December 1 2025 #280 - Antennas, Amplifiers, and Mobile Radio Reality Checks | W3GMS Workbench

This edition of the W3GMS 985 Workbench delivers a deep, practical dive into real-world amateur radio problems and solutions, with one of the most active and wide-ranging discussions of the month. Hosted by WA3VE, the group works through antenna theory, amplifier restoration, mobile antenna tradeoffs, and station-building decisions that every ham eventually faces.

Topics include G5RV feedline behavior and balun use, ladder line versus coax losses, Clipperton L amplifier restoration and power-supply capacitor upgrades, inrush current protection and step-start circuits, and hands-on advice for safely modernizing vintage HF amplifiers. The discussion also covers hex beam mechanical design, mounting considerations, and combining directional HF antennas with VHF/UHF verticals.

On the mobile side, the group breaks down short versus long VHF/UHF antennas, gain claims in dBi versus dBd, fender and bed mounting strategies for pickup trucks, garage-clearance realities, and why more metal still matters—despite marketing claims. New and experienced operators alike weigh in with practical field experience rather than theory alone.

As always, the Workbench blends technical depth with collaborative problem-solving, making it a valuable listen for anyone building, upgrading, repairing, or rethinking their amateur radio station.

Recorded live on the W3GMS 146.985 MHz repeater

Weekly Workbench – Mondays at 8 PM Eastern

Topics include: antennas, baluns, ladder line, HF amplifiers, power-supply design, mobile installs, and RF reality checks

What is W3GMS Monday Night Workbench Net?

Every Monday Evening at 8pm Eastern Time, the W3GMS/R Crew get together on the repeater at 146.985Mhz and discuss technical questions and sometimes do lessons related to Ham Radio for newer Operators to learn from experienced Elmers. The Workbench was set up to be a safe place for any technical questions to get asked and good answers to be given.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Good evening. Welcome to the 985 Workbench.

I'm Ron. My call sign is WA3VE. I'm very honored to be your host for this edition of the 146.985 Workbench.

I'm located in Westchester, Pennsylvania. We meet every Monday night at 8 p.m. local time here on the W3GMS Parksburg Repeater. 146.985 MHz with an input PL tone of 100 Hz.

For those who use tone squelch on receive, the repeater transmits a squelch tone of 94.8 Hz. Newcomers are very welcome. We encourage all stations to check in.

Take a look at the repeater website located at www.w3gmsrepeater.com. It has lots of information including technical articles, pictures of 985 users in action, and repeater etiquette and history.

Please be aware that on occasion, such as tonight, the repeater is experiencing intermod interference.

Please run maximum power or be prepared to check in digitally through Echolink or All Star. We want to hear you. To be able to use Echolink or All Star on 985, however, you need to register with us.

Directions for doing so can be found on the website. Again, w3gmsrepeater.com.

Also, when the AirMod is present before starting a transmission, give a short call to the host, that being me, am I getting in okay?

Once I confirm that you are, then you can share your longer comments.

And incidentally, as we go along, I will try to keep an eye on the squelch tails and let you know if the AirMod is present.

So, here on the workbench, we focus on answering general questions of radio theory and operation.

Additionally, we invite each station to briefly comment on your amateur radio activity in the past week.

When checking in, please indicate if you have a question for the workbench.

If you don't have a question, still check in.

After all stations have checked in, we will first share what we've done this past week using a roundtable format.

Please write down the call of the station that checks in right after you.

When you have finished your comments, turn the mic over to them.

Once we have made all of our comments, we will start the Q&A portion of the workbench operating as a directed net.

I will call on the station that indicated having a question and then for stations who wish to respond to that question.

Wait to be recognized by net control before beginning a transmission.

This helps us keep things orderly.

At times, though, it helps for two stations to go back and forth to clarify the situation, get more information, or ask additional questions.

Feel free to do that as needed, but then pass, when you're through, pass it back to net control, that being made.

And the following is a good rule to follow in general.

Don't be too quick to talk.

Pause a couple seconds before hitting the press-to-talk switch.

This is not only good repeater etiquette, as I just said, in general.

But the pauses are especially helpful to those who are on All Star and Echo Link.

When you do click the PTT button, wait a second before starting to talk.

We don't want to miss what you have to say, and it takes a moment for the repeater to process the PL tone,

and especially if this is helpful for the digital stations.

The repeater has a three-minute timer.

If you talk for more than three minutes without letting up on your microphone button,

the repeater completely shuts down until you release your PTT.

So every two to three minutes, release the mic button for just a moment,

and then you can continue, and that looks like this.

You don't need to let the repeater carrier drop.

Before we begin, I want to say thanks to all of our fellow Workbench hosts.

They're the ones who make this happen.

If you'd be interested in hosting Workbench, please contact Jim, AF3Z, or any one of us,

and we'll help you get started.

Lastly, please join us this Thursday night.

I think it's Mike, W3MFB, who is our host,

for the Thanksgiving evening edition of the Thursday night roundtable at 8 p.m.

Okay, this time we're going to start the check-in process.

Remember to indicate if you have a question for the group once you give your call sign.

So, digital stations only.

Digital stations only.

Those using Echolink or All Star.

This is WA3VE.

This is the 146-985 Workbench.

Digital stations only.

Please call now.

This is W1RC. I do not have a question, but maybe I might have an answer.

3EE, John in Landisville.

3EE, John.

call sign. So again, don't be too quick to talk. Additional digital stations, this is WA3VEE. Please call now.

Whiskey 8, Charlie Romeo Whiskey, CR, no question.

Certainly recognize CR. Great to have you guys on board tonight. Let's move to RF and then we'll give another call in general for additional check-ins here, digital and RF. Those now using RF, those using RF, please call now.

AC3RFG, Jim in Malvern, no questions, Ron.

If you can hear me, Ron.

It says, Alpha Alpha 3, Lima Hotel, and I'll have a question.

KC3YSM, Steven Downingtown, no questions.

AB3AP, Mike in Avondale with no questions.

Hold on one second there. Mike, we have you. Is there another station who doubled with Mike? This is WA3VEE. Please call now.

That may have been me. This is KC3YSM. If that was me, here I am. This is Steven Downingtown. KC3YSM.

Steve, I have you. Was there just another station?

Fried turkey.

Okay John, got you that time. Okay, let's resume the check-in process.

Additional check-ins for the Monday night workbench. This is WA3 VEE. Please call now.

Watt 3 Foxtrot, Foxtrot.

Watt 3 Foxtrot, Bravo.

Again, there's another double, somebody double with Mike. W3MFB, other station calling please.

Watt 3 Foxtrot, Foxtrot, Zulu.

Jim, got you in there. Very good. Additional stations for the Monday night workbench. Please call now.

KC3SQI in Spring City. Good evening.

A whole bunch of doubles tonight. I got Wayne KC3SQI, other station to double with Wayne please.

Hi Ron, K3DBD, Kilowatt 3 Delta, Bravo Delta. Bob in Spring City.

Welcome aboard. Welcome aboard for short. Good to hear you. Okay, let's continue the check-in process. This is WA3 VEE. Additional stations, please call now.

KC3CW. No questions.

KC3KZJ, no questions.

KC3MAI, Joe in Downingtown, no questions.

KC3MAI, Joe in Downingtown, no questions.

KiloVector3, Juliet Gulf, Bravo, no questions.

KC3MAI, Joe in Downingtown, no questions.

KC3MAI, Joe in Downingtown, no questions.

KC3MAI, Joe in Downingtown, no questions.

Kilo Delta 3, Alpha India Sierra, Tim and Malvern with a question.

Very good. Let's stop right there. We've got some questions in here.

An awfully, awfully nice list tonight. Wonderful.

From the top, we've got W1RC, KD3EE, W8CRW.

Again, please write down who follows you.

KC3RFG, AA3LH, Leon, I heard you without a radio.

KC3YSM, Steve, great to hear you tonight. That's wonderful.

AB3AP, Mike. WA3KFT. K3FOX, Renee, wonderful. Welcome aboard.

MFB, AF3Z, KC3SQI, K3DBD, NA3CW, W3KZG, KC3MAI, KV3JGB, and KD3AIS.

Those with questions so far are Leon, AA3LH, and Tim, KD3AIS.

Did I miss anybody before I call for additional check-ins?

This is WA3VEE. Please call now.

The SQI question.

Wayne, thank you so much. I missed that you had a question there.

Okay, additional check-ins before we get started. Digital or RF and I'll leave plenty of room. This is WA3VE. Please call now.

Thank you.

Basically, definitely less than a minute, 30 seconds to a minute.

What did you do in ham radio this week?

Then we'll get to the Q&A section in these three questions.

W1RC, WA3VE, it's all yours, Mr. Mike.

You turn it over to me, Ron, sorry.

I did it. W1RC, go ahead.

I'm going to say good evening to everybody on the workbench tonight.

Just as you were talking, I got a phone call, so I told my buddy I'd call him back.

Say good evening to everybody and getting ready for Thanksgiving.

What did I do this week in amateur radio?

Well, I got a new radio last week.

I found a nice K3S.

I picked it up and I'm trying to figure it out, all the buttons and the knobs and everything.

Boy, that's a confusing radio, but boy, I'll tell you, it does everything.

It's really unbelievable what that box does.

Dual receivers in it and everything else.

So I hope you had a good time up in Maine.

I understand you were up in Maine.

And I figure if you're going to Maine from Pennsylvania, you'd be going through Massachusetts.

It's pretty hard to do that without going through this state anyways.

While you were gone, I sent you an email about something that we had been working on, and I wonder if you got that.

If you didn't, I'll resend it.

But that's something that I was talking to you about, and it's finished.

I got it done.

It seems everything is okay.

So I didn't get the call sign of the station that came in after me, but you know who you are.

So go ahead.

W1RC, standing by.

Oh, that's me.

KD3EE.

This is John.

Am I making it in?

Yes, you are.

Okay, great.

Thanks, Mike.

This is KD3EE.

John in Landisville.

My past week, I was at the lunch, or the breakfast, I guess.

You know, it starts at 9, could be lunch.

And then I wandered off to Marsh Creek to activate the park.

I set up my speaker wire doublet that I've been playing around with.

I tried, this time I had some time.

I tried the 4-to-1 ballon and the 9-to-1 ballon to see how it did, if it made it any easier to tune.

