Murrell (W9ISP) and his son Austin, Kevin (K9HX) and I attended the Ft. Wayne Hamfest on November 14, 2015. This is an annual event for us, and the last hamfest we attend for the year. This year was a bit larger than last, which I’m glad to see. Years ago, this hamfest encompassed two floors of the Colosseum. It was the largest hamfest in Indiana. Over the years, it began to decline. It went from two floors, to one floor, and then about four years ago, it was one half of one floor of the
Continue readingNotes from Portable Operation
Even though I’ve been a Ham for 44 years, I have not done a lot of portable QRP operations. I have built numerous home brew QRP radios and several QRP kits, but have never taken them to the field. I guess I like to build radios more operating them. My recent QRP operating from the vacation cabin was the first time I’ve set up in the field since the 70’s, when I operated with a Heathkit HW-7. I’m very familiar with all the problems that can be encountered in QRP field operations, but I didn’t realize how difficult some of
Continue readingPortable Operations
I am operating portable this week from the vacation cabin in southern Indiana. I’m using a dipole and a home brew radio I made back in 1993. It’s my version of the Micromountaineer with the addition of a VFO for the receiver. I call it the SB-40. (I will post info on this rig in the Projects page.) The antenna is newly constructed before the trip and I didn’t have time to tune it. The dipole was thrown together right before the trip using RG-178 mini coax, some Teflon coated #24 hookup wire, and a home made center insulator made from
Continue readingIndianapolis Hamfest – 2015
I attended the Indianapolis Hamfest at the Marion County Fairgrounds on July 11th. I always sell stuff at this hamfest. I’ve had very good luck in the past with selling and with purchases. One of the main reasons I like this Hamfest is that I always see people that I haven’t seen in years, or at least since last year. This guy, Brian K9KIX, came by the booth to my surprise. I had held the call sign K9KIX for many years. It turns out Brian had the call sign for just three days prior to the Hamfest. He had wanted
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