News
- Details
- Written by: Maintenance Guy
- Category: News
- Hits: 389
Sorry about the title of this article. Some of us are in our 50's you know 😛
Just a quick update on our progress on Thursday morning at the clubhouse, for those that haven't heard via the nets over the last couple of days.
Aerialbeam were once again in attendance and did all the scary ladder-based antics, while some of us were faffing with the antenna itself trying to find a definitive fault that we could attribute the recent problems to.
It's had a rough time up there, and we found a few things. Fortunately, the coax itself didn't reveal any further teeth marks or similar damage, so I don't know what that was all about. That would have been bad news. We found that the PL259 at the impedance transformer was hanging on by a thread, and the counterpoise fell off as we were lowering it, so we beefed both of those things up. I can only think that the plug has been stressed by having the coax taped to the supporting mast with zero slack before the strain-relief loop was added during the last maintenance operation, and that nobody noticed. Who knows? No point speculating, but it looks good until the next problem!
More self-amalgamating tape was applied, and as we didn't have any silicon grease available, Stella donated her lip-balm stick in a fetching shade of pink to help in the anti-corrosion battle.
We also found a discernible amount of water inside the transformer. Only a few drops, but not ideal. That's what happens when you drill holes in an IP65 enclosure. I like the small pressure compensation valves below in dealing with this problem (my enclosures are all bone-dry)...
but we didn't have any to hand, and I think that Phil G4UDU is toying with the idea of potting the whole thing up the next time around (and there will be a next time). I've never seen this done on one of these fairly hefty 2.4" toroid-based transformers, so that will be interesting. We settled for putting a tiny drain hole in the bottom of the box (I think - I didn't see it actually happen).
Ultimately, we ran out of time before the rigger had to be on another job, so although we had to drop the coil-end of the element to give us enough slack to lower the transformer at the other end to head-height, we didn't have time to trim that extension. We should be able to do this ourselves at a later date, as it's tied-off only just out of reach.
Phil also took away the external antenna relay with a view to either modifying it, or replacing it with an upgraded version. I think he wants to test it with 100+ Watts through it to make sure it'll stand up to my evil data transmissions. Consequently, the 'antenna' virtual switch on the eWeLink app does nothing, so anyone with access to the app should just leave this switched to the 'off' position for now.
Thanks to our friends at Aerialbeam once again. You do us proud. Thanks also go to attendees Chris G4ZCS, Mike G8KMP, Merv M0WVE, Stella M6ZRJ, Alan G8YKV and Phil G4UDU, who not only spends a lot of time supporting the club, but also donates a fair amount of hardware out of his own spare-parts bins without anyone even realising.
Well, that's all she wrote. 'Till next time,
Berni M0XYF
- Details
- Written by: Maintenance Guy
- Category: News
- Hits: 334
You may well ask!
So, everything became unexpectedly Tom & Dick after the last club night's rushed attempt to choke-off some perceived RF in the club shack. The diagnosis was subjective, but not unreasonable and likely correct to some degree, but after a handful of us attended the 'bunker' this morning, we discovered that there was more to it than a waft of Radio Frequency where it wasn't welcome.
Frankly, it's been a right dog's dinner in there since the major antenna work took place in the autumn, with no-one able to commit the time to straighten it out in a calm and logical manner like you would do in your own shack, but this morning we were determined to put that right.
Disappointingly, no-one thought to bring any breakfast, but I guess that just made us more motivated to get it finished, and after three hours, we were out of there.
Other than some serious tidying up and cable re-routing, I managed to re-house the KiwiSDR in its own plastic box (thanks to my local Chinese take-away) whilst Merv was rather insistent on wrapping it in aluminium foil - which would have looked much better in gold 😝 - but should help with shielding. I also re-soldered a nice BNC plug on the coax coming from the antenna in place of the ropey PL259 which was decidedly suspect and candidate #1 for the intermittent issues we've been having, to my mind. We also found a new home for everything up on the shelf, along with the WiFi access point/switch. I also stuck the RF protection unit and Wellbrook pre-amp together with some double-sided tape to help tame the writhing snake pit of mini-8 coax. I just need to make up a nice short link-cable to refine the job at my leisure.
