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Great day for short whips & /PM operation

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wayne burdick

Great day for short whips & /PM operation

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I was out walking around in a local park with the KX2 today, using a couple of different 48” loaded whips. (/PM = pedestrian mobile, closely related to “HF Pack,” though I prefer an ultralight version of it, with a “pack” weighing only 2 pounds.) There were quite a few stations on 20 and 15 meters, and I had no trouble working everyone I called using 5 or 10 watts. Oh, and the sun finally came out...it’s been wet up here.

Just a reminder to those of you who want to try this: You really do have to use at least one radial (counterpoise wire) if you plan to transmit. While receive works pretty well even without the radial, your transmitted signal will be 15-20 dB down, and you may have problems with RFI. This differential effect between RX and TX performance without a radial becomes more pronounced as you go down in frequency.

Short whips usually come with instructions that suggest adjusting the length of the radial wire and/or the length of the telescoping part in order to obtain a low SWR. While that is certainly possible, it’s far easier to let an ATU do the fine tuning. The ATU can compensate for variations in counterpoise length, bends in the wire, ground conditions, how high off the ground the antenna is, etc. If the SWR goes up for any of these reasons, just tap the ATU tune button.

(This is one reason that all Elecraft radios have internal ATU options, BTW.)

Please report back on your own success with /PM operation.

73,
Wayne
N6KR

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timmers

Re: Great day for short whips & /PM operation

OK Wayne, you've piqued my curiosity. Is this the first day of the
Elecraft marketing campaign for their own branded version of a portable
loaded whip? You discreetly use "a couple different" in your comment, but
as I'm a keen-eyed observer to this sort of phrase-ology, I'm taking the
bait.

Spill it Wayne - there's not many people reading this list now, so it's not
like you're telling company secrets to everybody. When's the new product
launch?

73 de VE7JBT - John

On 24 March 2018 at 15:41, Wayne Burdick <[hidden email]> wrote:

> I was out walking around in a local park with the KX2 today, using a
> couple of different 48” loaded whips. (/PM = pedestrian mobile, closely
> related to “HF Pack,” though I prefer an ultralight version of it, with a
> “pack” weighing only 2 pounds.) There were quite a few stations on 20 and
> 15 meters, and I had no trouble working everyone I called using 5 or 10
> watts. Oh, and the sun finally came out...it’s been wet up here.
>
> Just a reminder to those of you who want to try this: You really do have
> to use at least one radial (counterpoise wire) if you plan to transmit.
> While receive works pretty well even without the radial, your transmitted
> signal will be 15-20 dB down, and you may have problems with RFI. This
> differential effect between RX and TX performance without a radial becomes
> more pronounced as you go down in frequency.
>
> Short whips usually come with instructions that suggest adjusting the
> length of the radial wire and/or the length of the telescoping part in
> order to obtain a low SWR. While that is certainly possible, it’s far
> easier to let an ATU do the fine tuning. The ATU can compensate for
> variations in counterpoise length, bends in the wire, ground conditions,
> how high off the ground the antenna is, etc. If the SWR goes up for any of
> these reasons, just tap the ATU tune button.
>
> (This is one reason that all Elecraft radios have internal ATU options,
> BTW.)
>
> Please report back on your own success with /PM operation.
>
> 73,
> Wayne
> N6KR
>
> ______________________________________________________________
> Elecraft mailing list
> Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft
> Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm
> Post: mailto:[hidden email]
>
> This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net
> Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
> Message delivered to [hidden email]

--
Regards;
John Timmers
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Cheers - VE7JBT KX3 owner

Paul Van Dyke

Re: Great day for short whips & /PM operation

That is easy John ... When is Dayton ..??
Remembering the shock of the amateur radio world of the KX2's birth.

Paul -- KB9AVO

On 3/24/18, Jan Timmers <[hidden email]> wrote:

> OK Wayne, you've piqued my curiosity. Is this the first day of the
> Elecraft marketing campaign for their own branded version of a portable
> loaded whip? You discreetly use "a couple different" in your comment, but
> as I'm a keen-eyed observer to this sort of phrase-ology, I'm taking the
> bait.
>
> Spill it Wayne - there's not many people reading this list now, so it's not
> like you're telling company secrets to everybody. When's the new product
> launch?
>
> 73 de VE7JBT - John
>
> On 24 March 2018 at 15:41, Wayne Burdick <[hidden email]> wrote:
>
>> I was out walking around in a local park with the KX2 today, using a
>> couple of different 48” loaded whips. (/PM = pedestrian mobile, closely
>> related to “HF Pack,” though I prefer an ultralight version of it, with a
>> “pack” weighing only 2 pounds.) There were quite a few stations on 20 and
>> 15 meters, and I had no trouble working everyone I called using 5 or 10
>> watts. Oh, and the sun finally came out...it’s been wet up here.
>>
>> Just a reminder to those of you who want to try this: You really do have
>> to use at least one radial (counterpoise wire) if you plan to transmit.
>> While receive works pretty well even without the radial, your transmitted
>> signal will be 15-20 dB down, and you may have problems with RFI. This
>> differential effect between RX and TX performance without a radial becomes
>> more pronounced as you go down in frequency.
>>
>> Short whips usually come with instructions that suggest adjusting the
>> length of the radial wire and/or the length of the telescoping part in
>> order to obtain a low SWR. While that is certainly possible, it’s far
>> easier to let an ATU do the fine tuning. The ATU can compensate for
>> variations in counterpoise length, bends in the wire, ground conditions,
>> how high off the ground the antenna is, etc. If the SWR goes up for any of
>> these reasons, just tap the ATU tune button.
>>
>> (This is one reason that all Elecraft radios have internal ATU options,
>> BTW.)
>>
>> Please report back on your own success with /PM operation.
>>
>> 73,
>> Wayne
>> N6KR
>>
>> ______________________________________________________________
>> Elecraft mailing list
>> Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft
>> Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm
>> Post: mailto:[hidden email]
>>
>> This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net
>> Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
>> Message delivered to [hidden email]
>
>
>
>
> --
> Regards;
> John Timmers
> ______________________________________________________________
> Elecraft mailing list
> Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft
> Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm
> Post: mailto:[hidden email]
>
> This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net
> Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
> Message delivered to [hidden email]

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rich hurd WC3T

Re: Great day for short whips & /PM operation

In reply to this post by wayne burdick

I'm looking forward to doing some of that this spring and summer. I had
some issues with the BNC connection on the KX3 and, although it's not truly
configured as a mobile, I do want to use it like that. I bought a
replacement connector and after a little struggle with the ATU connections
to the RF board, it lit up and behaved like a new rig.

As soon as my base HF rig comes back then me and my KX3 are going
a-wandering. Hopefully sometime soon with an AX1. ;)

On Sat, Mar 24, 2018 at 18:41 Wayne Burdick <[hidden email]> wrote:

--
72,
Rich Hurd / WC3T / DMR: 3142737
PA Army MARS, Northampton County RACES, EPA-ARRL Public Information Officer
for Scouting
Latitude: 40.761621 Longitude: -75.288988 (40°45.68' N 75°17.33' W) Grid:
*FN20is*
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