Monday, Sept. 10, 2018 — For the first time since late Spring, the propagation on 75 and 80 meters this evening was fantastic — and for the first time in many, many weeks, I could copy 100 percent of the sigs from the NCS of the Georgia CW net I take part in.
Actually, it was phenomenal to copy every damn net station 599. For the first time in weeks, I didn’t have to strain to copy the NCS. I can’t tell you how many nights I checked in and could only get about every third character from the NCS. I felt fortunate if I copied two of the four characters of my call. About 1/3 of the times I’ve gone to the rig in the past six weeks I shut it off after hearing how weak the NCS was.
So tonight was a joyful celebration of killer CW — even if it was a net. Once the net concluded, I tuned up the band and was delighted to hear how strong signals were all across the phone band. I just hope these band conditions are here to stay.
SPEAKING OF BAND CONDITIONS …. I probably mentioned a large section of a maple tree coming down and taking down two antennas — a random longwire and a 80-meter doublet. I need to get at least the doublet back up in the air, ASAP … I really miss having the rig online here in the library, and with the bands returning, I would love to make contacts from Studio B.
Remember the recent lightning strike that killed our cable modem and two TVs? I found another casualty — the SWR section of my MFJ-969 antenna tuner. Specifically, the forward power reading no longer works, while reverse power works fine. I took the tuner apart and couldn’t find anything that looks fried. The way the 969 is built, giving the PC boards a real inspection for cold solder joints requires pulling the damn thing to pieces. I don’t expect to find a cold solder joint, but you never know.
I think I can still use the tuner, its just that for the SWR reading I’m going to have to watch the meter on the rig. I’m not sure what I’m going to do … I have a Heathkit SA-2040 tuner I will probably bring to Studio B, I just need an external SWR meter to run with it, which I would prefer NOT to do. I have that MFJ-989C tuner I picked up recently, but the issue with it is not the tuner per se, just its depth — its a very long case, deeper than my shelf space. The Heathkit case isn’t as deep, and it would probably be a better fit for the shelf. Hell, the SA-2040 is bullet proof, I should drop the MFJ tuners and just use what works and will work the rest of my days on this Earth!
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