You may find this interesting/amusing/ludicrous (pick one!)

[PA629]

Debated whether to post this or not, but.......

Stopped by the local donut shop the other day to refill the Thermos and happened to overhear the topic of discussion at a table led by the local "Channel Master/King of the Band/Zircon-encrusted Screwdriver/Mega-tech" (you get the picture) and his awe-struck minions. :roll: Seems his latest antenna project is going to be a parabolic reflector antenna for 11 meters. He figures it will be a "kick a** DX antenna due to the extremely narrow beamwidth" . I'm curious as to where he plans on putting this beast. His yard is the size of a postage stamp and is already full with his kids' swingset and his 3 1/2 element yagi on 1 pc. of tower (half of the one director is missing from his kids' running into it, wonder if the school nurse treats them for RF burns?). So he uses an A99 on a 20' push-up pole as his main weapon. This guy is the stereo-typical, cliched station operator in every sense. Over-modulated, splattering, whistling and hollering "AUDIOOOOOOOOO" all hours day and night (no he doesn't work ).

He doesn't really know me, but has a good idea who I am from the old days when he was just getting into this and I was taking another of my breaks away from the hobby. I just sat there smiling and couldn't help saying on my way out that I thought it was "an ambitious undertaking" . His reply was, "Oh yeah, what do you know about it?". 8)

Just another day in the 'hood........glad I live in the 'burbs.

 

[Captain Kilowatt]

What's wrong with a dish antenna for 11m? :roll:

This one works and is only 1000 feet in diameter.

 

[loosecannon]

good story!

i got a kick out of that.
(especially the part about the awe struck minions)
we have one of those guys here.
seems that if someone learns how to peak a TX coil and install a swing kit, everyone in town touts them as "the best tech around!"
or whatever.LOL

he operates out of his car parked at the truckstop and his garage.
i doubt he knows how to "fix" anything with a radio if it were broken.

thanks to him, there are about 10-20 newbies running around screaming their heads off about how loud their radios are.
every one of them swinging from S-1 to S-5, and sounding like they are surfing a wave while talking.LOL

if i remember correctly, someone did build a CB parabolic antenna back in the late 70's/ early 80's.
i think there is a pic of it on the very last page of one of the old SECRET CB books.
hey, whatever happened to Selman Enterprises anyway?
loosecannon

 

[PA629]

What's wrong with a dish antenna for 11m? :roll:

This one works and is only 1000 feet in diameter.

I'm guessing that the HOA or city zoning might have a minor stroke.

 

[BIONIC_TEXAN88]

haha, I think everyone has a guy like that in their neck of the woods, I know I do and he sure makes the hobby suck at times when he's bleeding over 20 channels up while I am trying to talk on ssb.

 

[Captain Kilowatt]

It won't be narrow at all.Beamwidth is a function of size versus frequency.The lower the freq the bigger the dish must be for the same gain.Hopefully THIS LINK works. Play with the freq and dish size and hit enter to get the other variables displayed.It shows that for a freq of 27 MHz and a dish 10m in diameter,or roughly 33 feet, the gain is only 6.0 Dbi and the beamwidth is 65.5 degrees. You would do better with a three element beam.Parabolic dishes are only practical at UHF and above and then they far outperform anything else.

 

[AudioShockwav]

Anyone have a picture of a snowdish with a magmount in the center of it????
:shock:

73
Jeff

 

[PA629]

Anyone have a picture of a snowdish with a magmount in the center of it????
:shock:

73
Jeff

In all seriousness, years back a guy I know locally had Vietnamese neighbors that caused his family more than a few problems. So just to agitate them he took his kid's aluminum snow saucer, mounted a 4' Fire-Stik in the center of it, stuck it on a mast in a tripod on the ground and aimed it at the neighbor's house. Had an old section of RG-8 running into his garage like it was hooked to some "Doomsday Device". It was inside his chain-link fenced yard and was around 20 ft. from the neighbor's side door and master bedroom. Really did look sinister. And it did cause the intended hate and discontent........

 

[Captain Kilowatt]

Anyone have a picture of a snowdish with a magmount in the center of it????
:shock:

73
Jeff

No but I have used them with a microphone mounted at the focal point. They make for a nice long range pickup.

 

[bigred222]

good story