Any Ham Radio Operators Here - Page 5 - Videokarma.org TV - Video

g6120 · #61 08-16-2008, 04:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by electronjohn

But that's the BEAUTY of it, Sandy!!! QRM, QRN, finicky tuning, antenna difficulties...hammin' wouldn't REALLY be fun without a few challenges!

ive got to agree with electronjohn without question good point

its a hobby something to work for , setting standards for yourself maybe working with your kids and others with goals and making an accomplishment at what you have started .

i remember cutting and making my very first antenna and getting on the air that was magic - you got to learn and earn your ticket to appreciate it .

anyway thats kinda the way i look at it

kf2do
g6120

electronjohn · #62 08-17-2008, 08:08 AM

Update #2: Recent posts bring the number of licensed hams checking in on this thread to 26. Power supply for the transceiver arrived safely...waiting for a chance to bring it up slowly & take some voltage measurements. I'm continuing to scratch my head over what type of antenna to erect...looks like my lot dimensions and the way my house is situated on it may not allow a G5RV...so I'm thinking some sort of off-center fed dipole could be a temporary solution. I know it would be far from optimum... just need something up in the air before winter!

g6120 · #63 09-01-2008, 04:45 AM

just recieved a p.m. from sammyb

he being a new member and a Ham radio operator
here which i believe makes him # 27

anyone else lurking around

g6120

W9TR · #64 10-09-2008, 06:39 AM

W9TR checking in here. Mostly hang out in the McIntosh Audio forum, but I have restored and enjoy a few antique pieces: Philco model 84, Grebe Synchrophase, and a Grunow 4B.

draftingmonkey · #65 10-09-2008, 07:13 AM

Tech, KC7EGI.
Will upgrade someday when I move out of this SoCal HOA and can put up a real antenna. The canyon I live in makes it a little difficult to get out there without being able to put up a tower.

Use mostly 2M when on road trips. Am I #28??

Jeffhs · #66 10-09-2008, 09:37 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by draftingmonkey

Tech, KC7EGI.
Will upgrade someday when I move out of this SoCal HOA and can put up a real antenna. The canyon I live in makes it a little difficult to get out there without being able to put up a tower.

Use mostly 2M when on road trips. Am I #28??

Good day, sir. Jeff, WB8NHV here. I live in a first-floor apartment (the apartment building is only two stories high) in northeastern Ohio, 35 miles east of Cleveland. I also must use indoor antennas because of lease restrictions (no structures of any kind mounted outside the building); currently have a Barker and Williamson AP-10A portable antenna and an Icom IC-725 9-band 100-watt rig, and an Icom IC-T22A handheld. The latter gets out well to access a local repeater a couple miles from here. I am a member of the Lake County, Ohio Amateur Radio Association, and have been licensed since I was 16 years old in 1972 (I'm now 52). License progression: Novice 1972-74, off air eleven months between June '74-May '75, Technician May '75-June '85, General June '85 to present.

Even with indoor antennas, however, I manage to get on the air with my club's 2-meter and ten-meter nets, so my equipment isn't just sitting around gathering dust. I was very active on 80-10 meters, mostly CW, from my former QTH (location) in suburban Cleveland until 1999, when I moved and had to give up my 70-foot all-band dipole, 30-foot-high Cush Craft Ringo Ranger for 2m, and my packet radio installation (the apartment I live in now is too small for all that gear except the Icom HF transceiver). I also enjoyed DXing on 30-meter CW from my former QTH; don't know how well I'd do with an indoor antenna on that band, although one of these days I'm going to give it a whirl again from here. Living only a mile or so from the southern shore of Lake Erie, I should be able to work into Canada (southwestern Ontario, VE3) and southeastern Michigan (Detroit area) without too much trouble. Thirty meters being the QRP (low power) DX band it is, I should also be able to work all over the country with my 100-watt Icom rig and indoor antenna (I worked stations like gangbusters on 30 from my old QTH, so I know high power isn't a strict requirement for DXing there or on 17/12 meters either).

I wouldn't write off HF just yet. There are ways to get on the so-called "d.c. bands", 80-10 meters, with indoor antennas, as I have done. The B&W AP-10A (I'm sure they have an updated version, AP-10B or C, by now; it, or a similar version put out by MFJ of Starkville, MS is available at, among others, Amateur Electronic Supply in Milwaukee) is good for apartments and other settings (motel rooms, etc.) where large outdoor antennas are prohibited or impractical.

Good luck, and again, don't give up on trying to get on HF, even from an apartment. Where there is a will, there's a way.

73,

fredh · #67 10-16-2008, 04:16 PM

K5OG, Fred, here.
Extra class since 1977.
Mostly collect and restore Signal Ones but have other boat anchors as well.
http://www.k5og.com/

RickB · #68 10-16-2008, 05:14 PM

de KI5SL.. I've kept the license current, well, as current as a grandfathered Advanced can be...but very rarely get on the air...usually only to check into the Collins Collectors net on Sundays....

Worked a lot of stations via satellite in years past when AO-10 and AO-13 were hot...made contact with the Space Shuttle twice, once via voice and once via packet...

