Repairng Telescoping Crappie Fishing Poles

My 16' crappie fishing pole broke in the big wind we had here in Ohio a week ago. I have had it for over a year and have never had a problem with it before. I was holding up my sectional dipole and had a lot of stress on it - I had a lot of tension on the feed line, not just the antenna. I guess you could say I should have known better. Hey, I wasn't expecting 70+mph winds!

Anyway, the pole broke at the second section down about 8-10" from the top of that section. My repair uses fiberglass cloth and epoxy to re-join the sections. It isn't pretty, but it works!

Notice how the pole broke - it is an off-set break, this actually helps in lining up the two sections later.

The first step to joining the two pieces is to rough up the joint a bit. I used the wood saw on my swiss army knife. The goal here is to give the epoxy something to bite in to, not the slick black paint on the pole. The roughing will weaken the original material, but it is going to be coated with fiberglass so it doesn't matter.



I used a strip of fiberglass about 2" wide by 4" long. I wanted enough to wrap around the pole about 3 times.

I actually messed up here. The next step is to mix up some epoxy. I used 5 minute epoxy, but you really need to use 30 minute. The 5 minute sets WAY too fast. I had enough time to get the first layer and a half of fiberglass wrapped and squeegeed and then it started getting tacky. I had to rush the last bit of it and I never did get the fiberglass to lay correctly... Oh well, next time I know what to do!



You want to start by coating the joint with epoxy. Not too much, you don't want it being squeezed inside the pole. You want just enough to get the glass cloth to begin to adhere to. Get the cloth wrapped about half way around the pole and then start squeegeeing more epoxy in to it. You want the weave to nearly disappear in the epoxy. Keep working the epoxy in to the cloth all the way around being careful to keep good tension on the cloth but also not moving the cloth around too much. It takes a bit of skill to get it right. Again, use 30 minute epoxy!!! You will have to move real fast if you use 5 minute. 12 minute might be OK, but if this is your first time trying fiberglass I would highly recommend going with 30 minute just to have the extra set time.

Also be careful to keep the joint tight and straight. It will be impossible to do this while you work the glass cloth but once you get all laid down you want to press the pole pieces together and sight it (like you do lining up the rings on a fishing rod or checking the straightness of a 2x4) to make sure it is strait. Put a little bit of pressure wherever the pole needs it. The best time to do this is when the epoxy is viscus goo. Keep straightening the pole through the tacky phase and until the epoxy gets stiff but sticky. Lay it down in a position that will not put pressure in any direction on the pole to make sure it doesn't move.

After my repair the pole is still fully collapsable, however it does not collapse as easy as it did before. The tip section has to sqeeze past a glob of epoxy that got pressed in to the joint. Other than that it works great! I would say that if the pole breaks again it will not be in the same place.

NorCal Doublet - Want One?

The NorCal Doublet is a really neat antenna. It is an ultra-light doublet configuration antenna that uses computer ribbon cable for it's construction.

I have been experimenting with some antennas to add to my go-kit as well as something I can take with me on a hiking trip. For light weight you can't beat the NorCal Doublet. I weighed mine at a whopping 3oz! That is the entire thing - including the feed line (no support, just what is in the picture). The antenna is 44' long with a 28' feed line, all made from one 50' length of 4-conductor computer ribbon cable.

I have extras made up if you are interested in one. They are $15.75 through paypal or $15 with check/money order - packaged, shipped, and ready to run. All you need is to hook it to your tuner and support and you are on the air!



E-mail me at kc8qvo@yahoo.com for ordering and availability. I prefer payment by paypal (faster), however I will accept a check or money order but will wait for reciept of payment before shipping. As of December 19th I have 1 left.

I make no claims of performance or characteristic impedance by band. They are built the same as described in the original article. I had extra wire so I figured I would make up a few and make them available to other portable operators who might be interested. First come, first served! Once my current batch is out I can make more, but my supply right now is limited.

OSU's Farm Science Review

The Farm Science Review is a really neat event OSU does every year. I have never been to it before, though. Since I am wanting to get in to the Agricultural industry (specifically John Deere AMS) I figured I would go and hopefully learn a bit and see the sights as well.

