When we were Novices, it's a wonder we made any contacts at all :-) Back
in '55, I was the only ham in Port Orford when I got on and had a sort of
Elmer in W7EUG, who lived in Riverton. He gave me my Novice and
Conditional tests. He had an 80 meter dipole and had it fed with that old
'twisted pair' telephone line for a feedline. He gave me some of it to use
on my first antenna.
I had a Heathkit AT-1 transmitter and one crystal for 7178.5. I didn't
have any PL-259's so I just bent one of the wires on the twisted pair
(which was really stiff copperweld/steel wire) and poked it in the coax
jack on the back of the AT-1. The other wire I just taped to the outside
of the coax jack with a piece of tape.
Actually worked a WL7 one night for my first ever DX contacts. That whet
my appetite for more :-) 73
Tom W7WHY
On Sun, Oct 1, 2017 at 6:22 PM, Don W7WLL <w7wll@arrl.net> wrote:
> Amateur radio is more than a hobby, but that is certainly one part of the
> definition.
>
> I think we, including myself, often let ourselves get embroiled in
> subjective issues where our opinion seems important to weigh in about, over
> other things.
>
> I think K9YC hit the nail on the head back a few posts, you can work the
> world on most anything, if you've the patience. I remember as a kid back in
> '55 actually trying to load different weird things and good friend W7GG
> (then W7TDK) giving me signal reports from about 2 miles away. Didn't prove
> anything but that you could do that.
>
> I do want to know what I should be doing, and what the supporting and
> proven scientific methods are that support the 'should'. Like everyone who
> puts antennas up, from a practical standpoint I probably will usually end
> up with something a bit off mark (but will understand why and be willing to
> live with any undesirable circumstances). You do what you got to do and
> what you can do.
>
> And what antenna works on on person's site might be a dummy load on
> another's. Just the way it is.
>
> Let's not get uptight. It is OK to talk about one's own experience or
> opinion but let's not attack another's. I think it is OK and right to
> correct something that is scientifically known to be inaccurate (but
> careful, your circumstances may vary).
>
> I'm still not a Ford man but that doesn't make them a 'bad' car.
>
> Take a breath everyone!
>
> Don W7WLL
>
>
_______________________________________________
_______________________________________________
TowerTalk mailing list
TowerTalk@contesting.com
http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/towertalk
|