2026... I've been a licenced Radio Amateur for some 57 years, operating mostly on the VHF/UHF bands and some HF. In 2021 I returned exclusively to the 28MHz (10M) band to take advantage of Solar Maximum.
A couple of years ago my very best friend and XYL Diane (for some 46 years) passed away. Cause, Interstitial Lung Disease and the end was traumatic to say the very least. I'm still reeling...
So, I've had to make some big changes at a time when my own health is not good.
I decided to move my station into our large kitchen area, a room that I tend to use the most. You can see pictured above my current setup, a Yaesu FT-710 SDR transceiver connected to my Antron 99 vertical antenna via an earthed patch panel for safety.
My antenna mast is very well earthed with heavy conductors because we live in an area where lightning strikes are common.
I had planned to try 70MHz (4M) band and carried out the required software update on my FT-710. Unfortunately the first antenna that I tried a simple halo was useless. Since then I have aquired a simple two element yagi which will be aimed in an easterly direction but not yet installed.
You can see that I've been experimenting with solar power. Panels are very cheap these days and 130Ah sealed lead acid batteries keenly priced too. Because my operating is somewhat intermittent these days I have two window stick on panels trickle charging two 130Ah batteries. This arrangement works really well even through winter. During summer peak sunlight hours to prevent overcharging I simply switch on radio, it's sufficient load then prevents over voltage. Crude arrangement but it works!
Outdoors I have four panels, two 50W and two 25W all in a parallel. These feed an MPPT controller charging four 130Ah batteries. A 2000w continuous rated (4KW peak) pure sine wave inverter is used to run my kitchen equipment, lighting and computer during mains power outages and on some good solar days. This arrangement has worked well during recent storms and during National Grid planned works. It has also reduced to a certain degree my household electricy bill!
73 Derek G4CQM