It didn't really, but I did stick with the 4-to-1.

I made 15 contacts on 10 meters with FT8, 4 watts.

And I made 11 park-to-park contacts with CW on 20 meters.

So I could have done the whole activation, which requires 10, on CW, so that's kind of cool.

I also set up my all-star node this past week to keep recordings of what it transmits, which is mostly just connected to this repeater.

So I could have recordings of this stuff, like maybe this workbench.

Let's see.

Next up is CR.

I got to talk to CR at breakfast a lot.

Thanks for saving me a seat.

CRW, this is KD3EE.

Very good, John.

Thanks.

And Ron, glad you had a safe trip up to Maine and everything went well for you.

Good evening, all.

This is CR.

Let's see.

This week in ham radio, the normal 985 things to include breakfast, which was great.

Went over to Bill's on Saturday and was one of the helpers with him changing out his 2-meter, 70-centimeter antenna.

SimplexNet this coming Saturday is looking for homebrew antennas, so I put together a 2-meter-quarter wave.

I tested it today, talking to Joe and Ron, so I'm ready for Saturday, Bill.

And the next person is Jim, KC3RFG, WHCRW.

KC3RW, KC3RFG.

Thanks for passing to me, CR.

And I agree with you.

Breakfast was great, as always.

And thank you to Ron, WA3VE, for hosting the workbench this evening.

Not too much activity here again.

This week I've been really busy outside, so not much to say except the normal daily nets I do and some 985 activity as well.

So with that, I will send it over to Leon, AA3LH, from KC3RFG.

Jim, take it away, Leon.

Thank you, Jim.

Thanks for giving it to me.

I appreciate it.

This is Alpha Alpha 3 Lima Hotel.

Yeah!

It's past week.

Somehow or another, I decided I got the idea I wanted to drop antennas.

I'll dipole antennas and take a look at them.

So I've been doing that, playing with antennas.

And that's what's going to lead to the question then.

But, yeah, that's what I was doing.

Spent a couple days, you know, three hours a day dropping antennas and researching them and checking them out.

And that's what I did, because I went to breakfast.

And, of course, they're on some two meters.

But that is my idea.

Now I want to give us over to KC3YSM.

Mr. Steve, go ahead at A3LH.

Thank you, Leon.

This is KC3YSM.

Good evening, everybody, and the group.

A nice breakfast on Friday attended.

That was great to see everybody.

A quiet week.

A couple nets.

Getting ready for Thanksgiving.

And this year is a quiet one.

Usually I'm hosting about 25 people.

And this year we are, well, it's low-key.

There's going to be about six of us.

So that's all good.

But that's about it for me.

So this is KC3YSM.

I'm going to turn it over to you, Mike.

AB3AP.

Here you go.

KC3YSM.

AB3AP.

Good evening, all.

Well, ham radio for me for about the past month, this is my first time on the air.

Roughly a month ago, my wife got assigned to a project at Schofield Barracks on Oahu in Hawaii.

And being the selfless husband I am, I offered to accompany her and tag along.

So while she was working hard and dealing with the Chinese threat in the Pacific, I was sipping Mai Tais and walking the beach in Waikiki.

So it's good to be back home after a very turbulent flight home.

And I snugged up my dive pole, which I had loosened before going to survive any storms.

And back to the old routine.

So with that, over to you, John.

WA3KFT.

AB3AP.

KB3AP.

WA3KingFoxTango.

Okay.

Very good, Mike.

Well, I've been perousing the bands.

Ten meters has had a number of openings.

And even these past couple of days.

So nothing like talking to Texas and Oklahoma and so on.

Haven't heard North and South Dakota in a while.

But I think the guys will wake up and they'll find out that talking to the East Coast is available.

But two meters, six meters, and ten meters is where I spend most of my time.

I do spend some on 40 meters.

So, usually 40 meters on Sunday.

So, we kind of go from there.

And so far, all 14 of my antennas are where they belong, up in the air.

And I've got my fingers crossed when the wind blows.

Kilowatt three.

Fox, Fox.

Ready.

WA3KingFoxTango.

Good evening to everyone on the workbench this evening.

What did I do this week?

Well, I began work on the Clepperton, which I mentioned a couple of weeks ago.

I got that verified that the transformer works, but I don't have, and I've got voltage, but it's low.

So, I put a new tarback power supply cap board.

I'll be working on that next couple of days.

I finished, I fixed my IFR 1500.

So, now I have that board in the test area.

I fixed, actually bought a, a while back at the Hamfest, I picked up an FT-101B.

It was a kind of crappy shape, but I just needed it for the fan, for another one.

And I started playing with it, cleaning it up, and tweaking a few things, and darn, it's back on the air.

And it has full power.

So, that was a pretty good thing this week.

Been playing, learning more about my 3D printer,

and making some things that I found useful on some of my, uh, uh, my working on these rigs.

I have a question.

Uh, it's related to the, uh, hardback board, but, uh, if you want to add that to the list and call an audible here, I'd appreciate that, uh, Ron.

So, back to, uh, over to, uh, uh, Mike at W3MFB, K3FF.

Awesome, awesome, awesome.

Awesome, awesome. W3MFB.

Uh, Weekend Ham Radio.

Uh, uh, just playing with that any tone.

Thank you, CR.

Uh, 5-5, quad 5, or whatever, the newer version.

Been playing with that, making contacts on it in the mobile.

Uh, a little bit of driving.

A little bit of stationary.

Uh, but it's working well.

Sounds great on the air.

It's excellent on AM.

And my Yaesu FT-991 Alpha sounds like garbage on AM.

So, just food for thought.

But the any tone quad 5, new generation, sounds brilliant on AM.

Uh, so AM and sideband and FM works very well.

So, thank you, thank you.

So, yeah, that's working good there.

And then been chit-chatting with Barry on 10-meter, uh, parked usually on 28, 390 around lunchtime when he's home working from home.

And the last two CUSOs we've had, uh, folks pop in.

We had a guy from London pop in one day, last week.

And then we had, uh, a gentleman from, uh, North Texas pop in as well.

So, that was fun.

So, that's about it for me.

So, over to Jim, AF3Z, W3MFB.

Okay, very good.

Thank you, Mike.

AF3Z here.

And not much to report.

A few conversations on the, uh, on the repeater here.

And, uh, probably some CW sometime.

I can't even tell you what.

So, been a low, uh, time for, uh, AM radio here this past week.

So, with that, Wayne, over to you.

KC3SQI AF3Z.

Thank you, Jim.

AF3SQI.

This is KC3SQI.

Um, far as radio, um, I've been working a little bit on, uh, getting my, uh, 7300 retuned to the new antennas.

And, uh, trying to get the waterfall working with the new antennas.

And, uh, getting the, uh, baseline working.

And, uh, trying to look at, uh, 6 meters here at the same time.

And I'm trying to work on, uh, on the, uh, rigs tonight.

So, with that, I'll turn it over to K3DBD.

This is KC3SQI.

KC3SQI.

All right.

Good evening.

And, uh, nice, uh, nice group tonight.

This is K3DBD.

My name's Bob.

And I'm in the, uh, most western part of Chester County you can get without getting into Montgomery County.

I'm pretty much about a quarter of a mile from the Schuylkill River up here in Spring City.

Try to, uh, listen here, I've listened here a lot over the years.

And I thought I should check in here and, uh, be a little bit more vocal.

I'm, uh, I'm, uh, I have the, I have my beam on it and, uh, it's generally slammed up against the stop.

But, uh, I don't know, maybe, maybe an F7 tonight.

So, not sure what would cause that, but, oh well.

And my noise floor is already starting to go up.

Uh, the, the Christmas decorations from my, my neighbor are, uh, alive and active.

And, uh, I'm not sure what goes on over there, but, um, it creates a lot of RFI.

And, uh, this week in ham radio, I didn't do a whole heck of a lot.

Uh, we had breakfast up here at our local radio club, the Potsdam Group.

Uh, I did that on Wednesday. That was a lot of fun.

Um, what else did I do in ham radio?

Didn't much, didn't much, anything on HF.

Just some GHF, uh, work.

And, uh, had a couple, well, I did work on a, on a power supply.

We have a power supply that, uh, was up at our repeater site that got blown up through a power failure.

It's an MSJ 75 amp switching power supply, which is, every now and then I pull it out and do a little work on it.

And it's still not repaired.

And if you can't find a schematic for it, that would be nice.

Um, let me drop it a moment.

All right.

And, um, now I'm also repairing a 1950 vintage Warlister jukebox for a friend of mine.

They've got a, a circuit port in there that got broken in half and part of the record selecting mechanism.

And, and there's not much in the way of electronics.

But, boy, is there a lot of relays.

Holy cow.

Relay, relay logic, I guess we could call that.

So, uh, so that was my activities this week.

Um, also, uh, for those of you who get QST, uh, the latest issue of QST is a nice article written by a couple of our club members up this way, uh, Bill Hewitt and, uh, the mayor president was in there on, uh, on CODA activities.

And, uh, it's quite good.

If you've got that, uh, try to read that over.

And, uh, it's, uh, it's a local group.

Some of you guys, uh, down this way or down the Parksburg way may have, uh, attended some of those, uh, gatherings.

And, um, but I think, I think the next on my list is NA3CW at Chuck.

So we'll see how, see if I got it right.

So Chuck, over to you.

And, uh, the best to everyone.

K3DVD.

Yeah, Bob, you got it right.

And, uh, welcome to 9A5.

We hear a lot of people, hear a lot of people listening to us, but, uh, we like to talk to them as well.

So, uh, be not scarce.

Um, not much to report, uh, this week.

Did the breakfast, of course.

Great time.

Lots of people came out.

Um, got to talk to quite a few.

Not as many as I wanted to, but things, I had to move on.

And, um, local, uh, mobile activities.

Uh, and, uh, of course, uh, working at Bill's place, putting up his new antenna, which, uh, Joe reports from Bill that, uh, it works very, very well.

And a good time was had by all, uh, number of folks here on this, uh, this network, uh, present.

And, uh, as Bill said, uh, to have that much competent help made a, uh, difficult job a fun one.

And, uh, it was done safely.

And, uh, thanks especially to, uh, Travis and to George, who, uh, were our Skyhook guys.

Uh, so, over to another guy that was on site.

Scott, W3KZG, NA3CW.

Uh, W3KZG.

