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View Full Version : The radio gods, quantum physics, and the HTX 10.


N9WOS
11-27-2002, 06:47 PM
When you work with slightly sub standard equipment
and antennas, you notice things that are not always
apparent to the normal operator.
There is things that become major factors that are hard
to quantify.

One of the most intriguing things is the affect that
you radio's name has on the propagation to your site.

I have seen it to many times to dismiss it.

I can listen to someone talk for an hour and i finally
decide to make a contact with him.
I usually always get him on the first try or the third try,
But never the #second try.
I don't know why but the second try never works.
The radio waves go to some big dummy load in the sky.

When i make contact with him my signal is always strong.
He's report stays the same when i tell him I'm running 25Watts.
The QSO will proceed along fine until we sign off.
But If i tell him the radio is an HTX 10 rat shack radio.
The next response i will get usually has the term QSB in it.
And in a few seconds, his signal will start fading too.

I also have A HW 101 that is my main HF rig.
The affects it has on propagation is also veery strange.
It seem that i can always walk on pileups with the
120 watts that it can push with the Mill spec 6146's in the
output stage, but i can never make contact with someone that
wants to talk for more than a few seconds.
It's just the RST, name, and location, then he goes to the next one.
Any one that is having long conversations with other people
can never hear me.
And the only country that i can't walk on the pileup
and make the contact is Japan.
That one has really puzzled me.
I can work Europe and Russia with no prob.
Africa and south America comes in clear but Japan is no go.
I can hear them fine but something isn't coming together somewhere.

I haven't been able to quantize the factors causing it.
I have my old P133 pounding away at the variables as i type this
but I'm thinking about pulling time one a cray machine to
speed up the process.

My best guess to this point is the problem affecting the HTX 10
is the ether molecules don't like accepting RF from such a
cheap and pathetic CB knock off that only cost $89 new.
It doesn't have any history behind it and it doesn't meat top of the line specs
so they aren't going to waste their time helping it.
They don't act biased against it until they hear what it is, then
they go on strike and the quantum transfer function goes to hell.

I think the HW 101's problem is it's been used on pileups
and contest to much by the previous owner.
It's got into a pattern and it's sticking with it.
It won't even entertain the idea of a brick key conversation.

The problem with Japan is pretty obvious.
The 6146's have a bias against Japan so they aren't going
to help me talk to them under any condition.

The solutions are obvious.
I will have to refrain from telling what radio
I'm using when I'm using the HTX 10.
Or I'll say I'm using the old heathkit HW 8.
The ether will work double time to carry my signal then.
I'll be able to WAS in under a week.
All I'll have to do is make up a little cloth cover for my radio
to make it look like an old HW 8 if the radio gods come to check.

As for as the HW 101 goes, i will have to trick it into some long
conversations until it gets use to the idea.
And when i contact Japan I'll have to say that I'm talking to
japar or something, That way the finals won't get suspicious.
All thou the person on the other end may think I've lost it.
(Of course they already do, so no harm there.)

Or i could crank up my Hallicrafters HT 18 or SX 96 and run
a few days of brass pounding CW to appease the radio gods
so they will let my HTX 10 signal through un hindered.

Or i could crank up my HW 12A single bander heathkit radio
and run it a few days to earn some brownie points with the radio gods.

I'm currently trying to find out what the best type of radio would
be to get the ether stream to help me the most.
Once i find that, I'll start making radio covers to make any
radio look like that, then the band will always be open and
everyone will have a 599 signal report.

And some accessory things i will sell is little tape on things
to go on your coax.
It will look like the coax is spliced together
with bobby pins and duct tape.
That will be good for a few good S units from the radio gods.

The antenna i will sell will look like a piece of 1/2 inch cooper
pipe with plastic pipe couplers at the joints but it will have
a full matching network inside with modern high strength
nylon and fiberglass insulators inside the plastic PVC joints.
That will worth a good 8 S units from the radio gods.

This is N9WOS, And 73 to you and happy holidays to everyone.
^o^

W5ATX
11-29-2002, 02:51 AM
Your observations are quite interesting and your theorems concerning same are potentially valid.

Let us know what you find through your planned research on solutions. Maybe we'll be able to say we knew you when . . .

Oh, and also, you should have posted a disclaimer at the start of your post. Something like "Warning! Do not read while consuming carbonated products" or some such.

N7CPC
11-29-2002, 06:24 PM
Ibelieve you may have sumpn' here. My twenty five watt Yaesu will out talk my one hundred seventy watt Kenwood any day. Maybe the plastic Yeasu cover will allow all the output power of the kenwood to propagate.

