Projects Page!
AKA The KF4OUI Do-It-Yourself Page.
Do you have a bunch of junk piled up in the backyard? Do you have a propane torch, a pipe cutter, a measuring tape, and a few hours to kill? If so, what are you doing here?!!?!?!? You should be building something! I know you need another antenna or some other radio related gadget.
NOTE! These pages might take some time to load due to the photos!
Project 1: The portable antenna mast holding device.
Working the Breakaway To Key Largo one year, I discovered a hole in the coverage area of the 147.000 repeater. This hole happened to be where I was posted. I decided that the thing to have is some kind of antenna mast that can be quickly deployed by one person. Preferably, this mast should be self supporting. I looked in a catalog and saw exactly what I was looking for, but with a $150 price tag. And that was without a mast! OUCH! There had to be a better way. There was, and I found it!
Project 2: The 6 meter copper pipe J-Pole.
This was a spur of the moment project. I had just got an Icom 706MKIIG and just had to get it on the air. I could not work HF at the time, and I already had 2 meter / 70 cm stuff . What I needed was 6 meters!! but here in lies the problem. I had the rig. I had some feedline rescued from a junk pile. All I needed was an antenna. I could have ordered one, but it would have cost money and worst yet I would have had to wait for it to arrive!!! I wanted to be on the air that day! One trip to Home Depot (OK actually TWO trips because I forgot to buy some stuff the first time) and an hour or so later and I had an antenna!
Download my J-Pole calculator! Note - this calculator is a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet. You need Excel to open it.
Project 3: The 6 meter square loop
For this project, I decided I needed something else for 6 meters. The J-pole was fine, but it was not really what I needed for local SSB use. Apparently, on VHF bands there is about a 20 db loss between a vertical and horizontal antenna. With my vertical j-pole I could barely hear another ham only 20 or so miles away with a 3 element quad pointed at me! Also, I might someday have 6 meters in my truck, so I will need some sort of antenna. This design was an experiment for me. I will install it at the base first, and if it works I will build another for field / mobile use.