Past Amateur Stations

of

N5XO

I was inactive in HAM Radio from 1974/75 until October 2006. I picked up my Technician license in October 2006, and purchased from the local Candy Store KComm a Kenwood TS-711. I had NO experience with VHF/UHF operations before and found that I had a lot to learn from my HF only days. This was the first rig in the shack, my HW101 that got me all fired back up required some new drive belts and a replacement power supply as mine was missing in action. The TS-711 was a GREAT all mode 2 meter rig, and I should have hung on to it.

HAM Station October 2006:

In late November I started looking at new radio's for the shack. I had a budget for one really good quality radio and I wanted a shack in the box that would give me everything I would want. At the time I never thought I would have more than that one radio and maybe a 600 to 800 watt amp. I looked long and hard at the Icom 746 Pro and the Kenwood TS-2000. I liked the display on the Icom, but the TS-2000 won me over as it would do 440 and 1296 as well. So last week of November I added a Kenwood TS-2000

Ham Station December 2006:

January of 2007, strong end of the year sales with my job pushed me into a very sweet bonus, and I ordered from KComm a Ameritron 811H amp to celebrate both my bonus and my upgrade to General, also found a fantastic deal on a Yaesu FT-990 at what is now the Schertz HAM fest. So both were added to my shack mid January.

My wife started wondering what happened to the JUST NEED THIS ONE RADIO. Course she was with me through my computer hobby days in the 80's and 90's and was used to I JUST NEED THIS ONE MORE {fill in the blank}

Ham Station January 2007:

Remember my desire for both the Icom 746 and the Kenwood TS-2000? Well some time in late January Kcomm had a used 746 {non-pro} come in. The deal and price was too good to pass up, even though I needed it like a hole in the head. So!!!

After playing with it for a short period...I ended up using it as my primary HF rig, and the Yaesu FT 990 was put on 80 meters. I had a friend up in Brownwood Texas that we would talk to regular when he or I got in from work on 80, so I would monitor our frequency on 80 meters for him on the FT-990 along with a few other friends and operate 20 meters and 17 meters. I got were I really enjoyed being able to operate and monitor multiple bands at once.

Ham Station January 2007:

My poor little 30 amp Ameritron Power supply was very taxed, so I purchased a Luke 100 amp power supply. and also expanded a few accessories such as a couple of antenna rotors and put my every faithful HW101 into the shack. so mostly rearranging.

At the time my antenna's were two tripods on the roof one with my 2 meter beam and omni, and the other held a small Tri-bander and supported my 80 meter dipole

Ham Station March 2007:

My Macintosh monitor gave up the ghost, as I did a lot of Video editing and Photography as an additional hobby I purchased a large replacement monitor of 40". That pushed me into a small rearrangement of the shack. But nothing major. My shack pretty much stayed stable for about 6 months.

Ham Station April 2007:

A local ham really wanted an HF/2 meter rig for his car as he was planning some travel sight seeing and visiting of family. He wanted to trade for an FT100D that I had and so we swapped for the TS-520S. I have to say that is a radio that I loved the audio on. Fantastic audio.

Ham Station April 2007:

At our local club monthly swap meet, someone had an old SB200 that was in non-working condition. I like working on them and playing with the older stuff. So picked up the SB200 for $50.

Several resisters and capacitors, 2 tubes and some soldering later....it was working fantastic. I played with in the shack for some time until I finally sold it to another ham who has been getting a lot of use out of it for the past 4 years.

Ham Station August 2007:

I made it all the way to July 2008 with out any changes.....and then purchased a Icom 756 off E-Bay. It is this radio that made me fall in love with pan adapters.

Ham Station July 2008:

Boredom and new power tools, set the stage for a full shack remodel.....Also my wife was becoming more active in the hobby and we wanted a true multiple operator station.

Ham Station November 2008:

I started working out of the house, and converted my HAM shack into a combination work office and ham shack, so I needed to down size the shack and make it more compact. At the same time I added two FT2000D's to the shack, which made the down sizing a bit entertaining.

Ham Station November 2008:

With all of our children out of college, married and leading lives on their own, and spare rooms for Ruth's and my use now, coupled with no more weddings to pay for, college tuitions to cover. We decided to move the HAM Station out of the room it shared with my work space and into what used to be the Den.

Before moving the equipment, we designed the room totally around it's functionality. After removing the sheetrock and adding additional insultation for sound deading on interior walls, we added in the ceiling wire mesh in all 4 walls, ceiling and then grounded the mesh to the grounding system. Creating an effective Faraday Cage for the room. As well as dropped from the breaker box 5 40 amp 220volt out lets and 5 40 amp 120 with both circuites having whole circuite power conditionars providing a very electrically clean room.

Then we built custom shelving, counters and set about building a full contesting station designed to support up to 3 operators at a time. With NO interest in HF contesting, most of our focus was on 6 through 23cm.

We also added in full ESSB sound equipment, and studio recording capability.

Ham Station June of 2009