Micheal,
I do FM Only. The folks on the contesting reflector are super helpful. Do a
search on the reflector under "VHF contesting KM4KMU" on google or using the
reflector search tool under my call KM4KMU. Lots of great information from the
contesters here.
My QRZ page may be of some help too. Last night I gave a 45 slide one hour
presentation on my FM station build and contesting experience, good, bad,
lessons learned from last January and this past September. If you send me your
email address (send to nosigma@aol.com) I will post the presentation to Drop
Box and pass a link for you to down load the presentation if your interested.
I am adding 6m FM to my station for January. I have been torn between building
a custom beam (mountain top mobile via Jeep) or getting the Dominator omni and
setting up a second mast. I am probably going to go with the beam since the 6M
rig is all about the multipliers.
I love my M2 220-10 EZ and 440-18 beams. The 220 antenna was perfect at
factory settings out of the box. the 440 was a bit more challenging to get
dialed in perfectly, it took a couple hours with network analyzer to get it
spot on perfect, but I tend to be a little uncompromising.
I run the CX-333. Its a great antenna. I use it for close in work, under 60
miles and the beams for reaching out and grabbing grids/multipliers,187 miles
is the best so far. Beyond that one condition I find that the omni is pretty
worthless. I exhaust the close in contacts after about 10 minutes at the top of
each hour and after that its all about the beams. My location is unique, your
results may vary. FM can be a bit of a desert so BIC is key.
73
John Young
KM4KMU
-----Original Message-----
From: Michael Murphy <michael@k5mbm.com>
To: vhfcontesting <vhfcontesting@contesting.com>
Sent: Thu, Nov 3, 2016 1:01 pm
Subject: Re: [VHFcontesting] Setting up new station
Thank you all who responded. You've all given me something to think about.
Following on some of the advice given, I am going to shoot for FM only
in the January contest. I will not have moved to the new location yet
so it won't be optimum, but it will be a start. All I really need to do
is get a 6 meter FM antenna up. I already have a Comet CX-333 for 2,
1.25 and 70cm. I am thinking of getting a Dominator 6M antenna from
Norwalk Electronics. It will handle 1500 watts and is highly rated.
Right now my antennas are mounted on 20' poles attached to the eave of
the house. I have 10 segments of Rohn 25g to put up at the new
location, but I am thinking of a temporary 30' setup with the 6M antenna
attached to the top. Along with setting up the logging software, I
should be able to get it all done by the January contest.
As somebody said, this will give me experience in the process from
beginning to end and afterwards I can evaluate what needs to be improved.
Again Thanks,
Michael Murphy
K5MBM
EM20
On 10/29/2016 11:13 PM, Michael Murphy wrote:
> This is an opinion question, so tell me your opinion and why you feel the way
> you do. I have been wanting to get into vhf contests, but haven't got it all
> together yet. I currently have a Yaesu 450D and 100D. Also have 3 Tyt 9000
> (2m, 1.25m and 70cm FM). I will be moving in a few months and have been
> thinking about the new shack and thinking of upgrading the equipment. So if
> you were to start from scratch to build a decent single operator station
> primarily for Vhf contest (I've be doing HF just fine with what I've got
> now), what equipment would you use? I like that the Elecraft K3 has support
> for multiple transverters. I also like the Icom IC-9100 for its 2m and 70cm
> capability, but no transverter support. When it comes to tranverters, I like
> the way the Elecraft transverters work with the K3, but Demi has more band
> choices. As far as antennas go, I've only got a triband vertical for the
> FMs. So any thoughts and comments are welcome.
>
>
> Sent from my iPad
> _______________________________________________
> VHFcontesting mailing list
> VHFcontesting@contesting.com
> http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/vhfcontesting
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