And with it comes antenna preparations. The first beverage out was the 500 meter, 50 degrees Asia/Pacific beverage. It has been an exceptionally quiet antenna in the past, but last autumn we noticed noise coming and going. It only periodically disturbed DX-ing though. However this was the spectrum that met me after I connected yesterday:
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| Afternoon spectrum |
Of course, this was not good. The noise band seemed to come and go at rather random intervals so I was relatively sure it was not man-made. Getting a good grounding at the starting point has proven to be a bit tricky, so I decided to investigate this lead first. Equipped with a sledge hammer, extra copper rods and leads I reworked the grounding system with four rods into the rather stony ground. When I got back I found this spectrum:
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| Daytime spectrum |
Now we're talking! This is just about as quiet as it can get. You will notice the horisontal lines on parts of the spectrum. It's Loran C noise, and reducing it any more than I have already done isn't possible without switching off the station.
Despite the noise yesterday evening, I was able to hear DX as several Japanese MW stations were audible with good levels, especially JOHR HBC Sapporo 1287.
To round this off, a couple of pictures of the starting point and how the antenna stretches towards the shore on the other end.
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| Mostly rocky soil, grounding is difficult |
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| Last 300 meters towards New Zealand :-) |
2 comments:
Bjarne - Is it possible to put an entire 2 meter (more or less) ground rod into your rocky soil?
Chuck
Chuck: Maybe...if 1) it's a copper clad steel rod, and 2) you have a machine to hammer it down. You'll need a lot of force so a copper-only rod will probably bend.
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