[HCARC] Field Day Antennas

Fri Jun 6 11:53:09 EDT 2014

I wonder if it would be possible to poke/jam/pull any more cables thru
without taking some out.
I don't remember exactly when we put up that tower and antennas, maybe ~15
years ago.

Before the RC had their roof remodeled it was flat roll roofing and tar.
There was a handy steel ladder attached to the building close to the outside
door that we used to attach a 40 ft. mast.  One end of a dipole was tied off
on the outside power conduit of the tax office next to the alley.  Talk
about nerve!  They might not have noticed if the end of the dipole hadn't
fallen on one of their cars parked next to the RC's fence.  The other end of
the dipole was tied off on the corner fence post on the east street side.
When we put up the tower we had a hell of a time drilling holes in the
concrete block wall for the wall bracket.  It turned out that the blocks are
some kind of ceramic.  We wore out several rock bits which would come out of
the hole red hot.

-----Original Message-----
From: Kerry Sandstrom [mailto:kerryk5ks at hughes.net] 
Sent: Friday, June 06, 2014 10:02 AM
To: Harvey N. Vordenbaum
Cc: hcarc at mailman.qth.net
Subject: Re: [HCARC] Field Day Antennas

Harvey,

I didn't know how the antennas were setup.  If it were me, I would use the
three existing RG-8/U runs for the multiband vertical, the 2 m and the 432
antennas.  I suspect that 1 or 2 RG-8X cables would fit between the RG-8/U
cables.  That would take care of the low frequency dipoles.
*****There's one RG8X too for the RC antenna.********

How long have the existing cables been in place?  It may be time to replace
them anyway.  Perhaps Chuck could give us an idea on the lifetime of coax
cables.

The purpose of my original e-mail was to get us thinking about the
usefulness of several lowband dipoles in close proximity to each other.  
*****The steel roof could be a problem for dipoles in close proximity.  Of
course they are bent 90 deg. To utilize the most of the building's horiz.
area******

In any event, we need to figure out what we can do with the club station and
its antennas.  If we have to run a couple transmission lines on the outside
and through a window for this exercise, I think that would be acceptable.
It would also let us know how well we can operate multiple HF rigs from the
club station.

We need to do this as simple as we can.  The more complicated we make it,
the more problems we will probably have.

Kerry

On 6/6/2014 7:43 AM, Harvey N. Vordenbaum wrote:
> Due to the limitations of the building feed through conduit we only 
> have a few coax's (RG-8's) available.
> The HF antennas are combined outside by a remote coax switch box.  
> There is one spare feed through cable however.
> There are separate coax's for the 2M and 2M/.7M antennas.
> Fred has an idea of replacing all the present RG-8's with RG-8X cable 
> thus gaining a few more lines passing through. Someone could make a 
> calculation about how many lines would be gained. Making this change 
> would not be easy, however and time is getting short.
> For field day we may have to pass coax through the partially opened 
> window, but then you wouldn't want a generator running nearby.
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: HCARC [mailto:hcarc-bounces at mailman.qth.net] On Behalf Of Kerry 
> Sandstrom
> Sent: Thursday, June 05, 2014 10:07 PM
> To: Gary J - N5BAA; hcarc at mailman.qth.net
> Subject: [HCARC] Field Day Antennas
>
> Gary,
>
> You may only need to put an antenna up for the GOTA station across the 
> street.  Questions you need to answer are:
>           1.  Do the existing 40 and 80 m dipoles have separate 
> transmission lines?
>           2. Can you operate one transceiver on the 20/15/10 Vertical 
> and another on the dipoles simultaneously?
>           3. If the answer to 1 is yes, can you operate with one 
> transceiver on 80m and another on 40 m simultaneously?
>           4. Is operation even permitted on 30/17/12 m for field day, 
> if not you don't need any WARC antennas?
>
> If you can operate on 80 and/or 40 simultaneously with 20/15/10, then 
> that is probably all you need.  You won't be able to operate two 
> stations on any single band even with separate antennas behind the RC 
> Building.  I suggest that if you really don't need to add any more
antennas you shouldn't.
>
> You should check out all the antennas and transmission lines that are 
> a permanent part of the station a couple weeks ahead of time in case 
> you need to make any repairs.
>
> If you are operating as 2 or 3F (why not 4F!!) then I don't think 
> setup time is even a factor since the station is ostensibly part of a
"permanent"
> emergency fascility.
>
> Kerry
>
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