Yeah, ditto on all that, Chuck.

It was a fun day over there.

A little, a little windy and chilly, but we got through.

And, yeah, Travis and George were the, uh, were the kings of that tower.

So, we got it done.

And, uh, can't wait to, uh, see the kind of distance Bill can get on that, uh, antenna.

So, I did the similar thing as Chuck did.

I was at the breakfast and then we, uh, helped Bill swap out his antenna.

So, that was my week in ham radio.

It goes to KC3MAI.

This is W3KZG.

W3KZG.

Thank you, Scott.

Uh, KC3MAI.

Joe here in Downingtown.

Uh, unfortunately, I was not able to make the breakfast.

I would have liked to have done that.

I couldn't get the day off.

So, uh, I was really upset about that.

But, um, gonna have to try for the next one.

Um, I didn't do anything on HF.

I did have a little bit of time to spend, uh, with my CW.

Uh, learning, trying to listen to some more letters.

I didn't put the amount of time in that I would have liked.

But I still did get a little bit in.

So, I was happy about that.

Um, with the help of John K and 3i, we started to look a little bit more at, uh, an all-star note.

I'm gonna look at, uh, you know, probably pulling for one of those within the next week or two.

So, he was very helpful in, uh, letting me know what I should be looking at.

Um, so, I, I appreciate his help.

So, that's about it on my end.

Um, I'm gonna give the piston over to Matt, KV3JGB, KC3MAI.

Thanks, Joe.

Thanks for the show.

This is KV3JGB.

Uh, yeah, real quick.

I know we got a lot of, a lot of people here.

So, let's see.

A couple, I'll just say real quick.

A couple weeks ago, I had Patrick on the HF.

We talked to, uh, he got someone in the Edmonton Fitzgerald special event on the shores of, uh, of the Lake of Bears, which one I can't remember, so I won't say it.

Um, so, that was kind of cool for him.

Uh, did the Friday breakfast, which was always fun.

Helped, well, I don't know if I helped.

A bunch of KC3, okay, Bill's antenna raising.

But, it was very cool.

I got some videos and pictures and, Ron, I, I gotta send that over to you so you can put up on your, on your thing to send out to the group.

'Cause I got some good, good stuff there for people who couldn't make it.

Uh, actually, I guess that's it for me.

I kind of spoke kind of fast there, uh, as I tend to do, so.

Um, actually, I'm gonna hand it back to you, Ron.

I put my kids to bed and didn't write down who was next here, so.

KV3JGB.

That goes to Tim.

KD3AISWA3.

ZEE.

KD3AISWA3.

This is KD3AIS.

Tim in Malvern.

Uh, this week I did attend the breakfast and I did get my 27, uh, ICOM 2730A installed in my new to me vehicle.

And, depended on the help of some fine gentlemen on the repeater to make sure it worked properly.

But it also leads to my question when the time comes.

So, I will turn it back to Ron.

W-A-3-V-E-E.

This is KD3AIS.

Very good, Tim.

Well, thank you so much.

Excellent comments all the way around.

And, Mr. Mike, yes, I did get your email.

I've been offline for the past few days, uh, higher priorities with family stuff, so sorry to say.

But, I'll get to your email here eventually and respond to that.

All very, very good.

Okay, before I, uh, well, first of all, before I get to the questions, let me see if there are any additional,

check-ins.

You're listening to the 146-985 workbench.

This is W-A-3-V-E-E.

Your host, Ron in Westchester, calling for additional check-ins.

Digital or RF?

Please call now.

Hello, Charlie-3.

Oscar, Oscar, Kilo.

A-3-G-L-I.

No comment, no question, just lurking.

Uh, V-E-2, Alpha Echo Delta, uh, 50 miles outside of Montreal.

Hold for a second.

The V-A-V-E-2 station again, please, and your name.

Sure, my name is Howard.

H-O-W-A-R-D, Hotel Oscar Whiskey, Alpha Romeo Delta.

My call is V-E-2 Alpha Echo Delta.

I'm pretty active on H-S, so if anybody has been active, you've probably heard me.

Uh, just checking in.

Very good, Howard.

Welcome aboard.

Uh, glad to have you tonight, especially from up there in Montreal.

Uh, one last call for check-ins before we get to the Q-A portion.

This is W-A-3, V-E-E.

C-3-H-Q said just to say hello to everybody.

I don't know anything about antennas, although I help work with them.

with them but I don't know what makes them work and stuff but I just wanted to say hi. KC3HTZ.

Very good. Excellent all the way around. So that's additional check-ins here. I acknowledge

Bill, KC3OOK, KA3GLI, VE2AED, and KC3HQZ. So Bill, your quick comments on what happened in the ham radio, yeah big question here. What happened in ham radio in the OOK world this week?

Not much at all, Ron. KC3OOK here. Good evening everyone. You've got a huge group here and a lot of good questions. And some new people and it's great to hear them. For me, of course, the breakfast and the antenna party.

And I want to say thank you to Joe for organizing the party and especially thank you to Joe for the antenna. And thanks to everyone that helped come out and put that up. It was a lot of fun. And I think Chuck sums it up. But we have a very efficient group of people. And there's just so many helpful people on 95. So it is much appreciated.

And I know you've got a big group here, Ron. But I'm just going to relay just one of the results. I'll actually give you two. I worked a station in Dauphin County Saturday night on the Simplex net running 12 watts and I had a 5.7. But the most telling was I worked Jeff, W3KAM.

And normally, working the X510s, we cannot hear each other. He can hear me when he turns his beam right on me. Last night, he could hear me with the same signal strength as his beam. So, yep, it made an improvement.

Okay, with that, let's see. I'm going to turn it over to Dave. Ka3GLI. KC3OOK.

Okay, Bill. Sounds like he should be in pretty good shape there. Ka3GLI.

Not a whole lot going on here this past week. Mainly just the breakfast. So, I'll send it on to the next person. I'm sorry. I forgot to write down the next call sign. Ka3GLI.

Very, very good, Dave. Not a problem at all. I just was across the room here. It goes to VE2AED up in Quebec. Go ahead, Howard.

I'm not sure. My phone rang, and I'm using my phone. So, let me just see if I'm doubling with anybody. This is VE2AED. Hang on.

Okay, I guess it's all mine. Good evening, gentlemen. My name's Howard. I'm located about 50 miles northwest of Montreal on a nice, snowy antenna farm.

And I thought I'd check in. I called W1RC, Mike, out near Boston on the phone, and he couldn't talk.

And I conspicuously heard a W3 call in the background of his house when he said he couldn't speak.

So, I guessed right away that he's probably on this net.

I just wanted to say hi to everybody. And I know there are many on, so I won't hold it.

And hopefully, I'll work some of you on HF. I'm reasonably active and tend to experiment more than transmit, but do a lot of listening.

Not sure who net control is, but thank you very much for being there.

This is VE2AED near Montreal.

Very good, Howard. Excellent. This is WA3, Victor Echo Echo, WA3, V-E-E. Name is Ron, Romeo Oscar, November.

I'm located in Westchester, Pennsylvania, about 25 miles west of Philadelphia.

Glad to have you on board tonight, for sure.

And, Jean, your comments very quickly.

KC3HQZ, WA3, V-E-E.

We are working right now on our HF antenna, trying to get it up high enough and stuff so it can be heard,

because we've had trouble with it. We're having trouble with radios working, too.

We have some in the shop, so it's a little bit of a frustrating thing sometimes, getting this stuff to go.

But we're getting there. We got the antenna up higher, so I'm hoping that's going to work better tomorrow morning.

KC3HQZ.

Very good, Jean. Excellent.

Well, very good. Thanks for all the comments.

And I have so far the questions. I've got Leon, AA3LH.

We've got Renee, K3FF.

KC3SQI, Wayne.

And I've got Tim, KD3AIS.

Anyone else with questions tonight?

Thank you.

Very good. Let's proceed, then.

Now we'll turn to the questions and answers.

We encourage all stations to make comments, observations, and share experiences.

Don't assume that your level of experience and knowledge isn't enough.

We can all learn from each other and contribute to our discussions,

so feel free to pick up the mic and have some fun.

Okay, Leon, it's your turn with the question.

AA3LH, WA3, VEE.

All right, this is AA3LH.

The question that I have, I have a G5RV that I play with from time to time.

When I travel, I put it up and travel.

And it's got crappy brown ladder line, as this repeater tends to call that.

That's 450-ohm ladder line.

A 50-ohm coax screws right on the end of that.

Isn't there a loss right there?

I mean, you don't use a bow in it.

If you look up the directions, they say do not use a bow in it.

Or an isolator.

I should not use that.

And if I do, I have a loss.

Yet I have a 130-foot flat wire, 80-meter antenna that's got about 50 feet of crappy brown stuff on it.

On the end of that, it's a 4-to-1 bow, and so it matches.

Why don't I need a bow on my G5RV?

What's the difference?

Back to the net control, AA3LH.

Very good, AA3LH, WA3VE.

Comments for Leon.

Please call now.

KFT?

KFT, WA3VE.

John, go ahead.

The ladder line is part of the antenna.

So, the point where you connect the coax to the ladder line would be the same as connecting coax to the middle of a dipole antenna.

The ladder line is part of the antenna.

So, basically, you have a ladder line that's a vertical, and then you have a flat top for the top of the G5RV.

WA3 KFT.

Thank you, John.

Additional comments for Leon. This is WA3VE. Please call now.

NA3CW.

NA3CW. WA3VE. Go ahead, Chuck.

NA3CW. If memory serves, G5RV himself also said you could run balanced line all the way back to the station.

And then, of course, you would have a balance to feed that.

The fact that it's going to coax, you know, and it runs a fairly high S-- well, you'll have to tell me what your SWR is running. But, um, yeah, the-- another possibility is just run twin lead back to the station, too.

NA3CW.

Very good. Additional comments? Please call now.

Nothing heard. AA3LH. WA3VE. Leon, did that help?

Yeah, it did. I understand that, yeah. I'm running, uh, I got about-- it's about 50 foot of, uh, uh, uh, of LMR 400 that I used, uh, used to go ahead and fire the thing up with. And it seems to work rather well as it is. It just seems. But my big, long, 80-meter antenna that I have, I didn't have a balance on it for a while. I mean, it wouldn't talk.

