The first thing I did today was eliminate the ugly piece if lumber that was holding up one end of my fan dipole. Instead I made a triangular lash to two trees in the back yard. The antenna is now hanging freely and the back yard has no antenna-related eyesores.
The next project was to erect my field day mast to make sure everything fit together properly.
The design was based on a PVC mast that I found in an antenna book lent to me by my friend Dan (AB0RE). I didn't want to haul around 10ft sections of pipe, so I decided to cut them down to 5ft. With a little help from my cousin Matthew (W0ZZY) I decided to nest 5ft sections of 2x2 lumber inside. This had the added benefit of increasing rigidity. The bottom section has an extra 3ft section of 2x2 to create an offset while assembled. The whole thing is 23ft tall when assembled and nests down to 5ft sections that should fit into any car.
The next project was to erect my field day mast to make sure everything fit together properly.
The design was based on a PVC mast that I found in an antenna book lent to me by my friend Dan (AB0RE). I didn't want to haul around 10ft sections of pipe, so I decided to cut them down to 5ft. With a little help from my cousin Matthew (W0ZZY) I decided to nest 5ft sections of 2x2 lumber inside. This had the added benefit of increasing rigidity. The bottom section has an extra 3ft section of 2x2 to create an offset while assembled. The whole thing is 23ft tall when assembled and nests down to 5ft sections that should fit into any car.
