I always zero beat.  My TS590 does it automatically with the touch of a button.  The ones that annoy me are when you get someone answer you off frequency, so while they're answering I zero beat to them and then after the next over they've tuned off again to maintain whatever they reckon zero beat is.  Luckily the TS590 zero beats the RIT as well.

Yours,

Dene
VK5DO
Vk4TN

 

......... also vernier tuning for the plate tuning cap.

Where'd you get the vernier and what one.  That's the most annoying thing about my 200.  It needs a vernier.

Ta.

Dene

I've got a Yaesu FL2100Z and a Heathkit SB200.  Both old and cheap.  Usage and output power - they are comparable with about 600W max out for about 90W in.  The Yaesu has WARC bands and is a bit easier to tune.  They don't seem to pump out much more after about 85 - 90 W input so why do it right?   I'm not sure what US S/H prices are for these but here in VK, they are about a quarter to a third of the price of the cheapest comparable brand new amp.

Dean
VK5DO
VK4TN

Hi All,

I'm looking at buying a second hand 2m All Mode and have the choice between a Kenwood TS700 or an Icom IC290A.

Thoughts??

Thanks,

Dene
VK5DO, VK4TN

My favorite is BUT.

Dene

I'm, interested in having a look but ich spreche nicht Deutsch.  Is there an english version?

Dene

Howdy all,

I've just put up a OCF dipole for 80m and above.  It's fairly close to the ground so I'm not suprised it's SWR on 80 is a little high but still useable.  On 40 and 20 the SWR is close to perfect.  Above that though - no good at all.

I've used a 4:1 balun at 1/3 along or 17% off centre. 

I thought I should have 15 and 10m working ok with this antenna as well.

Suggestions please.

Yours,

Dene
VK5DO

I recently bought a SB200 that I think is going into self oscillation.

On 80m, when I tune up with a CW signal at low power from my exciter, all is ok and the tune is fine until I wind up the exciter power to anything more than about 50w. At that point my swr/pwr meter suddenly goes full scale on both FWD and REV. I button off the exciter immediately and it stops ok. If I wind the power from the exciter down and key on again, all is well until I wind it up again. This all happens ONLY on 80m. 

Radio is an IC7000, Tuner is a homebrew T match that's built to take it and antenna is a horizontal loop fed with open wire. 

Now, I'm fairly new to QRO. Is this typical of an amp "taking off" and how do I stop/fix my SB200?

Yours

Dene

> This has enabled me to learn to copy in my
> head (to some degree at least) and start
> having nice CW ragchews on the air while I
> sit back in my chair and relax instead of hovering
> over a pad of paper trying to write down everything
> the other guy is sending.

That's exactly where I want to be and what I'm working towards.  The whole "writing" thing is as-bad as the "keyboard" thing.  I want to get past all that and just be able to talk to people. 

Dene
VK5DO

I came up with the same idea about a week ago.  Here's what I did.

Go to a website that has the lyrics of all the theme tunes for old TV show. 
Copy the text into the "record" feature of "Just Learn Morse Code".
Convert the text to a WAV file of 22WPM CW. 
Import into iTunes. 
Create a playlist of about 10 of you favorites
Burn them to a CD.

Now I've got the theme songs for things like Gilligans Island, Green Acres, Top Cat, The Adam's Family, The Flintsones etc all in 22WPM on CD that I play in my car on the way home from work.

I like it 'cause the text is something you know really well (unproductive childhood some might say) so there are plenty of clues but it's fast enough to challenge me.

Could do the same with favorite songs or anything really I guess.

Dene
VK5DO

Hi All,

I recently sold my Flex 3000 after less than a year of owning it and thought I'd share some observations on the radio.

I live in VK and got the radio sent over direct from Flex in August 2011.  After less than 3 months I had to send it back to the US for repair when the firewire hardware in the radio died.  Tim at Flex was great and they paid for freight both ways from South Australia to Texas and back and I had the radio back in less than a month.

