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Welcome to Handiham World!

Handiham Headquarters will be closed for the United States Thanksgiving holiday

Welcome to Handiham World!

Image: Matt, KA0PQW, and the bucket truck lift operator, Jeff, KC0UOW, ride the bucket up to do some antenna work. Photo courtesy Don Rice, N0BVE, taken during Matt’s antenna work in October. Don had just completed some work on Matt’s 220 MHz antennas, and Matt was headed up to do the final inspection.

It’s always a good idea to get your antenna work done before winter, especially if you live in Minnesota, as Matt, KA0PQW does. One may be blind, but that doesn’t mean you can’t do antenna work. Matt directs and does hands-on work on his antenna projects, and has some great helpers.

I have always recommended having at least one helper available for any antenna project that involves working on an elevated antenna system, whether it is on a roof or high on a tower. The reason, of course, is safety – if something goes wrong, the second person can provide assistance or call for help. Besides, most of these projects really do require at least one more set of hands – and eyes. You can use a spotter to check for hazards like power lines and buried pipes or cables. This goes for any ham radio operator, whether they are blind or sighted. I shudder to think of all the times I have not followed my own advice, but in my defense I was young and stupid. As a teenager, I navigated our family home’s rooftop like a monkey – stringing antennas, hurrying down to test for SWR, then running back up the ladder to the roof to make adjustments – all without anyone else around. When I bought a used tower, I was up and down that thing dozens and dozens of times. I did buy a Klein lineman’s belt but even so, I worked alone all too often. The closest call I ever had was on an old telescoping mast. I had just finished my antenna work and stepped onto the ground when the steel cable holding the top section snapped and the tower telescoped back down. A few seconds delay in getting off would have meant amputated fingers and toes! Worse yet, I did not have a helper around.

Well, I have learned a lot since then. I ask for help, so that I have someone there to do antenna work as well as to help us both stay safe. I plan to stay safe – and you know what? Staying safe means more happy years of ham radio fun!

Welcome to Handiham World!

The move, part 2

Welcome to Handiham World!

Handiham Office Move – New HQ Entrance

Image: A view of the entrance to the new Handiham headquarters. The large double doors are right at ground level for easy wheelchair access. The windows let in plenty of natural light, and the woodland setting is not only sylvan and restful, but it’s also RF-quiet!

The round building is quite a surprising change from our old office space in a traditional building at Courage Center. The Camp Courage Reception Center is a two-level round structure, with the main camp offices and a great room on the top floor. That level also has a computer lab and a staff lounge. The lower level, where our new Handiham Headquarters office and station are located, is accessible from ground level without any stairs or ramps because the building is what is commonly called a “walk-out” design, built on a hill, so that both the levels have access directly from ground. You go in the main door and you end up in the camp office level. You go around the building to the side, and you enter the Handiham office, which is down on the lower level.

As I write this, we have a functioning HF station in place, a Kenwood TS-570SAT with a matching Kenwood supply. The antenna is a GAP vertical, which is mounted within 20 feet of the rig, just outside the building, and visible in the photo if you look just to the left of the building. Although we do have a code key and microphone, the station is pretty bare-bones right now. There is additional equipment in a cabinet that is identical to the one at Courage North.

Although I have installed a Kenwood TM-V71 dual band VHF/UHF rig next to the TS-570, there is no antenna system for 2 meters and 70 cm. This deficiency must be remedied before Radio Camp next May, but I am confident that we can get a new antenna up, probably mounted on the old TV antenna mast on the roof, which is also visible in the photo. I have been able to hear the N0BVE repeater system while in my car driving within a mile of Camp Courage, so I am confident that we will be able to access not only that repeater but several others, especially if we can get up a beam antenna, at least for the two meter band. Nearby St. Cloud has an excellent repeater, the W0SV system.

We do have work to do on the headquarters antenna system, that’s for sure. Although we do have a very nice triband HF beam in place on a 50 foot tower, the coax does not terminate where we need it in the new location. I plan to ask our volunteers to help me look the situation over and figure out how to complete that installation. Because of the distance to the tower, I would expect that we need to consider buried hard line to keep losses to a minimum.

