Re: [amsat-bb] AO-10 first contacts last night

[k6yk@xxxxxxxx]

HI Greg and the group.
Happy Thanksgiving Day!

Your setup is doing pretty darn well on AO-10.  I think many people think
it 
takes a real  killer station to work AO-10, but it really doesn't.

I could always hear AO-10 and AO-13 but never had a transmitter for  435
or any other 70 CM  CW or SSB.  I guess eventually the desire to get on
finally
overtook me and I decided to try something. 

I Put my  FM rig on 435.100 or so (10 watts with an omni vertical), and
keyed
the mike button to see if I could hear my signals coming back.  Beep Beep
!
Real weak, but just to hear it at all was amazing to me.

So  with just an  FT-221R, 12 element beam, no preamp, no elevation
control, 
and a Heathkit  HW-24 with 10 watts and omni vertical I was able to
actually 
read my own signal, especially on the peaks of the fades.  This was with
the 
bird  out around 25,000 KM.  I hooked up a little mobile amp to the
Heathkit
and with 50 watts, I actually had a pretty fair readable signal, but only
could 
QSY in 5 KC steps.  I called CQ a lot with my "buzzy" sounding CW signal
and
answered every station that I could get close to, and made about 10 QSO's
including Japan!

Well, that did it!  I got busy and bought a second hand  FT-726R and a
few
attachments (final amp, preamps, etc.) and experimented with a few
different 
antennas and it was  "Away We Go!".

73, 
John, K6YK
 


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