Loading...

And I embarrassed myself today by having a, with my antenna that I was showing off, and I ended up when I was attempting to do resonance at 20 meters, I ended up having a flat, infinite SWR across the entire HF spectrum. So don't worry. I will say that that story has a happy ending though, because although I embarrassed myself publicly by having a completely wrong result of what I was attempting to flashfully show off, it turned out it was the aluminum tripod. You know, the FJ2289 antenna is, you know, the ginormous rabbit ears that without the coils is a half-wave dipole for 20 meters. It will turn down all the way to about 13 megahertz with those long 5.3 meter or 17.5 foot long dipoles. So, poles, poles, to the two of them end up being a half-wave antenna for 20 meters. But the post that you mount on the tripod, you know, the MFJ tripod, that post is not metal, it is made out of fiberglass. And if you mount the hub that has a ganella type, you know, feedline type 4 to 1 ballon, that post goes right next to you and brushes against the windings on the toroid of the ballon. I was attempting to use a smaller, much more lightweight tripod to partially demonstrate that the antenna could be more portable by skipping the heavy duty tripod. Unfortunately, the aluminum post sticking up in there ends up totally screwing up. It, you know, it has reactants with the toroid that's right next to it. And so, with the help of Don, I think it was, he and another ham that I can't remember his name, I hope that they send the emails that they said they would because that way I'll be able to sort out who's who, we held it up of that. And everything changed. And so I managed to do what I was seeking for, which is to have a 1.00 to 1 SWR at the desired frequency and the entire 300 kilohertz of the 20 meter band is still all below 1.2 to 1. Aside from that, I thought it was a lovely outing that we have every year and I'm so glad I got to see everyone, I'm out of time, KX2-CW, all the numbers to all my hams, Joan on Broadway handing it back to them. Well, Joan, thank you very much for giving us both a lesson in antenna mechanics and another embarrassing story. Maybe we'll make that a theme for tonight. Maybe we can come up with embarrassing stories that we've all committed because we are human. Who knew? It's interesting that you got a flat open SWR with that oddball reactant, but you found a way past it with Buddy, a little help from my friends. Let's move on now and talk to Brian, if I have this call right. And if he's Brian and not Ryan, KK7MZW, come ahead. That was perfect. This is Brian, KK7MZW, walking on the city streets with a family member who may or may not choose to, no, she's shaking her head. Sometimes we get third party traffic, but not today. It was kind of a big radio day for me. I went up to Cougar Mountain and did the Lake Washington Time Club Rain or Shine. Kind of cold, kind of stormy exactly, but not summery. Kept my motorcycle gear on and my warming hat the whole time I was up there. But it warmed up, so it's really nice here in Kirkland right now. We're just walking around the neighborhood and kind of enjoying the sunset and the view of the city of Seattle and Lake Washington. And it was a pretty nice radio day. Oh, and the SimplexNet. And that was funny because the host of the SimplexNet was on Cougar Mountain and I didn't bump into him there. But that's all right. KK7MZW, back to net control. Brian, quick question. Who is the reluctant third party with you? This is my daughter. She's been on the radio a few times. Oh, very good. Well, maybe we'll get to talk to her next time. Sounds like a nice day. And the Lake Washington Hand Club. Boy, I wish our local hand clubs wouldn't schedule over each other. Somebody must coordinate stuff as everybody knows, I'm sure, the PSRG technique at the Zolgia Park was today. We have few enough meetings. We should be able to go to them all because we're all friends, basically. Let me see, did I come in here getting the people checked in here, John, Brian, then we had an I.O. from Bill, KN9, CWC, and an earlier one from Peter and Santa Cruz. I think I muddled my way through that round. So let's move on to the next round. But for the beginning of this next round, I want to save this first opportunity to check in to anybody who thought I blew it on the last round, who thought you checked in and I didn't call on you. So that's the first person, the first people I want to hear from is anybody who thinks they should have been in the first round. This is K7WFB, come ahead with your call sign and name.