[WSWSS] New beacon update and some thoughts about beacons

[Wayne Overbeck]

N6NB/b is down for the moment to solve a power problem
(when you're not "on the grid," that can be a challenge).
 
Chip makes a good point about the pros and cons of
beacons.  My own reaction is that I put the beacon up,
beaming north up the central valley, because I have found
KJ6KO/b to be very useful as I traveled around and checked
out various locations.  But I often can't hear it well in the
L.A. area with a mobile antenna (stacked loops).  My
beacon runs S1-2 in most of Orange County on the loops.
Up in the hills I've seen it hit S5.
 
Even in the densely populated northeast, I have found the 
beacons to be extremely helpful as I checked out sites there 
(there are numerous good beacons in the northeast, 
including a set run by the Mt. Airy Packrats in Philadelphia).  
Often in the east, as here, there is no one on the air, so a 
beacon can be an excellent signal source for both 
propagation monitoring and assessing the quality 
of various radio locations.  I caught a nice two-meter Es
opening last October in West Virginia (FM08) that was
first detected by alert beacon-listeners.  One wouldn't
ordinarly expect Es at 144 MHz in early October!
 
I think a beacon needs to be readable with a modest antenna
to be useful.  I don't think one watt, vertically polarized, would 
be adequate for my needs as a user of beacons.  In
choosing to use a directional antenna and point it north from
my property (which is 100 miles north of L.A. to begin with),
I was trying to minimize the concerns Chip mentioned about
beacons, while still having a usable signal.  The beacon
antenna is a design by K6MYC, by the way.  I doubt if I 
could find another small Yagi with a better pattern.
 
Incidentally, I heard from KJ6KO, who says he can hear my
beacon in Placerville at S2 with a directional antenna, even
though his own beacon is much louder there and on
an adjacent channel.
 
73,
 
Wayne, N6NB
 


---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
SBC Yahoo! DSL - Now only $29.95 per month!

--- StripMime Report -- processed MIME parts ---
multipart/alternative
  text/plain (text body -- kept)
  text/html
The reason this message is shown is because the post was in HTML
or had an attachment.  Attachments are not allowed.  To learn how
to post in Plain-Text go to: http://www.expita.com/nomime.html  ---