01/07/2009 | K3PX SKN-2009 was another joyful event here at K3PX. I made 8 QSO's on 80 meters, 13 QSO's on 40 meters for a total of 21 QSO's in 12 states. I used several rigs and keys during the event. The transmitter was an old EICO 720 at 90 watts input, with a Hallicrafters HA-5 VFO. The receivers were either an old Drake 2-B with a Drake 2-BQ "Q-Multiplier", or an old Drake R-4B receiver. When the QRM/QRN got too severe, I went over to my Kenwood TS-570SG tranceiver, running 100 watts. The antenna is a 176 foot long center fed, 40 meter double extended zepp antenna fed with 450 ohm ladder line via an MFJ-962D antenna tuner. By the way, this is a great simple and cheap antenna system, as I have worked all kinds of DX over the years on all bands (including WARC) from 160 meters thru 6 meters !!! That is quite a span of frequencies to cover with one wire antenna. I chose three different keys from my collection. First is my favorite, a Danish made Amplidan marine key, the Marconi 365A (a big, old, brass workhorse), and also a Marconi 365EZ marine key. The Amplidan has a slightly curved, long forearm, a great feel, and very quiet. The long forearm provides a nice mechanical advantage, cuts down on operator fatigue and is a joy to use. There were many nice fists, but I vote for "Best Fist", Bob (N2HM) at the W2WSC historic marine radio site of, WSC, in West Creek, NJ. He used a J-38, yet had an excellent fist, an absolute pleasure to copy and listen to. The keys used and mentioned in the QSO's were J-38, Speed-X, Kent, Llaves, various old time spark keys and a cootie key used by Karl, N3IJR.
- "Bob", K3PX, Rileyville, PA -- K3PX