I work in a corporation filled with EE, ME and Physics Phd's and "Fellows", of which I am neither.  I am constantly dumbfounded by their lack of Basic Common Sense.  Perhaps this should be a mandatory course offering at the colleges that hatch these poindexters.

Tom, I found Port Forwarding to be confusing to set up on the WRT54G router.  I went out and replaced it with a Netgear WNDR3400 and found that it was extremely simple to set up Port Forwarding on it.  I did this not for Echolink, but for a number IP cameras installed around my home for weather observation and general surveillance.

This has happened to me as a result of a less-than-glowing review right here on eHam of a product that shall go unnamed.  I was called by the owner of the company on a Saturday morning, to my cell phone while my wife and I were out for breakfast.  How he got my cell number remains a mystery.  We launched into a cordial chat.  The owner wanted to get to the bottom of why I gave his product a scathing review.  After about 30 minutes of discussion, the owner of the company asked me to box the entire product up, of which there were a number of parts placed around my yard and shack, and agreed to replace the entire product with a new updated unit with one caveat.  I in turn would agree to return the defective product, and update my review here on eHam.  After sinking $700 into a now unusable piece of equipment, I unfortunately jumped at the opportunity.  Upon receiving the replacement, I put it into use and added a second post regarding the product.  Mysteriously, my original post disappeared, so my references to it weren't of any help.  In my updated review, I stated the facts, the phone call, etc.  I never heard from the manufacturer so I assumed he was satisfied with my end of the agreement.

In retrospect, I'm not proud of the events that led to a free replacement.  I should have stuck to my original review and left it stand.  It was junk, and I wasn't alone with that opinion.  I just got lucky.  I feel that I compromised my integrity just to save $700.  I still believe the product is far inferior to its competition (which I now use), and I don't hesitate to state that in any of the forums when a discussion of the product may arise.

Interesting.... I just checked the re-write of my review and found that the update has been deleted as well.  While I don't know how long it's been down, I do know it had been up for several years. That I will take a sworn oath to.

Excellent photos, Tisha!

Google:
"Linux Rotator Control Software" and you'll get a bunch of returns.....

My AH-4 control line is approximately 136' from the transceiver. It works fine.  Be careful though.  I lost my first one from what I believe was a very close lightning strike and subsequent current being induced onto the unshielded control cable.  The unit is lacking any input protection, and the control section was a total loss.  Interestingly, the antenna side of the tuner appeared fine.

Love my Alfa Spid rotator.  Hated the controller though, so I replaced it with a Green Heron RT-21.  Awesome combination.  Ramp up start and ramp down stop feature is great.

The Citizen Weather Observer Program, or CWOP is similar to Mesonet. Over 6000 backyard stations around the country upload data which gets digested by MADIS ( Meteorological Assimilation Data Ingest System) run by NOAA.  The data is used to build high resolution surface weather maps.  Once a volunteer signs to the CWOP, they can check their station data from anywhere over the internet.  Here are the current indices at my station:
http://www.findu.com/cgi-bin/wxpage.cgi?call=k3gm Each weather station is compared to those around it, so there is an ongoing quality control check to assure accurate data. There are a number of different brands of recommended stations if you wish to sign up for the program.  Please visit www.wxqa.com for station requirements.

Here's at least what I found.  Si/Pb solder rapidly degrades when exposed to the acidic rain that we experience here in the east.  The once gleaming fillet of solder quickly develops a white crust, and the entire joint continues to "rot" away.  I use a DX Engineering stainless steel radial plate with my vertical's large radial field, and what I've chosen to do is to make a loop in the copper wire and connect it directly under the bolt head foregoing a lug at all.  I suppose a more noble solder alloy may work better than the 60/40 that I had on hand.

Curious as to the integrity of the joint, I have on occasion measured the resistance in any given radial wire by clipping one lead of my VOM to the plate, then successively piercing a number of wires with the other lead connected to a hat pin.  The joints appear to have not degraded in the least, but there could be a minute amount of resistence that my meter cannot measure.  I also have a number of high tensile aluminum radials that I installed as a longevity experiment, and these too are connected to the plate in a similar manner.

Davis Wireless Vantage Pro 2.  Mine has been in operation for 6 years.  Immune to high RF fields, it is mounted to my SteppIR BigIR elevated guy post.  I recently swapped out the sensor suite board after the "supercap" on it failed.  Customer service was exceptional, and a new board was sent out while the old one was still running on battery and solar power.  I never actually lost any significant amount of data.  Swap out was easy, and I was back up and running in minutes.  A really nice station.

I use Quicksilver's crimper and connectors.  They appear to be nearly identical High Sierra's (above).

If I was a dirt poor college student looking to get the most bang for the buck, looking for a transceiver with tight filtering that would do all the modes you mentioned, and do it on the cheap, I'd be looking for something like a Yaesu FT-101ZD or better yet, an FT-901 of '902DM, or a Kenwood TS-520, or TS-830.  These are workhorse HF rigs from the 80's with tube finals, and built in power supplies.  They have switchable filters and will handle high VSWR without folding back power, and can be had for a few hundred dollars today.

Just a comment regarding your Subject title:
"....10 meters and down" would indicate to me that you're talking shorter wavelengths and consequently higher frequencies.  I knew what you meant, but "10 meters and up" (i.e. 28Mhz and down) is actually what you're looking for.

My experience using tethered balloons over the years for Field Day ops is that latex weather balloons perform poorly.  A slight breeze flattens the windward side of the balloon increasing its area and forcing the balloon downward on its tether.

What works is a "barrage" style balloon.  You'll often find these tethered at car dealerships advertising "special sales".  The blimp shape and fins point the nose of it into the wind, and it doesn't flatten out as round balloons do.  Our club's balloon was obtained off the internet.

"Far Field" begins  about 1 wavelength from the antenna, and for 1/4 wave antennas extends out several wavelengths in an area known as the Fresnel zone.  For longer verticals, 1/2 wave for instance, the zone can extend out more than 100 wavelengths.  

Remember that what you do in the near field to some degree determines the radiated field strength in the far field, but soil conductivity "out there" is a major player.


How are you feeding this antenna?  Are you using your transceiver's built-in antenna tuner, or are you using a remote antenna coupler at the base of the antenna?

This is great information to me as I'm planning to string my first Beverage this weekend now that foliage here has died off and the ticks are gone for the season.  I have about 700' to play with that runs off into my deep woods.  I have a bag of electric fence insulators that I plan to nail from tree to tree, then string with 17AWG hi-tensil aluminum electric fence wire.  It will terminate at the edge of a secluded pond that borders my land. I have some concerns about leaving enough height above ground to allow deer and the occasional hunter to pass under it without being clotheslined.  If I allow 7 or 8 feet above ground, is this still within acceptable height limits with respect to earth?