Hello, newbie saying hello

[KI4NNL]

Hello,
Not my first post here, but I figured I should say hello.
Have had my tech only a few months now and am studying when I can to go further, but I tend to be very very busy with other hobbies and I own a small hobby ranch of sorts.

My main hobby though are fighting robots. I was founding president of the SECR (http://www.secr.org), although I don't do much with them anymore. #I held the first large robot event in the SE US way back in 2002, here is an event report by one of the folks that attended, you can even see me in a picture or two.

Farm Fight Report (http://www.teamradicus.com/comps/2002/ff1/)

Here is a promo video for another event, but all the video is of the one at my place

.FF vid (http://www.rc2.ucf.edu/battlebot/Moebius%20Web%20Video/southernassault.wmv)

Looking forward to interacting with everyone.

[KC0VWU]

Hey that is pretty cool. I used to watch Battle Bots all the time and as far as I'm concerned it is the greatest sport ever.

[VE7NOT]

If you own a hobby ranch have fun with the 160m full wave loop when you get hf http://www.qrz.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif http://www.qrz.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/laugh.gif

[KI4NNL]

Thanks, I am lucky enough to have a windmill tower in place and two people are giving me some crank up towers they no longer use (thank goodness for satallite tv! http://www.qrz.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/tounge.gif )

[KI4ITV]

That is some really cool stuff! I have always liked the sport of building and competing robots. It has all the elements of a redblooded american "guy sport".
1. You get to tinker, and build stuff.
2. You have a reason to collect stuff "you might need later".
3. Competing to the "death" is a viable competetive option.
4. 'RC' controls take two hands. So you get to say "Here, hold my beer and watch this."

Lookout football! I think I see the future here.
Thanks for the link. Welcome to the ham culture and nice to meet you.
73,
Trey P.

[KI4NNL]

Its a great hobby. Doubt it will ever quite be football, but I prefer it. I will say that the pit area after a major event has a very interesting mix of beer, creativity, dangerous machines and probably unwise decisions. But you will probably never see anything quite as much fun.

[KI4ITV]

I always thought it would be a really cool hobby to get into. But, with all my other hobbies the money would not be there. I would be reduced to using balsa and rubber bands! Maybe someday.
That is some really cool stuff.
Today's project for feeding the tinkering jones, is a $6 homebrew quad for 2m.
Here, hold my beer and watch this! http://www.qrz.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

[KI4NNL]

HEHE, yeah, its not cheap. I have taken a break from the robots for a bit and started into this hobby because 1. I really like it so far, and 2. its cheaper and easier then robots. Hopefully I won't getted dumped on too much for saying that, but its true, reletively speaking of course.

[al2i]

I suspect warring robots are a vision into the battleground of the future.

[k6bbc]

Welcome. I love those robots! Cool, cool, and cool!

(be careful who you talk to around here - there are several hams in KL7 land who will get you into nothing but trouble)

K6BBC

[kk7ue]

Quote[/b] (k6bbc @ July 23 2006,15:49)]Welcome. #I love those robots! #Cool, cool, and cool!

(be careful who you talk to around here - there are several hams in KL7 land who will get you into nothing but trouble)

K6BBC
As well as some six landers...... http://www.qrz.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

[KI4NNL]

Heh, I am so new, those last two posts are totally lost on me http://www.qrz.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

[KI4BNC]

Welcome to the hobby.
awsome footage on your bots there!
wonder if you could use the frequencies for cheating with the bots there...NAAAAAHHH...It wouldn't work...would it?http://www.qrz.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif http://www.qrz.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/cool.gif

[KI4NNL]

nah, we have pretty tight freq. control. And we use "sniffers" to hunt down the spurious signals. That was how I first ended up looking into ham actually. We needed a directional ant. design that was easily handheld, well the foxhunt websites were a great help in that.

[w4rot]

How do from the radio barn.
Wait til KC0KBH , Devan gets wind of this bot stuff.
Haven't heard him in a while, but sounds like something he would go nuts over.
Have fun!
w4rot

[KI4NNL]

Cool, I may be too new to contribute any tech knowledge about ham radio, but if anyone is interested in fighting robots let me know, I'd be happy to point you in the right direction.

[K0RGR]

Quote[/b] (KI4NNL @ July 22 2006,08:20)]Its a great hobby. Doubt it will ever quite be football, but I prefer it. I will say that the pit area after a major event has a very interesting mix of beer, creativity, dangerous machines and probably unwise decisions. But you will probably never see anything quite as much fun.
You mentioned your windmill tower. At this website, you can see what one of our locals did with his windmill tower:

W0VB's 2 meter arrays (http://www.qsl.net/w0vb/)

Terry works moonbounce as well as terrestrial meteor scatter.

No General license required to do this, but some skill with Morse Code is extremely helpful for the aurora and moonbounce work.

[KI4NNL]

wow thats sweet. #I am also going to use it and a few other old tv towers as anchor points for realy big dipoles. I cant wait to build a big honking rotator too! #Thats nothing but a ham radio robot! #I will probably use a linear actuator instead of a pulley system, just to be different.