KB6NU's Ham Radio Blog

Monday evening, I installed a phone plug on the keyer in place of the header that was on there. This turned out to be more of a job than I’d anticipated. For some reason, I had a heck of a time unsoldering and removing the header. Once that was done, installing the phone plug wasn’t so hard. Took me about an hour and a half from start to finish.

I’m getting better with the keyer, too. I’ve been running it at 15 words per minute, and that’s starting to seem pretty slow. I can copy at least 17-18 wpm, but didn’t want to try to send too fast just yet. Next time, though, I think I’ll crank up the speed a little.

While I am making fewer keying mistakes, there are still times when i just lose it. By that I mean, my concentration flies out the window, and I get all out of sync. When that happens, I stop, take a breath, and then start over again. Fortunately, all of the operators I’ve worked so far have been very accomodating.

Thursday, I took the Heathkit keyer apart, spread out the schematic and began poking around. It looked to me like everything was working the way it should, so I buttoned it all back up, built a cable to connect it to my IC-735, and voila it keyed the rig perfectly.

My only guess as to why it didn’t work right before is that I had the positive and negative contacts swapped. If you’re keying the transmitter with a straight key, swapping them doesn’t matter–the key is only a mechanical switch after all, and the current doesn’t care which way it flows through a switch. But the output of the keyer is a transistor, and current flows only one way through a transistor, so you have to connect it properly.

Instead of using the capacitive paddles built into the keyer, I’ve opted to use the Bencher paddle. I played around with the sensitivity adjustment for the capacitive paddles, but I just couldn’t find a setting that wasn’t too sensitive. As a result, I was getting a lot of phantom dits.

The problem with using the mechanical paddles is that instead of using a stereo phone plug, Heathkit decided to use a small header. This is, of course, a lot less standard than a phone plug, and the local Radio Shack did not have the proper connector. To use the keyer today, I had to use some clip leads and Mickey Mouse it. I hope that Purchase Radio will have what I need, but if not I may have to modify the keyer to accept a phone plug.

The good news is that I made eight contacts today using the paddle/keyer combo. I asked the operators on the other end to be a little patient, and fortunately for me, they were, for the most part. I think I got better along the way, although during the last contact, I got tired and began to lose concentration and started making a lot of mistakes. All in all, though, I think I’ll like using the keyer once I get proficient with it.

I have a Heathkit keyer that I bought and built nearly 20 years ago. It’s actually a pretty cool device. It’s processor-controlled and has a number of memories. The unique thing about this keyer is that it comes with built-in “”paddles.”” They’re not mechanically operated, but rather switch capacitively.

As I mentioned earlier, the output doesn’t seem to be working properly. When you touch the paddles, the output switches, but it latches up into an always on state.

I dug out the schematics and opened the case, but this thing was not designed for easy troubleshooting. The voltage regulator, for example, mounts to the base, and the leads poke up through the PC board where they connect to a header. To troubleshoot the board, you have to disconnect the voltage regulator, and once you do that, you have to figure out another way to power the board. I guess I’ll just connect 5V directly to that connector, bypassing the regulator altogether.

I just spent a couple of days down in Miami Beach. I didn’t take any of my handhelds, although I’m thinking that maybe I should have. We were on the 10th floor of our hotel, so I could have done pretty well on VHF. Maybe next time.

On the flight home, I happened to be flipping through one of the in-flight magazines and noticed that Plantronics is now producing a wireless headset for cell phones, the M1500. It has a range of up to 30 feet and its rechargeable battery provides 2.5 hours of talk time, 60 hours of standby time. The headset fits neatly over the ear, and it comes with an adapter that plugs into the headset jack of a cell phone.

I’m going to contact Plantronics about adapting this for amateur radio use. There’s two ways to go: get them to sell me just the headset and build an adapter or get them to also design and build an adapter. In addition to the audio output, the adapter would also have to have a push-to-talk output. Also, I would have to design and build cables for the different rigs currently on the market. That might be kind of a hassle, as they all seem to use different connectors.

