[CQ-Contest] W3AU SK: W6UM's comments

[Fred Laun]

Chas, W6UM (ex-W6HOH/W3NPZ) asked to have these comments on the late Ed 
Bissell,
W3MSK/W3AU, posted here:

It is heartwarming to read how so many others also have fond memories of the
W3MSK/W3AU operations and especially of Ed himself. A few additional points
may help the perspective on what was a prototype MM operation.

Ed was masterful at innovating new procedures and techniques. With towers in
a heavily wooded area, there was no way to erect antennas in one piece or by
tram. Ed developed the tilt head method of mounting, referred to in the ARRL
Antenna Book as the "PVRC Mount", which facilitates mounting one element at a
time and also permits one person alone to erect an antenna. This technique is
easiest with relatively balanced antennas, i.e., evenly spaced elements along
the boom. As a result the 7-element Yagis on a one-wavelength boom on both 20
and 15 were built this way. Before antenna modeling was possible these wound
up being empirical designs, with Ed performing minor tweaking of element
lengths on the tower after each contest based on operator evaluation of "did
it work better or worse than in the previous contest".

Many of us felt there was some magic in the resulting 7-element 15 meter beam
at one point, and operator mutiny was threatened if he changed even the
slightest detail. When antenna models became available, the W3AU empirical
design calculated within 0.5 dB of the maximum gain possible, although lower
in F/B. After moving to FL, Ed built an exact copy, which again proved to be
a terrific performer. After my weekly skeds with Ed on 20 meters we would
always QSY to 15 so I could once again hear the business end of "The Big 7".

Again before modeling, the quantitative effects of the severe element
diameter tapering used in 40-meter elements could not be calculated. This
necessitated trying many different sets of element lengths and evaluating
each beam to arrive at the best results. Ed even tried a 3-element
configuration with two directors and no reflector, before deciding a
conventional configuration was better. One of his favorite stories concerned
the contest when he had put up the 5-element 40, on an 80 ft. boom. Ed was
comfortably seated in the bathroom fondly looking out the window at the beam
when the boom broke near the mast and two elements came crashing down into
the trees. Fortunately they were the two outer directors, and we were able to
finish the contest with a tail-heavy 3-element beam.

Ed at W3MSK was the first I am aware of to use a quarter-wave sloper, a very
common antenna today. Another pioneering effort was with
orthogonally-polarized beams mounted on the same boom, an experiment to see
if vertical polarization would help at those times when the horizontal
antenna is too high for optimum propagation. Unfortunately, the weather
destroyed this setup before any definitive conclusions could be reached.

In the photos of the W3MSK station, there are actually ten amplifiers in the
racks, five each for cw and ssb. Our regulations then were based on power
input, not output. The efficiency of a class-c amplifier gives about 200
watts more output at 1 kW in than does a linear, so each cw amplifier was a
pair of push-pull triodes, mostly 450TLs. They were assiduously adjusted to
exactly 1 kW for each contest.

After retiring to FL, Ed still managed to put up six towers, although his
operating time was limited. For the first time he actually used some
commercially manufactured antennas and rotators, although he always found
design improvements to be made to them. He enjoyed daily chats with friends
in VU-land, as well as personal visits from local PVRC cold-weather refugees
N4KW and W3TMZ. Less frequent but especially welcome were the times he got to
see the Whites, W1CW and W1YL.

Many of us will miss W3AU. His enthusiasm, his energy, and his insight are
worthwhile models for anyone. We will never see his like again.

Chas., W6UM