As the winter approaches the low bands particularlly become less noisey and the propogation starts become much more reliable out farther distances.  It makes for the best AM radio at night on 160/80 and 4O meters. 

Winter also means more time indoors and the AM hams have time be in their shack and work on projects.  I have a few projects in mine for the winter i.e. restoring the Johnson Viking I and an Hammarlund HQ-110.  It's the time to improve our stations.  

You are welcome to leave feedback on this post with your Winter Projects you wanna accomplish.

Hey everyone!  Having been inspired by SolderSmoke and Resonant Frequency and other fine ham radio related podcast, audio zine offerings, I have decided to do up an audio journal about me and my radio interests.  I have the initial offering ready for your listening pleasure.

SkyWave! KX5JT Audio Journal

Hope you all enjoy it.  I'm not sure what direction it will evolve in but I do hope to keep it fresh and add good content relative to amateur radio.  This first one is simply about how I grew up to become interested in electronics, computers and radio. 

73 from John, KX5JT

My DX-60 came last Thursday from Alistair Electronics.  I had Ken fix the mode wafer switch, put in a push-to-talk and apply the WC3K audio/resting carrier control modifications.  I put it through it's paces over the weekend and it's working great!  I now have the HB-10B VFO matched up with it as well. 

The transmit audio is beautiful.  I have been getting a few unsolicited kudos on the audio.  Jeff, W0XV and Bob Heil, K9EID (from Heilsound) gave me some nice feedback.  Bob said the DX-60 sounded great.  Jeff is interested in applying those mods to his best DX-60.  Now the SB-200 is doing a great job but I have the desire for MORE STRAP!!  I suppose I'll have to eventually do something about that! 

Until next time, 73 friends and fans!

John, KX5JT

I have a pet peeve. I wish that amateurs would always use the accepted ITU approved phonetic alphabet when phonetics are used. The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) phonetic alphabet is generally understood by hams in all countries. It is used when signing your call or passing information that must be spelled out. The ITU adopted the NATO phonetic alphabet developed in the 1950s to be intelligible and pronounceble. It is generally understood by all amateur radio operators around the world. It has a long history of working very well in harsh phone conditions.

Jazz Fest, May 3rd! NEW ORLEANS BABY!  Well, I may be going alone, I'll have to find someone to bring since I have two tickets.  The person I was going to bring... well.. .she isn't coming.  Life goes on.  I'll have fun no matter.

On the ham radio side of things, I'm expecting my Heathkit DX-60 sometime this week to come back from Alistair Electronics.  I employed Kenneth Shaw, W5KFS of Albuquerque, New Mexico to repair the mode switch, install a PTT and apply the WC3K audio and resting carrier mods on it.  While he was doing so he also changed out all the old caps, many which were leaky.  I wanted a good working DX-60 to get on the air so I went with Kenneth for the work.  Now I can take my time learning with the Johnson Viking I that needs some repair.  Also, I am planning a homebrew 160 meter monoband linear amplifier which may become an A.M. transmitter too.  We'll see how that goes. 

Noisey band conditions lately with all the springtime weather but I have been making a few AM contacts on 40 meters day and night.  Also doing a little 20 meter SSB in the afternoons and some digital modes, mostly Feld Hell on 40, 30 and 20. 

73 from the South Coast!

KX5JT

I ordered a matched pair of Svetlana 572B tubes. (Russian)  They are in the Heathkit SB-200 and I think I will keep them there for a while and see how they hold up.  So far they are doing fantastic.  I now have the pair that was in the amp, Sylvania (USA), the Shuguang 572B's  (China) and the Svetlanas (Russia).  So I should be set for a while all though I'm still weary about the Chinese tubes.

At some point in the future, I will attempt a homebrew Class C plate modulated AM transmitter with transmitting tubes.  I am doing a mental excersize about using 572B's for this.  If someone has a copy of the RCA Data Sheet for 572B's I would LOVE to see it!  I do have the RCA data sheet for 811A tube.  I could use those specs for a very conservative design using the 572B's at 811A specs.  Anyway who knows what I will actually do when the time comes (a few years or less maybe?).