Another consideration is how we will get on the 160, 75, and 40 meter bands. Although the GAP vertical does tune 75 through 10, it is not adequate for regional net operation, where higher angle radiation is required. To remedy that problem, I would like to look at a wire antenna, something like a center-fed Zepp, around 250 feet long, to really grab those 160 meter signals! Ideally, we will be able to install a second remote base station for our members at this location, and it will add the “top band” of 160 meters to the frequencies our members can operate.

The move to Camp Courage is going to be far better for our station operations; there’s just no doubt about it. Several years ago, when the HVAC system was updated at Courage Center, banks of SCR fan motor controllers were installed to make the heating and air conditioning systems more energy-efficient. If the load was light, the AC frequency was varied downward by these controllers. If the load increased, the AC frequency increased. There is an energy savings, but the RFI generated by the system produced noise at S9+10 dB levels on the HF bands. It was intolerable, and we had to resort to porting the receiver signal in from remote receivers at Courage North or the K0LR station, both of which are located hundreds of miles north of the Twin Cities in quiet RF areas. Although this worked for some types of operation, it is hardly desirable or practical for working DX or quickly grabbing a CQ that you would hear, simply because it was a lot of fiddling around to tune both the remote receiver and the transmitter that was sitting in front of us at Courage Center. The new location is very quiet, with no significant RFI. It will be a huge relief to operate without having to deal with overbearing interference.

But the move has not been without some glitches. My phone still isn’t working, so calls to my office number go straight to voice mail. The good news is that I have the system set up to immediately email me whenever a voice mail is left at my number, so I can immediately call the person back.

Another issue is how we will handle equipment donations. While we still have a small amount of equipment storage space at Courage Center, it is looking like this space will be needed by another program that rehabilitates wheelchairs for distribution to people with disabilities who cannot afford new chairs.

Thus, I am considering a change for the equipment program to Camp Courage, and that will mean that gifts of equipment will be accepted at the Camp Courage address instead of the Courage Center address. The equipment loan program has already moved to Camp Courage. As you know, Avery Finn, K0HLA, has retired. Since he ran the equipment program, we are trying to figure out how to operate it in the upcoming year. Our current plan is to distribute equipment to our members at the next Radio Camp session in May.

Speaking of Radio Camp, I’ll give you an update on our new location for that event in a later edition of your weekly e-letter. For now, I’ll just say that we will be on the “Woodland” side of Camp Courage, where we will enjoy brand-new cabin facilities that have some wonderful meeting spaces and living areas, including spacious screened porches for each cabin, as well as gas log fireplaces in the large common areas.

For Handiham World, I’m…

Patrick Tice, [email protected]
Handiham Manager

Welcome to Handiham World!

The first order of business is the upcoming time change in November: Sunday, 1 November 2009, we move to standard time in the USA. The Handiham daily EchoLink net remains true to local time, so if you use local time to check in you will not notice any difference. However, if you use GMT, the net time appears to shift by 1 hour. Instead of beginning at 16:00 GMT, the net begins at 17:00 GMT. The first net affected by this change will be the Monday, 2 November EchoLink net.

For net managers, the time change means making sure that net control stations are aware of the plan to shift net times by one hour relative to Universal Time. The problem is certainly one for amateur radio nets that have worldwide participation, since different parts of the world may elect to follow a seasonal time shift. About 70 countries have at least some form of daylight saving time. Three notable exceptions are China, India, and Japan. A station checking in to the Handiham EchoLink net via the N0BVE repeater system in Minnesota would observe no difference next Monday, as the net would begin at what appears to that station to be normal local time, 11:00 in the morning. However, relative to GMT (which never shifts by the season), the net will now begin an hour later, at 17:00 hours GMT instead of 16:00 hours GMT.

An easy way to remember the difference is to know the “normal” number of hours between your local time and GMT. In Minnesota, where I live, the difference between local time and GMT is +6 hours. That means if the net is on at 11:00 hours in Minnesota, I add 6 hours to 11 hours and the total is 17:00 hours GMT. That is the same as 5:00 in the afternoon Universal Time.

In the summer, when Daylight Time is in effect, the difference between Minnesota time and GMT is only 5 hours.

