The first radio Uetli adventure...

...with some delay  (3 days) I write about my Uetliberg adventure... I would like to write: "about my first Uetliberg adventure" as want to repeat this more often...

We try to visit Uetli twice a week - so far Tuesdays on bicycles and Thursdays on our own foots. Last Thursday we started from my home around 6p.m. with Oliver and Eduardo (friends).

Weather was oook in that moment but was raining before and some rain was expected later in the night. Well, one of the good things I had learned in this country is that "there is no bad weather, only inappropriate clothing" I had appropriate rain coat in my backpack so I seemd to be prepared. If that would be the only contents of my bagpack - that would be easy... No, together with the rain coat there were: KX3, power amplifier Midland 747B, MFJ antenna tunner, two Lipo batteries (3S, 2.2Ah) and buddipole antenna with 2.5m mast. This time no tripod which is nice and light as long as you didnt have to carry it on your own back 8 km (constantly up)...







this time climbing was harder than usual..







We reached "top of Zuerich" around 8pm. The view from there was spectacular as usual...

click to see full

I mentioned last time that one of aims to go there is to spend some time with friends and - as everybody knows - the time is even nicer when some beer(s) are involved - we couldn't resist also this time. So beer was involved and finally I started my radio activities some time later...

I also mentioned that I had spent some time the day before checking that I don't miss any important cable, element etc. Yeeees. I checked all the cables that I usually forget (connecting radio with amplifier or changer PL/BNC). This time I had everything except ... central element of Buddipole.

Without this element Buddipole antenna just doesn't exist. At the beginning I wanted to build any antenna from some piece of wire but I didnt have any... Finally I managed to connect both arms of Buddipole directly with the cable. That definitely was not perfect as both arms touched the bench however such built antenna could be tuned and I did even some QSO.

The propagation was not exciting this day or just my new antenna was just deaf... I did one nice QSO with Marco HB9ZAG. Maybe it was not DX (abt 20km) but at least I had opportunity to test this specific setup - power amplifier powered by Lipo battery. Definitely such setup works - the only problem is for how long Lipo battery can last. It is only 2.2Ah and amp returns something abt 100w... The good side of such batteries is high possible current (in this case - 2.2Ah - 20C - 12.6V - even 40A !!!). The bad side is that they explode sometimes.. (never happened to me but if anyone wants to use them please read about them before!!!).

We did some tests - how to drive the power amplifier to get more power but without distorions. It seems that (at least on 14MHz) I should use no more than 1W output to drive the amp. I need to find some power meter to check what the power is in such setup (from the gauge in tuner looked like around 100W).

Finally around 23:00 I decided to leave - around 5 minutes after I had packed everything it started to rain... I went down by train..

Next 2 days my muscles didn't let me to forget about this interesting adventure...

I'm thinking about some wire antenna which should be smaller and lighter than Bud...

73!

hb9ega/p, op: Marcin, QTH: Üetliberg... @22.05.2014 20:00 CET

...one of the biggest turist attractions in Zürich is Üetliberg - the hill just next to the city with stunning view to city, Zurich lake, Alps and countryside on the other side. Uetliberg has about 950m over sea level (I live at abt 430m) and is very popular place for trips by foot, bicycle or train (no car access). 

With some friends we visit it regularly (if possible twice a week - once by velo (bicycle) and once on own transport (foots)). It about 18km going there and back (unfortunately the first 9km "going there" is also "going up"...).

Tomorrow (Thursday) is walking day but this time instead of having beer on the top (and now the secret - why we do it - was revealed...) I'm going to have some QSO(s). As the hill is already quite high I will not take the 15m mast with me (yes, nice 15m high and less nice 20kg...) but just basic buddipole mast (2.5m) which I will mount to something (fence..?). Radio - KX3 with portable power amplifier and very portable Lipo battery. These Lipo batteries have best capacity/weight ratio and therefore are used in flying planes models. Such battery maybe will not survive too long (2500mAh) but is able to deliver power for 100W operations (even more) for a few QSO(s). Maybe I will take two of them so I can have 2x a few QSO(s)...

I didnt check so far how heavy radio plus antenna and plus all this stuff is going to be.. In the worst case still there is the train...

So now the batteries are charging and I'm trying to collect all these necessary cables, microphones etc. It happened to me (luckily once) that after assembling huge antenna on even bigger mast I discovered that didn't take ...radio..

So stay tuned (somewhere around 14.275 tomorrow after 20:00 our time...) and hopefully see you tomorrow :) If anyone would like to join - tomorrow or every Thursday 8 p.m. @Üetlibrg...

Night trip to Buchenegg

I think I mentioned already that most of my Radio activities are related to trips outside Zurich. First the noise level in Zrh is terrible, second my antenna located 4 meters over the ground between other buildings does it's best but ... When I leave Zurich instead of 3..5 stations in the band I can hear 20..

So that evening I packed some equipement and visited Buchenegg - the small village (very small) on the top of some hill located on the left (West) side of Zurich Lake.

There is a parking there which is my "base". It is usually quite empty at night - visited by nice couples in the cars who stop there to discuss the film that they just had seen in the cinema (I guess because what else they could do there in such darkness ...:)))

For some reasone they prefer to be alone there because when their car's light "see" my antenna they usually stop for 40..90 seconds and  ...leave the parking. Even worst film could not be discussed so shortly :)))

As you may see on these pictures Im not always QRP. So far have no idea what the output power from Midland B747 power amplifier is... But definitely not QRP because the gauge in the antenna tunner almost bends sometimes at the end of the scale (strange, scale is to 300W but this is not possible).

Need to check it.

First "field test" of the new KX3..

First "field test" of the new KX3 happend on 7th of May.. 

I have some nice picnic place near Zurich where usually test new antennas/radios/ideas. This time the conditions were perfect - rain had a break and for one hour I could build my station (Buddipole on 5m mast) and try to make some QSO with a new KX3. 

Why rain is "just perfect"? Because then the picnic area is really empty (who would like to have a barbecue when all around is wet) and I can practice the witchcraft in peace...

I had a few qso. At the end I was called by Kevin M0XLT and we had really nice chat. Kevin gave me very good feedback related to my audio and signal (55). I had the output power between 5..10W

but seems that my signal was really good in Southern England. Thanks Kevin, that was great QSO especially that one of my really first with this radio.

Finally the rain decided to come back again there so I decided to come back home...
I was really happy with the results.