don't spend 40$ for a stake mount. go to walmart get a stake hole ancor ($2.50) go to home depot get a sturdy 2inch wide piece of metal about 4 inches long. drill two holes in it. one of which 1/2 inch  (to which you add a $4 pl259 to 3/8x24tpi mount)  then take the ancor apart add one washer to the anchor bolt put the piece of metal on, add the other washer, put the anchor back togehter. put it in the stake hole. tighten it (no holes). attatch the antenna and a short ground strap.

I spend a total of 7 dollars on my stake hole mount. don't pay 40$ plus shipping when less than ten bucks and a half hour you can custom build one.

73
zeb

if you are planning to properly ground the incoming coax, and you have the forethought to plan this before the house goes up.   get a professional entrance panel.   like from polyphaser. I've done quite a bit of work bringing in coax through polyphaser (and cheaper but still good)  entrance panels.   GROUND THE PANEL! GROUND THE COAX TO THE PANEL! GROUND THE RADIOS TO THE PANEL.    make the panel your single point of ground.  everything outside should be connected to it, and everything inside should be connected to it. then connect that panel to your in soil ground.

you can always add lightning arrestors to this panel as well, but simply grounding the coax is ok for most people.  

this system is what I'd love to have again. but I live in an appartment right now.

 oh, and don't forget to wire your house with cat5 cable for eithernet.   even if you don't use it, it'll increase the value of your house by around 5-10K.

 
73
zeb

the question is do you have a computer that you can give to the autopatch?  if so there is free software that will run a repeater and or autopatch through soundcard and modem.


works for me.

I made a similar setup for a VX-1r HT.   works great.      there are a million reasons why something will or won't work, none of them can replace actual trial.



kd7evs
zeb

I've noticed several people asking about ERP calculations.   Apparently eham.net users are smarter than qrz.com users cause I haven't noticed it as much here.  but due to a post on qrz.com I've created a ERP calculator and decided i would post the link here. it's simple and free. only 5kbytes

http://www.hangarz.com/downloadz/erpcalc.zip

just threw it together in the past 20 minutes, but tested it on several systems.


73
kd7evs

______
Attention Idaho Hams!!!
Join the IDhams yahoo group
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/idhams/

you could do it.    seems QST had a phased whip article about a year ago.


you could put one antenna in the center, and four spaced in a diamond around it. I believe 135degrees off center was what is recomended but I'd have to find that article.


zeb
KD7EVS

We've created a new group for hams of idaho. this group is open to anyone in idaho, from idaho, going to visit idaho or interested in idaho ham radio. so pretty much everyone is welcome.

This is for discussion of events, club activities, ham fests or such in idaho; also for any topics related to operating in idaho.

Please join us, send an e-mail to idhams-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

or visit http://groups.yahoo.com/group/idhams/


zeb
KD7EVS

I've done hundreds of nmo roof mounts I usually take the headliner half down. (after you punch a hole through a headliner twice with a drill you learn)    Also I drill from the outside in. always makes a better hole.   use the right hole saw, it's crucial. I use one ordered from a telecomm shop, meant for NMOs it has a smooth lip on the edge of the saw and will debur the whole as well as prevent your saw from doing damage.

be careful of some dodge's and other vehicles which have a double roof, that can be a pain.


oh, last tip.   those round pegs that keep the headliner in place...   use a small flat cat's claw to pull them out.  (you know, a short flat crowbar of sorts.)

if you break one your local car dealer usually has a ton extra and would charge a quarter if anything to give you one or two.


have fun.   and as much as you want to close your eyes when you start drilling,  DON'T!

zeb
kd7evs

alright.
     



zeb
kd7evs

N6AJR; no offense tom, but if you've never been somewhere where you can't reach "someone" on 2m. you don't get out enough. Come visit east central idaho sometime. I can show you countless places where my 60watt mobile won't raise the level of static on anyone else's radio.    granted here in the mountains if you can get high enough (in the summer) and with 60watts you can usually hit a dx repeater or maybe luckily snag some soul on .52   granted you could probably get out a yagi, bounce rf off a 747 or maybe you'd be there the one day a year a satelite flies over with high enough angle you could hear.

that being said,  146.52 would be your best bet. take the advise though, make sure your coax and antenna are making full use of your transmitters output, never throw away RF.

also, go to HF. running a QRP (low power) setup with simple wire antennas will get you more "someone's" than 2m.  

also, as per the other post, if your life is in immediate danger, do not fear contacting someone on another band. law enforcement may get upset at you, but your life is worth that.   also in the USA the FCC is on your side.

73
zeb
kd7evs

I've wished that one of my mobiles was a dual band a million times.  once was storm chasing when i ran out of 2m repeaters and had to break off chasing a storm. there were 3 440mhz repeaters in that area.

being just north of detroit, I'd say there is plenty of 440 activity for you to play with.

look at it this way, you know how much money you can spend. set a price, flip through AES, HRO, gigaparts and other sites/magazines circleing all the radios within 50 bucks of your price. then see what has the most features that you want.    if the features are pretty similar between those that have dual band and those that don't. GO WITH DUAL BAND!!!    if for your money getting dual band will be a sacrifice in extra bells and whistles, you probably want to go with a mono.

if you go with mono, I garuntee at some point you will regret it. how much will you regret it? or how often? that depends.

