First Dry Run of Portable HF Station

Putting it all together in the rear garden

9m tall Prowhip aerial erected in rear garden ~ tunes on all the Amateur HF ('Short Wave') bands.

Solar panels charging sealed lead acid battery ~ Yaesu FT450D HF radio on white folding table.  

This is my 6-year old sealed lead acid battery ~ used as a spare as the leisure battery is being charged.

The solar panels are working really well ~ allowing me to run 100 Watts output from the radio. The battery is being topped-up as it is being charged at 40 amps via the solar panels. 

Front view ~ note aerial coaxial cable off to the vertical antenna. Cable is 24 feet long, which helps with the tuning process for the vertical aerial on Amateur Radio HF bands.

Yaesu FT-450D radio ~ using a Heil Hand Mic for good audio response & driving of the rig (to get high power output ~ closer to 90W on peaks).

Even though the bands were not very good, due to a recent solar flare that knocked out HF communication to some extent, the radio did pick-up many Italian & German Radio Amateur Stations.

Getting everything ready for portable HF operating ~ Part 2

Vertical Aerial

The Prowhip vertical aerial that I use is based on a fibreglass fishing pole which is less than 1.3m collapsed and 9m extended. Link HERE.

The aerial wire, shown here in red, travels up the fibreglass pole as you extend it to its fullest length. The wire is captured at the tip end, so no threading required!

At the bottom of the aerial you can see an UNUN ~ which allows an unbalanced piece of wire, as shown here in red, to join with a length of 50 Ohm coaxial cable to the radio, without the signal from the radio feeding straight back & frying it. This way, the aerial can be electrically tuned ('cut' to length electrically) using an aerial tuner ~ allowing the maximum signal to get out into the ether and around the globe :-)

Here, at another location from my own, you can see the vertical aerial fully extended ~ 9m ~ mounted on the aluminium post (shown behind the aerial in the photo just above this one). The coaxial cable feeds from the bottom of the UNUN to the rear of the radio.

Yesterday, at this location, I was able to tune the radio on all the HF ('Shortwave Bands' = High Frequency) bands that we can use, including the additional 6m band (50MHz) that we have access to here in the UK.

Stations worked included one in the Azores on the 20m (14MHz) band, which was not particularly 'alive' as conditions were electrically noisy (recent Solar Flares).

I am very happy with this aerial & await using it further this Summer :-)

Yaesu FT-450D HF Transceiver

This is the transceiver that I intend to use whilst out and about working HF portable. It is a very good (smallish) size, whilst maintaining good ergonomics, power and facilities. The internal tuner works very well with the vertical aerial mentioned in part 1.

I will be writing more about this little gem another time.

That's it for now :-)

73 de John G0GCQ

Change of Aerial and repainting mobile mount

A couple of days ago I received my new Diamond NR-790 Mobile aerial (Antenna for my USA readers) to replace the one I borrowed from my friend John (M1FEL).

Diamond NR-790 on car

You can see that this is the Mark II model ~ now using two heavy-weight closed coils.  The 2m band (145 MHz) sees the aerial as a 6/8th wave device (giving 3.7 dBi @ maximum of 300W power out of the radio) whilst the 70cms band (433 MHz) identifies the aerial as 3*5/8th wave device (giving 6.4 dBi @ maximum of 250W power out of the radio).  The aerial is able to handle more than I require, but it is substantially made and has already given fantastic results (see below).

The base below the black 'collar' is much improved

The photo above shows the lower part of the aerial.  Between the mount, i.e. bottom of the aerial, and the first black collar is an important part of this aerial's success: it is a built-in 'ground-plane' ~ ensuring that the aerial is really efficient when it comes to 'matching' the frequency in use.  This section is much larger than the Mark I version ~ probably to handle the extra power ~ but also because the matching has been improved.  The aerial performs as least as well as the Mark I, maybe better?

Painted aerial mount

If you look at an earlier post, you can see that the aerial mount had to be modified ~ leaving it a mixture of black & silver, with a touch of bronze!  I'm not usually worried about looks but, on this occasion, I thought I would paint it all black, using enamel bought from a local shop.

Needless to say, they did not have black!  Henry Ford would be turning in his grave, I thought, but then I saw a pot of red enamel.  The rest you can see for yourself!  I think it looks better ~ even though I have to clean the red enamel off the wire later!

As for the efficiency of the aerial?  Using 5 Watts of power from the radio, I can talk for miles on 2m (145MHz band) ~ not using a repeater I quickly add ~ and I had a similar reaction when using 5W on 70cms (433MHz band), despite going into dips, under tunnels of trees, etc.  Quite amazing!

John (M1FEL) and I will continue to carry out tests on the efficiency of the aerial over the next few days.  Our test for tomorrow will be to see how far we can work each other using 5W on 433.375MHz.  

More anon............ so watch this space!

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 ............

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.