Category: DX Commander

24-Hour Stress Testing 2-Stations, the new Yagi and the new Band-Pass filters. 20m is currently on this antenna: yagi:

Last time out, we had a successful first lift and have had it guyed and upright for a week before fitting the control cables for the rotator.

Before that, we broke the Create Rotator. We fished out the Yaesu G-450 and did a successful "launch" with a 6:1 pulley.

This is a 12m tower project for an HF Yagi / Quad etc. long story.. *BUT* the guy points are dual-use as both a 40m 4-Square switchable antenna array – as well as the tower. ALl lines will be replaced with Dyneema after we’ve sorted it all out.

There will be 4 vertical antennas coming off each guy point. Accuracy is mandatory for both the 4-square (impedance matching and gain etc) and you’ll see shortly in another video why they need to be spot on because when we move to a non-stretch Dyneema rope, all 4-guys need to have same tension when the tower is lowered and raised.

Further, the tower needs to be totally detuned from 40m so we have a fibreglass insulator to change the resonance to around 9MHz. We COULD add a further insulator above the rotator to move that to about 24MHz. More of that in later video. There will be a temporary yagi going up on the top of this tower which will give me time to develop the multi-band quad antenna.

The G-450 rotator will eventually *have* be replaced. The vertical force specification on the G450 is 200Kg. I broke the Create RC5-1 which had double that. There are no sideways loads on the base of the tower so I only need to worry about vertical loads.

The start of the construction is here: https://youtu.be/SbMy_82XRDM

"Part 1" is this one https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_pQN0pMvmA

The "disaster" video is here: https://youtu.be/4eiEd00N5GU

We covered the planning of this tower on a previous video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AmgUGuoudb4

We also made a video about Quads – which is the target of this tower: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3r9ff32j9Yo

And here is some information about 4-Square antennas which will surround the tower (tower will be de-tuned off 40m): https://youtu.be/joWUH2PgGZg

Next video in this series is the full-blown QRO test.

Finally, we will lay the radials down for the 4-square and connect up the control box.

Enjoy. And Subscribe you b*ggers! Or even just give me a nice comment!!

I’m currently "remote" and I can’t turn the yagi. I have a project in hand to be able to do that soon but I left the Yagi facing WEST to NA and also possibly long-path to VK. Anyway, that’s the fun I am suggesting we have.

Some DX sound-clips from Friday’s stream.
Full video out Sunday 10th November 2024
https://youtu.be/3m7Oo76hPtw (Premiere)
https://youtu.be/-wsx-ml69xE (Previously)

This video details how we mounted the Yagi on the home-brow mast "thingy" and tried to pull it up by hand.

https://youtu.be/BYuIEu9KOrE – Yagi Project – Full Build

Last time out, we had a successful first lift and have had it guyed and upright for a week before fitting the control cables for the rotator.

Before that, we broke the Create Rotator. We fished out the Yaesu G-450 and did a successful "launch" with a 6:1 pulley.

This is a 12m tower project for an HF Yagi / Quad etc. long story.. *BUT* the guys are dual-use as both a 40m 4-Square switchable antenna array – as well as the tower. ALl lines will be replaced with Dyneema after we’ve sorted it all out.

There will be 4 vertical antennas coming off each guy point. Accuracy is mandatory for both the 4-square (impedance matching and gain etc) and you’ll see shortly in another video why they need to be spot on because when we move to a non-stretch Dyneema rope, all 4-guys need to have same tension when the tower is lowered and raised.

Further, the tower needs to be totally detuned from 40m so we have a fibreglass insulator to change the resonance to around 9MHz. We COULD add a further insulator above the rotator to move that to about 24MHz. More of that in later video. There will be a temporary yagi going up on the top of this tower which will give me time to develop the multi-band quad antenna.

The G-450 rotator will eventually *have* be replaced. The vertical force specification on the G450 is 200Kg. I broke the Create RC5-1 which had double that. There are no sideways loads on the base of the tower so I only need to worry about vertical loads.

The start of the construction is here: https://youtu.be/SbMy_82XRDM

"Part 1" is this one https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_pQN0pMvmA

The "disaster" video is here: https://youtu.be/4eiEd00N5GU

We covered the planning of this tower on a previous video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AmgUGuoudb4

We also made a video about Quads – which is the target of this tower: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3r9ff32j9Yo

And here is some information about 4-Square antennas which will surround the tower (tower will be de-tuned off 40m): https://youtu.be/joWUH2PgGZg

Next video in this series is the full-blown QRO test.

Finally, we will lay the radials down for the 4-square and connect up the control box.

Enjoy. And Subscribe you b*ggers! Or even just give me a nice comment!!

Early morning here at the factory looking for DX Pacific / VK and ZL

Just testing out 20m.

How to drop the tower back down if the wind is blowing in the wrong direction..? Woops!!

https://youtu.be/BYuIEu9KOrE – Yagi Project – Full Build

Last time out, we had a successful first lift and have had it guyed and upright for a week before fitting the control cables for the rotator.

Before that, we broke the Create Rotator. We fished out the Yaesu G-450 and did a successful "launch" with a 6:1 pulley.

This is a 12m tower project for an HF Yagi / Quad etc. long story.. *BUT* the guys are dual-use as both a 40m 4-Square switchable antenna array – as well as the tower. ALl lines will be replaced with Dyneema after we’ve sorted it all out.

There will be 4 vertical antennas coming off each guy point. Accuracy is mandatory for both the 4-square (impedance matching and gain etc) and you’ll see shortly in another video why they need to be spot on because when we move to a non-stretch Dyneema rope, all 4-guys need to have same tension when the tower is lowered and raised.

Further, the tower needs to be totally detuned from 40m so we have a fibreglass insulator to change the resonance to around 9MHz. We COULD add a further insulator above the rotator to move that to about 24MHz. More of that in later video. There will be a temporary yagi going up on the top of this tower which will give me time to develop the multi-band quad antenna.

The rotator will eventually be replaced. The vertical force specification on the G450 is 200Kg. I broke the Create RC5-1 which had double that. There are no sideways loads on the base of the tower so I only need to worry about vertical loads.

The start of the construction is here: https://youtu.be/SbMy_82XRDM

"Part 1" is this one https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_pQN0pMvmA

The "disaster" video is here: https://youtu.be/4eiEd00N5GU

We covered the planning of this tower on a previous video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AmgUGuoudb4

We also made a video about Quads – which is the target of this tower: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3r9ff32j9Yo

And here is some information about 4-Square antennas which will surround the tower (tower will be de-tuned off 40m): https://youtu.be/joWUH2PgGZg

The NEXT video in this series is when we fit the top of the tower, fit all the lines (ropes), add an extra guy-point and make the tower fully operational – as well as site the 4-vertical elements (non functional currently until we connect it).

The next video after that one in this series is to make a temporary yagi mono-bander for 20m and fire at USA. Then finally, rotator cable, ethernet, control wires etc up the pole.

Finally, we will lay the radials down for the 4-square and connect up the control box.

See pinned comment for Jonathan’s stream on the Yagi – 20m calling DX USA

I’m on the low-bands, Jonathan on the higher bands. Let’s go!