. I used a small bit to make a pilot hole, then used a step bit to gradually increase the hole size. I use a block of wood as a backer on the pilot, then no backer with the step bit. I use the middle one in the picture below, courtesy of Harbor Freight. It leaves a nice clean hole, no burrs.

 

[timbo]

I finally got all the parts I needed for my Ear Candy audio filter/amp and QRP power supply. Last night I got all the mounting holes drilled (more on that later), and started connecting everything up. In a moment of boldness I soldered wires to the board during the test phase and had a bitch of a time replacing some of the connections. If the weather stays bad I'll get it finished up tonight.

Today the external display I ordered for the tiger striped 857 came. Followed all the directions I could find online and no dice. Turns out there's an internal fuse on the power from the CAT port that may be blown. I'll have to investigate that tonight too. Unfortunately it's a surface mount fuse, so it may call for desperate measures. It works with my 857D and 818, but doesn't even try to power up with the 857, so no power is the likely culprit.

Drilling holes in Altoids tins:
I've seen a lot of people online struggle with this. They get some holes drilled just fine, then one just rips the whole side of the tin open. I used a small bit to make a pilot hole, then used a step bit to gradually increase the hole size. I use a block of wood as a backer on the pilot, then no backer with the step bit. I use the middle one in the picture below, courtesy of Harbor Freight. It leaves a nice clean hole, no burrs.

View attachment 789045

I have a set of these...they make short work of a lot of chassis work. I have a set of Greenlee chassis punches too but these are much faster and easier to use on 99% of my projects.

 

[ToddDubya]

I have a set of these...they make short work of a lot of chassis work. I have a set of Greenlee chassis punches too but these are much faster and easier to use on 99% of my projects.

I was hoping I could get away with a paper punch, but no luck. If one needed to make a lot of holes in a lot of tins, I'd expect punches to be the best way assuming you could get a tool on there.

I don't know how I made it so long without step bits. They really are great.

 

[ToddDubya]

Wa-BAM, the CAT port through the mic works. I was planning to put this into a go box anyway, so it's just a different cable up to the display. I think it's just an Ethernet cable, so I'll need a shortie.

I checked the SMD fuse and it is indeed blown. That's not a very good design. I guess that's a common failure for people who use the ATAS antennas, since they draw power from that port.

Okay, back to the Ear Candy build.

 

[ToddDubya]

Well not technically in the shack, but more like the armory/reloading room/printer room...

My buddy is moving away and couldn't sell his 3D printer, so he gave it to me. I'm not sure why he wouldn't sell it to me, but I wasn't going to argue. It's a Lulzbot, which I hear are great machines. I've never used one before so this'll be something new to learn. Once I get it figured out I'll probably start with something easy like antenna winders and so forth.

There's plenty of stuff already designed that I can start with, and I'm sure I'll end up making some custom stuff down the road. I've not had good luck with CAD programs in the past, but now I have a reason to learn.

 

[ToddDubya]

Wire winder from Thingiverse. I just took a screenshot of a video I sent my mom. This isn't meant to impress, just that I already got something going, shack related.





I threw a little stretch cord around it and it's ready for business.

 

[ToddDubya]

I exercised the printer again tonight. Tonight's project was a doodad for an end fed half wave that doubles as a wire winder. I found the design on Thingiverse and embedded my call sign on the reverse. It's just PLA so I don't know how well it'll hold up, but we'll see. I made it as somewhat of a prototype for a semi-permanent installation, which renders the wire winder aspect moot, and the material substandard. But I wouldn't be mad if this replaced the clunky portable setup I'm using now.

The little bracket is for the SO-239 connector. Other than they'd probably print poorly I'm not sure why the designer didn't include mounting holes for the connector as well, just the connector hole itself. Your toroid goes in the center and presumably you zip tie it down. Three holes for wire strain relief and plenty of holes for mounting options.



And a 49:1 transformer. I've been reading, watching a few guys who've done a shitload of testing on various cores, winding styles, turns ratios, etc. This was one of the better performing methods that uses toroids I have on hand, so I'm trying it out. Honestly I'll have no idea if it's more efficient unless I hit AK or HI.



I'm sure I'll wrap this up this weekend and get it out in the field.

I've got a few other projects back burnered right now. The one I'd like to finish is the 857 with the wonky display. I got the one in from China and it'll work just fine. I want to mount everything in a case from ChinaFreight and have a nice compact portable setup.

 

[ToddDubya]

All that's left is to tune it up. So far so good.

 

[CatSnoutSoup]

All that's left is to tune it up. So far so good.

View attachment 791385

Very cool.

 

[ToddDubya]

I just looked back to see if I had any photos of my original EFHW I built and I don't. It was very, very loosely modeled on this design but was a pretty rough design. It's since been repackaged into a small plastic container which is a vast improvement, but it's neat to see how the quality of my builds has improved in just a year and a half since I started building antennas. Obviously a 3D printer printing someone else's design is a luxury I didn't have when I started, so there's that.

I have a four element cubical quad I built for 70c this spring that's just wires hot glued to a piece of wood. That'd be a fun thing to make a better setup for. It's not perfect but it does work. SWR is a little high and I've though about adding a hairpin match. Just have to measure it and see what it needs.

 

[RUT]

Been off the air for some years now but suddenly got the urge again. So, I picked up a new FT-710 over at HRO and got it up and running. Things have come a long way since I got into this many years ago!

