April 2003

My message to our club members has been slightly delayed this month as I have been distracted from my usual routine, as I suspect many of us have been, by an intense interest in the war of liberation of Iraq.

My prayers go out to our brave fighting men and women and to all those fighting with the coalition to free Iraq. As a father and grandfather I certainly can empathize with the concerns of the many family members of the military personnel overseas. Let us all pray for them and do all that we can keep a positive attitude toward our country and our leaders.

As for other more mundane pursuits, I have been busy building a coax relay terminal in a Stahlin Brothers, fiberglass box. This terminal which will be mounted outside of my ham shack, consists of 5 Dow-Key coax relays which will be able to select any one of 3 antennas for the HF output and 1 antenna for the VHF/UHF output on my IC746 transceiver. All antennas will be switched to ground through the NC contacts when not selected as the antenna of choice. I addition, there will be one output available for selecting a cantenna dummy load. The purpose of this terminal is to keep all EMP from near-by lightning strikes, out of the hamshack and indeed out of the home. Hopefully, it will work.

I plan to bring the box to our next meeting for "show and tell" so that you can all see my efforts. So, let’s all come on out and make it a good meeting.

Don Schultze 3/22/03

K2CZT