01/04/2010 | WA5MUF Straight Key Night 2010 was an excellent way in which to bring in another new year. It was my honor to QSO with some other SKN stations such as KD, NL, WB9CIS, AD5VJ, WA5FWC, K9BGL, WF5W, AF5L and K6ILM. It was a great event with a lot of great rag chewing. I look forward to reading the various comments in this SKN "soapbox" section by others who share a fervor for CW.

CW is at the heart of the heritage -- and future -- of our wonderful hobby.

I primarily used a Ten-Tec Century 21, but I also used a homebrew rig I built in 1965 from the earlier 1964 ARRL Handbook....You can find data about the homebrew thirty watt, three-band transmitter on pages 169-171 of the 1964 ARRL Handbook... it was also described in QST, December 1957, pages 34-37, by Silent Key W1ICP, Lewis G. McCoy. The rig is a crystal-controlled, grid-plate type using a 6DQ6A pentode, while the power suppy uses a 5U4G in a full-wave circuit. It also uses the OD3/VR-150 voltage regulator tube, which makes for fantastic viewing while sending because it glows with a purple discharge.

I am uploading a photo of my homebrew rig in this "soapbox" section.

By the way, I made a short SKN video during SKN 2010 which is available at Youtube....if you want to watch it, you can copy and paste the following web address and watch it at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KmWObZX0mzE


Take care all and I hope you have a great year with good health.


73 -- WA5MUF