Saturday, June 20, 2020
One week until Field Day 2020! I’m not certain that I’ll be operating outside in one of our fields or not. I’m tempted to set up shop in our barn; I could run a feedline that serves my existing inverted vee in the tree between the house and barn, and use it without need to erect a new antenna.
I could really make this a Field Day with a purpose — to check out our generator. Several years ago, I paid $75 for a 1200-watt generator, which is tiny in comparison to most other generators. As a guy who depends on a CPAP and an O2 concentrator at night, the generator really is aimed at keeping those devices running while I sleep.
I haven’t started it in 3 years or so, and I think its time my son and I drag it out, fuel it with fresh gas, and give it a try. Of course, I can buy new 1200 watt generators for $130 all day long; if I need to buy one, I’ll buy at least a 5kw generator. More likely, I’ll buy the highest capacity one I can afford. But for now, I have an existing generator.
I bought it following an ice storm several years ago; the ham who sold it to me bought it in the immediate wake of the ice storm, when his house was without power for a couple of weeks. He upgraded to a much larger genset, so that’s how I ended up with this one.
My wife and her girlfriends are planning to go to the lake next weekend, which frees me up for the weekend for Field Day.
IC-756PROII. I have to tell you that the more I operate my IC-756PROII, the more respect I have for the venerable old Icom. It operates so damn well that its hard for me to believe the rig is 18 years old.
I also have a 756PRO that’s about as nice a rig as the PROII. The later PROIII I have boxed in the attic was the only new HF rig I’ve ever purchased. I’m unlikely to get rid of it.
While I use my FT-950 daily here in Studio B in our library, I have to admit that the receiver in the PROII is much easier to listen to than the Yaesu. I can’t put my finger on the “why,” just that the Yaesu FT-950 is fatiguing on the ears after some time listening. The FT-2000 is less so, but without doing a side-by-side comparison, the PROIII seems to me to the receiver that’s most pleasant on the ears. Your mileage may vary.
FT-2000 CHANGES. As stated earlier, my FT-2000 recently developed an issue that it won’t shut down when you hit the power button. The rig only partly shuts down. But I still love using the rig and won’t replace it with one of my Icoms.
Now I bought the FT-2000 used from a TV engineer; he sold me the rig, the matching speaker and the DMU for a really good price. Two or three years ago, I removed the DMU and its monitor and installed a kit to use an RTL SDR dongle for an improved panadapter system. Unfortunately, the damn thing NEVER worked for me. I still have the cables and software, and have never gotten them to work.
So I’m thinking of getting the DMU out of storage and putting it back online, along with the monitor I used. While the spectrum scope capability of the DMU is slow and somewhat limited, it still beats the hell out of nothing!
Those changes are down the road a bit. Field Day 2020 gets top billing. Listen for me to operate our club callsign, W4DHV — W4 Danger High Voltage — next weekend!
73 es CUL … de KY4Z … SK SK …. dit dit ….
