Antenna work will be scheduled within the next week or two at station W0ZSW in the Twin Cities. The current antenna setup, a 200 foot (61 meter) center-fed double extended zepp, now requires additional coaxial cable in the feedline length to tune properly on 160 and 80 meters. We propose to increase the overall length of the antenna to eliminate the need for this additional feedline, which introduces loss. The additional antenna length will be added as 50 foot sections on each end of the existing antenna. If all goes well, this project will reduce noise, allow the LDG AT-200PRO autotuner to match the antenna on 160 and 80 meters without the need for additional feedline, and make the entire installation more efficient.
We have been disappointed with the performance of W0ZSW over the summer months. We think this change to the antenna system will make the station more useful on more frequencies. When work commences, we expect the system to be out of service only a few hours.
Another planned change is the switch out of power supplies from the two Astron linear supplies (which are mismatched) to a single Astron RS-50M, which will have the capacity to power the TS-480HX at the full 200 watt level. The existing Astrons do not have meters and one is a 20 amp unit while the other is a 35.
Please direct comments to wa0tda@arrl.net.
