Blue Ham Setup
We were rigging the antenna for Blue Ham in 2022, and to get it out of the way fo the car park we thought we would try it a bit more east-west than north-south
This time we will take the RG213 cable over the car park rather than have people driving over it ;) Which meant getting onto the roof with Mike applying a clever tensioning knot to the cable, this allows you to take up slack but doesn’t let the cable run out in tension. Handy having a Scoutmaster on the committee!
the tensioning knot at the other ends was also good, but happened to include the upper fence wire, requiring a redo associated with colourful language ;)
Which was perhaps a little bit strong for the young and sensitive ears of the occupants of the field.
We tried this, lined everything up for minimum SWR and started the rig up, listening to RAF Volmet on 5.45MHz, then tuned to an empty spot on the band at 5.438MHz. Empty, that is, other than S9 of noise, which was a lot more than last time.
There was a little bit of 50/100Hz buzz, which indicated perhaps a mains origin. A glance out of the shack window showed us the likely enemy, the 415V power line going to the storage facility a couple of fields away.
Our antenna is end on to this, and in the near field of the QRM, it being a lot less than 60m away. So we moved the antenna to along the fence down the drive, a N-S orientation both about 40m from the power lines and also parallel to the run. That way we get further away, and also get balance on our side.
Now RAF Volmet was clearer - well, as clear as the artificial speech is ever going to be, and we got about S5 of noise at 5.438MHz.
which is all round a lot more satisfactory. A successful half day’s work. Thanks to Matt 2E0FNT, Mike 2E0RWW, Chaz G6UVO and Petra M7PAH.