[Lowfer] Pounding in a ground rod - NOT FUN

[Andy - KU4XR]

Hi all:

" XR " will be off for a little while tonite while I try to snag
" WMS " . Condotions tonite appear to be better from what's
showing on Ralphs grabber at the watering hole. Last night all the
signals were very weak, but strong tonite.

I picked up an 8' ground rod today to start work on the GND system.
I was going to get a 500' roll of #14 solid, but it went up $ 5.00
in a weeks time. Same ole roll of wire, but this week its worth 5 
more dollars than last week. Yeah right !! I'll catch that when it
drops again.

After an hour of pounding, broke the handle of one sledge hammer,
absolutely wore myself out, I finally managed to get the rod in 
the ground about 6-1/2 feet. About 3 feet down is hard clay, and
shale rock. It's hard to bust thru that stuff. I drove the rod
in the ground directly below my LOWfer vertical and top-hat. 
I connected a short piece of #10 wire between it and the radial
system. I haven't tried it on transmit yet, but I instantly saw a
reduction in received noise on the LOWfer ant. and it is clearly
evident on the waterfall display of Spectrum Lab. The white fuzzies
that run up and down the waterfall almost disappeared.  It appears 
that the ground rod did make a difference. I was skeptikal but
tried it anyway, and now glad I did.

73 all :::



Andy - KU4XR - EM75xr - Friendsville, TN.
LOWfer Beacon " XR " @ 185.29866 KHz ( QRSS-60 )
Coordinates:  N:  35* 43' 54" - W:  84* 3' 16"
http://www.myspace.com/beaconxr