With the discussion about high dipoles going on I thought I would throw in a
low beam episode.
For years the Old Natchez Amateur Radio Club ran a very competitive class 3A
Field Day station (W5KHB). The site was the International Paper Picnic
grounds south of NatcheZ right on the river. One of out top ops K5IIN was
heavy into DX (this was 1959 or 60) and almost did not want to come as 15
was open to EU every afternoon. George W5KHB set up his 3 el 15 meter beam
on a 4 foot saw horse to put it together and test SWR before putting it up
on 40' of Rohn 25. The receiver (don't laugh) was a Gonset G66B. Bern was
assigned to first tune the receiver and then check SWR with the matching G77
TX. Since he was a CW guy he tuned across 21010 and there was a ZB1 (now
9H1 Malta) pounding in. Bern got up and ran to his car and headed home to
try and work the ZB1 on his beam at 50' or so. About 2 hours later he
returned and said the ZB1 was just barely readible at his QTH.
George ran 15 phone for about 2 hours and then Bern got on 15 CW and ran a
whole slew of W1 to W9. Toward the end of the run the ZB1 called in and
Bern dropped his glasses and his pencil and nearly forgot to reply. We all
looked the other way while Bern used his own call to log the ZB1 afterward.
I remember the guy who talked about working rare Asia DX with low power an a
dipole slung between two trees....then he said by the way QTH is Thailand!
So its location...location...location!
CU on FD????
Dave K4JRB
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