SomeNetBlog

svhfs conference

Posted: May 4, 2006 5:39 pm by n4ofa
Filed under: amateur radio

Here are some pictures from the SVHFS Conference I went to this last weekend in Greenville SC. Fancy hotel there………..plush, with a free breakfast bar in the morning and a free open bar from 5-7 in the evening. Had a really good time and picked up a new toy there.

http://www.w4dex.com/gallery/SVHFS-Southeastern-VHF-Society-Conference-2006?page=1

http://campus.pari.edu/svhfs/2006/ slide show

We had antenna testing, talks and presentations on technical interests, Some very expensive test equipment loaned to us. I brought some of my Equipment and they testing it to see how well it was working. Found out That one was broken and had to be repaired.

The Banquet this year had a Nobel Prize winner and fellow ham, Joe Taylor, as the public speaker, he brought his Nobel Prize Medallion and passed it around for all to see, unfortunately everyone was in awe of holding this in Their hand and it never got to our table.

Prize Drawing was the last thing on the menu and again this year there were some good prizes, my ticket was far down the line however and I got one of the last prizes, still always exciting and fun. Wish I had won that Bird Watt meter or one of those antennas.

The best part of the whole weekend was meeting and talking to hams from all over the country, EME, Amp builders, homebrewers of ham gear, experimenters, Rovers, Vhf contesters. Most were technical people with years of training and experience, many now retired or getting up in years. If you could think of the right questions to ask, you could get some valuable informative answers and how to do’ information. A ham from Florida, John Logsdon, brought some of his OLD testing equipment that he had out in the chicken house and dusted it off and set it up on a table. I sat with him for three hours and he used this
Simple gear to see how my transverters were working. I sure learned a lot as he used harmonics from a old signal generator to produce a signal on 2304 mhz and then display the waveform on a 1960s crt screen, his diagnosis? There was extreme signal from the LO being leaked through the output, my transverter was not working right and probably had a bad MIMIC or something In that stage that was shorted. Surprisingly I saw the same thing show up On a $90,000 automatic testing thingi’, pushed the button and said exactly
What John told me and showed me….. amazing stuff to see first hand and learn from. What great fun for me, and John had a blast. My transverter is now being repaired by Steve at downeast Microwave, who says it is the mixer that was zapped by me by to much drive. He is installing a 10w input board that should stop that from happening again. Hard to remember to turn the radio down to 1 watt when you are tired from a long contest. THANKS JOHN, for hauling that heavy gear up here from Florida and sharing your knowledge With me.

Next year I want to bring more of my transverters and see what I can learn As they are tested/evaluated. This part of the conference is worth the expense of admission.

New toy: 5760 transverter, and 10 watt amplifier, bought at the flea market on Friday night, now being converted to 13 volts by downeast microwave. Now if I can get 10 GHz white box working properly I will have 10 bands for roving in the contests. I left out something…………. My friend and fellow rover, Wayne, N4FLM, found me a 222 amp at a hamfest and brought it to me….YEA, now 100 W on 222 mhz. Where will I put everything in that van…..UMM

A local ham and experimental builder did a presentation on a 903 mhz transverter that he built out of surplus parts, he won 3rd place with This project and 200 bucks. Very nice job Bunky, K4EJQ.

My Volvo drove me back and forth with no problems, 28 mpg, first trip Since I had spent some money on needed repairs.

You can see I had a fantastic time………………

Mike N4OFA

More articles on SomeNet by N4OFA