Even so, I think this would be a very cool amateur radio accessory.

I worked my first DX just now with the new 20m vertical–EA8DA in the Grand Canary Islands. It was kind of odd, too. First off, the band was really noisy. Also, he was the only DX station I heard on the entire band. He replied to my CQ and we gave each other 559 reports, though, so conditions couldn’t have been that bad. Who knows?

The Grand Canary Islands are part of Spain, so I assume that EA8DA speaks Spanish. I’ll never know, though. I wimped out on my second transmission. Next time I work a station from Spain or Latin America, I’ll have to try some of my Spanish on them.

Even though sales were disappointing, the LCARC Swap wasn’t a complete waste. I finally connected with a guy that I’d been trying to meet for a while. A couple months ago, I posted on a website that I was looking for a keyer for my IC-735. Shortly thereafter, I received and e-mail from a guy who didn’t have what I was looking for, but offered to sell me one of several external keyers that he had. He also had a couple of paddles for sale.

The funny thing is that even though he had a “”1″” call, he lived in Ypsilanti, which is the next town over. He, too, thought, he’d have to ship as I have a “”6″” call, so he naturally thought I lived in California. It’s kind of funny that it took a post on a national website for us to make contact.

Anyway, I expressed some interest in one of the paddles he had. We had a hard time meeting up, though. Once, I called and he happened to be out for the day. Another time, I had to cancel as something had come up on my end. This went on for several months.

We finally did connect at the swap. As I was checking in, he came in right behind me, and I noted his name and call on the registration card that he picked up. Apparently, he goes to all the swaps. His business is liquidating the estates of silent keys, something he’s been doing for 20 years.

This gentleman’s name is Jan, and his call is K1ND. He’s an extremely pleasant guy to talk to, and he’s an honest dealer as well. If you see him at any of the swaps you attend, make sure you take a look at what he’s selling.

The Bencher paddle he sold me looked as though it had never been used. The terminals have not been soldered, and it came in the original box, with all the original paperwork. The anodizing on the base is in perfect shape, too. I bought for half the new price, and it looks like I got a great deal.

I carted a stock of books down to the L’Anse Creuse Amateur Radio Club swap this morning. I had to get up at 5:30 am to get over there in time to set up for the 8 am start. Ugggh.

The traffic was not very brisk. In fact, it was downright disappointing. I remember attending this same swap back in the 70s, and there were many more people there. I made some sales, but most attendees looked like they were after cheap radio hardware, not books.

The vendor next to me was selling tubes. He wasn’t having much more luck than I was and he drove in from somewhere in Ohio. At least I didn’t have to drive that far.

I did learn some things, though. For example, several people asked for specific books. I can now go out and get those, so that I have them next time. I also passed out flyers and business cards, so maybe those will turn into customers at some point.

Despite the snowy conditions today, I finally got the 20m ground plane antenna up and adjusted. As suggested in the Handbook, it’s hanging from a tree branch. I think I adjusted it a little too short, though, as the low-SWR point seems to be about 14.150. Even so, the SWR is only about 1.3 at 14.050.

The antenna’s bandwidth seems to be quite wide. It’s less than 1.5:1 across the entire band. Who knows? I may even try to work a little SSB with it.

The jury’s still out on how well the thing is actually working. (We all know that low SWR does not equal good performance, don’t we?) The first contact was with a K0 in Missouri. I gave him a 589, while he only gave me a 559. After we said our 73s, though, a KB4 in NC called and we were both 599. I didn’t hear any DX on the band this afternoon. Its position so close to the tree has got to be having some effect on the radiation pattern, too, I’d guess.

I did the coax balun thing by looping the coax three times just below the feedpoint. I don’t know if that’s helping reduce the RFI or not. I didn’t have any problems with RFI on 20m before–just 40 and 10.

For my next trick, I’m thinking of building a 17m/10m dual-band dipole out of some 450-ohm coax I have laying around. It would be nice to be able to have the ability to get on at least two different HF bands. Also, I’ve never worked 17m, so that would be something cool to do.