Well, another road trip over and done with, and while not quite as exciting as something Mr. Kerouac perhaps would have written about, work was done and clients were happy and arrived home safe and sound.
The trip (with W7WZ along to help) began by traveling to Union City TN, where WB4YDL faced needed repairs to his crank up, along with the installation of a new shunt feed system on his 120-ft tower, as well as the installation of an 80M four square, supported by that same tower. Jamie had convinced me to give a short talk at their local hamfest on Saturday morning, which was only attended by 17 folks. It’s convinced me doing these things (except for Dayton) is probably not worth my time. Anyhow, after that, we began working. Overall, things went well, with beautiful weather, and only constant high winds to contend with. The four square resonated nicely, later tests with the shunt feed show it near the middle of the band, and the crank up repairs worked out fine (although the motor was reluctant to go up afterward, but I’m sure that’s un-related). When the electric motor shop guys showed up, the guy tapped the switch and the motor reversed perfectly. Go figure!
Then down to Byhalia MS, to install K4EAR’s new tower and beam. Mike put up 90-ft of 45G, with a 4L 20M monobander. Rain and wind delayed us a day, but got done overall on time. His location is superb,
from a radio perspective–flat, isolated, with no apparent electrical issues. Mike’s running a Flex 5000A, and I had a few moments for him to point out its features and spin the mouse (okay, he has the knob encoder setup for it, but you get the idea…it’s an SDR driven by a computer, there aren’t a lot of knobs).
I was very impressed! It may not be a contest setup, but it’s very nice.
Then a short swing up and over to Nashville, where WD4K was experiencing a number of problems. I was only able to diagnose them, however. His old Prosistel has given up the ghost, after turning a 3L M2 40M Yagi, a C-31 and an 80M rotary dipole. Suggested he go with a TIC Ring for the 40M and turn the rest with an old faithfulT2X.
Then further East, to Kingsport TN, where N4TG wanted his antenna and tower taken down. I convinced Ralph he could realize several more years of service from his 55G simply by painting the tower, rather than paying me to take it down, the put it back up after re-galvanizing. It’s 50-ft of UN-guyed tower and while 55G is very strong, it still whips around a lot while up there working. The TH-7 came down with no problems, despite 20 years of tree and shrubbery growth in the interim. Mast and rotator came out next, no issues whatsoever, although the clamps were the most rusted I’ve ever seen.
Home this morning, whew~!
stay tuned