I have been interested in farm equipment since I was really little. I was obsessed with toy tractors. I had everything from plastic toys to die cast tractors (with working steering wheels!) to remote controlled tractors. So the agricultural industry and I go together pretty well. I am starting courses this Fall for a minor in Agricultural Systems Management, with a specialization in equipment.

My main goals going to the FSR were to learn more about AMS and how to get in to the field, and above all, satisfy my childhood desire to sit up in a big (John Deere) tractor!

John Deere had almost every tractor series on display from their small yard lawn tractors all the way up to their king size 9030 4 wheel drives. They did not have any track tractors, though.







This is just about the biggest John Deere tractor out - it is a 9330. This is one that I jumped (I mean "climbed") up in.





It is equipped with duals all the way around and has an articulating frame - the front wheels don't steer, the whole front half of the tractor pivots. There is also a 9030t series with track drive (like tank treads) that does not articulate. Again, none of these were on display. The 8030 series also comes in a track configuration.

Here is the inside view from the cab:



Notice the people's heads on the bottom right of the picture. That should give you an idea of just how high up you sit in this one. Talk about blind spots! I thought driving an F-350 with a two car goose neck trailer was bad. I guess farmers don't have to thread their equipment through as many holes as being on the road, though.

I am sure this is a mock-up of what the GreenStar screen looks like (and for all I know this box is empty with just the picture on the screen). However, it does show what GreenStar does quite well. It is a digital map of your field with a model of the tractor and equipment on the screen (dimensional only, not a "picture"). That way you can see (dimensionally) where you are going (or, where the computer is going hehehe). It is really amazing stuff.



More controls:



They even had a 9770 STS combine on display. This thing is a giant!



View (not much with that building there):



View of the GreenStar display for the combine:



I accomplished both of my goals. I talked to a real nice guy just a bit older than I am at the main John Deere booth for a good 10-15 minutes about AMS and our different backgrounds and education. It was a real interesting conversation.

From what I found out from the John Deere guy there were on-going demonstrations of the AMS technology. There are some fields associated with FSR across the highway (the north side of I70) from the main event. To get there you ride a shuttle - which is a tractor pulling two four wheel farm trailers (like a hay wagon).

Here is a view from the shuttle looking out to the fields down the road:



Here is one side of the field, the picture is blown out a bit (I bumped the camera in to manual mode by accident):



This is the row that they had the AMS systems running in (on the tractors anyway). Here is the StarFire RTK base station that they were using (I think, it was set up and it looks like it was operational!):



Most of what I observed was strip tilling. This is a practice where instead of tilling or cultivating an entire field a farmer will till just the rows that will be planted. The reasoning behind this is that the less implement engaged in the ground the less soil needs to be broken up. Try dragging a shovel through (not over, not scraping, but through) packed dirt and see how hard it is to move it. Now expand that to something that is 15' wide or wider and you can imagine how much power it must take to move it. The smaller amount of soil engaged by the implement the less power (and fuel!) that is needed. In the end it saves money, wear and tear on equipment, and probably time as well.



I had a lot of fun at the Farm Science Review, and I learned a lot as well! I look forward to my courses this coming year and what the rest of the industry has waiting for me when I am done. Next year I will be sure to make it out to the Farm Science Review again!

An Unexpected Weekend

Last weekend (Friday through Monday)was real screwy. The first few days were OK. Saturday (the whole day) was spent building my sectional dipole antenna. It took me a lot longer than I had expected it to take. Sunday is when the real adventure began.

I got up around 11:00am. My dad was going to run out to get some stuff so I came along. I noticed it was a bit breezy, more so than we had experienced the past few days. The first place we went to was Harbor Freight Tools. I would equate this store to Northern Tool (for those of you up north). They have all kinds of gizmos, gadgets, and a bunch of nonsense stuff no one really needs. They also have GREAT deals on (cheap) tools and equipment. I picked up a battery charger to use in conjunction with a battery as a portable power supply for my go-kit. For $10 I couldn't pass it up. I also picked up a yard of felt to make a liner for the Pelican case at Joanne Fabrics - for a whopping $3. This is going to be a good day, right?