So, to set forth a practical example, a station checking in from Japan will notice that the net now begins at 2:00 a.m. during the winter, when we shift to standard time. All summer, when Minnesota was on Daylight Time, that same station in Japan would see the net starting at 1:00 a.m., so you can see that it might be more difficult for Asian stations to keep the net schedule at such an inconvenient hour. We also get check ins from India, and since, like Japan, India does not shift times from Daylight to Standard, those stations will also observe that the net begins an hour later.

The Handiham Monday HF nets also remain true to local time, the only problem being whether or not we are even going to bother keeping these nets on the books, so to speak. The nets, other than the CW net, have fallen into disuse and might as well be abandoned. The relentless sunspot minimum with its poor band conditions has taken a toll on participation, and the RFI that prevented us from using our old station at Courage Center meant that we could not pick up the net if there was no other net control station available. We had a number of dedicated phone operators who stuck it out as long as they could on the 20 meter net, 14.265 MHz, but when stations just don’t show up, there really isn’t much of a net. A perennial problem with the 14.265 frequency is that the Salvation Army Net backs up against our net time and does not always change with the season.

It is time to decide what to do with these HF nets. The CW net stays in place on 40 meters, but the HF phone nets need a complete re-thinking. Let’s hear your ideas, now that the sun is again showing signs of life and solar cycle 24 will begin bringing us better HF band conditions. Oh, and let’s not assume that all the activity will be on 14 MHz and above. Maybe you would like to have a 75 meter net, or perhaps a 160 meter net, either of which would allow for fairly wide geographic coverage during the upcoming northern hemisphere winter. While nets are normally discouraged on 17 meters, we used to have an informal gathering on that band during cycle 23, when the band was open often. Alan, K2WS, started that “informal non-net get-together”. When band conditions became so bad that we just couldn’t keep the 17 meter non-net going, it simply died out. Maybe conditions will improve and we can get together informally on that band, or perhaps have a more formal net on a higher frequency band like 10 or 15 meters.

Think of the advantages of a 10 meter net:

• Novices and Technicians can operate SSB phone between 28.3 and 28.5 MHz.

• A quarter wave vertical antenna for the 10 meter band is only about eight and a quarter feet (2.5 meters) long. It is much easier to fit a 10 meter band antenna into a apartment or condo living situation than it is to fit a 20 meter antenna into that same space.

• Band conditions will soon favor 10 meters with the solar cycle producing higher sunspot numbers. That means that smaller antenna systems and lower transmitter power will become practical for working HF again.

• There is a lot of spectrum space on the 10 meter band. It is not crowded with stations as the 20 meter band is.

• Modern multiband rigs cover the 10 meter band, so many of us already have the equipment we need.

• The Handiham Remote Base station at Courage North operates on the 10 meter band, offering another way to get on the air.

Look, all I’m asking is that we mull this idea over and think about the HF nets. I hate to drop the 20 meter net altogether, but 14.265 MHz is just a very crowded frequency. We could consider running the net in a less crowded part of the band, but that would mean moving to the Advanced or Extra portions of 20 meters. Do you have any ideas about that? Perhaps it would offer even more incentive for some of our Generals to upgrade, but even if they don’t want to upgrade, there would be other nets that they could join on bands like 10 meters.

I guess we have to admit that every station is not going to be able to get on every net. The secret to building a successful on the air community is to have enough choices, alternatives that serve as many Handiham members as possible.

For Handiham World, I’m…

Patrick Tice, [email protected]
Handiham Manager

For Handiham World, I’m…

Patrick Tice, [email protected]
Handiham Manager

Welcome to Handiham World!

Photo: Here I am pointing to the spot we had to excavate for repairs after putting a ground rod directly through an irrigation system pipe during Field Day one year.

A story you will be hearing about in the weekly amateur radio news is a tragic one. ARRL and commercial media are reporting the deaths of three family members by electrocution during an antenna project. Says ARRL, “At approximately 8:40 PM on Monday, October 12, a man, woman and their 15 year old son were killed while trying to erect a 50 foot vertical antenna at the home of the man’s mother, Barbara Tenn, KJ4KFF, in Palm Bay, Florida. The deceased were not licensed amateurs.”

