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2014 ARRL Straight Key Night

01/09/2014 | K3PX

 SKN 2014 was very enjoyable. I made 23 quality QSO's on 40 and 80 meter CW in 11 states and a VO1. The furthese were in ID, FL, AL, NL (Canada). The rig was a Kenwood TS570 driving an Ameritron AL811H amplifier at 600 watts. The antenna was a 140 ft. CF zepp fed at 30 ft. with 450 ohm ladder line via an MFJ-962D antenna tuner. The key was one of my favorites from my collection, a Danish made Amplidan long lever marine key. 40 meters was very active but noisy and I went to 80 meters where it was quieter there with very strong signals. There were many types of keys used, but the majority was still the old J-38. Some of my QSO's were interesting. W3WKP, Dave was operating a station in VA by remote control from  Bucks Co, PA. Nifty set-up! I worked Jim, WB8SIW in Marion, IL who was using "the same J-38 key" as used by Harry Turner, W9YZE (SK) who set the world sending record of 35 WPM while in the US Army. If interested there is much info about Harry on GOOGLE.  I had fun with some SKN CQ's and had many calling at once, so had to pick and choose. Most signals received were 599/589 and many very nice fists. Many vintage rigs were used by the other op's, Heathkit Apache & Mohawk, Viking Valiant, Viking II, Adventurer, Ranger and RME 6900, an old Harvey-Wells T50 which sounded fantastic, HT-37 & NC300, older 5 watt Argonaut, etc. Nice time, nice operators and fun. Looking forward to next years SKN 2015.

Bob, K3PX

 

-- K3PX


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