AmateurRadio.com

LP-100 reading

I was on the air the other day using the MFJ loop and as I was trying to tune to the lowest SWR reading I noticed an odd thing happening! Available to me at the station are 3 separate points to view the SWR. I have the SWR reading on the K3, the LP-100 and the MFJ remote control for the loop antenna. While tuning the loop antenna I was able to get an SWR of 1.5.1 on 20m with the K3's meter this is a very decent reading. I had the same reading on the MFJ remote unit but the LP-100 was showing 2.08 SWR??? The way the meters read the SWR are as follows.....the K3 right at the radio, then the LP-100 and then the MFJ remote unit. Oh and in case you are wondering if I am SWR meter crazy, I have the LP-100 in the game plan as it also reads very accurate output power and when operating QRPp it comes in very handy. . as for the MFJ remote that just comes with the antenna package and is really used to adjust the antenna and I really don't rely on it's SWR meter. I have heard and read in the past that the remote MFJ meter should not be relied on to much. ANYWAY.............I am getting this odd reading on the LP-100 and it is on all bands that I get a differing reading from the other SWR meters. First thing that came to mind was faulty coax or faulty

K3 meter

LP-100. I bypassed the LP-100 ( I removed the LP-100 and attached the two PL-259 using a SO-259 coupling) using all the same coax that fed the LP-100 and there was no problem. I then setup the LP-100 on it's own, meaning out the K3 through the LP-100 into a dummy load and there was a perfect match. Then I simply removed the SO-259 coupling and added the LP-100 again....there was the funny SWR again. Not sure what is going on here. In my trouble shooting I tried the LP-100 on it's own into a dummy load and it worked fine. I then used all the same coax cables and bypassing the LP- 100 and all was fine. Therefore LP-100 is fine and cables are good??? Not sure what is going on here.

The waterlogged  PL-259

Well FINALLY I was able to get some radio time it has been so long and really there were no good reasons just what I call excuses!  On Saturday afternoon it was time to get some long over due radio time in. I ran my coax jumper  to the 1788 MFJ loop from my K3 radio, I settled into my radio chair and flipped the switch…..and……it was time for Murphy to visit me! With the MFJ loop you are supposed to tune the loop for peak noise and this was just not happening. I was getting numerous peaks but the SWR was all over the place! I thought about it for some time and after trying numerous ideas it finally hit me! I have a 6 foot coax tail on the loop and via a coupling I connect the coax from indoors. It was really raining the last few days and the balcony was very wet and "normally" my outdoor coax tail is in a plastic zip lock bag. This past rain storm was also accompanied with a strong wind and somehow the coax was removed from the bag and was in the water. I removed the coax and checked it with my ohm meter and it showed a high resistance between the centre conductor and shield. So it seems water has made it's way into the PL-259 connector and after installing a new piece of coax and doing some check with great results it was time for bed. My loop is supported by the MFJ tripod. I have a cover over the loop it to help disguise it and kinda makes it look like patio furniture. There is lots of wind being high up and on the lake so the cover has to be secured around the centre pole of the tripod. It's great that the antenna works perfect with a cover and with it secured as well I just want to come up with an easy way to connect and disconnect the coax from the antenna. I don't want to remove the cover or un-secure it from the centre pole. Any ideas from ham world would be approbated.

A shot of the balcony antenna open for suggestions.

It was time to take the plunge and load Windows 7 on my PC, there were up's and downs to both the preparation to the loading of Windows 7 and also during the loading of 7. I had an external hard drive and decided to use it to help out in the Windows 7 transformation.

Boy was I surprised to get this!

It was February 2013 and we just really finished unpacking all our boxes from the move into our new condo and I felt it was time to let some steam off and get on the radio. My new MFJ 1788 loop antenna had arrived and after some tweaking it was setup and ready to go. The ARRL DX CW contest was on and what a better way to give the antenna a workout! I blogged about my ARRL event and the use of the magnetic loop antenna. I was very pleased to see I was getting out and able to be a points giver in the contest. I was more concerned with checking out the MFJ's antennas performance from my condo location than taking the contest seriously. As a wise ham had told me long ago "always submit your contest score" and I did just that......last week a certificate came in the mail. It seems I was first place in Ontario south section for QRP!! No it's not top in the  country or world but for my condo station it was a great accomplishment. To think I was not even trying for an award.....maybe next year I will go for points and see how I do?

I want to first want to thank all those who commented on my last post. At the time I was making a choice of either upgrading Norton 360 for another year at a price of 60.00 or go with one of the online free programs. I received a huge amount of feed back from the blog world. There were comments sent to my blog, email and from amateurradio.com where my blog is also posted.  I have decided to go with AVast for my PC online protection. There were lots of great suggestions and I even found out about some free software I never knew was out there. Thanks again for all your feedback. Now onto the next blog post......

