KD4HXT Blog

Bummer dude!

After a nice day of casual DXing yesterday (and a few new ones on my DXCC totals) I was geared up for the WPX-SSB contest.  During the first contact at 0000 hours, the VFO Knob on my FT-990 froze.  It simply wold not turn at all.  At first I thought it was a set screw that might have come loose, but after removing the knob, i physically could not move the shaft.  I have a service manual for FT-990 and it's the rotary shaft encoder that froze up. 

I obviously was not going to be contesting this weekend. While I can use CAT control to change frequencies via computer, it's not real helpful in contests when you search and pounce.  I'm basically OFF-THE-AIR.

I've had the Ft-990 for 17 years.  It's been in for repair twice.  Always somewhat minor issues.  Last year I sent it to Brian Cambell, WA4GEG, in Tennessee.  He did a fantastic job repairing a dead audio circuit, and doing a touch up on alignment.  I wrote him with my issue and he replied promptly:

You may be able to loosen it back up with a little penetrating oil applied to the encoder shaft bushing (remove rubber tire from VFO knob, loosen the Allen set screw and remove the knob.) Apply a drop or two of penetrating oil to the encoder shaft busing area every hour or so for a 24 hour period if necessary (stand the radio on its rear panel -- front panel looking up.)

> Do you still work on 990's???

I stopped working on them due to the parts problem. And these days I have my hands full in supporting the 4 versions of the FT-1000 series rigs.

If you can't get the encoder shaft loosened up and working, you might check with Beltronics and see if they still have any FT-990 VFO shaft-encoders or the ability to modify the set for a different replacement encoder:

So we'll try the oil and see if it works today.  Otherwise, it may be time to find money for a new radio.  I have my eyes on the FT-950.

Oh, I hit the 15,000 logged QSO on the radio earlier in the day.

A young man who's been working for me as a paid intern, recently received his Technician ham license.  Jason March is a smart guy who is currently attending Cal Poly in the EE program  KI6OII is his new call and he's been somewhat active on 2-meters.  I let him borrow a 2-meter rig with antenna.  So what does he do?  Goes out a builds a coper J-Pole antenna for use at his home while attending Cal Poly.  Jason found plans for the antenna on-line and with help from him dad built it.  A great example of the future of ham radio.

We just returned from a week of vacation, more on that later.

QSL cards received:

N0JJQ - This was for a card I sent in 1994 for a 6-meter SSB QSO.  (I was in Florida at the time). Edwin says he's a little behind in his QSLing.
W3LL - 20-meter RTTY with sase.  Bud says he needs my prefix for WPX RTTY award.

LOTW has been very active.  My VP6DX confirmations all came.  I'm also just 2 states away from confirming WAS-CA via LOTW.

Back from Nashville after a week.  Hear TX5C on the air and managed to work them 30-meter CW and 20-meter phone in a couple of minutes.  New one for me.  Total now 215.  Info on the group at http://www.clipperton2008.org/index.html

I'm in the process of returning home from the 2008 NRB (National Religious Broadcasters) annual convention in Nashville, Tennessee.  It's been a terrific five days here, and while I have nothing to compare it too, it's been called one of the best NRB conventions ever.  It was my first time attending.  I will be back, especially since I was elected to serve for the next 4 years on the Church Media Committee.

While it was fun, home is better, and it's taking forever to get there!

I left the Gaylord Opryland complex about 11:00AM and need to wait until 4:00PM to catch my first flight.  I hope that it arrives on time so I can make Salt Lake City, but it won't matter much because I'll have a three hour layover.  I don't get home until almost 11PM Pacific.  (that's 1AM on the Dave body clock). 

The point of all of this is my questioning of why it should take so long to get home.  In this day and age, can't computers help the airlines manage flights, schedules, and delays better?  Last summer, I was traveling home after a week long video shoot in Washington DC.  Delta over-booked me on a flight from Atlanta to Salt Lake after changing the aircraft type to a smaller capacity plane.  Delta knew about it when I departed Washington D.C. because they would not issue a boarding pass for that particular segment, saying that I would get one in Atlanta.  (red flag #1)  In Atlanta, the zoo at the gate was amazing.  The gate agent had no idea why so many people were waiting to board. (red flag #2)  I looked at the aircraft parked at the gate through the window and noticed that they reduced the aircraft from a 767-400ER to a 767-300, about a 70 passenger difference.  (red flag #3)  After a long while they announced all the names of passengers who would not make it on the plane and told us to hike to customer relations counter to get re-ticketed. Another long line.  I had to remind the agent who was re-booking me of the promises the gate agent was making.  Since I was out of luck until the day,  Delta paid for a hotel, taxi ride, meals, and gave me $200 bucks toward a future flight.

The poor Delta employees had a lot of work to do.  I saw good Samaritans who had a boarding pass take mercy on family's with small children and gave up their seats.  The same for older passengers.  Please tell me why the Delta computer system can't figure this all out.  It's 2008 people!

If you're a ham radio operator or scanner enthusiast, you've probably noticed how difficult it is to find active frequencies for your radio.  When we moved to Bakersfield, I searched several sources and was never satisfied with the results.  The ARRL repeater book has tons of listings for repeaters off the air or totally inactive.  Several other books or web sites have information that's out of date or not helpful.  I found plenty of great info the Southern California, but Central Valley information was lacking. 

We set out to produce a local list of frequencies that was accurate and helpful for newcomers and veterans alike. The list is checked to have the ability to receive a signal with my 50 watt radio and a Comet GP-15 antenna at 25 feet high.  It's a work in progress but a labor of love.

I spent the better part of today updating and revising the list.  We've included a ton of new information and verified accuracy.  Since we use cloanable radios from Yaesu, software is the best way to program them.  Some great software is available for my radios, VX-7R and FT-7800.  No matter what kind of radio you have, I think you'll find the files we've made available helpful, directly or indirectly. We've included CTCSS and DCS tones and splits as we know them for each listing.

Here is the basic HTML page: http://davekalahar.com/bakersfield_scanner_freqencies.htm   A PDF is also available on that page, and you can download a ZIP that contains the Microsoft Excel spreadsheet, the VX-7 database file for Commander, and the FT-7800 database for the G4HFQ program.  Use the database files to directly clone your radio!

Please, give me feedback.