AmateurRadio.com

Winter Maintenance

Good evening from the Shell Beach shack as the Kenwood TS850S listens on 20m CW through a trapped vertical between a pair of condominiums. I’ve noticed a significant uptick in activity as the weekend roller coasters into Sunday. Truly, it is good to hear signals on 15 and 20m with a bangin’ sunspot count of one hundred and sixty seven!

If this number remains stable through the night into tomorrow my plan is CW all day long.

In the meantime, our break in weather has allowed time for antenna maintenance and one reflector on the KLM, 3 element 40m yagi, at SL’s antenna ranch is going through corrosion treatment. Our local marine environment is terribly corrosive and fighting it is an on going test of patience. The climbing standing wave ratio reached a point of diminishing performance.

We are taking down one element at a time instead of the entire antenna. This afternoon all the hardware on the rear reflector featured in the photograph was removed for cleaning and/or replacement. Additionally, alkaline was removed from tubing intersections and intersections were thoroughly cleaned. Likewise, linear loading hardware was removed with contact at elements given a good scrub with wire brush to remove deposits.

John is going to check intersections for continuity prior to re-installing the removed reflector.

I’m stoked to see best numbers in a long time and looking forward to tomorrow’s CW marathon session inside my Shell Beach shack.

Life is wireless.