New Microphone easy rigblaster hookup!

  

Today I got a new (oldschool) Buck Rodgers microphone (Love these old Mics) from my longtime elmer kb7uxe. It had a regular headphone style jack on it so I was a little confused as to how I was going to hook it up! Then I took a look at my rigblaster......The rigblaster plus has a PTT input and a nice audio in jack that fit the bill! I merely made a nice little PTT switch with the proper connection to plug into the rigblaster and plugged the mic into the audio jack! Works just fine for me....... 

Cutting the cable! Homemade TV antenna!

Today I decided that I would turn in the old crappy cable box and save a few hundred dollars a month. I only watch a few prime time shows, and I more than likely will never miss cable except for my ability to record a few shows at once! While standing in line waiting to turn in the useless device that was only good for charging me money to collect dust in my house. I had a antenna moment and decided to build one of those simple UHF antennas for my decent sized TV in the living room. I goggled homemade TV antenna and jumped over to.......
http://www.tvantennaplans.com/
It has a few simple designs that work pretty well and generally cost around 5-15 Dollars depending on what you already have laying around the shack!

I ended up with 2 antennas because my cable free neighbor needed a antenna also So I made him a 2 element TV antenna!

ANTENNA 2 after a little practice I build one with a reflector...  It was a hair stronger than mine with a  reflector added on! The picture is with a real TV channel on.

 ANTENNA 1  I used this one without a reflector and ended up with 40 channels!!!

Overall I was surprised by the signal of these little guys! A lot better than buying a antenna that would be weaker and a lot more money. And they can hide out in a corner if you are chicken to look poor!
Stay tuned because I'm building a 16 Element with reflector as soon as I get more wire and brass screws!!!! I will also add in a Homebrew Howto after I modify the design a little to make it a little more efficient!

Please Click a few AD's for me  So I can keep up the MAD SCIENTIST act!
Here is a picture tutorial for the Insane! Enjoy!!!

                 Also see another version here 

Shortwave Magnetic loop!

My friend wanted a antenna for his shortwave radio! He stated that he did not want a huge antenna hung in a tree and wanted to have the ability to keep it inside..... I gave this a few seconds thought and told him to grab a small box. He found a box at goodwill that would work and I searched through the junk box in my ham shack and came up with some copper tubing a few connectors and a capacitor! WALA tunable shortwave Magnetic loop! Not bad for an hours work and a few cups of coffee and some beers!

80 Meter 5-btv MOD 2

I added another wire to my original BTV 80 meter mod and made it into a kind of cage vertical on 80.
After I added the wire it actually needed trimmed down quite a bit so it shortened up my wire a little (2 feet shorter)
this modification is simple and consists of a 40 meter trap at the top of the BTV with a length of wire 18-24 feet long added from the top and sloping down or flat top its up to you! It works alot better than the stock BTV setup and cost about $20 to build a 40 meter trap and add the wire.