W5DNT / W5FR Ranch Station

W5DNT / W5FR

EM-01wo

Hamilton County, Texas

The 4 element SteppIR yagi sits atop a US Tower HDX-555 at 57’, turned by a Yaesu 2800 rotor. Inverted Vees for 160 and 80 meters are also mounted on the tower, as is a VHF/UHF 5 element yagi.

Shown below is the tower’s base, which includes a service platform, access ladder, raising fixture and lightning protection system. Not visible are the 10 yards of concrete and 250 lbs. of re-bar used in the engineered base.

 

Here are a couple of views of the ranch station. First, the original 756 PRO III and Alpha 87A operating postion, followed by the new equipment configuration which now accomodates an IC-7800 as the primary transceiver, along with both an Alpha 9500 for HF and an Alpha 8406 amp for 6 meters.

An R-8 vertical is also kept around as a reference point to demonstrate how nice it is to finally have a yagi up. The family dog “DiXie” (sk 2008) stands guard!

An Array Solutions K9AY Loop, located about 200’ from the transmit antennas, is used as an 80 and 160 meter receive antenna.

 

W5DNT / W5FR Ranch Station

Location: Hamilton County, Texas (EM01wo)

 

Primary Rig:

ICOM 7800

Alpha 9500 Automatic Linear Amplifier

Alpha 8406 Six Meter Linear Amplifier

 

Secondary Rig:

ICOM 756 PROIII

Ameritron AL-1200 Amplifier

 

Digital

Mix-2.18 Multi-mode Software

Micro Keyer II

Multiple Am Com Clearspeech DSPs

Pentium 4 Mobile Centrino 1.4GHZ PC

DV Dongle for DSTAR

 

VHF/UHF Rigs

Kenwood TH-D72 HT

Kenwood TS-733 Transceiver

 

Antennas:

Four element SteppIR with 40/30M adder at 57’

160/80/40M “Fan” Inverted Vees at 55’

K9AY Loop for 80/160M Receive Antenna

Cushcraft R-8 Half Wave Vertical (for grins!)

5 element Yagi at 68’ for 2M/440Mhz

Palstar AT-1500DT Matchbox

Alpha 4510 Wattmeter

Drake W-4 Wattmeter (6M use)

 

Microphones

Heil PR-781

Heil Pro Set HC-5 & HC-6

RadioSport RS60CF with M208 Wide Response Dynamic Mic Element

W2IHY’s 8 Band EQ, EQ Plus & iPlus

 

CW Paddles

Begali Sculpture

Begali Signature

Begali Camelback

 

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