Posts Tagged ‘vibroplex bug’
Bugging Out
April 15th, 2016 | 
Author: Vibroplex Bug QSO
Sometimes I'm in a mood to use my bug. I'm still a relatively new CW operator and using my Vibroplex Original Bug is both novel to me and a challenge compared to my Kent Straight Key or using paddles.
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| The key lineup with the Bug in the center |
I purchased my bug used on a well known auction site for about $65. It dates to sometime in the mid 1970s but it doesn't differ much from bugs made in the past 75 years. I have added some weight to slow it down to around 19 wpm DITs by taping a heavy spacer onto the factory pendulum weight as well as adding a heavy metal spacer to the end of the pendulum. The weight on the end of the pendulum is held on by a simple plastic drywall screw anchor. I can pull the weight off the back quickly if I want to let it go up to about 25wpm DITs. Without the extra weights this bug sends at around 27wpm at it's slowest speed and up to... well I don't know how fast because I can't control it at the fastest speed yet and I certainly can't copy others at that speed so I usually keep it below 20wpm for now.
If you haven't used a bug I encourage you to give it a try. It's a challenging key to get the hang of but the effort to learn it is fun and rewarding. I especially enjoy the tactile feedback from that swinging pendulum and the the click-clacking of the pendulum against the hanging damper.
I was using my Ten-Tec Eagle (model 599) purchased used from a local ham. The Eagle is a super little QRO radio although in this QSO my output is 5w. If you have sharp eyes you may see that the power level is set to 7w but that is actually 5w output according to my external meter. The 100 number under the CW symbol is the bandwidth that I was using. I generally keep the bandwidth at 500 Hz but there was a station operating above us that I wanted to mask.
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| Ten-Tec Eagle 599 |
The Eagle is a great CW rig. This model has 3 front end crystal filters 2400Hz, 600Hz and 300Hz giving it nice selectivity for any mode.
I was working Ed, KG4W in VA who is an SKCC member. If you want to work other manual key stations 3550 kHz is a calling frequency for the SKCC. Ed told me during the QSO he was using a VIZ vertical bug which is a unique and interesting bug design.
He reported my signal as 599 and he was 599 as well. I was running 5w output power to my 80m OCF Dipole. He was using an Yaesu at 100w to a fan dipole. 5w was sufficient for this QSO but if he had reported me as 559 or weaker I would have raised my power to 20w to make copy for him easier. I enjoy using QRP but when I rag chew I don't want to make it difficult for QRO stations to copy me if I can help it so having the Eagle allows me to raise my power if necessary for the communication.
The QSO
So here's the qso between two bug operators. I hope you enjoy it...
That's all for now
So lower your power and raise your expectations
72/73
Richard, AA4OO
Can anybody hear me
Calling QRP CQ - Inconceivable
My 80m OCF Dipole has been a surprisingly good antenna and I've made contacts with it on all bands except 6m and 160m. Based on my past experience trying to tune up short antennas on 160m I really hadn't considered trying to use this Windom for 160m. But through some email exchanges with another ham in Illinois who had recently put up a 160m antenna we decided to try a scheduled QSO on the top band. So it was time to give the Windom a shot on 160m.
Amazingly my 80m Windom / OCF Dipole has 4.5:1 SWR native around 1.8 mHz and it matches easily with a tuner across the entire 160m band. That was a surprise.
Amazingly my 80m Windom / OCF Dipole has 4.5:1 SWR native around 1.8 mHz and it matches easily with a tuner across the entire 160m band. That was a surprise.
I tossed my mighty 5 watts call out at 1810 kHz not expecting much...
Within a minute of calling CQ I had a faint QRP station from Maine tried to work me. After about 4 tries I finally copied his call correctly but then lost him. Immediately another station called me and we exchanged the niceties of signal reports, location, rigs and weather. I received a nice 579 report for my 5w and I gave him a 599+ report for his thundering kilowatt station. He needed to work my County so I was glad to be able to provide him with the contact. Following that call the former QRP station from Maine was back in there and finally we worked each other. We had a nice QRP to QRP QSO on the top band. He gave me a 549 report but he was using a 400 ft beverage receive antenna. I was struggling a bit more to copy him through local QRM on my side and a less qualified receive antenna and reported his signal as 339.
Those were my first two contacts on 160m using CW. Who'd have thought my cloud burner antenna and QRP power would get me such quick results on the top band. I just figured no one would hear me.
So how do you know if and where your signal is getting out ?
The Reverse Beacon Network
I had to quit right after those two QSOs but when I later checked my email the original station with whom I'd planned the scheduled QSO reported that although he had not heard me he said I was getting out and sent me a link to something called the reverse beacon net showing a couple of stations that were hearing me on 1810 kHz.
You mean I can find out in near realtime if and where my signal is being heard by an automated system? No way! That is cooler than a Ronco Pocket Fisherman. Recall that I'm relatively new at this stuff and this may be old hat for a lot of you. But the ability to toss out your call and in real-time check where your signal is getting to just warms the push-pull final transistor in my heart.
The Reverse Beacon Network can give you the last 100 reports of your station. So I took a look and saw some of my weekend activity where I was shooting some fish in a barrel (I mean working contest stations) and there were beacon reports of my call from such places as far South as the Antilles and as far West as Utah.
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| Map of the last 100 reports from Reverse Beacon stations of my call sign Color coded by band |
So the reverse beacon network report tells you what station heard you, the frequency, the signal to noise ratio (higher is better) and your word per minute (wpm) speed.
It even includes a speedometer
Being a new CW dude my word per minute speed is of interest to me. Most of my QSOs in the past week have been at 15-16 wpm. I'm using a Vibroplex Bug I received last weekend and have slowed it down with a home-made weight attached to a drywall anchor pressed on the end of the pendulum. I found it interesting that some beacon stations reported me at 19-23 wpm. I looked at the time and the frequency and realized that the higher speed was from my first on-air QSO using the Vibroplex Bug with N4HAY before I slowed it down with my junk box bug tamer.
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| My brief speed key session with N4HAY |
So if you are using a manual key and don't know what speed you are sending just check out a beacon to see what speed they are reporting.
Summary
This reverse beacon stuff has been around a while. So unless you're a newbie like me you probably already knew about it. But if you haven't used before it's very cool, especially with regard to knowing how your QRP station is being heard. Are you making it 1000 mile per watt? Is your antenna propagating East, West, North or South. How and where is the skip? This answers many questions that I had been wondering about as I'm operating. A shiny new toy, just in time for Christmas
So that's all for now.
So lower your power and raise your expectations
73/72
Richard N4PBQ
