Fast forward a long long time and sometime in March we started actually looking at the problem.  We were able to find out of 4 rotors we had one that actually turned and the only problem it had was that had some ball bearings that had come lose and were bouncing around inside the rotor.  We found out of 4 1/2 controllers, that the controller we were using in the rover was fine with the exception of needing a new light bulb.  We replaced the light bulb with ease.  The second controller we had needed some new bulbs and the start/run capacitor was bad.  The capacitor was easy to replace but the light bulbs were a small problem.  The bulbs we ordered were 12 volts yet the bulbs installed in this controller design used the 24v that was used for the rotor.  With a little crafty rewiring to put the bulbs in series and we were done.  The third controller just needed a new light bulb as well.  The other controllers we had, one which had taken a lightning strike and the other that was just spare parts left were left alone for now.

First we opened up the rotor which would turn and were able to easily locate and replace the ball bearings.  Then when we went to reassemble the bell housing we could not get everything to line up properly so that the brush on the potentiometer would set properly in the bell housing and would turn when the rotor turned.  After several attempts and the day getting long we decided to abandon it for another day.

Fast forward to June 6th.  We finally got back to looking at the rotors.  We quickly identified that in order to put the rotor back together properly that we first had to turn the rotor to the left North stop.  Then we turned the potentiometer just slightly off of its left stop.  We then noticed that if you place the rotor so that the potentiometers brush points in the middle between the bottom housings screw holes then it would all line up.  We did this after a few attempts and then figured it out.  We then were able to put the top bell housing right down on top of the housing with easy and without pushing the potentiometer to the left or right.  Success.. One rotor up and running perfectly.

The next one we decided to work on was the one that stopped turning that we were last using on the rover.  We opened it up and did a visual inspection.  We were not able to find any obvious problems with the stop contacts or any of the gears so we wired it up to the controller.  Once connected we verified the brake solenoid worked fine and it appeared that the rotor was trying to turn.  Further inspection of the gears more closely didn’t really reveal anything until Dad decided to stick a screwdriver up against the main gear off of the motor and push on it a little.  As soon as he did that it was unstuck.  What had happened was the grease in the rotor had got in there and hardened causing the rotor to cease.  The rotor was then free but still had a little resistance.  We decided to disasssemble the entire gear assembly.  We cleaned each piece and then applied liberal amounts of the new grease we had purchased.  Then fortunately we were able to reassemble all the gears and were able to easily turn them by hand.  We quickly put up our paper towel shields to protect us from spraying grease and tested the rotor.  The gears turned smoothly in both directions without any issues.  We then reinstalled the main ring gear and tested the rotor in both directions against the stops.  Upon finalizing that test,we then disconnected the cable as we could not put the bottom bell housing back on with it attached.  We then did the same procedure as we did before and completely reassembled the rotor in one try.  We then wired it back up and verified that the calibration was still good and the rotor turned properly.  We also spent some time cleaning the potentiometer contacts which seems to cured our meter hesitation problems we were having.

I know Dad had done this kind of stuff in the past but I was very proud to successfully complete these repairs and in true ham style on the down cheap.   We now still have 2 rotors to repair.  One we believe just needs a new terminal strip but while we have it apart we will strip it down, clean it and grease it all up.  Just to make sure its ready to go for the next 10 years or so.  The last one may have had some damage to it so we aren’t really sure what is going on there until we open her up and peak inside.

The current economic conditions have wreaked havoc with both of us. The company I was working for went bankrupt! Two months prior to the closing, I was laid off along with many other employees in an effort to survive. The result was that after 40 years of continuous employment I have been forced to retire on a less than adequate salary. Dave has been struggling with his new families needs as well. We have both decided to take a break from Roving for a while.

The status of the rover is not too bad. At least nothing a little money won’t cure. Besides the normal annual maintenance the engine has developed a squealing noise that comes and goes. I think it may be either a water pump bearing, an alternator bearing or perhaps power steering bearing. At any rate it doesn’t help to lure us into the Mountains and back woods with a pending failure. Also the engine driven air conditioning is no longer working. Last year we had the propane system worked on but it still doesn’t hold gas for very long. This affects the furnace, refrigerator, and stove.

Next is the status of the Radio systems. At the end of the September 2009 the main mast rotor froze up and wouldn’t turn. To work on it we have disconnected the upper mast and left it lying on the roof, removed the lower mast and the rotor. Out of 4 HAM-M / HAM-IV rotors ALL were in need of some repair. This work is still in process.

