Comments for W4FT on Amateur Radio

Comment on CQ WW SSB 2011 – mixed results by w4ft

w4ft — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 14:06:16 +0000

Patience, Tom. It hasn’t been that long since the contest. Results often take 6 to 12 months to be published, depending on the contest. Check the CQ website at http://cq-amateur-radio.com/cq_contests/cq_ww_dx_contest/index_cq_ww_dx_contest.html for the results of this one, when they’re published.

73,
W4FT

Comment on CQ WW SSB 2011 – mixed results by ZS2EC

ZS2EC — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 11:34:51 +0000

I WANT TO KNOW MY RESULTS FOR 2011 THROUGHLY ENJOYED THE CONTEST

Comment on 80 meter Skywave loop replaces HGSW by w4ft

w4ft — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 20:12:16 +0000

RE: HGSW Antenna performance
In the post, I gave the impression that the HGSW performance wasn’t very good. The fact is that “MY” HGSW wasn’t working very well. I looked briefly at the antenna when I took it down and it seemed to be suffering from a number of mechanical problems, like failures at joints, corrosion, etc.

We have used this antenna for a couple years at the W4DW Field Day operation on 15 and 20 meters with great success. If you are considering this antenna, it is definitely worth a try. I think that as an antenna on it’s design frequency, or as an alternative to a dipole, it is a great choice!

73,
W4FT

Comment on High Gain Single Wire Beam to replace 80m dipole by W4FT on Amateur Radio » 80 meter Skywave loop replaces HGSW

W4FT on Amateur Radio » 80 meter Skywave loop replaces HGSW — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 20:06:43 +0000

[...] week, I replaced the HGSW beam with a full wavelength 80 meter Skywave Loop Antenna. The antenna is about 285 feet long and is [...]

Comment on CQWW SSB on the HGSW and a new Water Tank! by w4ft

w4ft — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 03:01:25 +0000

Hi Gordon,

You’re right, I didn’t put much info in on this article on the design of the antenna. Might be because the details were in the one immediately preceeding this one.

http://w4ft.com/2010/10/high-gain-single-wire-beam-to-replace-80m-dipole/#more-306

Three important things for you to know. First, I cut mine for 20 meters. I wasn’t terribly precise, which I think contributed to it not matching up on 20 as well as our field day version for 15 meters did.

Second, I feed the antenna with 100 ft of 450 ohm ladder line for better performance.

Third, and you’ll love this, the antenna’s inventor updated the design by removing the coil to get a near 50 ohm impedance. Details on this and a few other changes are in a follow-up letter published about 6 months later in QST.

You’ll no doubt want to go to the link above and read the details, especially the paragraph following the table with the swr readings. Also, it’s a good idea to run an external antenna tuner with this one. I am using an MFJ 993B automatic tuner, which gives me pretty good performance on all bands from 160 to 10. It was good for a over a quarter million points in the CQ WW SSB a few weeks ago!

73,
W4FT

Comment on CQWW SSB on the HGSW and a new Water Tank! by Gordon Jones W5OU

Gordon Jones W5OU — Thu, 10 Nov 2011 22:54:54 +0000

“CQWW SSB on HGSW and a new Water Tank” :

Hello W4FT: I can not discern from the referenced article as to which “size” (Band) the antenna was cut for? You gave me more infromation on the Water Tank than you did on the antenna. Did you have that [expletive removed, ed.] coil left in the antenna?
I made one for the ten meter band. Never have I been able to get the SWR any where near a “good place”. I’m going outside and remove the coil – right now! Then I’ll see if it works within reason.
73, Gordon – W5OU e-mail me at:

Comment on Bike MS New Bern 2011 by Rick Yost

Rick Yost — Tue, 06 Sep 2011 17:21:18 +0000

Thanks for all your hard work, Cliff! I appreciate the waypoints for each of the correlating cue sheet turns! Now I just have to figure out a way for my GPS to not display the waypoints that are duplicated. If you know of a way to do this, I would certainly appreciate any tips you have. I’m thinking the only way to do this is delete all waypoints on my GPS that are not part of the route I’m monitoring.

73,
Rick

Comment on So whaddya think? by Gary

Gary — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 11:45:32 +0000

Purchased a couple of Icom OPC-1186 cables from Cliff. Separation cables for my Icom IC-2720H mobile unit. These cables are not that easy to come by these days, so it was great that I found Cliffs page via Google. Cliff sold me the cables at a great price & service & delivery were fantastic. Thanks to Cliff, my mobile unit is back in service. I’ll be sure to be back here anytime I need something for my amateur needs. thanks. 73 Gary, N2GLS.

Comment on Power Strip injects WPTF into my SSB signal??? by w4ft

w4ft — Sun, 24 Jul 2011 18:03:37 +0000

@Kent KC0DGY
Good suggestion, Kent. For most problems like this, it would help, but I’m using an industrial 6 ft. power strip with no LEDs. It probably doesn’t have any electronics besides a switch and some wires and plugs. I haven’t opened it up to find out yet though.

Frankly, I’m guilty of not following up on a bunch of stuff, including this. People have asked me about the performance of the RigBlaster Advantage and the HGSW beam antenna, but I really haven’t spent enough time on the radio to give them a fair assessment. Instead, I’ve been focused on a kitchen remodel.
73,
W4FT

Comment on Power Strip injects WPTF into my SSB signal??? by Kent KC0DGY

Kent KC0DGY — Sat, 23 Jul 2011 19:01:27 +0000

I’ll bet its in the LED or the surge protection part of your power strip (the LEDs can act as detector diode). I would suggest either putting in some RF bypass ceramic disc caps if you can get inside the power strip, or put one of those snap on ferrite toroid style RF chokes on the power line right where the power line goes into the power strip. I had a strong local AM station get into my telco line and a few turns of the phone line through a ferrite downstream from their demark point totally cleaned my AM station problem up. Good luck. Kent