V44KF

I am still out of a decent transceiver on the operating table. The Drake TR4CW is decent, but not decent enough for me to spend more than 15 minutes on the air chatting with my local ham radio buddies, during which time I have to touch up the dial and bring it back on frequency at least once, maybe twice. I agree with my ham radio neighbour that if I switch the radio on early it will be steady on frequency when I am ready, but I will also have a steady increase in paying for electricity which I am not using but for heating up a rig. That I do not agree is a wise thing to do. I am looking forward to the Kenwood TS940SAT being on the bench shortly, maybe for the long holiday weekend, so I can justify staying home and talking to some new friends on the other side of the world if we can find the propagation. On a long holiday weekend like this it would be extremely nice if we had a clubhouse where we could congregate and work some DX too. Club house as in the ham radio Society Head Quarter

The TS940SAT is now outside awaiting pickup and subsequent maintenance. The hammer has failed to resuscitate the receiver on the last few attempts and I had no choice but to pronounce the T940SAT dead to ham radio. A couple days ago V44KO dropped by with his antenna checking devices, and that forced me to remove the Kenwood from the operating table and replace it with the Drake TR4CW . After a few minutes and antenna connector cleaning we had audio. If you had told me that after 10 years plus you could just take up a Drake transceiver, plug it into 240 volts ac, connect an antenna, and it would function just like today was the tomorrow of ten years ago, I would tell you "you got to be making joke", but that is the reality, and maybe someone can explain the "why" of it to me. So why did V44KO bring his modern antenna checking devices? I don't trust the built in Kenwood SWR meter 100%, but I am still guided by it. My old Heathkit HM-102 meter does not agree with

This was the comment made by V44KW at the conclusion of the exercise last evening. We were at that time in the Red Cross HQ building on Horsford's Road which housed the EOC and emergency station for the Basseterre communications district. I did not hear any dissenting comments, neither did I hear any verbal response to acknowledge that anyone else in the group heard his comment. For my part I agree, and now that I think about it, it is a great idea, but it does not have to be the full blown operation with establishment of the National network, etc. I also got to thinking that maybe we could use this platform to launch weekly DXing and operating sessions, either from the Red Cross HQ building [until our site is ready] or from portable and mobile locations. Weekend evenings may be most convenient for other hams, but any and every evening is okay for me as I am still unemployed. I have been ready for this operation since last year when my portable top and bottom loaded vertical antenn

Gosh!!! I must be slipping ... it's like a whole month between blogs, but then I did not promise to be on a roster or a schedule. I am not one of those people who create the news to make the news, like buss your face with a hammer so that I can scoop and report on it, that is desperation journalism, not that it does not happen, but surely not in our Caribbean ... so you have to be careful with the information sources these days, all of them are not decent and honest, like once ago. I understand that my comments last month seemed to cause a ruckus and hams were calling for me on two meters one evening to either clarify or verify or explain, what I wrote in plain language. I did not write in any code, but I now get the impression through the grapevines that everyone is quite clear, and may be in agreement, of sorts, with what I said and what I did not say. The facts are UNDENIABLE, indelibly written in history, but some people have a hard time with it because the word POLITICS may be

I just came from the restroom and you know how you sometimes get ideas when you are in there. I don't want to call it inspiration but if you think that what it is I will back you up. Actually, my flash came when I was under the shower and the water was slightly below body temperature for mid morning. I was thinking photography not ham radio, so I don't know where the flash came from, and since it seems to be a truism I will say a few word, very few, on this. Some people have a way of wanting to tell others what they must do and say, and could do and say, and I am not into that foolishness. Every person has a right to do and say what they wish, anytime and any place, but if in so doing they violate any laws and bye laws, to which a penalty is attached, following any recourse that was taken by those who felt 'hurt' or mischievous, you can either suck it or appeal the judgement, if it was legally obtained. The long and short is, if you don't like it lump it or deal wi

WOW!! It is just a week short of a month since my last ham radio blog, and time seems to be just zipping by, and I must be slowing down real fast ... but no, it can't be me because I am always right and perfect, so it has to be you and everybody else. I learn from today's youths that anything that's wrong in the world is your fault, it can't be me ... even when you catch them with the cookie in hand. Some world we live in nowadays, but one day when they get old like us, they will suddenly awake and make the discovery, and new meaning may be given to certain words like radical. When these youths get hot under the collar, they hot, too hot for Jerry Springer's show. Every now and then I see mine take off, and "like a dirt bike" is no longer an appropriate description, maybe "like a backhoe, bulldozer and dump truck" is more accurate. Anyway, when thing are normal we still love them, we have no choice, we brought them into the world ... even though

Today I saw my first Flex 5000A on eBay, and I just had to lay down a bid on it. There were also a couple Elecraft K2 and Ten Tec Omni 6 rigs. I suspect that even though things are tight some hams are not letting go their top-of-the-line Ten Tec Orion or Elecraft K3 transceivers, until it is absolutely necessary. Well, I wouldn't either, something else would have to go first, second and third, but not my ham radios nor my fishing tackle. I know that some happy hams will be camping out on eBay, on the coop, and I myself might loose some sleep watching the auction minutes counting down. My Kenwood TS-940SAT is calling for maintenance again, so I am honoring the message about MTBF. I used to think that I was the only person who had been turned off by an unexpected, albeit unwarranted, response from a supplier for a ham rig made in Japan. I now find that I have friends with similar experiences, for the same brand of equipment [it is not Kenwood]. I will endorse the equipment for it