The store-bought 2m/70cm groundplane antenna I’ve had mounted on a broomstick inside my apartment now has a home outside where it can reach so many more places. After some brainstorming sessions in the hardware store, thinking of methods to mount 3 sections of military surplus fiberglass poles to my balcony railing, I figured out how …
Tag Archives: antenna
Magnetic California
It’s not going to win any beauty contests, but with my slapped-together Small Magnetic Loop Antenna (small MLA), I just worked two stations in the San Francisco Bay area with 20 Watts on FT8! (11pm CDT, 20-meters, antenna in living room.) By comparison, it takes me over 40 Watts to do the same on my …
1:0 Balun
Severe storms and winds this weekend prompted me to take down one of my two antennas for safety. I have a 20m inverted-V dipole with 1/4 wave 300Ω twinlead as the feedline from the center insulator to a 1:1 current balun mounted on my wall (the twinlead is transparent at 20m frequencies). The other antenna …
Portable Tree
My experiments with raising a portable antenna mast continued this weekend. Building on the lessons of my failed first attempt, I went back to the drawing board. After a few delays in getting out to the field (thanks to early winter sunsets and busy schedule), I finally achieved success in raising an effective 20 meter …
Lessons at Terminal Velocity
The joy of failure is that I am forced to learn from my mistakes. It feels joyless now, but really it frees me from the burden of choosing to learn. Either I learn and improve, or I will no longer be burdened with finding joy. Work began this weekend to implement a portable 40′ tower …