Not exactly. The first sign of things to come was the fact that there was debris flying everywhere - insulation from construction sites, bags, leaves, twigs, you name it. If it was able to blow around it did.

If you read my post on EN39 you know I don't like wind too much. Well, this is another excursion of sorts.

I came back to the house to find my Crappie pole (supporting my sectional dipole and feed line) in two pieces laying on the ground. The trees were swaying more than I have ever seen trees move before. The Weather Channel was showing a "high wind warning" bulletin for our area.

Oh, there goes the neighbors fence across the street! Hmm, the fence in the back yard just squashed all the plants!

Then the electricity went out. The electricity has gone out many times before so no big deal, right? Well the wind is still blowing.

I think I will go outside and pick up my antenna, just in case a tree falls and I can't get to it later.

I tell you what - going outside and feeling the wind, hearing the howling sound of the air moving through the trees, wood creaking, fence planks rattling, and standing there rolling up a bunch of wire looking up at all the trees moving overhead was a very uneasy feeling. I was watching all the trees very closely and anticipating the gusts of wind. Just in case I had to drop everything and run I was ready.

Luckily no trees fell... on me. I didn't know this at the time but half of a maple tree on the side of the house was taken out. There was so much noise from all the wind it was impossible to hear the tree come down.

My dad's SUV was parked there all morning. It just so happened he took off in it a few minutes before. We should have all bought lottery tickets!



There was also a limb that fell down in front.



All day Monday was spent cutting up the trees. My dad and I did all of the work up to this point. I chopped up most of the stuff and my dad bundled it up. From what we found out we could set all the debris by the road and the city would pick it up - brush in 4' long bundles and piles of loose leaves. The rest of it was cut up in to logs for future use in the stove.

Before getting to work on the big limb I pulled the limb out with the truck. I hooked a chain around it at the top (a big job in itself - 30-40lbs of chain is a bear to yank up and around a tree on a rope!), added a tow strap for some extra reach, and hooked the whole string to my hitch on the truck. The trick to this was to yank the big limb out on to the driveway, pivoting on the branches that were already down on the pavement, without tearing out the fence. The limb fell in such a way that this was exactly what happened. Once the limb let go at the top it cleared the fence fine on the way down.



From what we know power will not be back on there any time soon. Power coverage is spotty at best. The tie up is all the lines and trees that are down. The trees have to be cleared first and then the work can start on the power lines. With such a widespread area that is affected it could be a week before everyone is back online.

At some point we heard on the news that the whole area had 70mph or higher wind gusts during the event. If I remember correctly - 74mph is the start of category 1 hurricane winds. Although we did not get the rain, storm surge, and flooding along with it I think I can relate to what it would be like going through a weak hurricane.

Sectional Dipole for the "Go-Kit"

The main antenna consists of the two loops on top, the two below are the 60m sections that can be added.

I know I am not the first person to come up with this idea. I have seen and heard of many variations of this antenna throught my years being a Ham radio operator. One of them even included relays for remote band control HI. Mine isn't that sophisticated, in fact it is as bare-bones as you get.

I wanted an antenna that I could toss in my go-kit so I would never be without an antenna. My requirements for it were to be coax fed, compact, cover all bands 6-60m, and be resonance agile so I wouldn't be stuck cutting or needing to add to it when out in the field.

The first step to the antenna was getting my lengths. I used the formula 234/f (in mHz), or 1/4wl. This gave me the length I needed for each piece. I started with 6 meters and added, sequentially, the other bands to that one after the other all the way to 60 meters. The only hangup I had was on 12 meters. The length I needed turned out to be 4" longer than what I calculated for some reason. After that the rest of the lengths were close. As I got lower in frequency I had to trim more and more. It is better to be long than short on this one.

