Hello Brian, To keep Topband "fresh & exciting", I've gone backwards in time. Reading up on earlier exploits, I am amazed what was done with low power limits & Loran interference. Today, with high po
TX3A announced that they had "high QRN" just before they qsy'd to 80. Judging by the few postings, they must have been struggling on 160. Half an hour before my sunrise, they were back. They were ama
Right on Jake! I had to wait until the very cold weather before I could string my 500' Beverage down through a Cedar Swamp. What with the bugs & bottomless swamp ooze, you REALLY don't want to go in
I needed a Beverage towards Europe to use on my 1920's station, so I picked up a roll of #14 THHN and strung it out through a Cedar Swamp at 30" average height. I couldn't resist putting the MFJ on i
Hello Bruce, I'm located between Lake Superior & Lake Michigan, and have been on 160 for 8 years now. I've heard no beacons on the Great Lakes. I hear them mostly from the Northern Atlantic & the mid
I find that my 1927 Regenerative Receiver does quite well with QRN. No agc, excessive gain, or ringing filter problems at all & simple audio filtering is very effective. It has two different audio fi
Hello Charlie & Paul, I'm using a single vertical wire Marconi T with a pair of 6 wire cages for the tophat. Each cage starts at a single point at the vertical top, and has 3 foot dowel spreaders at
Hello Doug, The 50-60% figure depends on your soil conditions, so may vary quite a bit. With my poor, sandy soil, the Vf is 67.7% with the radials laying on the ground. When I buried them 6", the Vf
I cant agree with this conventional thinking. Why does a piece of wire magically lose its length just because you lay it on the ground? The electrical length changes because of Vf, and its resistance
In response to Eddy's (VE3CUI) question about anyone using "shortened radials", I have been using these for two years now, with very good results. Coming to TopBand after decades on VHF, I was confus
--Original Message-- From: k8bhz@hughes.net Sent: Friday, December 19, 2014 1:34 PM To: Bill Wichers Subject: Re: Topband: Confusion in ON4UN's Low Band DXing radial lengthcalculations. I fail to see
Very true peter, but with my 25 ohms or so impedance level, 2 ohms was hardly worth doubling the wire & shovel work.... Brian K8BHZ That might mean a lot at only 4 ohms radiation resistance 73 Peter
Actually, I don't believe the Brown et al experiments showed this conclusion at all. Their extensive experiments showed an optimal radial length of about 3/8 wavelength (actually 0.41). This, with ON
Hi Eddy, As usual, you've nailed it squarely! For many years I was an avid 2 meter DXer, really enjoying meteor scatter on ssb and moonbounce with cw. When digital methods came in to make those modes
I think you've missed Eddy's point. Like him, I don't have a computer in the shack. The radios are in my lab down in the basement; my computer is upstairs in the "computer room". Yes, I'm obviously o
I see....you copy CW at hundreds of words per minute in your head? Congratulations! One of my most memorable meteor scatter qso's was with a lady from the South who had the most beautiful accent, acc