Got into Ham radio in the eighties when I started worrying about all the power I was using on Chicken Band and fearing a visit by Uncle Charlie...also wanted to explore the digital modes like FAX, RTTY, PACKET, etc...remember, this was before the Internet explosion...but, we did set up a TCP/IP network here back before there was ANY html at all, using Kantronics D4-10 radios, Ottawa Packet Interface cards in our computers, and the NOS program...had my own dotted IP, I guess it's still mine...we had a gateway to the Internet at the old Datapoint Corp., here in town...we used the net back then to set up skeds with Hams all over the world, well, wherever there was a DARPANET/Internet gateway to Packet radio, I guess, everything was at command line, even the chats...no Windows, even pre Linux...ahh, the good old days!!!

It was always fun to download weather fax from the likes of Bracknell, NOAA, even some of the satellites...and to search out and find FAX and RTTY transmissions from news outlets around the world, sometimes even ships at sea...those are gone, moved to the Internet and to satellite communications, no more "eavesdropping"!...

I have been a SWL since 1963, though, 2 years after my first exposure to Ham Radio with a visit to my Father's best friend in New Jersey...but, as a nine year old kid didn't know anybody that was in to it down here in San Antonio...so, got a cheapo SW receiver for my 11th birthday and been hooked ever since...

I do miss high sunspot activity and the days of the Cold War and all the various propaganda outlets by all the little third-world countries...interesting times...maybe when the spots swing around again I'll get active....HF was always my favorite but there's just nothing that I can hear lately that makes me want to get on the air...

.

bills · #69 10-19-2008, 08:21 PM

New ham here KI6JUV.
Made my first contact Last week on the Battleship Missouri in pearl harbor Thanks to the Missouri A.R.C. KH6BB.
Also got a tour of the radio room TO COOL!!!

Have some photos of the Missouri and the Bowfins radio room.
if you would like to see them let me know.
bill

hvlee · #70 10-23-2008, 11:27 AM

All vintage, mostly all Hallicrafters:

HT-32/SX-101A, HT-44/SX-117, SX-100, Viking Ranger, SX-71, SX-16,
Zenith 1948 AM/FM table model, 1936 Zenith console on loan to my son.

Just discovered this forum by reference in Vintage. Audio-wise, I'm mostly interested in Dynaco.

Harry Vaught, KT4AE
Maryville, Tennessee

electronjohn · #71 10-23-2008, 12:48 PM

Glad to have you around, hvlee!! My 5th grade math sez 32 licensed hams have checked in to this thread so far. Which Halli setup do you prefer...or is it the SX100/Ranger combo that gets the most airtime? John de KD0DQZ

hvlee · #72 10-23-2008, 01:41 PM

Boy, that's a hard one. To keep it fairly short, I have to say that the HT-44/SX-117 gets more use. Emotionally, I'm more attached to the HT-32/SX-101A but the HT-44/SX-117 is almost like solid state in terms of stability and convenience. The pair can be slaved together for "tranceive" operation. There's not much AM action here and I only have a vertical, so the Ranger/SX-100 mostly sits. I love the SX-100 in spite of its well known faults. It's the one I'll take to the nursing home, just to look at if there's no more AM.

I forgot to mention an S-20R which is a great little radio. It reminds me of (and is the ancestor of) the S-40A that my Dad had which started the whole thing for me.

Actually, when I started I wanted everything but I've trimmed down to the point where I only have the pieces I really want.

If I go first, my wife says she's keeping the Ranger and the SX-16 to remind her of me. She likes the looks.

If she goes first I'm keeping the Marantz 2285B & BIC Venturi Spec 6 Formula II's that we call "Hers" and she abuses with "Oldies".

Harry, KT4AE
Maryville, Tennessee

speedy22 · #73 10-23-2008, 01:55 PM

You bet, K0IS, Larry. Been a ham since 1966...operate mostly CW on HF and mostly SSB on 6 meters. Use my Drake C Line regularly and an ICOM IC 740. Latest project is getting a Butternut vertical set up here for 80/40/30.

73,
Larry

Robert Grant · #74 10-23-2008, 02:13 PM

I'm a ham, too, though I don't get on so much anymore, too much QRN on lower HF, too few sunspots for 17m, and 2 meter FM seems to be totally DEAD!

I get on 6m when skip is in, and will probably do so more when lowband analog TV stations (my favorite DX) sign off for good.

Rob (call sign not included for a degree of privacy, please write)

Kc2edh · #75 10-23-2008, 02:48 PM

KC2EDH here, I've been a ham since I got my Tech+ when I was 13. Since then I've upgraded to General but haven't been especially active lately. For now I have 2m\400 in my car and a Hallicrafters receiver at home, but thats about it. My father got me into radio, he has been licensed since he was in high school and is into DXing mostly on 20 and 15 meters. He has a great HF station set up, with a collection of Yaesu and some older Kenwood and Drake transcievers.

I've since moved out and gotten my own apartment, but not much room here to set up an HF antenna! Can pull in shortwave broadcast from around the world, but not so much amateur activity.

The hamfest scene has been reduced the last few years around here too, some area ones which were huge when I was little are now quite small. Must be a better market for boatanchors and transcievers online than at the flea markets.