I seem to remember that insulated wire (not shielded, just regular coated wire) has a higher velocity factor than bare wire. This means that the length needed will be shorter than in theory. Case in point, I chopped off a good foot to 16" off my 40m dipole when I made it out of 12g stranded hookup wire (the suff you get off the spool in a variety of colors at Lowes or Home Depot). I am not sure what the exact conversion is for the 24g wire I used, however.

Another thing I did with this antenna is I made jumpers that varied in length so I could tune the antenna by making it longer or shorter. Depending on where the antenna is set up the SWR could vary a little so I wanted to be on the safe side and design this in to the antenna. All the bands are tuned with a 4" jumper in place. Since I started with 6 meters this is really the only band that is "short". This way, if the antenna's resonance goes down in frequency I can pull out the 4" jumper and add a 1", 2", or both a 1" and 2", or none at all, to get the antenna tuned back where it should be. I have extra jumpers to go all the way up to 16" extra if need be on the high side.

I did not make a jumper for 75/80m. The antenna is very long as it is at 60m and the wire is so small that I didn't want the extra stress. For a portable antenna it might not be too bad, though.

I used LMR-200 for the feedline. I was going to use LMR-100 but I figured the 200 had less loss, which is a big consideration if QRP is necessary. At 5 watts you need all the efficiency you can get. I figured 35' of feed line would be enough to go up my crappie pole and over to the rig with plenty of room.

The wire I used for the dipole was a spool of 75' of 24 guage speaker wire from Radio Shack. I didn't realize it until I started working on the antenna that the wire is solid. This isn't the best stuff to use for an antenna as it breaks easier than stranded wire (stranded can flex more without the same metal fatigue).

I used 12-14g spade lugs from Home Depot. My first thought was to crimp and solder them. However, only the female ones took solder. The male ones must have some kind of coating on them that won't allow the solder to wet to it. Instead of soldering them I folded the speaker wire over (about 3/8") and stuck the loop in to the connector and then crimped it. This way the wire has a better hold in the connector. One thing to keep in mind is to get the connector crimp "fold" to go in between the loop. In otherwords, the wire isn't all on one side. This will make it impossible for the wire to come out without breaking.

The antenna works very well. However, I have noticed the bandwidth on the lower bands to be quite narrow. I would attribute this to the wire being so small. I am sure this is a common problem. I have the antenna tuned on 40m so the SWR dip is about 7.100. This way, the SWR goes to about 1.5:1 at the bottom of the band (where I will operate mostly anyway - CW) and I can still get up in to the SSB portion with a 2:1. Since I am an Extra I can play on the bottom of the SSB band, which the SWR is only 1.3-1.5:1 there. The bandwidth on 60m doesnt matter since the channels only span about 70-80kHz.

Due to my "unexpected weekend" I was unable to get any pictures of it deployed this time around. My crappie pole broke Sunday morning so it is out of commission for a while. I will wrap some fiberglass around the break and fix it up when I get some time.

Pelican case go-kit for the FT-857D, also computer case

I have been planning out my strategy for this for a while. Ever since I made the decision to get an FT-857D (way before I got it) I have wanted to make a go-kit. I wanted something that could withstand abuse and be totally reliable and ready to go anywhere and everywhere I go.

I have heard of Pelican cases in the past. It seems any time you hear of equipment cases they are Pelicans - cameras, guns, surveying equipment, even Bird Watt meters! So, I thought it would be a good idea to get a Pelican case for my go-kit. If they are used by the military and the government they must be good.

The main goal I had in mind was to keep things compact. I have a problem with packing too much stuff. That has always been the case. I am a Ham radio operator, what can I say? Everywhere I go a radio goes. However, that encompasses everything else to make it work, right? Wires, antennas, power sources, etc. I have driven several people crazy when it comes to trips hehehe.

Because the FT-857D is so small I thought the Pelican 1450 would do. It is deeper than the radio is so things can be stacked a bit and there would be some space to the sides for extras - mic, key, wires. One thing to keep in mind with a case like a Pelican (and the environment you use it) is that there needs to be space around the items for foam. Unless you go with an empty shell case and just pile everything in to it, however this really defeats the purpose of having the protection of a Pelican case. So I really didn't know if the 1450 was going to be the right case. Measuring things and looking at dimensions online is one thing, but actually having the items in hand and being able to physically lay them in/on something and move them around to see how it all works really goes a long way.

