Hi Jerry,
Let me break this down for you a little bit.
The only advantage to having an Arrow-type antenna is that you can more easily hold and point the antenna, bypassing the need for a rotor. I wouldn't recommend this method if you're going to use your 857 with out-put of more than 5 watts.
The FM birds will require more than 5 watts to get thru all the QRM.
If you have two rigs to work with, why not try out AO7, FO29, or VO52? You'll find them easy to get into; I've worked AO7 with my 817, on mode A, using CW and 5 watts into a Ringo Ranger. I couldn't do it on SSB though, AO7 wants a little more gain than that.
My antennas now are 11 elements on both 2M and 70cm and I can always hit the birds. I turn them with an HD73 rotor.
73 de N8AU, Jim in Raymore, MO
Light travels faster than sound... This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.
Date: Thu, 1 Nov 2007 12:05:22 -0600 From: "nr5a" [email protected] Subject: [amsat-bb] New to this! To: [email protected] Message-ID: 017301c81cb1$c631ca00$6400a8c0@PC270429458147 Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed; charset="iso-8859-1"; reply-type=original
I use to work the RS birds and just loved it, now of course there is nothing like that. I swore I"d never do the FM birds cause I don't even do the FM Repeaters. I've lived near Rapid City, SD for 21 years and can count the
number of times I've been on the reapeaters here on one hand. Sorry they
just don't do anything for me.
I've broke down and decieded I want to get on the FM birds. The radio will be mostly my FT-817 or I can go FT-857D if I get the urge.
I see antennas like the Arrows where 2 beams are on the same boom, is there a real advantage to this?? My antenna will be mounted outdoors and I'm going in the direction of 2 antennas on a cross boom. I'm not that interested in parading around in a parking lot carring a antenna and looking silly.
How much antenna do I really need? I have tried listening on the FT-817's rubber duck antenna with no results. I thru together a hastly built one element egg beater type. (a site to see, held together by duct tape.) The other nite I almost heard AO-51.
My next step is tearing off the eggbeater and duct taping a 3 el yagi to the yardstick. I want to see the difference and maybe learn something while playing.
I'll go now cause I'm probably wasiting your time thanks for reading this.
Jerry - NR5A - South Dakota
The FM birds will require more than 5 watts to get thru all the QRM.
Not at all. In fact, lots of folks make QSOs on their HT and ALH-800 antenna every day. I made 2 yesterday morning with W7JPI and KG7EZ, with just such a setup.
What is ten times more important than your power output is the ability to work full duplex, especially when it's crowded. The 817 and 897 neither will do this, so consider adding a 2nd receiver of just about any sort to work the birds like a pro.
Good Luck, Drew KO4MA
Hi!
The FM birds will require more than 5 watts to get thru all the QRM.
Not at all. In fact, lots of folks make QSOs on their HT and ALH-800 antenna every day. I made 2 yesterday morning with W7JPI and KG7EZ, with just such a setup.
And on 3 different passes today (one AO-51 pass this morning, and two AO-27 passes this afternoon) I made about 13 contacts with a similar setup. Sometimes, on very high passes, I will go to a long duckie like Diamond's RH77CA or SRH77CA instead of the whip, and once in a while even break out a VX-2R and work the FM birds at 1.5W on those antennas. With a dual-band Yagi or log periodic, I have gone to 500mW and (a couple of times) even down to 100mW and still made contacts.
What is ten times more important than your power output is the ability to work full duplex, especially when it's crowded. The 817 and 897 neither will do this, so consider adding a 2nd receiver of just about any sort to work the birds like a pro.
Definitely work on the receive side of the station before transmitting. Since only a few watts - or less - is all you need for the satellite to hear you, work on the receive side of your station so you can hear those low-powered signals coming down to you.
For most of the past 2 months, if I am on the satellites I am using an HT (Icom IC-W32A or IC-T7H) and a long telescoping whip (Maldol AH-510R is my preferred whip, but I also have an AL-800H whip in my HT bag). I could make a few more contacts with a directional antenna instead of the long whip, but having a small bag with everything I need for my FM satellite station is pretty neat.
Good luck, and 73!
Patrick WD9EWK/VA7EWK - Phoenix AZ http://www.wd9ewk.net/
participants (3)
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Andrew Glasbrenner -
Patrick STODDARD (WD9EWK/VA7EWK) -
Reicher, James