 

[ToddDubya]

Welcome back to the hobby. I see a brand spanking new notebook

I've got the FTDX10 and I'm not entirely sure what the difference is between that and the 710, other than the FTDX10 may have more features brought out to buttons vs menu driven. Awesome radios, good choice.

What's first? What brought you back?

 

[RUT]

>>What's first? What brought you back?<<

At my point in life (old) I'd gone about as far as I could or wanted to in the firearms hobby. So, I said "what the heck". The downside is I'm pretty much having to start from scratch as far as equipment goes, thus the FT-710. My last rig was an FT-920, which I was perfectly happy with. I could have gotten a good used one for far less that the 710, but they're not really supported by Yaesu anymore. For an antenna I put up a Nelson end fed dipole for 10-40, but am considering putting up a second one to cover 10-80 in a different location. The good news is I haven't forgotten my CW, although a bit rusty.

 

[timbo]

Been off the air for some years now but suddenly got the urge again. So, I picked up a new FT-710 over at HRO and got it up and running. Things have come a long way since I got into this many years ago!

Welcome back! I took a 15ish year hiatus from ham radio starting back in the late 90's and got back into it again in 2012. I'm still catching up. It's what I like about ham radio...there's always something new to learn.

 

[Coyote33]

I picked up a new FT-710 over at HRO

Looked it up online. $1300!!!!!
No wonder I haven't gone much past the Baofeng HT (handheld transceiver) I have, and the Yaesu FT2800 given to me. Note: The 2800 does not seem to transmit properly any more. Hmmm, no wonder they gave it away.

Edit: Now on "sale" for $999.

 

[ToddDubya]

Looked it up online. $1300!!!!!
No wonder I haven't gone much past the Baofeng HT (handheld transceiver) I have, and the Yaesu FT2800 given to me. Note: The 2800 does not seem to transmit properly any more. Hmmm, no wonder they gave it away.

Edit: Now on "sale" for $999.

These are on sale right now. 80w of 2m FM glory for $170.

YAESU FT-2980R

144 MHz 80 Watt FM Mobile Transceiver - 3 Watts of RX Audio - With MH-48A6JA DTMF Microphone

www.hamradio.com

 

[ToddDubya]

I tuned up my new end fed project today. After slowly trimming and watching 40m not get better as fast as 20, 15, and 10 got worse, I decided to just worry about 40. There's no sense in having a 67' wire that isn't good on 40m. Eventually I got it close enough, 20 was still good, 15 and 10 fugedabouddit.

After drowning my sorrows in a campfire and a hamburger made over a campfire, I set up my radio and played some POTA. I was at the super secret squirrel location with a typical noise floor of S-0, and I tend to get decent signal reports. I couldn't say how many people asked what I was running because I was the strongest signal out there. Everybody gets the occasional "Hey, great signal. Nice job." but this was more than that. So I was happy with it on 40 and 20.

I need to learn a little more about the Ls and Cs of end feds. I just follow the recipe, but there's some tweaking to be done that I think would/could make a difference.

Meanwhile I was thinking about a fan dipole for the super secret squirrel location this winter and found Radio Man. He sells about a million combinations of fan dipoles, regular dipoles, etc. on ebay as well. There's one for 40/20/17/15/12/10 I might just pick up. About $100 with a choke balun and all the wire already cut. You just need to hoist it up and add spreaders if you want. Although I'd likely monkey with the tuning.

I'd really like to not have to setup an antenna every time.

 

[ToddDubya]

Or use the end fed I just built, and supplement with a fan for 17/15/10. I rarely use 12. That would simplify setup immensely.

 

[ToddDubya]

Well damn, now I'm thinking I should build a fake DxCommander that I can hang from a tree vs using a pole. Thingiverse has all the parts and I just happened to get a spool of PETG delivered today. Radials will be problematic at the super secret squirrel location as it's not exactly a nice grassy lawn, but more like granite rocks carelessly deposited by glaciers. And I'd have to somehow keep it from twisting up on itself. Perhaps "guy" the separators to a tree or two. This sounds far more complicated than a fan dipole, and potentially work worse.

 

[n1oty]

I tuned up my new end fed project today. After slowly trimming and watching 40m not get better as fast as 20, 15, and 10 got worse, I decided to just worry about 40. There's no sense in having a 67' wire that isn't good on 40m. Eventually I got it close enough, 20 was still good, 15 and 10 fugedabouddit.

After drowning my sorrows in a campfire and a hamburger made over a campfire, I set up my radio and played some POTA. I was at the super secret squirrel location with a typical noise floor of S-0, and I tend to get decent signal reports. I couldn't say how many people asked what I was running because I was the strongest signal out there. Everybody gets the occasional "Hey, great signal. Nice job." but this was more than that. So I was happy with it on 40 and 20.

I need to learn a little more about the Ls and Cs of end feds. I just follow the recipe, but there's some tweaking to be done that I think would/could make a difference.

Meanwhile I was thinking about a fan dipole for the super secret squirrel location this winter and found Radio Man. He sells about a million combinations of fan dipoles, regular dipoles, etc. on ebay as well. There's one for 40/20/17/15/12/10 I might just pick up. About $100 with a choke balun and all the wire already cut. You just need to hoist it up and add spreaders if you want. Although I'd likely monkey with the tuning.

I'd really like to not have to setup an antenna every time.

I've never been a fan of end-fed antennas. I have never personally seen one that worked well on multiple bands. On the other hand, I have had great success with OCFD's. I suspect that a lot of people gravitate toward end fed antennas because of a desire to only have one high attachment point. In other words, simplicity. Unfortunately, simplicity frequently comes at a cost.