Topbanders,
Finally got the right conditions to try something I've wanted to do
since I moved to this QTH. The Wisconsin River is out my front door,
and this year it froze hard enough before the snows to be safe to
walk on. So, today I installed the following: 1000' Beverage laying
on the ice (actually under a few inches of snow) terminated with 300
ohms to 1/4 wave wire in-line and 4 short (25') radials, at about 30
degrees to the main wire front and rear. Its pointed at 50
degrees. The river averages about 10-12 feet deep.
The transformer is a K9AY 9:1, RX-end ground is an 8' copperweld rod
driven right at the river's edge. Feedline is presently 100' of
RG58, isolated from the antenna ground, but not yet grounded except
thru the station ground via the coax shield to the radio. Tomorrow I
intend to put a short ground rod near the entrance and install a 100
bead choke following the ground rod.
Currently very disappointed. The antenna is, as expected, very
quiet. It hears enough noise to just barely wiggle the S meter on the Orion.
OH3XR was quite readable on the 4 square, but couldn't copy him on
the new antenna. Maybe I just don't have enough gain, but I think I
should have at least been able to tell he was there. The RDF of this
antenna should be quite superior to the inverted L Comtek 4-sq.
A complicating factor is that the preamp in the Orion won't switch
on. Hopefully a cockpit error, as I just got the radio 2 days ago
and haven't even started to learn all the functions, but nothing in
the manual says the preamp is dependent on anything but the front panel switch.
I had tried it earlier and it functioned normally. I tried rebooting
the radio with no result. Haven't tried master reset, and don't want
to yet, as I don't want to have to figure out all the settings again
before the Stew Perry tomorrow night.
Any advice on either something I should try with the antenna or to
get the preamp working on the radio will be appreciated. I do have
an outboard preamp I will hook up tomorrow, if need be. Tonight I
have a Christmas party, so can't do what I really want to do till later.
73 Ron KK9K
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