Author: N7ONP

It’s the middle of summer already!  At least in my mind it is the middle of summer.  I know, the first day of summer was just a few days ago; but, I am a product of the 50’s and 60’s and summer started right after school ended as far as we were concerned.  And in those days school ended a day or two before or after Memorial Day as the Taft High School band always played for the  Fleet of Flowers and we had to wear those wool uniforms and get them turned into Mr. Kelmer even though school was out.

           But alas and alack, Chuck, this is a blog for the Amateur Radio Club so get with it!  The last month has not treated me to a lot of time to play with my radios.  I have had a few highlights like learning to use the new magnetic loop antenna I acquired.  It helped me with a problem I didn’t know I had.  I was on my deck using the magnetic loop with two different transceivers, an Icom IC-706mkIIg and a software defined Resent RS-918.

          It was a Sunday afternoon and I was tuned to a 40 meter net The Western Social Net which operates on Sundays from 1:00 to 4:00 on 7.230Mhz.  The receptions was good and I was copying stations from British Columbia to Reno and Southern California.  I tried a number of times to log onto the Net to no avail.  What did I expect, I was only putting out 10 to 20 watts PEP on SSB.

          After an hour with no success, I went down to my ham shack and tuned up my Icom IC-746 Pro putting out 100 watts or if I kicked on the amplifier I would generate 500 watts.  I could barely hear the stations that had been 59 on the magnetic loop!  This did not bode well!  My finely tuned Ham Diagnostic Sense (somewhat akin to the cartoon character’s Spidey Sense) told me, “There is a problem with your station!” 

          My  diagnostic mind shifted into high gear!  Two weeks before, my son had been weed eating and suddenly my signal strength dropped to zero.  Was it interference from the noisy weed eater’s engine?  No, it was the weed eater cutting my coax thus in technical jargon preventing the signals captured by my antenna and traveling down the coax to my transceiver to get to my transceiver.  My acutely technical mind immediately came up with a solution; “you must replace the coax, Chuck!”

          That may seem like an easy fix but you must realize some important factors.  First of all I’m 78 y.o. And crawling under the house (which used to be a simple chore) now is neither simple nor safe.  I had to ask myself do you really want the embarrassment of the Fire Department extracting you from that crawl space??  Secondly will the current body type even fit through the crawl hole used by the earlier version did string the coax?

          The answer to both questions would be, probably not!  But I have multiple runs of coax as at one time I had multiple antennas.  “Substitute W7CRG … substitute!”  So I picked the LMR 400 cable which had run out to a vertical antenna.  It was the newest and would conduct a signal the best.  The connection had been on the ground but I carefully “waterproofed” the coax connector with antenna tape.

          To get to the point, the expensive tape job didn’t work.  Water had seeped up the dielectric and caused all sorts of bad things from corroding the shielding to creating a resistance between the shielding and the center conductor.  I substituted another coax and wow!  I had signals getting to my radio!

          Putting up antennas and stringing coax is not an easy task.  Therefore, when we get it done we tend to leave it alone and “not fix  what ain’t broken” …. until it is broken.

          Lesson to be learned, no matter how much precaution we take … things break and deteriorate.  If things change at your station, there is usually a reason and it is better to fix it as soon as you can.

          So, get on the air!  If you need help or advise, ask for it!  Enjoy your summer and tr y to include Ham Radio!  July 1^st starts the 13 Original Colonies special event.  Check the web page for info!   

          Happy 4^th of July!  73  Chuck Gerttula W7CRG

Curiosity seems to be a trait of many Hams.  We are curious about how something works or functions.  We are curious about new and innovative things and processes.  We are curious about how we might use, change and improve various things that come into our hobby and, for that matter, our lives.

          That trait has been good for our hobby and good for our minds.  We grow when we exercise our minds and experiences.  This hobby has grown from spark gap CW to modulated speech; AM, FM, SSB; to specialized communication modes such as RTTY (Radio Teletype), SSTV (Slow Scan TV), Satellite and bouncing signals off the Moon’s surface (EME), digital modes such as PSK31 and FT8.  Those are just a few of the technologies hams have come up with and there are many more developing using UHF and microwave technologies.

          Hams are also looking for challenges.  We try to accumulate the highest number of something.  For some that is equipment … “How many radios do you really need??”  “Just one more …”  For others it is contacts, they collect the number of contacts they make for countries around the world, the various states within our country, the counties within each state, contacts from Grid Squares, Parks (County, State, National), SOTA (Summits on the Air), lighthouses, islands, you name it.

          One ham I met was so proud of the QSL cards he had collected that all of the walls of his ham shack were covered with them.  An impressive array which took years to accumulate and probably weeks to organize and place on the walls.

          Part of this blog is about curiosity and part of this blog is about diversity.   Hams are individuals who have some group interests and traits but also hold a wide variety of interests and abilities.  For instance, not all hams have the ability or desire to build, modify or repair electronic equipment.  Not all hams have the patience to tune up and down the bands listening for a call sign from a faraway place (DX).  Not every ham finds the challenges of accumulating the most points during a contest fascinating.  Not every ham wants to train to provide communication during emergencies but the satisfaction of public service and being there “When All Else Fails” is a lure to many in our midst.   Some like maximum power and some get pleasure from contacts on the least power (QRP).

          To me, after nearly 30 years of Army service, the phrase “Be All You Can Be” is more than a recruiting slogan.  I find satisfaction in becoming an Extra class operator.  Not that it provides me any sense of status; but, rather it  was one more challenge to meet and allowed me to provide certain things like testing as a VE for all levels of license.  Many of the things I do as an amateur radio operator are simply for my own satisfaction.  Isn’t that  one of the reasons we humans have hobbies?

          So, I challenge those of you who might read this blog, stretch yourself, don’t be afraid to try something new and different.  Obtaining a higher class license may not make a significant difference in your ham activities but perhaps it will give you self-satisfaction.  CW is something that has been a difficult skill for me.  Perhaps I’m too old to become really proficient but I’m exploring developing some CW skills to satisfy my personal bucket list.  Is it easy?  No, it is very frustrating and I have started and stopped more times than Wile E. Coyote has tried to catch the Roadrunner and with about the same success rate.  But the challenge is still there and maybe one day ….

          Remember Field Day is coming up this June and will be held in the parking lot of Oregon Coast Community College in South Beach.  Hope to see you there and as always hope to hear you on the air!  73!

Chuck  W7CRG