4m Transverter

Tonight was the 4m Tuesday night contest and this time I was determined to try to hear something on this band. My Yaesu FT817 does not cover 4m, so I thought I might try to get my transverter running again after years of being in the loft packed away.

My Yaesu FT101E is still running fine after it's service, so I hunted around to find the necessary leads to connect the transverter to the FT101E. The only lead I didn't have was a connection from the antenna (which is BNC) to the UHF input on the transverter. A trip to Maplin was in order to purchase a BNC socket connector. I also bought a cheap CB type SWR Meter, I needed it so that I see if my transverter put out any RF!

The contest started at 8.00pm and guess what? It still worked! Heard loads of stations, but although my SWR meter tells me that RF is present, nobody could hear me!!!

Managed to work Ross G6GVI, he could hear me OK, but why could other stations who were quite strong not hear a trace?

I measured the power out of the tranverter at about 3w, so really I put it down to my vertical and a very poor SWR.

I am amazed that the transverter still works, it is also a 6m transverter as well and this also works fine!

Spring!

At last...its Spring!!

Gosh...what an awful Winter we have had this year...snow, snow, snow. A gorgeous morning today, but clouded later.

Been planning my new antenna array, thinking about a 5ele 2m yagi, 10 ele 70cm yagi and maybe a 3 ele 50mhz yagi. All this with a (cheapish) rotator monted on the side of the house next to my shack. looking forward to going to the NRSA rally at Blackpool so that I can collect all the bits.

Spring is sprung

Grass is riz

Wonder wher dem birdies iz?

Shakespeare

So what has this blog got to do Shakespeare?

Well, today we had to give a presentation to members of the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC). Although my knowledge of the man and his work is a bit sparce, I was totally fascinated by todays visit. I probably learned more about Shakespeare and how it can be used to inspire young people and communities than I ever would have thought. During the presentation we used a video clip of one of our children in school using digital technology that was truely amazing!

I still don't understand Shakespeare, but my English teachers at Hayward School certainly did and above is a picture of my old English teachers Mr Hanley and Mr Worthington taking group to Stratford-upon-Avon back in 1970.

Stand up for Shakespeare!

FT101E Revival!

My Yaesu FT101E has sat in the loft now for the last three years gathering dust. I decided a few weeks ago to bring this wonderful rig back to reality again and try to use it again. I bought it down from the loft and plugged it in only to find that it didn't work!!

The switches were noisy and no output from the transmitter, so tonight I spent some time getting it up and running again.

Nothing a squirt of WD40 can't cure!

Even managed to cure the sticky drive mechanism. This rig is superb, built like a brick toilet and still calibrated even after three or more years of neglect! I bought FT101E in 1980, the year my daughter was born, cost £380...a lot of money then...but 30 years on it still performs!