Adapting the aerial mount on the car

The trip up to South London, from the Kent / East Sussex Border, in the new car on Friday was fine ~ but I noticed that the (usually reliable) aerial mount (antenna for our American friends) was not able to keep the aerial vertical.  It had that slightly 'swept back' look about it.

Adapted Mount

Luckily for me, that kind Radio Amateur John (M1FEL), who lives nearly 1/4-mile from me, has a grinder, drill and a selection of new BA bolts.  You can see that we removed the central locknut and knurled wheel affair and, instead, used a couple of bolts.  The top bolt stops the bracket from rotating (Left <> Right in the photo), which was the main problem, and the central bolt stops the bracket from coming apart.

'Inside' of the bracket

The aerial I am using, you may recall from a previous blog, is the Diamond dual-band NR-790.  This is an excellent aerial ~ allowing me to work John over 50 miles simplex on 145.375MHz (2 metre band) despite great lumps of chalk (including Wrotham Hill) in the way! An excellent piece of kit!  All I need to do now is paint the exposed metal matt black ~ probably Humbrol enamel.

Radio fitted in 'bin' below 12v supply

The radio was, quite simply, the easiest to fit in a long while. Conveniently, the estate car has what I can only describe as 'bins' either side of the tailgate.  The one on the nearside has ample room for the radio (good for circulation & cooling qualities)  ~ benefiting from the cigarette-lighter socket (rated at 20 Amps) above.

Offside ~ showing aerial cable

The other bin is not being used for any radio gear!  The photo above, however, does show you how the aerial cable, mostly hidden underneath the boot space close to the spare wheel, exits the car and runs up the tailgate channel ~ eventually meeting the bracket.

Radio remote head & microphone

The photo above shows the remote radio head in position under the Radio / CD / iPod controller.  You can see the storage position of the Bluetooth headset.  This configuration means that there is only one wire visible from the back of the car to the remote head.  Quite neat!

The rig ~ showing the local 'natter' frequency in MHz

If you look at the above photo closely, where the Bluetooth headset docks with the remote head (just where it says 'Dual'), you can see the blue light on the Bluetooth headset.  That is showing that it is fully charged.  The good thing is, even when the radio is turned off, the Bluetooth headset continues to be charged ~ showing a red LED when doing so.  Clever, eh?  The headset has power for just over 3 hours continual use.  Good enough for me!

'Bumper' sticker from the States

So I am steadily getting the car the way I want it.  Till next time dear friends!

The new car arrives!

So ~ the new car has arrived!  Finally, after leaving the garage in Ashford, I arrived home at 11am this morning.

I am very pleased with the car.  It is the new Fabia Estate variant ~ the 105bhp 1.6 Turbo diesel 'straight-4' engine ~ made in the Polish factory two weeks ago!

They have improved the on-board computer & the display (it was already excellent) and also the radio / CD / iPod player display.  I like the fact that I can fully control the iPod from the radio itself ~ music-wise, that is.

The engine is quite quiet, very economical and, best of all, is incredibly efficient!  Driving around Ashford this morning registered 58.8 mpg!  It should be around 65 mpg at least on a longer journey ~ great!

My friend John (M1FEL for those Radio Hams amongst you) kindly took all these photos for me!  We then 'hatched a plan'.  How long could we wait before putting in the Ham Radio 'rig' and attach the aerial?  We planned for after lunch!

Then the rain came down in buckets ................

It didn't put us off!

The remote 'head' for the radio, which is fitted in the boot & uses the 20 Amp 12v socket at the back.  All fully fused, etc., drawing only 12 amps on full power.  This is fitted on a small metal bracket, thanks once again to John (M1FEL).  The clip to the bottom left-hand side of the 'head' is the recharging clip for the Bluetooth headset.

As it was still tipping down with rain, you can see that I am wearing my 100% waterproof jacket ~ but the important bit (really!!) is that I am wearing the Bluetooth headphone/microphone.  This is totally 'hands free' and very safe!

You can see that we fitted the aerial (a Diamond dual-band aerial for 2m & 70cms bands) ~ a mere 1.4m tall ~ works well!  Thanks to John (M1FEL) who lent me his aerial as it performed better than my (shorter) one.  Who says size doesn't matter?

Everything is working well!  Great!

My grateful thanks to John, of course, without which I would not have the radio 'up and running' within 4 hours of getting the new car back home!

Until next time ............

Shoreham Air Show 22-08-2010

I had been looking forward to attending this airshow all year!  The 70th anniversary of the Battle of Britain & the 100th anniversary of Shoreham Airport (oldest commercial airport in the UK) ~ so a special trip.

I have not invested in a 400mm Canon Digital IS lens as yet, that will have to wait until next year, but I do have the 200mm variant. I also took with me my trusty Canon EOS 20D and the latest Tamron wide angle lens for close shots in and around the static display.

I set the ISO to 400 as the day was *very* misty ~ with low cloud base between 90 and 300 feet ~ mostly seemed to be about 150 feet.  Lots of heavy showers peppered with that drizzly mist that just lingers. Ugh!  I set the speed setting to 125/sec so as not to freeze the propellers in flight ~ I wanted to see 'spinning' movement!

I managed to take a couple hundred shots even though the flying was cut back to virtually nothing.  I felt so sorry for the organisers, stallholders & event participants ~ they must have put so much into the organisation and preparation of the show.  If it hadn't been for the weather, it would have been a fantastic day out!

The first flying event ended in disaster!  You can see that the tip of the left wing took the initial force of the impact.  Just as well as, in my opinion, the glider was released too low to the airfield (cloud cover being so low, I expect) ~ turned to lose speed and face into the wind ~ and then seemed to 'stall'.

This, naturally, meant that the flying display was put back by at least an hour whilst the ambulance carried the injured pilot to Worthing Accident & Emergency hospital + photo forensics were taken from the Police Helicopter.  After the runway was cleared, we carried on the limited flying. Rain, rain and more rain!!!

Overall a great day ~ but a pity our typical British August weather got in the way!  Oh well, maybe I will be able to attend next year?

This shot shows you a Mark 2 Hurricane B flying along runway 20 @ Shoreham Air Show 2010.

Getting ready for the new car

I have used many Amateur radios in my cars over the last 27 years: covering the HF (Shortwave) bands right up to 1.2GHz (23 cms) band.

Sometimes I have had four different rigs in the car at the same time!

I have now reached the stage where I *think* I only need one radio in the car! The most common Amateur Radio Bands in use, for mobile working, are definitely those in the '2 metre' (145 MHz) and '70 cms' (433 MHz) range. I have a dual-band radio ('rig') that is quite small and yet powerful.

The rig runs at 50 Watts on the 2 metre band and 40 Watts on the 70 cms band. That is to say, the amount of radio 'energy' that leaves the rig has a maximum of 50 or 40 Watts. The rig can transmit at lower powers!

Luckily for me, this rig has the ability to use a Bluetooth headset so that I do not have to hold a 'fist' microphone whilst driving. I have always used a wired remote microphone, with a switch on the gear lever, before ~ but the thought of using a totally wires-free system was quite exciting!

I have fitted the Bluetooth board in the radio and have added the Yaesu speaker microphone that clips around my ear. I have tested it out & it all works fine!

All I have to do now is wait for the new car! Should be Tuesday 24th August.

I'll let you know how I get on with this project.