It just, it just, it needs a balance to talk. And this, and this G5R, little, little G5R, we 102 feet long, doesn't need one. I just was wondering why. But, okay, I understand now. So thanks for your help, guys, at A3LH.

Very good. Excellent. This is WA3VEE, and you're listening to the 146-985 Roundtable on the W3GMS Parksburg Repeater. Next, we go to Rene, K3FOXFOX. Good evening, Rene, your question.

I'm, uh, this is Ron. This is K3FF. Uh, my question is, I, I mentioned before, I'm doing the Clipperton, and, uh, uh, uh, the original Clipperton has, uh, eight 100 microfarad, uh, caps. And, uh, the original Harback, when it was out in the Midwest, uh, was selling the kit with 220 microfarad, uh, caps.

Now he's sold it out, uh, in fact, I'm, unfortunately, I think he may have passed away. Uh, he sold it out to the, uh, amp guy up in Connecticut. And he is selling with 330 microfarad caps.

Uh, and I wonder if, uh, if, uh, if that might cause a problem. Uh, so, uh, open to, uh, anybody who can help. Uh, thank you.

Thank you, Rene. Excellent. Uh, I'll save my questions, uh, until later, cause I have to look up and see exactly what I did. But other, other commenters for Rene's question on the, um, capacitor input, uh, power supply, uh, on the Clipperton L, on the Harback, uh, rebuild kit.

Wa3VEE comments now.

Okay.

On WA3KFT, WA3VEE, go ahead.

WA3KFT. I have one of those Clipperton L's. And I haven't messed with the filter caps. Uh, generally speaking, larger is better in microfarads. Uh, especially in the air.

Uh, especially, especially since we use the amplifier on sideband. Because on sideband, you're looking for pulses of energy. And with a larger microfarad filter, uh, it, it maintains the plate voltage on the, on the tubes. So, uh, having a larger microfarads than as originally built, uh, is a larger microfarad filter.

built is a benefit to you. I am sure that you'll reach a point of no return that you keep putting

more and more microfarads in there and it doesn't buy you anything, but the size that you mentioned

is probably perfectly okay. My Clipper Tren finally stopped working the other day, and I have a

suspicion I wore the tubes out. I have no output from it now, so I'm going to have to open it up and see what gives, but I have one here, and up until two days ago I was using it, and to the best of my knowledge it still has the original power supply parts in it. This is WA3KFT.

Please, NA3CW, WA3VE, go ahead.

The question is not whether a lot of capacitance is good or bad. The question is, is all that capacitance going to smoke the input primary circuit? And Ron, I think you had experience with that amplifier. I was just wondering what do they do currently, if anything, to limit inrush current, NA3CW.

I'm going to go back and look. I'm actually looking. That's why I delayed a little bit. Excellent. NA3CW, WA3VE here with the group. I don't know. I've got to go back and look here. I'm looking through the pictures. Imagine me taking... I just happened to take just a couple pictures. So, imagine that. Let me go back and see if they did anything at all to limit the inrush current. I don't believe so. But there's nothing on this board.

And these are, there are eight 220 microfarad caps on this Harbach Electronics Rebuild Kit.

But let me continue to look here and see.

And what I will do, Renee, is I will send you this link on SmugMug to all my photographs of when I actually restored this clipper to Nelvet sitting right next to me here in the shack.

So let's call for, well Chuck, let me turn it back to you to begin with.

And then we'll call for additional comments.

NA3CW, WA3VEE.

Yeah, excuse me, NA3CW.

Yeah, that was my only question.

I'm not familiar with that amplifier.

Hang on a second.

I'm not familiar with that amplifier, but I am familiar with amplifiers.

So I just wonder what they had, if they had a limiting resistor and a relay or, here with the AL80B, you end up with a resist, I believe it's a resistor and another, and a relay.

And they're just relying on the speed or delay of the relay to be enough delay.

But also the Tom Roush, WA3VEE, designed the B model, including the B transformer.

And he says, you know, not to mess around with any inrush current limiting or whatever, because it's all built in, calculated into the wire sizes of the connecting wires to the filaments and also to the limiting impedance of the transformer.

So it's a bigger question.

You know, it's a system kind of a question.

But, you know, obviously I don't have any answers.

I'm not familiar with that rig.

But, yeah, that really is the question.

And, Renee, you're absolutely valid there in wondering about it.

Back to you, Ron, NA3CW.

All the way around.

Well, I just turned mine on here.

I do not hear any relays.

I don't remember seeing any relays in the primary circuit.

However, it doesn't rule out the possibility of a resistor.

But I'm inclined to believe that they probably do not have any at all.

So let's go for additional comments before we turn this back to Renee.

On the Clipperton L.

This is WA3VE.

Anyone else with additional comments, please call now.

Renee, let me turn it back to you.

And I'm going to send you this.

This is probably going to be of minimal help.

But at least it will show you what I did.

You might be able to glean something from some of the photographs here of how I actually just went through and restored this Clipperton L.

So, like I said, it doesn't directly answer your question.

But you might be able to pick up a couple things here and there.

I know one thing that I had problems with on the Clipperton L.

was I ended up finding out that the transmit receive relay was being driven with a very hot voltage of about 18, 18.5 or 19 volts, if I remember correctly.

And this goes back a number of years now.

So what I did was I put in a very cheap, small voltage regulator circuit that actually took that voltage down to somewhere in the neighborhood of 13 volts, much, much more manageable.

That's one thing I found.

Maybe something you want to look at on that TR relay.

Totally unrelated to what you're asking about, but just something else to look at in that amplifier that I hope is helpful.

Because those mid-text relays are unobtainium as far as I know.

Anyway, let me turn it back to you and see if this adequately confuses you.

K3FF WA3VEE with the workbench.

GMS for a little bit of information.

Rene, hold on.

Let me turn it over to Joe here.

W3GMS.

Good evening, Joe.

I'm glad you jumped in.

WA3VEE.

Please go ahead.

Good evening, Joe.

I just happened to be near the computer, and I pulled up the schematic and verified there's no inrush current limiting.

And I would highly recommend that you put that in.

All the amplifiers here I build are modified.

I've always used it.

There's various techniques you can use.

I kind of prefer the relay to either to short out a thermistor.

You know, they have these negative temperature compensated thermistors that are specifically designed for inrush.

And the idea is, you know, they start out at some higher resistance value, and then as they heat up, they get extremely hot, and they go to milli-ohms.

And that can work.

But the problem with that, if you have an AC line dropout, and the capacitors are discharged, it's long enough, and then it comes back on again because the switch is on, then you really don't have any inrush protection.

So when I got my Ameritron AL82, they had an inrush limit in, but it was kind of like one relay delay, which is typically 8 to 10 milliseconds.

So what I did is I ran the, there was a little DC primary supply there, and it made up just a little simple circuit with a little RC delay on it to pull in the relay X amount of milliseconds.

I went way, way out.

I went out to like 100 milliseconds.

So it gives a step start.

You hit the on switch.

100 milliseconds later, you hear the relay close.

And then, voila, you're on with full soup, and you can see it on the high voltage meter on the front.

And that has worked out very, very well.

So that's the deal.

And for resistors, you can either use the semesters for that, which are manufactured, they used to be manufactured by a company called Keystone.

And Mauser sold them, and they probably still do.

I don't have the part numbers in my head.

Or you can use some of these cement flame-proof type resistors.

And they work extremely well, too.

You don't need a lot of resistance.

I forget, 2 1⁄2, 3 ohms usually does it, but you can calculate that.

And you can, you know, just worst case, it throws out the impedance of the transformer.

As soon as the capacitor is short circuit, the voltage comes up.

You're turning it on at the peak of the AC sinusoidal signal.

AC sinusoidal waveform.

And you can calculate it for that and kind of take it easy on things.

So that's that on that.

I hope that helps, 7-3, and commits with you all later.

And good to hear a lot of the new people here on my repeater tonight.

V-E-2-A-E-D is a very good friend of mine.

His name is Howard, which he already knows.

And Howard is a great guy and has a wonderful, wonderful station up there.

I sent his, if you guys have qrz.com available, just take a look at his massive station.

V-E-2-A-E-D.

And I'm sorry he got out of here so quickly.

Okay, I'm rambling.

I don't want to do that.

7-3.

And back to you, Ron.

W-A-3-D-E-E-W-3-G-M-S.

Now clear.

Well, thanks for coming in.

And like I said, I need to slip over and have a cup of coffee with you there.

Lots to catch up on.

And I have to deliver the two reels of 1,000-foot Dacron.

So thanks for the net here indulging me in those comments, sidebar comments.

Excellent.

All very, very good.

And like I said, Rene, I will send that stuff over to you.

I'm very familiar with the delays and everything in thermistors from my old design days.

So I echo exactly what Joe is saying there with the actual delay.

And yes, the longer, well, within reason, the longer the better.

At least 20 milliseconds of delay is good because it gives the transformer a chance to magnetize,

at least through one cycle.

Let me go ahead and call for any additional comments before I turn it back to Rene.

This is W-A-3-V-E-E.

Anyone else?

KC-3-O-O-K?

Absolutely.

KC-3-O-K, W-A-3-V-E-E.

Please go ahead.

Don't have much to add to the conversation, but just for fun, I Googled AI.

I searched Google AI and just asked that question.

And it came up and said, no, the Clipper-to-Nell does not have inrush protection.

Then it went on to describe, and I was reading it as Joe was talking, and it was almost word for word.

But I did see that Harbach at one time made a step-start board for the Clipper-to-Nell,

but I know a lot of the Harbach stuff is not available.

So that's all.

Thanks, Ron.

W-A-3-V-E-E.

KC-3-O-K.

Back to you.

Very, very good.

One final call for comments before I turn it back to Rene.

This is W-A-3-V-E-E.

Excellent.

Rene, did we beat that one enough?

A3-F-F.

W-A-3-V-E-E.

W-A-3-V-E-E-E-K-3-F-F.

Well, I got a complete answer, I guess you could say that.

I certainly appreciate it.

Thank you so much for everyone, your comments.

I recall that I had a step-start I installed, and I think it was the Harbach unit, on one of my 922s years ago.

And I had completely forgotten about it.

And I didn't see one for the DENTRON, but I wonder if I could adapt it.

That had it, I guess it was about, oh, I could go over and I guess I could clip the switch.