You can read the rest of the story on the ARRL site, and you should, because one of the best ways to follow up on a serious accident like this one is to take a look at the facts and begin a serious discussion about what went wrong and how to prevent another accident in the future. I will let you read the ARRL story and watch the TV news report for the details, but this story did serve to remind me of the days long ago, when Don, W0DN, now a silent key, and I started the little antenna company in Butternut Township, Blue earth County, Minnesota. Don lived in an old, rural schoolhouse, and the property was actually pretty good for an antenna business because even back in the mid-1970’s it was served by underground power lines. There was no chance at all to inadvertently swing a piece of aluminum tubing up into a power line while you were busy thinking about running another SWR check and trying to be as quick about it as possible so as to get as many tests in as possible. Of course there were always other things to be careful about, but the “work area” was clear of overhead hazards, and it needed to be, because in the day in, day out routine of putting up antennas, complacency would inevitably set in and one would lift a vertical antenna up without looking skyward first.

Complacency. It’s a phenomenon that is well understood and respected by trainers in aviation, driving, firearms, law enforcement… The list is endless. The way it works is that you learn about procedures that ensure the highest level of safety in whatever endeavor in which you engage, and you follow these “best practices” faithfully many times until they become routine. Nothing bad has ever happened, so you become a bit complacent – maybe you don’t really need to go through that checklist each time. After all, you have never had an accident, and you know what you are doing.

Than, without warning, it happens. An “accident” that causes property damage, injury, or even death. In firearms training, it is the time even an experienced range instructor, a fellow who had given me instruction, leaves a loaded weapon within reach of a toddler – I will never forget the tragedy that his family had to live through when distracted, he left for only a moment, and one of his twins picked up a pistol and shot the other twin. In ham radio, it happens when someone works on powered up equipment or rushes to put up an antenna without looking for wires.

I doubt that it is even possible to buy a commercial antenna designed to be installed outdoors that does not carry a hazard warning about looking up and avoiding powerlines. We put them on our products way back then, but manufacturers cannot control the installation of their antennas. Amateur antennas are certainly safe enough to install and use, but they are likely to be put up in places that are full of compromises. Unlike commercial antenna installations, amateur antennas are usually not at a site designed for antennas. There might be a need to mount the antenna on a residential roof. There could be power lines running along one side of the property and a “drop” from the power pole to the house. Neighboring houses might be relatively close by. There may be vegetation or trees. All of these things are potential hazards that must be considered before you even decide what kind of antenna to install.

Starting with a plan is a good idea. If you cannot see the proposed installation yourself because you are blind or cannot access the site for some other reason, you need to get some help from your radio club. I like to take a look at a proposed site and sketch a rough drawing that includes the house, the dimensions of the property, the locations of overhead powerlines and underground utilities, and any trees, other buildings, or possible obstructions. Although there is usually a “one call” service that a homeowner can phone to get a free location assessment of underground powerlines, water pipes, and natural gas lines, you are still on your own when it comes to underground lawn sprinkler systems. Since those will not be located by the “one call” service, you will likely not have them on your sketch and will have to dig carefully.

• It is always a good idea to plan antenna work for a time when you will have at least one “spotter” to help you out. A spotter is a person who does not necessarily climb towers or pull coax, but who will be there for you if you have an accident and help needs to be summoned.

• Be sure you begin a big project early enough to assure that you will have daylight to complete it. If Murphy intervenes and you fall behind schedule, stop working before darkness falls and continue your project another day. In the tragic story that opened this piece, the antenna crew had run out of daylight and were working in the dark.

• Be aware of the limitations your work crew might have. The people helping with a project may be enthusiastic and well-intentioned, but they may not know the safety basics. In this case, the crew were family members who were not licensed amateurs.

There is a fine line between “Monday morning quarterbacking” and a thoughtful discussion of what went wrong in the Florida story. One thing I do have control over is what happens the next time I put up an antenna myself. I can take charge of the project and have a plan. While that won’t necessarily ward off every possible accident, it will certainly make the project safer – hopefully as safe as it can be.

For Handiham World, I’m…

Patrick Tice, [email protected]
Handiham Manager