The DS222R rover antenna needs to be fixed and installed. It has a high SWR for some reason so we are still running the old 40 year old Cushcraft 11 element.

The 6 Meter PAR Moxon needs to be repaired after it was mangled several times in June and September.

The new 900 Mhz Amplifier will not put out more than 10 watts. I think I will need to purchase another Motorola Amp on ebay to fix this.

The new 3456 Amplifier needs to be built up with a heat sync, chassis and control board. Until then we only have 1 watt on 3456.

The new 2304 transverter and 50 watt amplifier need to be mated and installed. Until then we will run with the old 2304 system at 30 watts. It works just fine but takes up a bunch of space in the equipment closet.

The 2 TS2000’s and all switching systems are in good shape and fully operational.

The 6M system is fully operational with 400w output except for the antenna mentioned above.

The 2M system is fully operational with 400w output.
The 1.25m system is fully operational with 110w output.

The 70cm system is fully operational with 160w output.

The 33cm system is running barefoot with 30w output.

The 23cm system is fully operational with 150w output.

I hope to get some or most of the repairs and updates done by next September. For now I don’t see up going out for the June contest.

73 to all, Jim K3LFO

As mentioned before the main mast rotor failed at the very end of the September contest.  We didn’t know about it untill we tried to operate during the Sprints.  It was stuck on North.  We plan to replace some of the mast items such as the main hinge pin and the stop bolt.  Something is squeeling in the engine that needs some attention.  It sounds like a water pump bearing but I hope it is just a noisy belt.  All of the batteries need serviceing, the new 903 amplifier needs to be fixed, and the new 2304 DEMI transverter needs to be wired into the system and tested.  It just never ends!

We invested in the Mini Winnie so that we would not have to rebild the entire Rover each time we went out but there is still many things that pop up that need attention.  There are other benefits that still make it worth while such as having an on board bath  room with running water, a full kitchen with refridgerator, and air conditioning.  Someday we hope to get 5 and 10 Ghz running so it will be a complete 10 band Rover but for now 8 bands sure is a lot of fun.

73 and Hapy New Year,

Jim K3LFO

On top of this problem, the 6 meter moxon will need to be rebuilt … AGAIN.. The exhaust has some gasket issues, the linkage for putting the car from Drive into second gear is stuck or broke,  and there is some squeeling noise on some belt or wheel that seems to be temperature effected.  That will need to be looked into as well.  But since those repairs will most likely be quite costly, they will have to wait till next year probably.  Oh well..

50 Mhz – TS2000X – TE Systems 400 Watt Amplifier to PAR Moxon Antenna
144 Mhz – TS2000X – TE Systems 400 Watt Amplifier to DS 6 element Rover Antenna
222 Mhz – TS2000X – DEMI 222-28 Transverter to Mirage 110 Watt Amplifier to DS 10el Rover
432 Mhz – TS2000X – TE Systems 184 Watt Amplifier to DS 15 Element Rover Antenna
903 Mhz – TS2000X – DEMI 902-28 Transverter 30Watts to DS 33 Element Loop Yagi
1296 Mhz – TS2000X – DEMI 23120 120 Watt Amplifier to DS 45 Element Loop Yagi
2304 Mhz – TS2000X – SSB Elec RX – TX converters to Spectrum 40 Watt Amp and DS 45 Element
3456 Mhz – TS2000X – DEMI 3456-144 Transverter 1 Watt to DS 76 Element Loop Yagi

WE spent 4 ½ hours Saturday Morning traveling to our starting point on Camelback Mountain in FN21hb. The weather was terrible with pouring down rain most of the way. Once on the mountain we could not enjoy the view for the thick Fog. The propagation was poor but with Camelback overlooking a large number of VHF stations the activity was brisk. WA2FGK was only 29 miles away and drove the S meter up to 60 db over s9 on 3456! Bill K3EGE had warned me that it would be hard to leave that sight but we managed to call it quits after about 3 ½ hours and 111 QSO’s. We took another half hour to eat a bite of lunch (or was it really dinner?), pack up and leave.

Our next stop was an overgrown parking lot in front of an abandoned building along the road in FN11wa. This proved to be a terrible site. No microwave contacts were made and the surrounding terrain prevented us from hearing N3NGE who was close by in FN20!

Next we drove to the west side of Hazleton, PA in FN10xw. This was not a great location either with QRN on 6 meters. Only a couple of microwave contacts were made and it was still raining!

We moved over to the east side of Hazleton in FM20ax. We still did not hear N3NGE. Conditions were the same and activity had wound down due to the late hour.