1) make sure you have all the important features
i.e. ctcss/dcs encode&decode, direct freq enter via microphone keypad, 60+ memories, wide band recieve (to at least include NOAA channels), automatic repeater shift, reverse shift for monitering.... (there's more I'm forgeting)  

there are more features that are important too, but you'll see what everything in your price range has, and any radio that's lacking several features that others have in that price range should probably be left alone.

get on a local 2m repeater, or simplex and ask around for one of "the smart guys," ask them about 440mhz activity in and around your area. a quick look in an online repeater directory shows 8, 440mhz repeaters in detroit. not sure about your specific area but I'd believe that with that many in detroit there would be a fair number in the surrounding area.


hope this helps.

zeb

ok, I'm in the market for an 2m mobile antenna. primary requirements:

1) 3/8"-24tpi stud mount. (or adaptable to 3/8 stud)
2) don't want it too expensive, if I hit a tree and it explodes into several pieces I don't want to shed many tears. less than 100 would be great.

I built myself a mount to accept 3/8"-24tpi stud antennas. It's on a ford ranger, the mount is on the rear of the bed (near the stake hole). it's well grounded, but being where it's at it doesn't have a ground "plane."   I could if need be add probably up to three 1/4 wave radials at the mount to even up the ground a bit.

As for height, the sky is the limit. currently I've got a 7 foot 40m hamstick, that's already scraping the drivethru at burgerking so I'm not really worried about height and a foldover feature isn't important. (I'm going to be getting that much calories and fat, I can use the exercise to walk in, instead of sitting in the drivethru.)
I'm going to pull the 40m antenna and replace with the 2m until I get cw under my belt, then I'll build another mount.

I've been looking at lakeview's 3/4 wave, their 5/8's wave and several other companies' products.  I'd like minimum 3db gain, 4+ would be better. the lakeview colinear says 4.5Db gain and it is my current choice. I'll be running 60 watts out of the radio, about 15 feet of coax to the mount. I figure with connectors and feedline, I round to 50 watts input into the antenna.

now the last aspect I'm looking at, pattern. I know the cab will distort the pattern but I'm not worried about that. would it be worth adding 3 or 4 1/4 wave radials to even out the ground a bit? also I've heard varying opinions about colinear patterns vs other patterns. I live in the mountains, but also spend quite a bit of time in the flatland. I don't care to work sattelites; most distant repeaters even though they are on mountains, would be close to horizion due to distance. If I'm on the mountain, I want something that will keep most power at the distant horizion, but an HT at the bottom of the mountain should be able to whisper up to me.  am i picky? I don't think so, but probably.

any suggestions? experience with certain antennas that fit this order? should I be worried about the vertical pattern for my application? should I go with a ground independent antenna or will it matter?


I've always dealt with 1/4 on 2m (that or my high gain 19 foot base station antenna)

any suggestions (other than those of you that insist I add another nmo roof mount antenna) will be greatly appreciated.


zeb
kd7evs

if you took Wa9svd's opinion (as well as many others) then third party morse code would be illegal. surely morse code third party isn't illegal! Also packet would be wrong (pressing enter would key the transmitter) rtty would be wrong... probably others I can't think of right now.

Being a tech, you are most likly talking about VHF or UHF voice and probably fm.

Be at the radio! if you are demonstrating ham radio let them run the thing. guide them, be in control. But realize that it's people's definition of control that is really what makes the difference. for me, control is setting in a vehicle next to some one, explaining the radio, ham procedures, and handing them the radio and letting them do the talking. making sure that they identify as "Kilo Delta Seven Echo Victor Sierra Third party." making sure they don't use bad language, or anything of the sorts.

Just be in control of your station. if the 3rd party starts doing something wrong, correct them or take the radio away, that's control enough in most situations.

Have fun.

73
kd7evs

just for kicks...


what area of the world do you live in?  the best thing would be for you to meet hams around you, maybe attend a meeting and you can get some more info about your area. more info than any of us ESPECIALLY THOSE OF "US"  THAT ENJOY USING ALL CAPS could ever give you.    feel free to e-mail me "zeb @hangarz.com" and with a bit of searching with the ARRL we can find you a local or two to talk to. find a local, find local knowledge.   some places that are "hundreds of miles from civilization" you can actually do very well with on vhf with an HT. though I would suggest the VX-5 since it has 50mhz (6 meters) on it too.

another thing is, if you come up missing, and people look for you and someone know's your a ham they'll scan all the popular freqs while flying around looking. so even if not in good repeater coverage, worst case senario (hopefully) you would be able to talk to someone in a plane.    most search and rescue orginizations at least know about ham radio and would know how to listen for you.

though low power (QRP) on HF would be ok as the one ham mentioned.

e-mail me and I'll hook you up with a local club or group. I assume your out west with us, since it's not that easy to get "hundreds of miles away from civilation" back east.  


zeb

Got bored, created a "Ham Timer."

it's a clock, an id timer and qso timer.  and yes it will tell you how long your pork chops have been on the grill!

cute program I think, not alot to it.  it started as a 'joke' for someone who rarely ID's during a QSO and loses track of time easily.    

But, it is kinda useful, I'll be toying with this for a while and eventually this will be part of my station time keeping program.

eventually.  FWIW   http://www.hangarz.com/downloadz/ham_timer.zip

zeb