One might think one could not fool the RF Powers-That-Be so easily. But one would not have thought Clinton would get a second term either. Stranger things have happened.

I have a ten meter rig that has no recognizable brand name. Let me know which plastic cover works best on ten and I'll darn sure try one!

73 de Craig......N7CPC http://www.qrz.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif

K9STH
11-29-2002, 07:15 PM
Now, have you considered how well your antenna has been trained? A well trained antenna will help considerably. Over 30 years ago, when I first moved into my present house, I obtained an old HyGain TH-3 3-element triband beam that had belonged to W5QBM (big DXer and BIG contester until his death in the mid-1970s). He had trained this beam so well, that in the less than 6 months that I had it in the air, that I worked well over 200 countries and placed quite well in several DX contests. Now, when I replaced it with single band beams, the tower had, by that time, been trained by the TH-3 so that it trained the single band beams to perform just as well as the TH-3, in fact, over time, even better.

Before the TH-3, I had only a medicore signal and didn't work that much DX. The TH-3 was not known for being that good of an antenna. So, obviously, the careful training that it had from W5QBM paid off. It knew how to work DX and contests and I didn't have to even think of training it!

So, you also have to take into consideration how well your antennas have been trained and how well you treat them. If you don't treat your antennas "right", they won't work well in most cases.

Also, you have to make your sacrifices to the "radio gods" every Halloween else they "get you" the next year.

Glen, K9STH

W5ATX
11-29-2002, 07:37 PM
There's also one other rule about antennas: the crummier the weather while you're putting them up, the better they work. Put up that big tower and those quads on a sunny spring day and you may as well just pick up the phone or send an email. But suffer miserably putting that monster up during an ice storm, and you will have such good luck, you will be working DXCC without even going in the shack. The DX will come TO YOU! You'll come home from work and find 15 new ones (they call them "entities" now, not countries) in the log.

Yessir, RF theory can be a bit odd at times. Just go with it. Don't fight it, and whatever you do, don't do antenna projects just because the weather is good!

N0KLT
11-30-2002, 03:45 AM
Guys,

One additional factor you left out, never ever praise a radio, an antenna, or a computer(or any other electical or mechanical device) when you are where that device can hear you. To do so will invite and encourage immediate malfunctioning of said device. This also holds true for computer code. Never ever comment on how well some piece of code or entire program is running and especially NEVER comment on how long it has been since the program has failed. I have seen this done and before the words were out of the persons mouth there was something that caused the program to crash. This is not a random event or some occasional fluke. It is an immuteable law of nature.

73

Gary N0KLT

PS. also commenting on band conditions being good will cause the band to go flat almost immediatley

N9WOS
11-30-2002, 04:06 AM
And I'm still trying to find some of that coveted antenna wax
that i heard someone talking about a while ago. http://www.qrz.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/confused.gif http://www.qrz.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/confused.gif

K9STH
11-30-2002, 04:13 AM
ATX: Your observations are quite true about the weather. The best wire antenna that I ever had was a 270 foot long Zepp that had one "angle" in it to fit on my parent's 160 X 220 foot lot in northern Indiana. Just after I upgraded to General in 1959, I heard a contest on 160 meters. Since I had a transmitter and a receiver that covered the band (Globe Chief 90A + WRL 755 VFO and Hallicrafters S-85), I just had to get on the band. Looking around, I didn't have enough wire so I actually unwound several TV power transformers (I had an "unlimited" supply of TV parts from a TV repairman down the block) to get enough wire. After splicing and soldering it together, I found some insulators, some 300 ohm transmitting twin-lead that K9BPV had given me, and went out and erected the antenna. It worked great on all bands 160 through 10 meters except for 15 (there is a reason why this type of antenna won't work on 15). I was able to work the contest. And that was my main antenna until I went off to college in 1962.

By the way, did I mention that I put the antenna up at 3:00 AM, in 3 feet of snow, during a blizzard? The things we did when in high school!

Glen, K9STH

N9WOS
11-30-2002, 04:27 AM
The problem I'm having with my 80/40m antenna
is the moles keep eating the coax.

That's why i have a standing order for any
wireless antenna you can find.

That way i can hook the thing up without having
a coax to worry about.
I will also save money because i won't
have to buy any cable to run out to the antenna.

When i go to the radio store and ask for one
they just look at me strange. http://www.qrz.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/mad.gif

I'm sure someone makes one. http://www.qrz.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif