@@krjames5880 it was surprisingly productive too. Once we gave up on the 500mW on 40m and tuned that loop up to the 20m band, hooked up the old Xiegu DDS analog radio….
Glad you enjoyed the video. It was surprisingly successful too. That loop is deceptively effective even on 40m. The base / stand is a little weighty, but so is beer in glass bottles, and worth the effort to make the overall experience more enjoyable
You should. There is lots of slow code happening now. I love the simplicity of the gear you can run. Thanks for the comment and hope to hear you out there dit dit! 73 de VK2AOE
Do it !!!! You’ll always be grateful you spent the time to learn. 10 mins at a time. Couple of times a day. Slow stuff you can pick up. Then speed it up. It’s the mode for kings…and the odd beer drinking hooligans with radios
@@klejzbigniew true. And the gear can be so simple if you want to build something. A few transistors will get you a few watts. Some carefully crafted circuits will get you 20-30W without too much expense. 20W is an S point over 5W and doesn’t have a huge current requirement at 12V. But as far as learning the code. Just start. Learn the letters, numbers ? / and which is the break character. I used Morse Whisperer to learn the characters. That’s 10WPM sent at 5WPM. I then did the Lockdown Morse sessions to get myself up to 20WPM sent at 10WPM. Tuesday nights, here in Aus, you can get on the air at 5-8WPM and people will slow down. In fact it’s running now on 40m. I might get on. Have to extend the antenna back up. Might just poke the loop out the window. See how that goes instead.
The more I use that mag loop, the more I’m surprised by its performance. There’s something about high Q antennas. I need to run it up against the vertical. I think they would be within 3dB of each other on 20m
@@TheArtofEngineering I haven’t managed to get 10 and 15m matched with any efficiency using the toroid match. Been a bit ordinary. I’m thinking that the 4m and 3m loops are a little too long and so the turns ratio for those bands is a little too low and as a result the coupling suffers. But you’d see a higher corresponding SWR, so where is it going ???? I’m not seeing a high SWR. It’s less than 2. The poverty loop made of 2.5m of RG8 has 10dB over the 3m aluminium strap loop on 10m with some initial tests More experiments to do. I’d love to try a 13m loop on 80m. The 8m and 5m lengths joined together. Use all 20m of the loop and work too band. It would be 7m wide, but strung up between a couple of trees….. More engineering and experimenting time needs to be spent on this project. But a loop for 40m through 20m, that takes a 100W…I can say I have achieved that. A bit of refinement is optional, such as the auto cutoff that I have in the poke-out-the-window-tenna, and some cable management, and a battery pack / switch thing that was a little less _ephemeral_ Essentially the hard work is done. Cheers 🍻
I do remember the rocket launch. you launched it, not into the wind but downwind.....the trailing rope turned the rocket up wind. Anything that involves throwing for me is a dead loss!!!! TNX FER the comment OM 73. Alas my time at sea was short and spent mostly answering the satellite phone
@@PaulaBean Short answer …. YES! I’m sure VK2NAP will elaborate! There is a video on the end screen world Pixie day where we play with the same antenna as n my backyard. It is a cracker of an antenna 73 de VK2AOE
@@TheArtofEngineering Ah, you mean ua-cam.com/video/ybLSKLKypA0/v-deo.htmlsi=-JVoQl6rkpdqyZ6V&t=143 where there is mentioned a 'secret capacitor' like the spice mix of KFC 🤪🤪 Well I'm really curious about that capacitor!
@@PaulaBean the capacitor is motorised. It’s manually tuned with the aid of a VNA or the SWR sweep on the radio. The other thing of note is the ratio of windings on the toroid feedline transformer. The loop covers 20-40m but the radiation resistance drops as you lower the frequency. You need more windings on the 40m band than the 20m band. I have made two of these loops. This larger one which in various iterations has performed incredibly well. The second is a smaller one which I can poke out the window of a first floor room and operate on 20 and 40m Now, unlike many loops you may have seen, these loops will take the full 100W out of a transceiver. Earlier ones weren’t quite as robust, but were still able to take 50w before immolation. We have been talking for over a year now of doing a separate channel that would be a little more structured / focussed where we can go into more details on the stuff we do and some of the theory vs practical aspects of the hobby. Sadly our commitments and priorities haven’t allowed this just yet…..but watch this space. There will be more to come 73 DE VK2NAP dit dit
Beer! I know beer! Looks like a great time was had by all
@@youtubeaccount931 Romeo that! 🍺
Red wine would suffice, too.
Well done very entertaining, better have another beer.
Red wine 🍷 tonight 😂
It was damn fine beer. Some German brew from our local independent grog shop
That was fun.
@@krjames5880 yes it was a great day! Stay tuned for part 2 next week 73 de VK2AOE
@@krjames5880 it was surprisingly productive too. Once we gave up on the 500mW on 40m and tuned that loop up to the 20m band, hooked up the old Xiegu DDS analog radio….