Then early this year I started noticing higher output power on some bands.  This quickly developed to all bands and finally it was outputting 150W on all bands whenever the drive level was set anything above 2% or so.  I figured this might cook something so got in-touch with Flex again.  Dudley was a bit hopeless ("reset the database" multiple times and that's about it) but when I got onto Tim again, things moved quickly towards a solution.  Via Teamviewer he diagnosed the problem remotely and it was sent back to the factory again.  Flex covered the repair and one way of the freight and I had the radio back in about three weeks.  As soon as it got back I sold it.

I'm sure my experience with needing two warranty returns in the 1st year is a bit unusual but with no local support in or near Australia by Flex, I wasn't going to take the chance of this happening a third time.  Maybe mine was a "friday afternoon" build but it certainly seemed like a bit of a dud with 2 serious hardware faults in a very short period.

The other thing that I never did get sorted out despite various combinations, brands, cable runs and dozens of ferrites, was RF getting into the speakers.  I tried four different brands of powered speakers, some quite expensive, all sorts of cabling and ferrite combinations but never did sort it completely.  I could get it to work ok on some or even most bands but I always had one band no matter what combination I used that had massive RF noise.  I could use the same speakers as external speakers on other radios in the shack with the same antennas and they worked fine.  It was only when connected to the Flex that they got RF noise.  I put it down to a shielding issue in the radio??  Who knows. 

I'm not completely off Flex's though.  In fact I'd happily say it's the best radio I've ever had apart from the above issues.  Great to use, excellent receiver and good software.  I'll probably leave it a few years and once again head down the Flex road with a 6000 or whatever they have new at the time.  As long as the audio shielding is sorted out better and QC is improved a bit I wouldn't be afraid to commit again.

Yours,
Dene
VK5DO
VK4TN

The first step is to find out what the actual magnetic variation is in your area.

Then.......

Magnetic to True North with easterly variation -  Add the variation to your magnetic bearing to get true north
True North to Magnetic with easterly variation - subtract the variation from your true north bearing to get magnetic north
Magnetic to True with westerly variariation - subtract the variation from magnetic to get true
True to magnetic with westerly variation - add the variation to your true to get magnetic

As sea you also take into account another factor called compass deviation but I wouldn't bother with that in your situation.

Mucking around with sticks in the ground etc might be an interesting excercise but I wouldn't bother when the above system has been working for navigators for hundreds of years and will give you an answer to the degree.

Dene

Hi All,

I know this may be of limited interest to general readers of this forum given the age of the amp so I'm hoping there's someone who's changed input caps on the 2100Z who wouldn't mind contacting me via e-mail to answer a few questions on some specifics of the procedure.  Unfortunately I live remotely and don't have any other local help/advisors so need some remote assistance.

My email is doehme75@gmail.com

Some background................      I recently bought a 2100Z that presents high SWR to the exciter.  It's fine on 160, 40, 17
and 10 but the others are way high.  I'd like to at least restore 80 and 20 to a useable state.  Some of the redish brown caps when you take the back plate off, (I'm assuming those are the input caps??)  are a little darkened but not totally black or anything.  Just some are slightly darker than the others.  Are they the only caps that need to be replaced of are there others further in the amp that need looking at as well.

Thanks

Dene
VK5DO

Hi all.

I recently got a 2100Z and been on-air with good reports following the intructions as-per the manual  regarding plate current and loading. 

I read somewhere that the manufacturers recomendations about IP aren't quite the best to use. Does anyone know of this or any reason to use other than the Yaesu suggested IP?

Also is it good practice once the IP is dipped and max power out obtained, to wind in a bit of Loading thereby knocking the power back a touch? What is this actually doing to protect the amp? Doesn't this bring the IP up a bit whereas plate current should be kept as low as possible?

Lastly...where can I get a bandswitch? Mine's ok so far but would like to start accumulating a few spare parts for this old girl.

Yours
Dene
VK5DO

Great advice. Thank you.
Dene