But I think it had a big, I'd say maybe 200 milliseconds before you hear that relay click in.

So, I could look at it, I'll call Scott tomorrow, I'm going to ask him what he thinks.

Since he's the one who turned it from 220 up to 330.

And see what his input is on that.

I am going to run it on 115 volts, so maybe that might give a little sag there, a little help with the inrush.

I don't know, I could have that backwards.

I do recall seeing a, Ron, you appreciate the pictures.

I do recall seeing, in fact, I watched it recently.

There's a guy that's the radio shop guy who does a complete, he goes through the entire process of installing that board.

To a Clipperton, I studied what he was doing.

And I think I'm going to wait and see if I can get a step start before I go ahead and power that up.

But I will populate the board and I will get a head start on it.

And I appreciate all the comments.

Thank you very much.

There are other questions, I don't want to hold it up.

But, again, thank you.

And if I don't get a chance later, happy Thanksgiving.

Either one, WA3, VEEK3FF.

Other way around.

No, this is what this is all about.

So it takes as long as it takes, but we want to make sure that everybody who wants a question answered gets it answered.

So all very good.

And I'll just say one last comment before I go to Wayne here with his question.

But I really enjoyed restoring the Clipperton L.

When I got it, it just did not work.

And so I had this, they came with the kit.

And the gentleman I got it from was not able to put the kit together.

So hopefully you'll be able to pick up maybe a couple hints and kinks there.

And I might learn something from you in this process.

So if you have any questions, shoot me an email.

Certainly, certainly not an expert in this at all.

But still, just had fun working on the project.

So very good, Renee.

Great question.

And let's turn it over to Wayne.

KC3SQI, WA3, VEEK.

Wayne, your question.

Thank you, Ron.

WA3VE.

This is KC3SQI.

Okay.

Okay.

If anyone is familiar with the hex beam, the center pole on it, I'm thinking of what I'm looking at.

They say you can mount a X300 on top of the center pole for the balance for the hex beam.

And I've looked at several of them.

And I'm unclear as to whether the top of the balance is open or whether it's got a cover on it to work on the impedance on the inside.

So if anybody's familiar with that, I could help me.

And then I can figure out what I would do to possibly what I'd do to mount my X300 on top of it.

Wayne, KC3SQI, WA3VE.

Anyone who can render assistance to Wayne on his hex beam with an X300 sticking straight up in the air, please call now.

It looks like we might have stumped the chumps here tonight.

In any event, what I'm going to do is I'm going to look offline and see if I can find anything on that question myself.

Because I've been thinking for years about putting a hex beam up over here.

And that would be a great place also to have an additional antenna, vertical antenna, dual band.

So also, if you do happen to find something also in your searching, please share it with us.

One last comment.

Anyone with any comments for Wayne?

This is WA3VE.

Mike here. I only know one cat that's got a hex beam.

And that's Kurt down in Delaware.

K3KCB.

Kilo3. Kilo.

Charlie Bravo.

You might want to send him an email with your question.

Just tell him Mike.

Thorndale Mike says hi.

But, yeah, he has a hex beam.

It's on a tower.

He's got a lot of towers up there.

A lot of antennas are down in Delaware.

But, I don't know. Maybe he can help you out.

It's just, it's a shot.

But, you never know.

W3MFB.

Very good, Mike.

Thanks for that input.

One last call for comments for Wayne before we go over to Tim.

WA3VE.

Please call now.

W3NZT. Potential help for Wayne?

Perfect.

Good evening, Wadget.

To the list here.

Thanks for coming in.

Great to hear you tonight.

KC3NZT WA3VE, please.

Ron, and sorry for the late check.

And I just got out to the garage after all the bedtime stuff.

So, I don't know if this is going to help you too much, Wayne.

But, I looked at that a while ago.

I mean years ago.

So, I'm going off of my memory, which is probably not a good, reliable source.

But, most of the hex beams that I looked at, the mounting was designed to be the top of a mast.

And then it had its own little stub mast that came up to support the spreaders.

And so, I did look at, you know, just like you're thinking, to mount a vertical on top of that would be ideal.

And it looked like the only people that I saw that were doing that, they were using two standoffs.

They would use a standoff of the main mast that went up through the webbing on the hex beam.

And they would mount their vertical on top of that above the plane of the highest element on the hex beam.

And then they were usually spinning the entire mast to steer the beam.

I don't know if that is being described correctly.

But, the issue was that you couldn't have everything concentric because you had the mast that the hex beam was mounted to.

Then the hex beam itself had a little stub mast going up.

And so, the issue was, well, how do I get around that?

Because most people, it seemed the consensus was that that little stub mast wasn't strong enough to mount a vertical to.

So, the idea was to come up with a way to still have the entire beam steerable.

But, be able to securely mount a vertical above all of that.

And so, they did kind of like a standoff where the standoff was not concentric.

But, the vertical and the main mast were concentric.

I'm not sure if this makes sense to anyone.

But, that's what I remember seeing the workaround was for that system.

This is KC3NZT back in there.

Very good, Harvey.

All the way around.

Stand by.

Make sure I didn't hit the wrong button here.

All very, very good.

One last call for comments for Wayne.

This is WA3VE.

All good questions tonight.

Nothing else heard.

KC3SQI WA3VE.

Okay.

Thank you, everybody.

for your input.

And, yeah, there are two of the manufacturers of the hex beams now that say that their beam will support.

And, yeah, there are two of the hex beams.

And, yeah, there are two of the hex beams.

And, yeah, there are two of the hex beams.

And, yeah, there are two of the hex beams.

And, yeah, there are two of the hex beams.

And, yeah, there are two of the hex beams.

And, yeah, there are two of the hex beams.

And, yeah, there are two of the hex beams.

And, yeah, there are two of the hex beams.

And, yeah, there are two of the hex beams.

And, yeah, there are two of the hex beams.

And, yeah, there are two of the hex beams.

And, yeah, there are two of the hex beams.

And, yeah, there are two of the hex beams.

And, yeah, there are two of the hex beams.

And, yeah, there are two of the hex beams.

And, yeah, there are two of the hex beams.

And, yeah, there are two of the hex beams.

And, yeah, there are two of the hex beams.

And, yeah, there are two of the hex beams.

And, yeah, there are two of the hex beams.

And then they have really beefed up the center for the hex beam to do that.

It's no longer just a little thin aluminum.

But one of them uses a one-inch black iron pipe.

The other one uses a, I think he said three-eighths wall for a square support for the center of the beam.

So, but I've sent emails to both of them.

But neither one of them has got back to me on whether it's open or closed on the top of the beam.

So I guess I'll have to wait longer to get some answers back from them.

So thank you for the input back.

And I'll turn it back to net.

WA3VEE, this is KC3SQI.

Excellent.

All the way around.

Well, keep this posted for sure.

I'm very interested in hearing how that all turns out.

Excellent.

This is WA3VEE.

You're listening to the 146-985 Monday Night Workbench on the W3 GMS Parksburg Repeater.

One final question we have here is from Tim.

So Tim, you're up.

KD3AIS WA3VEE.

WA3VEE, this is KD3AIS Tim in Malvern.

My question, Ron, in the net is with regard to antennas.

So I am looking for a short antenna for my new-to-me Toyota Tundra so it doesn't stick above the roof and doesn't hit anything.

And looking at that, I've looked at three different antennas that are anywhere from 13 inches to 16.5 inches to 17.5 inches.

They all say 2.15 dBi of gain on 2 meter.

Some of them say have higher gain at 70 centimeters.

Some of them have the same at 70 centimeters.

And they all have 50 ohms of impedance.

And my question is, if I'm choosing between any of these other than the look of them or the small difference in height,

is there any material difference in the way any of these might perform?

Okay, that is an excellent question, KD3AIS WA3VEE with the workbench and the group.

Comments for Tim, please proceed.

KD3MFD.

KD3MFD WA3VEE.

Go ahead.

Thank you, thank you.

I think I heard the length correct.

I'm not exactly positive.

But something that short is definitely going to be a quarter wave.

So quarter wave is pretty much shooting an orange out.

You know, like, it would be good for me down here in the valley trying to get up over the hill.

But I understand you're looking for a low profile antenna.

I honestly, quarter wave, you know, Joe always tells me down here to get like a half wave or five, well, I have a half wave on two meter and five eighths on 70 centimeters.

But it's 47 inches long and you need to get in your garage.

So my suggestion to you is looking up on DX Engineering, Giga Parts, HRO Catalog, whatever, compact antenna.

And they make a seven inch tall one.

And I know that sounds crazy.

But they use magnets and it's about the width of a toilet paper roll.

It's crazy.

It works well.

I have a friend that has one.

The same guy in Delaware, Wayne.

But anyway, he has one.

And he was down in Delaware about 20, excuse me, 20 some odd miles.

He was driving Southern Delaware about 25, 30 miles away from the AA-3VI repeater and getting in clear on 220 and 440.

But anyway, so a compact antenna, they have a seven inch tall one and they have a nine inch tall one.

They work really well, look cool, people think you're a cop, I don't know.

But like, I just know the shorter antennas will usually be like quarter wave or so.

And I'm not sure, I mean, the difference between DBI and DB, somebody will be able to tell you that.

But I know there is a difference there.

It's, uh, all I could tell you is trying to get a little bit longer antenna would be helpful.

But in your case, you have limitations because you needed to get your car into the garage or wherever.

But, uh, I don't know.

I would go with a compact.

If I could afford one, I'd get one.

Uh, so I don't have a 47 inch, another antenna on the car.

But my car looks like a porcupine.

It's all good.

I got a 10 meter antenna on there that's, uh, 60, 67 inches tall.

So, I can't complain.

But anyway, uh, back to that.

WE3VEE, W3MFB.

WE3MFB, WA3VEE, additional comments for Tim.

This is WA3VEE and this is the workbench.

workbench. WAC3OOK. WAC3OOK. WAC3VEE. Go ahead, Bill. Yeah, Ron, Mike actually said exactly what I was going to say about the compact antenna. I have a friend that has one on a Porsche and it works exceptionally well. I just looked it up on DX Engineering. And yeah, DBI is, I forget

what, is 2.4 something less than DBD. But this is 3.1 DBI on the 7.5 inch. And that, I spoke to him many times, mobile. It works very well. It is $180, though, so it is not a cheap mobile antenna. So that's all I got. Back to you, Ron. WAC3VEE. KC3OOK.

