Topband: locals

[Jim Brown]

On Tue, 27 Jan 2009 13:14:50 EST, W7lr at aol.com wrote:

>I am going to borrow a K3 to see if that helps.  

I've owned and loved a pair of TS850s and a pair of FT1000MPs, but 
happily replaced all but one of the MPs to buy a pair of K3s. 
Other members of our club (NCCC) have done the same. I have three 
neighbors with K3s, and we all run high power. The K3s are a HUGE 
help, both on the TX side (much less phase noise, no clix) and the 
RX side (much better selectivity and strong signal performance). 

I'd guess that there are close to 50 K3s in our club, and all are 
reporting similar results. Owners (just off the top of my head) 
include W0YK, K6XX, N6TV, N6RO, K6AW, K6XI, W6DRX, K6MM, N3ZZ, 
K6TD. 

W6DRX is about 0.3 miles from me. He's the main reason I bought 
K3s, and I'm the reason he bought one. :)  From my own experience, 
I can tell you that they won't eliminate your mutual interference, 
but they will help a LOT. RX antennas can help some more. See 
below. 

A good RX like the K3 is still limited by whatever RF trash the 
other station is putting out. If his rig makes clix or phase 
noise, you'll still hear it if it's on your RX frequency. RX 
antennas can help to the extent that they null his signal.  
> 
>Is there any in-band filters that might help, or any other ideas? 

I think W2VJN used to make some very narrow band RF RX filters. 

Directional RX antennas can be a HUGE help. Anything from a 
Beverage to a loop with a strong null, depending on what you can 
build. Whatever you build, use my ferrite coax chokes to decouple 
them from the coax so that RF pickup on the coax doesn't fill in 
the null. N6RK has designed and built some RX antennas with nulls 
deep enough that he can run SO2R on 160 with one rig calling CQ at 
one end of the band while he's listening S&P on the other end. 
Details are on his website, and he's presented details at both 
Visalia and Pacificon. 

73,

Jim K9YC