Glad you enjoyed the video. It was surprisingly successful too. That loop is deceptively effective even on 40m. The base / stand is a little weighty, but so is beer in glass bottles, and worth the effort to make the overall experience more enjoyable
Love it good fun, have to get cracking on learning CW.
You should. There is lots of slow code happening now. I love the simplicity of the gear you can run. Thanks for the comment and hope to hear you out there dit dit! 73 de VK2AOE
Do it !!!!
You’ll always be grateful you spent the time to learn.
10 mins at a time. Couple of times a day. Slow stuff you can pick up. Then speed it up.
It’s the mode for kings…and the odd beer drinking hooligans with radios
@@MidlifeRenaissanceMan I'm blown away at the distance you can reach with cw compared to voice on ssb.
@@klejzbigniew true. And the gear can be so simple if you want to build something.
A few transistors will get you a few watts. Some carefully crafted circuits will get you 20-30W without too much expense. 20W is an S point over 5W and doesn’t have a huge current requirement at 12V.
But as far as learning the code. Just start. Learn the letters, numbers ? / and which is the break character.
I used Morse Whisperer to learn the characters. That’s 10WPM sent at 5WPM. I then did the Lockdown Morse sessions to get myself up to 20WPM sent at 10WPM.
Tuesday nights, here in Aus, you can get on the air at 5-8WPM and people will slow down. In fact it’s running now on 40m.
I might get on. Have to extend the antenna back up. Might just poke the loop out the window. See how that goes instead.
The more I use that mag loop, the more I’m surprised by its performance.
There’s something about high Q antennas. I need to run it up against the vertical. I think they would be within 3dB of each other on 20m
Yes and Doc Mag can null the noise and provides stellar S/N ratio.
@@TheArtofEngineeringa bit like the camera mics. One worked and one didn’t
Let’s see how many comments we get asking about the mag loop.
@@MidlifeRenaissanceManyes suitably arty “Wolf Creek” aesthetic! 😝🍷🍺🍷🍺🍷
@@TheArtofEngineering I haven’t managed to get 10 and 15m matched with any efficiency using the toroid match. Been a bit ordinary.
I’m thinking that the 4m and 3m loops are a little too long and so the turns ratio for those bands is a little too low and as a result the coupling suffers. But you’d see a higher corresponding SWR, so where is it going ????
I’m not seeing a high SWR. It’s less than 2.
The poverty loop made of 2.5m of RG8 has 10dB over the 3m aluminium strap loop on 10m with some initial tests
More experiments to do.
I’d love to try a 13m loop on 80m. The 8m and 5m lengths joined together. Use all 20m of the loop and work too band. It would be 7m wide, but strung up between a couple of trees…..
More engineering and experimenting time needs to be spent on this project.
But a loop for 40m through 20m, that takes a 100W…I can say I have achieved that. A bit of refinement is optional, such as the auto cutoff that I have in the poke-out-the-window-tenna, and some cable management, and a battery pack / switch thing that was a little less _ephemeral_
Essentially the hard work is done.
Cheers 🍻
Admiralty manual of seamanship vol1. Page 100. Throwing a heaving line.
I do remember the rocket launch. you launched it, not into the wind but downwind.....the trailing rope turned the rocket up wind. Anything that involves throwing for me is a dead loss!!!! TNX FER the comment OM 73. Alas my time at sea was short and spent mostly answering the satellite phone
@@williambrooks6629 it was a light line, so, like our ability to hold our alcohol, it was less than spectacular
@@MidlifeRenaissanceMan That magnetic loop has me intrigued. Is the capacitor on the top a home mad one?
How is the loop tuned? Is there some variable capacitor in the top, which is turned by a motor?
@@PaulaBean Short answer …. YES! I’m sure VK2NAP will elaborate! There is a video on the end screen world Pixie day where we play with the same antenna as n my backyard. It is a cracker of an antenna 73 de VK2AOE
@@TheArtofEngineering Ah, you mean ua-cam.com/video/ybLSKLKypA0/v-deo.htmlsi=-JVoQl6rkpdqyZ6V&t=143 where there is mentioned a 'secret capacitor' like the spice mix of KFC 🤪🤪 Well I'm really curious about that capacitor!
@@PaulaBean the capacitor is motorised. It’s manually tuned with the aid of a VNA or the SWR sweep on the radio.
The other thing of note is the ratio of windings on the toroid feedline transformer. The loop covers 20-40m but the radiation resistance drops as you lower the frequency. You need more windings on the 40m band than the 20m band.
I have made two of these loops. This larger one which in various iterations has performed incredibly well. The second is a smaller one which I can poke out the window of a first floor room and operate on 20 and 40m
Now, unlike many loops you may have seen, these loops will take the full 100W out of a transceiver. Earlier ones weren’t quite as robust, but were still able to take 50w before immolation.
We have been talking for over a year now of doing a separate channel that would be a little more structured / focussed where we can go into more details on the stuff we do and some of the theory vs practical aspects of the hobby.
Sadly our commitments and priorities haven’t allowed this just yet…..but watch this space. There will be more to come
73 DE VK2NAP
dit dit
@@MidlifeRenaissanceMan Thanks!