I have not heard of any "dealer" for Pelican cases, only online stores (and the company website, but you can't buy direct). So, I did some investigating on this. Come to find out, there is a dealer right here in Columbus, Ohio. It is only about 10 minutes from Universal Radio off of Broad St. East of I-270 on the East side of town.

The place is called Midwest Case Company. It appeared to be more of a distribution warehouse, so I didn't know if I could go there as if it were a store. I called the number and the guy there said it was a distribution office but I was more than welcome to go look around. So I did!

I decided since I was going to go out there I might as well look for a laptop case, too. I got a laptop for my birthday and no case, just a neoprene sleeve. I need something that will protect the computer a bit more than that.

I have to say I was impressed. I didn't think shopping for a case could be so much fun. If you need a case for something (or a bunch of stuff!) I highly recommend you try to go to a dealer! I ended up spending several hours (2-3) in this warehouse going through boxes of cases and seeing how everything would fit. I went through about 6-8 different model cases by the time I was done. Again, being able to have the objects in hand side by side with the cases really was the way to go.

My main goal in all this was to keep the go-kit as compact as possible without degrading its function. The first case I went to was the 1450 since that is what I thought I wanted. It fit the radio, key, mic, and chord but I would have squished it all in. Having the extra space on top really didn't amount to much because the foam block that comes in it is one piece (plus a 1/2" bottom and 1" or so lid piece). I could have cut the main block in half, though. Still, everything would have been really packed in there.

So I looked at the brief case style cases - the 1470 and the 1490. They are flatter but have more surface area so I could space the items out a little bit more than with the 1450. The 1470 was a bit too close but the 1490 seemed a bit better.

I then went up to the next size above the 1450 and the 1490 - the 1500. This was a deeper case like the 1450 was but slightly larger in footprint than the 1490. It most definitely would have been enough space. Again, the block was only one piece so I would have had to cut it down.

While looking at the 1450, 1470, 1490, and 1500 all side by side with my gear I figured the 1500 was just too big. I want a compact setup and there was just too much bulk with that case. For an expedition it might work alright, but for the situations I know I will find myself in that size would be too cumbersome.

Since I had my laptop with me I looked at the laptop cases. Surprisingly, the laptop cases are just different configurations of the regular cases they sell with foam - just with padded sides, a strap for the computer, and some had pockets for papers and a PDA in the lid. The 1490 happened to be one of these cases. So, since I was considering this case with the foam for the go-kit I figured it was a no-brain'er. The case could serve two purposes!

I walked out of this place with a 1490 that had the pick n' pluck foam package. I had some foam at home that I could use for the case as well, so I didn't need to buy anything other than the case to get my dual-personality Pelican case.

The first thing I got to work on was the rig configuration. The layout I came up with is this:





I made sure the pieces fit in there nice and snug. With the pick n' pluck foam you better go one block less than what you think you need than not, otherwise your items won't fit right. I will admit, though, that getting the radio in there is a squeeze. There is a lot of pressure on the foam (as you can see at the spacer between the rig and mic - it bows towards the mic) but I would rather have a radio that is hard to get in and out than to have it bang around in to other objects or flop out of position.

The kit is not completed yet. I am sure I will add things here and there to it. One item I really want to get is a Gamma Research HPS-1A power supply. It is a little bigger than a pack of cards but will run a 100w radio at 100w CW/SSB. It would be perfect for this setup! I also want to get some better batteries. I don't know that the batteries will be put in the case or not, though. All the essentials are there!

Now.. where can I go with it? I am sure I will put this to good use!

This morning I got working on the computer insert. This was a sheet of "egg crate" foam. I marked out where I wanted the computer and chord to go and then started trimming with a razor blade. It is a hack job, but the computer is protected quite nicely and there is not much pressure on the lid (as there was if I just put the computer in there without trimming out the block).