If you have a DBI number, subtract 2.1 dB, 2.1 dB from that. That gives you a more realistic gain for the antenna. That would be the formula that will get you the gain above a dipole, or DBD. Much more realistic gain figure. The DBI sounds a lot better. But again, if you're taking a 3.1, say

for instance, a 3.1 dB antenna, which would be like a 5.8 wave, what you're looking at, let's just say 3.1 dB antenna. You subtract 2.1 from that, you basically have about a dB, which is almost no gain. A gain of 0 dB is a gain of 1. Okay, 0 dB is a gain of 1.

In other words, if you put 50 watts into it, you're getting a 50 watt ERP or envelope. So in any event, that's just something to remember. Yeah, the relationship is 2.1. DBI minus 2.1 is dBD, if I remember that correctly. Additional comments for Tim. This is WA3VEE.

AC3NZT.

AC3NZT. Harvey, WA3VEE. Please go ahead.

Thanks, Ron. Real quick, Tim, is this going on the roof, or is this a fender mount?

It's a fender mount on the front hood of the truck.

Okay, what I would say is, in general, anything close to around 17 inches, plus or minus 3 inches, I suppose, that's going to be close to a quarter wave. The half wavelengths are going to be longer, around the 30-inch range.

For most of the trucks that I've seen mounted, the half waves work really well and look like a factory radio antenna if they're on a fender mount. The benefit, mainly from the half wavelength, is to fold one. It looks normal on a truck. It looks like an FM antenna that would be equipped from the factory, so it's inconspicuous.

The second is, I guess there's three. The second is, is the half wave is going to be dual band compared to the 5/8 wave that Mike was talking about. And so, if dual band is in your goals, that can be much more helpful than a 5/8 wave, which is even longer than a half wave.

The last one is, is the half waves tend to be a little bit more ground independent. Not completely, but they are less ground dependent than the quarter waves are. So, the short antennas, although they certainly will get you in the garage, with a pickup truck, if the truck fits in the garage, the half wavelengths should, on a fender mount, should also fit in the garage pretty easily.

So, if you're going to be, like I said, around 30-ish inches, up from the hood, that should still clear the garage relatively easily. When you go to the quarter wave, you do also have dual band capabilities. But if something is claiming half wave gain on a shortened antenna, they're just going off of a quarter, or they're going off of a matching network, would be my assumption.

The network matching is what gives you the dual band nature. But you still have a shortened antenna, so you're losing something there. There's some losses there. So, the claims of dipole performance with a shortened antenna, I would be skeptical of.

I looked into the compact antenna. It looks good. It's very small. I haven't used it personally. I know people that do like it. But me personally, I'd want as much wire in the air as I could get. Everything's going to be low to the ground on a vehicle.

So, if you have 17 inches from the fender mount or 30 inches from the fender mount, I think we're splitting hairs as far as elevation goes. But I would probably say, in my experience, the half-wavelength antennas, the 30-inch antennas, tend to hear better than the quarter wave.

And I've also had 5/8 inch wave. And I've also had 5/8 inch wave. And I've also had 5/8 inch wave on my vehicles. And I also thought the half-wavelength antennas worked the best as far as receive goes. So those are my experiences. KC3NZT, back to Ron.

comments all the way around no doubt about it additional comments for Tim this is WA3VE please please call now

KC3SQI

KC3SQI WA3VE go ahead

ok I have a 30 inch on a fender mount on a 93 Ford F-150 and the top of the antenna is just about the top of the cab so it is not a problem now when I put the 30 inch antenna on top of my

Toyota RAV4

it does get knocked off every time I go into the garage and forget to lower it so

but you as noted you do get better reception and distance out of a longer antenna it's also easier to get rid of the engine noise especially if you're putting it front fender on the pickup

some of the newer ones especially with a lot of electronics up there do get a little noisy so

what would be my suggestion is to try to do that or to try to put it near the cab on the bed but then you get into the problem of when you put stuff in the back of the pickup you do hit the antenna so that's my input on it back to depth KC3SQI

KC3SQI

My input on it. Back to depth. KC3SQI.

W3MFB all the way around. Additional comments, final comments for Tim. This is WA3VE.

W3MFB, one more comment.

Mike, W3MFB, WA3VE.

It's Mike again. Yeah, Wayne just nailed that one on the head. He was saying about putting it behind the cab.

You know, my buddy Aaron, KC3KZB, he has a half-wave antenna and he's got it mounted right behind the cab.

He's got an HF antenna on one side and the VHF, UHF on the other half-wave.

So, like Harvey said, about 30 some odd inches or so.

And a little mount on it.

And he's got it hooked right where, uh, right where you would link up, like, uh, uh, cordage or whatnot.

Uh, where the, uh, what's the name of it?

Uh, but anyway, like toe straps and stuff.

Where that, those hooks would be, he has it mounted right there in the coax.

Uh, goes right through the bulk of the cab through a grommet and, uh, there you go.

Short run of coax.

So, but, and his is on the right.

You could do right or left.

It doesn't really matter.

Uh, he can get in and out of his garage no problem.

Uh, and it's not really, it's like Wayne said, it's pretty much at the height of the cab.

And he has a Silverado, uh, he has a Chevy Silverado, uh, what I guess it's a 1500 back in the day.

But anyway, um, yeah, so it works out well there.

Uh, you do get a little bit of, uh, I mean, he has no problem getting into any machines, uh, in that direction, left or right.

It's going to pan towards, like your RFs, it's going to pan to the opposite direction.

But it receives real well, and it's kind of hidden back there.

And the guy uses his cab all the, you know, his bed all the time and, uh, never has an issue.

So, just food for thought.

Uh, WA3VE, W3MFB.

All the way around.

Uh, final comments for Tim.

WA3VE, please call now.

Hey Tim, KD3AIS, WA3VE, was that, uh, did we answer your question and give you some ideas?

Yes, Ron, thank you very much.

WA3VE, this is KD3AIS.

Um, very helpful.

It sounds like that a taller antenna works better, and that the only reason to have a shorter one is for getting in the garage or other concerns like that.

So, I appreciate all the feedback, um, all taken in good order, and thank you very much.

Back to you, Ron.

WA3VE, this is KD3AIS.

Very good.

One, uh, one final comment in summary.

Uh, more, more metal and height.

Generally speaking, height is might with VHF and UHF.

And as a, as, almost as a, as a, as dogma, um, the more metal you have, the better.

Because you're, you're collecting RF.

And the more metal there is to collect the RF, the better.

Uh, with, with some restrictions with regard to tuning and, and so on and so forth.

So, yep, you're absolutely point on with that.

All very, very good.

We've had 24 check-ins tonight.

And I just want to put one final call out there for anyone who still wants to get on the logbook tonight for the 985 workbench.

It's been a lot of fun.

I really enjoy running these.

And this is just really tremendous to have so many check-ins here.

And I hope that, uh, this was very helpful.

Even for those who didn't have questions, uh, for me especially to learn as well.

One last call for check-ins.

Digital or RF any mode.

Uh, please call.

This is WA3VE, and we'll get you on the log.

Good evening, Ron.

W3FES, Frank.

Noonan, Georgia on the All-Star.

Good evening, all.

Thanks, Ron, for taking the net.

Very interesting net.

Just tuned in a few minutes ago.

Back to you.

I have a comment and a question for Ron.

Uh, the station on All-Star.

Uh, RF usually takes precedence over digital, so you guys double it a little bit.

And, uh, not sure if that was you, Mr. Mike, but, uh, just confirm who that was on All-Star there, uh, right underneath of, uh, John.

This is WA3VE, the station on All-Star.

Please call again.

This is W3FES.

W3FES.

Fred, an All-Star from Noonan, Georgia.

Good evening, all.

Thanks, Ron, for taking the net.

Back to you.

Fred, great, great, great.

Good to have you on, on, uh, board tonight.

That makes 26 check-ins.

That sounds great.

Okay, very good.

Uh, first of all, I want to say thanks.

Uh, it's one of the longest workbenches I remember, but a very good one.

I say thanks to all the stations tonight for checking into the 985 workbench.

And, as always, a big thank you to Joe, W3GMS, for making the 985 repeater available for us in general, and especially tonight for making it available for the workbench, which runs weekly, regardless.

holidays, rain, snow, hot, cold, doesn't matter.

We're always here.

You're invited to use the repeater often.

It's a great way to show your appreciation for the gift of 985 to the amateur radio community.

Finally, we hope to hear you on Thursday night for the 8 p.m. round table.

This concludes the workbench for tonight.

Feel free, of course, to stick around and continue the discussion on 985.

But I will say have a good night.

A great week ahead.

Uh, happy Thanksgiving to you and yours.

This is WA3VEE, Westchester, Pennsylvania, saying 73, and I will be clear.

Have a good night.

WA3VEE. I have a question, Ron.

Very good.

W-H-C-R-W.

W-A-3-V-E.

Yes, sir.

Since you are the Smug-Lug guy, are you accepting photographs and video from the Saturday event over at Bills?

I know that I took some pictures and several other people took pictures.

Excellent. Excellent, excellent.

Yes, I am.

Now I am home.

I've traveled out for at least a couple days.

Uh, I've traveled out for the rest of the year after a 1,491-mile round trip to Bar Harbor and back in the last seven days.

So, yes, those wanting to send photographs to me, of course, email doesn't work because it's limited to 25 megs.

But I do have Dropbox, but I prefer Google Drive.

If you load the pictures onto Google Drive, send me the link and give me permission, I will access the pictures.

CR and I have been doing this for a long time.

It works superbly.

Uh, so, use Google Drive.

And if you have to, use Dropbox.

Both are free.

So, um, in any event, that's one good way to get me the pictures, that's for sure.

I will put them together and put them on SmugMug.

Send Joe one single link and everybody could look at all the pictures under that one link.

It works very, very well.

So, yes, that's the way to do it.

W-H-C-R-W.

W-A-3-V-E-E.

Ron, thank you very much.

Happy, uh, Thanksgiving, and we'll talk to you later.

I'm dying to see them myself because, obviously, I was 700 miles north of here when all that went on.

So, uh, would love to see how that went down for sure.

Thanks, CR, and thanks for, uh, thanks for bringing that up here for sure.

W-H-C-R-W, W-A-3-V-E-E.

