This is so cool!

Just logged a contact with Nick (RA3QPY) out of Moscow, Russia. Signal strength 5-9 (STRONG) both directions. Still no amplifier used on my side, only running 100A SSB. He could have been nextdoor! Very long reach with this antenna.

So, how's it doing? You be the judge...

I steered the beam to 15 degrees this evening and made a QSO with LY5A, a fellow named Jonas out of Lithuania. He reported reading my signal at 5-9 (for you non-hams out there, that is a strong signal report). Very cool!

And it's up!

The mast was the hard part, believe it or not! It took me about 10 minutes to foist the hexbeam onto the roof (myself) and mounted it on the pipe. Here is a picture:

Putting up the mast and rotator, part 1

The chimney mount and rotator showed up yesterday, so I started in on the rooftop mounting project. The rotator tested out okay, and I spent Friday evening putting the mount straps up. Not an easy task, especially with a large, tall chimney like ours. Here are some pics of me doing my thrillseeker installation:

Part 2 will be to load the antenna up onto the roof and onto the mast. It weighs about 20 lbs total, so hopefully this won't be too hard - it's just hella bulky at 20 ft across.

Steer... QSO... Repeat

I found a nifty circle map site to help me steer my beam to interesting parts on the globe - http://www.qsl.net/vk9ml/2002/beam_vancouver.htm

Vancouver is close enough to work. Just this evening I oriented to 250 deg line and caught VK3AKK out of Victoria, Australia. Couldn't navigate the pileup (I blame my antenna height), but even at 6 ft off the ground I was receiving his signal at 5/4. Pretty cool.

I will try some other bearings tomorrow.

Ready to do some laundry

The telescoping mast I had in mind was not strong enough, so I had to settle for a 1" steel pipe to get the antenna up. Not exactly optimal! The recommended height for this antenna is at least 20 feet, and I have it at 6 feet. Oh well. I will fashion a base mount this week so it can rotate freely to steer the beam.

At this height it does look a lot like those laundry drying racks you used to see in backyards everywhere!

Spider

The construction of the hexbeam started in earnest this weekend.

Here is the base with booms attached, no wires yet:

First, I brought in the tension cords to pull each rod in and up. Then I measured and attached the 10m, 15m and 20m driver & reflector wire sets. Here is the final product:

Weatherproofed and tested continuity - all checked out!

Now the trick - mounting on a base. I can lift the whole antenna with no trouble, but PVC as a base is out of the question because of wobble - here is my first mounting try.

I think a steel 1-inch pole will work nicely here.