73 from KX5JT

My beloved Heathkit SB-200 Linear Amplifier developed an intermittent problem that finally became permanent.  For the last couple months, I would notice a strange light "sizzle" sound coming from it after a warm up period.  This could be heard as a sizzling static in the reciever of my ts-570 as well.  It only lasted a few seconds at a time and only showed up on occasions every few days.  Finally, a visual inspection found some of the filter capacitors were "swollen".  It still had the original powersupply so I decided to use this as an opportunity to upgrade to the Harbach powersupply board and also install a Harbach soft-start while at it.

Well all went well and the amp has new lilfe now.  I had a set of Shuguang 572B's that I ordered as a spare set directly from China.  While I had the amp opened up I decided to rotate these in and give my Sylvania 572B's (made in USA) a break.  WHOA!  Those chinese tubes graphite anodes glow bright red in less than a minute with 130 watts carrier from AM or in about 3 minutes from 600 watts pep on sideband.  The Sylvanias barely blush at all ever.  That is scarey!  I don't want those tubes taking out other parts of my amp so I put them back on the shelf.  Be careful with Chinese tubes out there everyone!  Something is amiss with those!

73 for now, de KX5JT John -- God Bless

Hey everyone!  I had a chance to put the newly acquired DX-60 on the bench and check it out.

So I plugged in the 3880 crystal and went through the tune up procedure (first with my wattmeter and oil-filled paint can dummy load, then with a lightbulb).   She is putting out okay on CW, 55 watts @ 2.5 ma grid current and 150 ma plate current.  Funny thing is she puts out 25 watts resting carrier on AM at about 75 ma plate current with 2.5 ma grid current. 

She has a "dot" mic connector on the front panel and I had a couple plugs from switchcraft, so I wired one to a cord that ended in a 1/4" phone plug, which I put into my mixer output from my audio chain.  (I will wire my D-104 for the dot connector when I finish refurbing it).  Well the light bulb brightens up with voice!  Okay, on with the headphones and I tune my ricebox to 3880 and sure enough it picks up the signal from the lightbulb... tweak the audio drive pot.. but she does sound a lil distorted...

Well, before I can mess with this thing anymore I'm going to have to do something about antenna switching/amp keying/receiver muting at the very least to get it on the air.  I suppose at the very least a two position coax switch for the antenna, moving the function from standby to AM, then foot switch keying the SB-200 will put me on the air as a dirty temporary setup.  At least I will be able to get some reports.

Ultimately I'll need to get the HV off the function switch and work on a more graceful antenna relay/ amp keying/ receiver muting solution.  Oh and the matching VFO needs to be brought back to life.

It's progress!

KX5JT

Okay so now that I can load up the G5RV on 30 meters I made some contacts.  Great band, great people.  I also joined the 30 meter digital group and I am member#1769.  Since I can load up 160m now, I'll play with some of the digital modes there too! 

Join the 30 meter digital group and have some fun!

http://www.30meterdigital.org/

That's it for now, 73 John KX5JT

Hey everyone.... so I had this W2DU current balun that I bought with the idea that I would employ it in a fan dipole someday.  I still will likely do that.  I decided to put it on my G5RV for now instead of it laying around doing nothing.  The G5RV had 10 turns of coax for a choke where the coax meets the ladderline outside under the antenna.  Well I left that 10 turns for now AND added the W2DU.

Results:  MUCH less rf in my shack.  I don't ever get the USB mouse and Keyboard knocking off now.  Also I get much less RF into the Nady EQ and audio on the higher bands.  Moreover, I can actually tune my antenna on 160 meters and on 30 meters! WOW!  Now my SB-200 amplifier doesn't play on 160 but I can sure play around with some digital modes down there and maybe make some contacts!

peace and 73 from KX5JT