[Lowfer] FW: 600MRG> New member...

[WE0H]

Can anyone give this guy some advise??? He could become a good west coast
Lowfer. Hey Les, you might like his callsign>N6LF<.

Mike>WE0H
http://www.geocities.com/we0h/index.html

-----Original Message-----
From: Rudy Severns [mailto:rudys@ordata.com]
Sent: Sunday, March 03, 2002 11:33 AM
To: WE0H
Cc: 600 m club
Subject: Re: 600MRG> New member...

Hello,  Thanks for the welcome.

    Not much in the way of LF gear here.  I have an old Navy RAK-7 TRF
regenerative receiver and can also use the MP1000. But I have noticed that
the MP has a lot of birdies below 500 kHz even with the antenna port
shorted.  I have a 1000' Beverage out on the back forty which is of course
only 1/6 wavelength on 166.5  kHz but should work a bit anyway.  I suspect I
will need to put up a large loop of some kind.  Maybe a pair of crossed
loops, 30-40' high, with a goniometer.  Boy haven't thought about that in a
very long time!

It has been over forty years since I last operated below 500 kHz.  Was the
shore station operator at Eniwetok Atoll for incoming merchant ships.
Earlier I was an RM3 in the Navy reserve out of Bremerton, WA and ran MF
nets occasionally.

The note on the TBW transmitter struck a chord!  I remember very large black
cages full of tubes with anode connections coming out of the side which put
out only a few hundred Watts.  I guess some of  that gear is still around.
The DE on which we took training cruises had these rigs in the radio room
which was above the main deck.  I was surprised the ship didn't capsize with
all that weight up in the air!

Currently I am a 160 m fanatic but I think it would be a lot of fun to try
the lower frequencies.  I can put up a reasonable antenna.  I have two 150'
wood poles and a tall fir tree more or less in a line about 700'.  I modeled
a 150' vertical wire with a 700' wire top and came up with 1 Ohm radiation
resistance on 166.5 kHz.  The wire loss adds another 1.2 Ohm.  Of course the
tuner and ground losses will add a lot more but I think the antenna would be
reasonable at least.  There is an extensive ground system (ground screen +
radials) around the middle support where the vertical wire would be and the
whole thing is on a high, narrow ridge, so the ground losses might be
manageable.  It is also possible to hang a wire from my ridge to a tall old
growth fir on another ridge parallel to mine. Would be 1000'+ with about a
250' vertical wire down into the canyon, a la Jim Creek.  I will save that
one for later!

The challenge I face now is to get a transmitter going.  I have an old Henry
linear, complete with power supply, that I might modify.  Another
possibility is to build up a class D amplifier using standard power MOSFETs
which work just fine at 166 kHz or even 440 kHz.  For an oscillator I can
use my HP 8640B signal generator. Any advice would be appreciated.

For right now I was wondering if there are any schedules for transmissions
on 166.5 kHz.  I would like to try listening for a start to see if I can
hear anyone.  I live near Eugene, OR.

Thanks again and 73, Rudy N6LF