Fall of 2012 has not been a good time in my shack.
First I had to send in my Flex-5000 rig as the 2nd receiver was not working. Now I have a bad hum when TXing on SSB that I cannot isolate after I hooked everything back up. And it is not coming from the headphones as I have a second set and they also exhibit the hum. This is very frustrating and I have spent a lot of time trying to correct it. I still love this rig though.
I use CW Skimmer a lot and also bought a program from Afreet calledBandmaster. These programs were all integrated with DXlab and the PSDR software that controls my Flex-5000. In September Skimmer and Bandmaster stopped talking to each other. I wrote to the seller for help but have never heard back from him. I bet that if I rebuilt my PC that the problem would go away. But I work in a large factory and have to support 350 PC’s and rebuilding my own is one of the last things I want to do in the shack.
Then my SteppIR BigIR vertical started having problems on 80 meters. I could not get the controller to hold settings on 80 and had to retune every time I switched bands. After a while the antenna would not hold settings for any bands. The Steppir helpdesk suggested a lot of things but also told me to remove the 80M unit and after I did that it would tune 40-6M just fine. But then this past Sunday I tried to operate on 40M and found that it was not tuning correctly. After changing bands I found that it was no longer tuning ANY bands. In fact if you try to tune it with the controller the SWR never changes. Oh great. I will have to call the helpdesk again and probably send the 40-10 and the 80M units in to get fixed again.
At the beginning of the year I bought a Elecraft KPA-500 amp kit and built it. Very nice kit and easy to build. The thing worked great until October. Then it stopped transmitting on 160, 30 and 17. The helpdesk suggested that I reseat all the ribbon cables but I tried that and it made no difference. It is not going to be cheap to send this back to Elecraft for repairs as it is very heavy. Was never able to work PT0S because I never had enough power to be heard using the Steppir vertical. Oh well….
In August I bought a Kenwood TH-D72A as I wanted to play with APRS and also want to sell pair of old Kenwood TH-G71A HT’s as I would no longer need them. Well the volume/tuning knob on the TH-D72A always seemed like it was a bit loose but I really did not think too much about it until last week when I got no audio out of the rig. Just makes a weird noise. Guess it will have to go back to Kenwood for repairs. Oh and by the way the old TH-G71A HT’s sill work just fine.
The only HF equipment now working in my shack is the rig on CW/digital and my remotely tuned longwire. And true be told it is not that bad as I did work a lot of DX for years with that setup. Also I know that this setup is better than what many have. But man oh man did the amp and Steppir vertical help fill in my log with a lot of DX lately.
So there you have my tale of woe. I am not looking for suggestions or sympathy as I just wanted to whine and this is the only place I can think to do that. The XYL just rolls her eyes when start talking about any of this.
73
Zack
N8FNR
First I had to send in my Flex-5000 rig as the 2nd receiver was not working. Now I have a bad hum when TXing on SSB that I cannot isolate after I hooked everything back up. And it is not coming from the headphones as I have a second set and they also exhibit the hum. This is very frustrating and I have spent a lot of time trying to correct it. I still love this rig though.
I use CW Skimmer a lot and also bought a program from Afreet calledBandmaster. These programs were all integrated with DXlab and the PSDR software that controls my Flex-5000. In September Skimmer and Bandmaster stopped talking to each other. I wrote to the seller for help but have never heard back from him. I bet that if I rebuilt my PC that the problem would go away. But I work in a large factory and have to support 350 PC’s and rebuilding my own is one of the last things I want to do in the shack.
Then my SteppIR BigIR vertical started having problems on 80 meters. I could not get the controller to hold settings on 80 and had to retune every time I switched bands. After a while the antenna would not hold settings for any bands. The Steppir helpdesk suggested a lot of things but also told me to remove the 80M unit and after I did that it would tune 40-6M just fine. But then this past Sunday I tried to operate on 40M and found that it was not tuning correctly. After changing bands I found that it was no longer tuning ANY bands. In fact if you try to tune it with the controller the SWR never changes. Oh great. I will have to call the helpdesk again and probably send the 40-10 and the 80M units in to get fixed again.
At the beginning of the year I bought a Elecraft KPA-500 amp kit and built it. Very nice kit and easy to build. The thing worked great until October. Then it stopped transmitting on 160, 30 and 17. The helpdesk suggested that I reseat all the ribbon cables but I tried that and it made no difference. It is not going to be cheap to send this back to Elecraft for repairs as it is very heavy. Was never able to work PT0S because I never had enough power to be heard using the Steppir vertical. Oh well….
In August I bought a Kenwood TH-D72A as I wanted to play with APRS and also want to sell pair of old Kenwood TH-G71A HT’s as I would no longer need them. Well the volume/tuning knob on the TH-D72A always seemed like it was a bit loose but I really did not think too much about it until last week when I got no audio out of the rig. Just makes a weird noise. Guess it will have to go back to Kenwood for repairs. Oh and by the way the old TH-G71A HT’s sill work just fine.
The only HF equipment now working in my shack is the rig on CW/digital and my remotely tuned longwire. And true be told it is not that bad as I did work a lot of DX for years with that setup. Also I know that this setup is better than what many have. But man oh man did the amp and Steppir vertical help fill in my log with a lot of DX lately.
So there you have my tale of woe. I am not looking for suggestions or sympathy as I just wanted to whine and this is the only place I can think to do that. The XYL just rolls her eyes when start talking about any of this.
73
Zack
N8FNR