V-E-E-K-3-F-F.

W-A-3-V-E-E. Are you asleep yet looking at those pictures?

No, no, I haven't downloaded them yet.

I just wondered, you see up in Maine, I don't know how far up you went, but did you see K-1-U-R's antenna farm right along Route 1 there?

K-1-U-R. No, I did not. So the route we took was pretty much 95 all the way up to Bangor, and then I think it's 395 to 1 and 3 down to Mount Desert Island. We were right on the island, but on the other side of Mount Desert Island from Bar Harbor. That's where we were.

Yeah, you probably didn't get up as far as Jonesboro up there, which is past Ellsworth, so you might not have gone that far. We have friends up in Eastport, which is right at the end.

And so we do go past Route 1 there, and we do pass this antenna farm that is unbelievable. I think he's got now maybe six or seven antennas, all of which are a minimum of 100 feet. He's got some 80-meter beams up there. It's quite impressive, and you have to see it to believe it. I just wondered if you happened to see it.

I was in Eastport years ago. The first time we went to Bar Harbor, I believe, was 2006. I just pulled up the pictures. That's why I was across the room earlier here during the net. I was kind of doing double-due over here. Pulled up those photographs. I don't know if that's the time that we went into Eastport.

Eastport? Actually, it was 87, believe it or not. 1987, when we were in Eastport. 87-88. No, I don't remember. What's his call sign again? Because I put K1UR, but that can't be right. That's a gentleman in Framingham, Mass. What's his call sign again?

You're a little bit older than you are. He operates remotely. He's got a couple of Econics boxes, I guess you'd call them there, and he runs everything remotely. He's connected with ACOMP. I think he's one of the founders of ACOMP.

Cool. I'm on his site right now. I've got to look here. I don't see anything on the antenna farm on his QRZ page, but I will have to take a look. So he's between, so you're saying he's between Ellsworth and Eastport? I know that road well. We've been there before. That's where all the wild blueberry farms are, if I remember.

I'm going to get close today. I may have the call wrong. It's possible I have the call wrong. I may be thinking of Urick, the road shorts guy. I may have him confused.

If you've been down that long ago, it wasn't there. But I'm not sure. I had gone up there in 2014, and I don't recall if it was there, and I'm pretty sure it was there by then.

But I know that if I had seen it, it seems to get bigger every year. But yeah, if you know where the, you're near Arcadia, and you're near, if you ever go up there, there's a big Christmas tree or wreath. Christmas tree.

I think it's wreaths across America is just down the road from where he is.

Wait a second here. I can look this up. Wreaths across America. Well, we were in Arcadia. In fact, we hiked. We hiked one of the bubbles over by Jordan Pond in Arcadia.

Arcadia is one of my favorites. So, yeah, very familiar with Arcadia and that whole thing. Let me see where this is here.

So, yeah, we're in it. We, like I said, we stayed in Soamesville, which is, we stayed in an Airbnb, which has a spectacular, spectacular view of Soames Sound.

That's one sound over to the east of where Bass River is and the Bass River Lighthouse, the one that makes it on just about every calendar of Maine there is. Very scenic over there, I'm sure.

So we got up into Ellsworth quite a bit. Went through, of course, to get to Mount Desert Island. But then, of course, there are a lot of shopping and stuff like that.

My wife likes antique places, so we stopped there in Ellsworth.

Two hams up there, W1KRP, believe it or not, has a call sign.

Very nice guy.

Worked him on the Ellsworth machine.

And there's another guy up there, NA1OR, I believe it is, George.

And he has a fusion repeater up there, and he's linked all across Maine.

So both of those guys, very, very friendly, very welcoming group up there, it seems.

Go ahead.

Go ahead.

I remember talking to someone in Ellsworth, and in fact he had a pig-a-dog grooming place up there.

But I'm looking at the map now, and I see where you can go out of Ellsworth.

And you were going, I guess you went south to Moore Harbor out that way.

This is if you go follow Route 1 all the way up.

You would be, let's see, you take a short on 1A.

But I'm looking for it up here.

It's not as far as Machias, whatever it is, I think.

But it's up there somewhere, there it is.

Yeah, it's pretty far up.

It'd be further than that, and you must have gone, but not too far.

I see Machias, I think it's still all the way up there.

I see Machias, I think is how it's pronounced.

I could be wrong, too.

It's been ages.

But yeah, that's the great down east part of Maine.

That's really cool up there.

And yeah, I see Jonesboro.

You go through Columbia Falls, you get to Jonesboro heading east.

Then you get to Machias, and then over to Lubeck, and then on up into Eastport.

No, we didn't even go down Route 1, that part.

That splits off in Ellsworth, right where I see exactly what the intersection is.

Yep, there's a Hampton in there.

There's a place called Stone Park.

It's right by a tractor supply.

That's where 1 splits off from, man, these letters are so small here.

You can't even see.

It is funny, you zoom in on the map, and the route numbers don't get any bigger.

Yeah, that's where it splits off to 184, and that goes down to, or sorry, to Route 3.

And that goes down into what's called Trenton Bridge, and then down to Bar Harbor and Mount Desert Island.

So yeah, I remember this well.

It goes by the airport down there.

So no, we did not get on Route 1 in that direction at all this time.

So we're thinking about more family vacations up there.

I do want to get back to Eastport because it's kind of cool to go to the easternmost town in the United States.

Down at sea is the sunrise the first.

Go ahead.

We're going there every year.

I've followed you on the map here.

Yeah, I see where you're going down through Trenton there.

We have friends, like I said, up there.

They live down here, but they say there's some butter up there.

And so we've been up there pretty much every summer.

Now we have a trailer.

And we always stop at Ellsworth at Walmart to get our last-minute supplies.

And then we go up and we stay right there in Eastport.

There's also, let's see, W2, what's it, RN or something.

I forgot.

The guy does the, you read the minute on his remote rigs.

He's got an operation in Eastport.

And it is a great, really great transmitting location because it's so right there on the water.

But in all the years we've gone to Eastport, it's never changed.

Very cool.

I remember, of course, our now very much adult boys, one of which was just got married.

We were with him and my new daughter-in-law and her parents on this trip.

And it was, they were with us at Eastport.

They just really enjoyed going down there in that particular part.

Because we showed them on the map where we were and they said, wow, that's pretty cool.

In fact, actually, we actually went over on Campobello Island.

Have you done that?

We did that two years ago.

We went on the island and saw the Roosevelt Place.

Very good.

Let me pause here and see if anybody else wants to join us.

This is W83VEE.

In Cusa with K3FF.

It doesn't sound like we're probably putting everybody else to sleep.

That's good.

Yeah, it is just really, really cool up there.

We really like it.

It's just a long drive.

So what we did this time, Renee, was we broke it up.

And we stayed overnight in Andover, Massachusetts because, first of all, I was a little more than halfway.

At the same time, I wanted to see whatever became of the old Hewlett-Packard Medical Division plant.

And that was on Minuteman Drive in this complex called the Campus, which is where Phillips had their medical.

They bought the medical stuff from us, the medical division from us, and they were making their defibbers and everything else up there.

So it looks like they've actually abandoned the building.

So it must have built somewhere else.

But anyway, to get back to the point, it was another four and a half hours from Andover to get to Bar Harbor.

So it took us about, all told, with some stops, about a 12-hour ride.

And that includes a bunch of stuff going on in Hartford.

It's about the only slow part of the entire trip because I go Jersey Turnpike 287.

87 north, I avoid Tappan Zee Bridge, that whole mess down there.

And then take 84 all the way to 90.

290, 495, 95.

That's kind of the flight plan.

Go ahead.

That's pretty much the way we go.

We just go out to 78 and go up 287 and then pick up through Nyack there.

And we do go out to Tappan Zee Bridge, but it's a lot better than it used to be.

Many years ago, back in the 80s and 90s, I was traveling up there for work purposes on a regular basis.

And I remember going Friday nights, going across the Tappan Zee.

I've been out there for a couple of days up there and trying to get across the Tappan Zee before they fixed it.

And it was bad.

It was just a long trip.

No matter how I scheduled my calls, I would be...

I always sat there at the wrong time.

I even went up...

Sometimes I would go up as far as...

I forgot the town.

I'd go up to the town, take the Thruway up, and then take the Newberg Bridge across, just to beat the traffic sometime.

Eventually, I was able to have a...

I obtained a pilot's license, and I was able to go up there with a plane.

And I used to travel right over the bridge there, look at the traffic, kind of smile at myself,

and realize that all effort to get that license is pretty good at that moment to beat the traffic.

The way to do it.

Oh, my gosh.

How cool is that?

That is really, really neat.

Well, Newberg Bridge is exactly what we do.

We avoid all that stuff down there, even though, yeah, I agree, it is better.

And I'm hoping that all the construction's done, 287, and then, you know, you go over,

you can take 684 then, I believe, and that gets you over into the Hartford area.

You're heading almost due east, which is good.

So, you know, we just came yesterday, just across Fishkill.

Carmel, and I think it's Carmel, and I think Carmel is in New York State.

I don't think it's in Connecticut.

But Carmel, Fishkill, and then you're over the Newberg Bridge, over the Hudson.

Then 87 south.

Turn left at 87, basically, and comes south.

And one of the guys who, here on 985, lives right in that area.

And if I were by myself, I would certainly stop in and spend some time with him.

That's Rich, W-A-2-Z-P-X.

He lives right close by the Newberg area there.

So, always wanted to, if I could stop in and say hello to him, for sure.

I've always had the family with me.

So, that would be a little inconvenient.

But, nonetheless, all very good.

Well, thanks for sharing that, Renee.

Really appreciate it.

And, I hope the photos I sent you there, the restoration on the clip L, give you some ideas,

or at least are helpful.

If nothing else, to share what I had fun with over here, restoring this amplifier.

I had gotten the amplifier from a fellow up in a Poconos, Bill W-2-DGB.

And he was getting up in age, and he had the kit, the Harbaugh kit.

And the capacitors were not old enough to where they were dried out, so I could use the rebuild kit.

And you'll see how I put it together and everything else in there.

So, it's just my version of how to do it.

Certainly, I know you're capable of that, obviously.

But, nonetheless, I thought I'd share the, more of a fun, more out of fun than anything else.

And it wasn't 18 volts on the TR relay.

It was more like 17, but I was still running a little hot.