Meanwhile, over in the Flex corner, Phil was doing battle with the rather odd problems on transmit. This seems to have got worse over the last few weeks, and wasn't resolved by the rooftop remedial work that was attempted a little while ago. A lot of diagnostic work and plenty of on-air testing determined that the radio was fine, and after cutting and re-soldering the coax plug a number of times, due in part to the discovery of some strange looking teeth-like marks in the coax (very odd, but now removed) it was decided to perform a continuity test on the antenna/coax.
This showed up an unexpected 62Ω resistance (should be very close to zero), indicating that there is something amiss with the antenna itself.
Unfortunately, this will entail another rooftop excursion to determine exactly what's going on. Phil will make sure he's in attendance when this happens, as he built it in the first instance and is best placed to see what's failed. Whilst this might be regarded as bad news, it's actually good to know that we found something wrong and can therefore fix it. Assuming we can also prevent a reoccurrence, it's got to be a positive result.
Between now and then, the Flex is only really useable on Rx, whilst the Kiwi is back in action and available via the Homepage banner once again.
Your friendly local news reporter, on the scene in Burgess Hill.
Berni M0XYF
- Details
- Written by: Maintenance Guy
- Category: News
- Hits: 299
We're really pulling in a promising number of new members this year, as the profile of the MSARS website is definitely starting to pay dividends.
Robert is the latest to join. He is looking to take his Foundation licence soon, and is currently listening on his trusty Baofeng.
Welcome Robert, and maybe we can catch up on Zoom one Wednesday evening? No licence required!
I can most whole-heartedly recommend the Essex Ham Foundation preparation course. Take a look here:
https://www.essexham.co.uk/train/foundation-online
as well as obtaining and studying the beginners 'Bible':
https://www.rsgbshop.org/acatalog/The-Foundation-Licence-Manual-1711.html
Berni M0XYF
- Details
- Written by: Maintenance Guy
- Category: News
- Hits: 395
The WebSDR is currently (effectively) non-functional. It seems to fluctuate in its Rx levels anywhere from zilch to normal, and will require a proper visit to the club shack to resolve this issue. Regular club nights are not really feasible for this purpose.
In the meantime, I may be able to rig something of an alternative using OpenWebRx on a Pi from my own QTH, but it just depends on how much free time I have available.
If you want to know if I've managed to achieve this, just click on the banner on the MSARS Home page, and I'll temporarily modify the URL on there. We are aware that there is a problem, and you don't need to report it to us. The Flex is equally unpredictable right now, as evidenced by Mervyn on the last Sunday Morning net. Reason unknown at this time, but most likely related to the Kiwi problem.
Wednesday's lunchtime net was bonkers. Ken's linear went west, we had big signals from a couple of guests - SP8 and IZ4, and as the title has already given away, the strongest signal on the net by far was Barry in Sweden. Even with the broken WebSDR, he could hear himself on there! I was listening in too, and his was the only station I could receive.
Bob N4XAT was remote on my Yaesu, and we all enjoyed his company. I jumped on my own radio at the end, and landed at S9+20 with Barry, as did several other 'local' Sussex stations, so all in all it was one of those magical radio days when the stars were aligned. Excellent fun.
Oh, and while I'm at it, welcome to Henry M0VHR! Great to have you join MSARS. We are picking up a steady stream of new members now, which is absolutely fantastic. Please feel free to drop us a note via our contacts page, via our Groups.IO channel, or join any of our nets or Zoom meetings. You may also request access to the super-secret members section of the website here:
https://midsussexars.org.uk/members-only
That's where we keep all the good stuff 😃
73
Berni M0XYF
- Details
- Written by: Maintenance Guy
- Category: News
- Hits: 466
Steve Shorey G3ZPS was kind enough to present a very slick and professional overview of the communications systems and protocols employed by the emergency services here in the UK to members of the society back in December.
I've only just received a copy of the video, and I note that Steve has requested that we do not upload it to our YouTube channel, so I will of course respect his wishes.
Steve has put together a version of his talk specifically for members of the Mid Sussex ARS, and I have therefore uploaded a copy to our website and posted a link to it in our members section. If you do choose to download it, please only circulate it to other club members.
The talk is very entertaining, and covers the earliest days right through to the current time, where funding, technical restraints and politics have all had an impact on delivery of the latest generation of emergency services communications systems.
Please log in to the members section to access the download. It's a shade under 200MB in size, and well worth a view it you missed it or want to re-watch it.
Thanks again to Steve. We are very fortunate to have such talented presenters take time out to educate and entertain us.
Berni M0XYF
