Since I placed my antennas last year, I just put the coax cables thrue the roofwindow. A pretty fast solution but far from ideal, especially in wintertime since I can’t really close one window. Some time ago I bought an rooftile of lead. I think it is originally destined for some kind of mast. But if you mount it up-side-down it could be a great way to put coax cables thrue inside.
So I removed one rooftile and gently drilled a hole in it. Mounted the lead on top of it and put the tile on the roof again. Putted the cables thrue and sailed the whole thing with vulcanization tape. It looks pretty solid, let’s hope that is survives the winter!
LOTW approved!
A long last to-do on my list: apply for LOTW. Last week I read the instructions on the ARRL-website (also available in Dutch, I might add) and followed the line. I thought I had to upload my driver license and amateur license, but it turn out that I have to send a copy of both via snailmail.
When I dropped the enveloppe the other day my guess was I wouldn’t here anything within at least 3 weeks.
But, surprise surprise! This morning ARRL dropped me an email with the approval certificate! Whow, that was only about one week or so!
So tonight I’ll try to import my log in LOTW. Finally! Now I can see for sure how many DXCC entities I already scored….
New set: Kenwood TS-850
For years this radio has been my dream. I already did own a Kenwood TS-450SAT. A very nice radio. But the other day I saw a TS-850SAT on internet for sale. In the corner of the shack was a Icom 910H which I never used. I traded the Icom in for the Kenwood TS-850SAT. A pretty nice deal, I thought!
After close inspection it turn out the TS-850 has a serialnumber in the 20-million…. Bummer! That numbers turn out to have several leaking problems. But the salesman ensures me he checked the rig and there where no traces of leaking capacitors. He also gives me a 6 months of warranty. So with a good feeling I went home and plugged in my brand new TS-850. The rig performes excellent. Really cool features (e.a. slope tuning) and a good quiet receiver picked up at least twice as many station as my TS-450SAT does.
But now lift up the hood to check the dealer claims.
The capacitors of the CAR-board ARE leaking, let there be no confusion about that. Now I can do two things: bring back the TS-850SAT to the dealer to let it fix. But he already replied my e-mail with above picture saying: this is no proof, if you want it fixed, you have to pay half of the bill.
Well, I’m not want to pay anything since he promised me 6 months of warranty.
The other thing I can do is fix the problem myself. So I ordered the 10 capacitors of 10 µF/25V. I hope they arrive tonight. I will replace them immediately! The 47 µF-one wasn’t available so I have to search a little bit harder for that one. But before I order, I’ll inspect all boards for these faulty blue smd capacitors and replace these too.