So, that coil probably wasn't long for the world at that voltage.

K3FF WA3VE.

Yeah, Ron, I saw a video on the YouTube.

I'm a big researcher on YouTube.

And I've learned so much from the people on there.

that he had done this rebuild.

This guy, it's called the radio shop.

And after he started testing it, one of the light bulbs blew out because of the voltage being too high.

So, yeah, what he did was he put a little voltage regulator, stepped it down to, I think, 9 volts, at least for the bulbs.

Now, he claimed on that video that he thinks the relay could take the higher voltage.

But I think I'm going to put a regulator in there and just run everything at a nice constant voltage and maybe even a few bypasses in there just for the heck of it.

One other thing, by the way, if you do go through up again.

In Hudson, Mass., on the east side of the 495, there is a museum.

It's a World War II, well, it's a military museum.

We stopped there.

We were able to camp out in our trailer.

Let me drop it for a second.

We were able to camp out right on the grounds there.

And it is a fantastic museum.

And if you're up in that area, I recommend it.

They have incredible aviation.

They have tanks that you can drive yourself.

It is pretty expensive, but you can drive a tank.

They'll show you how to drive a tank.

And they have, if you've seen the Dirty Dozen movie, at the end of the movie, they're driving a, I don't know, kind of vehicle.

It's kind of a tracked vehicle, like a large truck.

They actually have the one from the movie there that they've restored.

And it's kind of cool.

But there's some really good stuff in there.

I recommend it.

By the way, I haven't got the pictures yet.

Did you send up my QRZ email?

Yeah, let me check to make sure everything went well here.

Oh, stand by one second here.

Let's see what we got here.

Yeah, K3FF, Photo Journal of VEE Dentron Clip L.

And there's a link there.

It's my smoke mug link.

Yeah, they went out at 2103.

So you haven't gotten them yet?

No, I haven't gotten them.

I've had problems with large emails coming through.

I'll have to check it on the server then.

I did upgrade my, I should be able to take up to a gig there.

But I don't know.

We'll see how it is.

It may have choked it off.

I could do that by sending a short email to it and see if it comes through.

But, yeah, I've gotten problems with that.

Do you know how big it was?

Kilobytes because it's just one link.

One link to many photographs.

So, yeah, it's just a link.

And that's your earthlink.net address, correct?

Correct.

If you sent the, you sent the, oh, just the link went through.

I thought you sent the pictures through.

I should have gotten that.

So I don't know why it isn't here.

I'll send it again.

That's not a problem.

Yeah, it's my SmugMug photo gallery.

And the link will open up, oh, I don't know, 50 or 60 pictures.

And then you can look at each one individually on the web.

So, yeah, it's just a link.

It's one line, actually.

I didn't even put in a, you know, high or anything or 73 or anything.

It's just one link.

Go ahead.

Look out for it.

I don't know why it didn't come through.

But we'll be on a lookout for it.

I don't want to hold you anymore.

It's getting late.

So thank you very much.

And thank you for hosting the net tonight.

That was very helpful for what I was looking for.

Just as a side thing, I did look, and there is a universal.

Harvac does have a universal step start, which is what I had gotten years ago.

But they've got $64, which is a little steep.

Oh, yeah.

And I have spoken to Steve also, the amp guy.

And we had great conversations and stuff like that as well.

So because I wanted to find out about it.

I also have a Dentron 160-10L.

And I was going to restore that, of course.

Always wonderful things to do.

But, of course, no time to do them for sure.

But let me know if you didn't get it.

Check your spam folder also.

Heaven knows it could be in there.

But if you didn't get it, just let me know.

I'll resend it for sure.

I'll just go ahead and resend it and see what happens.

Very good.

K3FFWA3VE.

Really enjoying the conversation.

Very much.

Appreciate that, Ron.

I'll say 73.

I'll say 73.

And if I don't talk to you, have a great Thanksgiving.

And I'll catch you on the net next week.

Great.

And I'll probably see you up at the Pottstown Club, too, as well.

So all very good.

Renee, you have a good night.

Thanks for the little road trip there over the air.

And I always enjoy that.

Love geography.

Love getting around.

Love finding out, hey, what's over here?

What's over there?

How do I get from there to there?

This road connects with that.

Always love that kind of stuff.

So ever since I was in third, fourth grade.

So, and I still get lost.

Anyway, have a good night, Renee.

You take care.

K3FF, WA3VE.

K3VE, K3FF.

Good night.

K3VE, Whiskey Alpha 3, King Fox Tango.

John, how are you?

WA3KFT, WA3VE.

How is it going?

One day at a time.

That link that you sent to the other fella deals with a Dentron.

I'd like to have that if you send it to WA3KFT at ARRL.net.

I'll get it.

Over.

My pleasure.

I will do that.

Absolutely.

You know, it was really fun.

I had said it before on the air.

I just had a good time.

Just getting the amplifier to work.

Of course, it's been a long time since I worked with High Voltage.

When I did that project.

Oh, I think it's not three or four years ago now.

But yes, I will send it to you and Renee.

You heard me say that that amplifier came from Bill up in the Poconos.

And I definitely did not even want to turn it on.

It hadn't been turned on.

And I don't know in the link.

And it was 18 volts.

It was 18 and a half volts that's gone into the regulator right off the transformer.

Rectified.

So it was...

And that's an RMS voltage.

That's on the Agilent.

You'll see it.

It's on the Agilent voltmeter here that I have.

And heaven knows what the peak voltage was.

Another good...

A square root of two over there.

So that relay was definitely cooking.

The bulbs on the front were...

As you know, you have the amplifier.

Were really, really, really bright.

Until I really scaled it down.

And that little regulator, I drop about five volts.

Five and a half volts.

And the heat sink's big enough to where it can actually...

It does rise.

Let's see.

I remember...

Oh, heavens.

I forgot.

Oh, here it is.

At normal room ambient, the heat sink gets to be about 126 degrees.

So you're looking at...

No.

Yeah, it gets to be about 126 degrees.

So you're looking at, let's see.

Let's say 70.

So you're looking at about a 50 degree rise.

But, you know, I'm not running this in an environmental chamber.

So the heat sink can take it.

And it's not...

It's well below the T sub J of the...

Of the regulator.

But I'll show you this and show you exactly what I did.

And it's not a problem at all.

Go ahead.

I don't know if mine has any modifications to it.

I know that I did something on the inside.

I may have...

I think I put LEDs in for the power lamps and the transmit lamp.

And I did a couple of little subtle things like that.

But I know that relay sits at the back end.

And it's the coax changeover relay to bypass or insert the amplifier.

And it sits right up on top.

But, uh...

Uh...

Come on.

Relays are...

Are built for 6 volts, 12 volts.

And then...

They jump to 24 volts.

But, uh...

They probably got a 12 volt relay in there.

And they're running it at 15.

Which is not a good thing.

Over.

Try 18.

As you'll see in this.

And, um...

Yeah, I got this one little regulator board.

I could always design it.

But I said, you know what?

I'm working on this project anyway.

I'll just look at Amazon.

Got this little $7 relay board.

I think I have another one laying around here somewhere.

But, uh...

You'll see how I mounted it inside the, uh...

Inside the amplifier.

And it...

It works really well.

I have an external volt meter you'll see on here.

That's the volt meter.

It's measuring 12.9 volts.

And I keep an eye on that, uh...

Regulator, uh...

Voltage.

But it's...

It's never...

I mean...

I've never had an issue with it at all.

So, uh...

And it's still...

It's still running.

I think it's well within...

It's still within the limitations of this small heat sink.

Uh...

The TO220 LM317 regulator.

So, it's within the capabilities of the heat sink.

Although the regulator and the heat sink.

So...

Think about it dropping another couple volts.

Then I would probably be out of margin.

But at least I'd be able to do this.

So, yep.

I'll be glad to send you these pictures.

I think you'll enjoy it.

But, uh...

One question for you.

Is there a 10 meter mod for this, uh...

For this amplifier?

I don't remember ever seeing one.

Or one that is convenient to do.

Go ahead.

10 meter mod is, uh...

I think adding one wire.

Uh...

Because the switch terminal is there.

It's there.

And, uh...

Uh...

Uh...

Mine was already modified when I got it.

So, uh...

Uh...

Uh...

It...

Uh...

Uh...

I just...

I just put a...

A white label on the front of it.

Uh...

Uh...

Uh...

Dash 28.

Uh...

Uh...

They may have a stop on the switch.

I don't know.

Uh...

That would make it stop it at the...

21 hertz.

But, uh...

Uh...

Mine was modified for 10 meters when I got it.

And I have probably used it more on 10 meters than...

Uh...

Any other band.

Uh...

I use it on 40 meters.

Uh...

When I run certain nets and stuff like that.

But, uh...

Most of the time, uh...

It's just, uh...

Running on 10 meters.

Go ahead.

Very good.

I do remember the stop.

Because I...

I do...

I do remember now.

I don't even know why I asked the question.

Because I, um...

I do remember now looking on YouTube.

And like Renee said there, I...

I also use, as...

As CR calls it, YouTube University.

To actually figure some things out.

See how things are done.

And I do remember seeing a modification.

The guy goes in and moves the stop.

For the switch.

And then I think you said there's a wire.

So, yeah.

There is...

Uh...

You're right.

I just forgot that it was out there.

There's a...

There's definitely a modification for 10 meters.

And I have an AL80B also below it here in this rack.

And I know that, uh...

The modification for that is just clipping a wire.

And that's able to...

That makes it capable of running on 10 meters.

If I remember that correctly.

I'm sending this link shortly.

Very good.

And, uh...

We'll catch up to you later, Ron.

AFT.

Clear.

Very good.

And, uh...

John, let me know if you don't get it.

And, uh...

I think, uh...

It might have ended up in the, uh...

The, uh...

Spam and...

Spam and Scrapple bucket for, uh...

For, uh...

For, uh...

Renee.

If nothing else, I will get...

I will get it over to him one way or another.

Really fun project.

I want things on the VEE bench.

No doubt about it.

Have a good night.

Thanks for, uh...

Jumping in there.

And let me know what you think.

Um...

Again, my version of a modification.

Um...

Your...

Your mileage may vary for sure.

Have a good one.

And a good night.

WA3 KFT.

WA3 ZEE.

WA3 KFT.

Thank you.

Thank you.