We drove about 4 hours to arrive at Dave’s QTH in FM19jj around 0300 local to catch some sleep.

The next morning Dave overslept and we decided to stick around for a big breakfast prepared by his XYL. I went out to the Rover and made a few contacts on the Square loops while waiting to eat.

The first stop on Sunday was Sideling Hill in FM09ve. Activity was low plus we were late on our schedule so we only made a few contacts then headed out.

Next we’re off for Hogback overlook in FM08us. Things really picked up here. The tropo was still flat but due to the site altitude we were doing quite well. Unfortunately we had to leave after only 2 hours to make room for another rover. Sunday evenings at Hogback are always awesome!

One more stop to make. We ran up Rt 17 until we were into FM18aw near Delaplane, VA. A quick stop on the side of the road activated grid number 8 with a hand full of contacts.

That’s it for September!

Upon testing the 900 mhz amplifier we got a whopping 0 watts out.  Upon further investigation we found a minor mishap in a set of pins being in the wrong spot.  After we fixed that we saw the bias voltage and had a few amps of current draw when the amplifier was keyed.  We thought we had solved the problem.  The end result was only 10 watts out.  Unfortunately we can do atleast 30 out of the transverter by itself.  We played with the drive levels but it didn’t seem to improve.  So we are still looking into what is going on with this project.  Hopefully we will get it figured out before we have to make a final decision on whether it stays or goes on Wednesday.

All start and stop times are just a guess but should give you an idea of our plans.  Look for us around 144.245 or 144.260.

We will be operating on 50 Mhz through 3456 Mhz with good power on all bands except 1 watt on 3456.

Saturday

Sunday

So the first order of business was to lower the antennas back down to the roof so I could work on it.  We unfortunately waited until the holiday weekend before the contest to do this.  We went to lower the mast and nothing happened.   The winch would not work.  We ended up uninstalling the wench and taking it apart.   Upon unspection beyond finding lots of rust on the terminal bolts, we found that the insulator on one of the terminals was gone.  This was causing the winch to short to the chasis which eventually connected it back to ground through the long path (mast->to bumper mount->to bumper->to vehicle frame).  What was really interesting was when i plugged just the positive lead to the WATTS UP meter (This is a neat little volt/amp meter that has powerpoles on it) it would shut off.  Couldn’t understand why until we found the short.  So we searched high and Lowes  (lol) for some sort of insulator piece that would fit over a 1/4″ bolt and the best we could come up with was a rubber end cap for 1/4″ bolt and a nylon washer.  So we cutoff the end of the rubber end cap and slid it down the bolt and slightly into the hole, placed the rubber washer on and then tightened the bolt together.  Since we were worried about the terminals turning we decided to attach the two leads to the terminal with it still open.  After doing that we reassembled the winch and presto chango it was functional again.  This was Saturday.    At the end of all that we were tired so we decided to pick that up on Sunday morning to reinstall it.  Meanwhile Dad took a look at the winch controller which has been broken since the last outing.  Turns out it was designed very well to be weatherproofed except at one part, where the wires entered it.  Well it was full of water and the switches inside were completely rusted out.  So for now we will just connect the power poles together manually to turn on the winch unless we come up with something better before the contest.

So Sunday morning, the first order of business was we decided to make an cut to something that is getting in the way of working on the mast.  We use a Rohn-25 house bracket to support the mast on the back of the RV.  It’s two metal arms are getting in the way and poking you in the gut when you are on the ladder trying to work on things so we decided to cutoff the unnecessary bits.  We don’t plan on reusing this anytime soon anyhow.  After that I reinstalled the winch and we were able to lower the mast back down to the roof.  We took some measurements and attempted to adjust the antenna to eliminate the SWR problems.  While I could minimize it by .10 watt it still was high taking readings from the radio bypassing the amp.  We then decided to place a dummy load on the end of the coax up on the roof of the RV.  Sure enough there was still SWR there.  So we start to think we have a bad piece of coax.  We then unplug the input and outputs from the amp and connect them together with a barrel  connector and the SWR goes away completely.  So now we believe we have something going awry in the amplifier.  It may be a bad relay or dirty contacts or something else.  Hopefully we will figure it out before the contest.  In the meantime, we are limited to 10 watts for the contest.

Today, we will be installing a 900 mhz amplifier that is a modified cellular amp.  It’s estimated to put out about 250 watts with 4 watts drive.  We shall see.  We’ll just be happy to see it work and put out more than our 30 watts we get out lol.