As most of you know Windows XP has come to an end….. and how does that affect WinXP users.....will  WinXP refuse to start up?……no it will start,  will your programs start up and run……yes your loaded program will still run. So what's the big deal you ask? The end of Windows XP means Microsoft no longer "supports" XP and if you serf the net this could be an issue as you will no longer receive security updates. (maybe you could get past this issue with 3rd party virus protection) If you are a big IE browser fan and you continue to use it you will  do so at your own risk as there is no updates.  If your XP machine is just used to run off line ham and family related stuff you are good to go…….UNTIL…..you want to upgrade to a new program as most programs may  stop supporting Windows XP platform as well. Windows XP was released in 2001 and it's hard to believe it has been around that long. In the past Windows has had some bust OS's for example ME, Win98 and Vista. If you have a PC that is not going on the net and your only going to use the programs that are on your PC I would think you could stick with XP! As for me Windows XP is really the only OS I enjoyed using and really had no troubles with. It has been around for a long time and those high up at Microsoft felt it was time for a channel change! My PC is on the net all the time both for ham radio and personal use. For this reason it is time for an OS change at VE3WDM. I chose to go with Windows 7. It has been around for some time ( released in 2009) and has good reviews, one bonus for me is you can run XP programs from within Win7. My PC will have no problem with Win 7 as the processor, ram and HD memory are well within spec's of whats required to run Win7. I have ordered Win7 and it's on it's way and my first decision is…….upgrade PC to Win7 or clean install ? So blog world give me your feedback!!

For two years now I have used Norton 360 on my PC and it has served me well and not even a virus or any other problems………BUT I do have to shell out 60.00 per year to keep renewing it and having the fresh updates. There sure is a lot more I can do with that 60.00 than spending it on Norton! Then there is the other side of the coin how much will it cost me both in time and possibly PC tech help to remove a virus or what ever else there is out there from messing up my PC. In the past I have had some free virus protection programs along with trojan, malware and worms now and then it did not work. So am I getting the "wrong" free stuff, are they really not as good as rumored to be? My Norton 360 renewal message has been coming up my my PC for about a month now and as always I have been procrastinating the whole thing. Now I am down to the last day and just having to pay another 60.00 seems like a money grab to me. In the past here is the free protection I have had for the PC.
AVGfree ......this freeware say it protects against virus's, malware and spyware but to get a firewall, safe data download protection and anti spam you have to pay 60.00 per year. 
Spybot S&D is free and will protect me in the malware dept but not sure since AVGfree does that if I am just repeating a protection? I know there must be other free software out there or others that cost money but not asking you for more each year? What do you use.....how is it working for you......I'm open to suggestions as I am very fast running out of time. 

Last Sunday Julie and I were on our way out the door and I wanted to check some directions before we left. I went off to the computer to look something up and as I turned the PC on a POPPING sound was heard…..then nothing! My six year old PC failed to start, absolutely nothing was happening. There was no time to look into it now we were heading out the door. Early that evening when at home I tried the power button on the PC again (maybe somehow the computer god's looked after things for me) it was the same….nothing. The tower has to come out from it's cubby in the roll top desk and opened for further investigation. I first made up a diagram of where all the USB cables, monitor cables, audio

Faulted part

cables and serial cables went so all could be placed back in the same place. I suspected the power supply was the problem and hoping I could find a reset button on the unit once the side panels were taken off the tower. I was not so lucky there  was no reset button but there sure was a noticeable burning smell and it was coming from the power supply. It was easy to remove the power supply from the PC but not without labelling what cables went where on the mother board. Doing similar things in the past I have said to my self "no need to write it down it's simple and straight forward" boy has that lie got me into some troubles in the past! With the power supply out and not yet opened I did notice the
power supply fan was missing some blades. Once the supply was opened up I quickly found the faulted

Cables everywhere

transistor. With the broken fan and faulted transistor it was time for a new power supply.
The old supply was a 500 watts supply the new one is 750 and can be used with a new PC when I decide to build one. The new supply fit perfectly into the tower and there sure were lots more cables on this supply! I ended up using only 5 of the some 20 cables so the rest were tucked away in an open bay for future use. With all the cables plugged into the mother board, hard drives and CD drive and the spare cables were as I said tucked away. Before putting the side panels back on it was time to plug in the new supply and power up the PC. I then pushed the power button and NOTHING!!!! Ok I said lets  try that again…..NOTHING!!!  First thing that came to mind was, did the faulted power supply take something else with it?? It was time to take a breath and think of my next step, time to recheck all the mother board connections.  After all I did take time to clean the dust off the board while the side panels were off

Ready to power up

maybe I loosened or disconnected something in my cleaning frenzy. All seemed good on the motherboard it was time to recheck the power supply again. It could be possible that even thought the supply is new it is defective? I checked that there was AC making it to the supply, that the proper connecters were used on the mother board and that I did not forget any connections. It was then I noticed on one connector did not seem to be seating right. This was a connector that had an "option" of adding 4 extra connections. It was a 20 pin connector but some mother boards were 24 pins as mine was a 24 pin. The connector had the 24 pin setup ready to go as it was snapped into place so I just plugged it into the board….very straight forward I thought……NOT…….there was also clear tape holding the extra 4 pin connector in place and this tape stopped the connector from seating firmly on the  main board and thus the PC not starting!  With the tape removed and 24 pin connector firmly seated the PC came to life! I am happy to say that all has been working well and the PC seems to run cooler and not as noisy ass the old power supply. I did notice some software hiccups once I was up and running.

The problem found

Some of the USB ports changed their ports on me. My K3 now wants to be com 3 and not com 4 anymore. This had me change around some radio software. Also when the PC booted  a bios page came up (never a good sign) asking me some questions about the type of start up I wanted??? This only happened once and all is good now but really not sure what that was all about I only replaced a power supply?? Oh and finally Oliver was in on the action too, he was fine with no PC and a new cubby.

If you look hard Oliver can be found