| Home Our Historic House Our Historic Town Wayne's pages: Ham Radio Cycling Kayaking Hot Springs Karolyn's pages: Gardening | W9AE My FCC callsign is W9AE. I have an Amateur Extra class license and have been licensed since 1977, when I was 16 years old. My main interests are DXing, satellites, and bicycle-mobile HF. I've contacted 324 DXCC entities on HF and 135 DXCC entities on satellites. My ham station. The transceiver is a Yaesu FT-847. On the left is a Heathkit SB-230 600W linear amplifier. My HF antennas have to be modest because I'm in a historic district and the local Historic Commission won't let me put up a tower.. The Butternut HF-9V vertical is 26 feet tall and has 28 buried 35-foot radials. It works on all the bands from 80m to 6m. In the background is a Buckmaster 135-foot off-center fed dipole supported by a 32-foot aluminum mast. It works on all the bands except 30m and 15m. All the cables run through a buried conduit to get across a gravel driveway. My satellite antennas. To make the Historic Commission happy, the garden fence lattice conceals the view from outside. The 8-foot fiberglass crossboom is 8 feet high. 144 MHz antenna: M2 7x7 element circular polarized yagi with SSB Electronics mast-mounted preamp. 435 MHz antenna: 15x15 element circular polarized yagi with SSB Electronics mast-mounted preamp. The 4-foot dish has a dual-band patch feed for 1296 MHz and 2401 MHz. On the feed is a DEM 2401 MHz preamp and Transystem downconverter. The azimuth/elevation rotor is a Yaesu G-5500 which is computer-controlled using SatPC32 software and a HalloRotor parallel port interface. ![]() In 2002 I made 177 AO-40 satellite contacts as FG/W9AE from the Caribbean island of Guadeloupe. Now pictures of my 50W HF bicycle-mobile setup. The bike is a Rans Rocket recumbent. The radio stuff weighs 11 pounds. Antenna from bottom to top: 4.5-foot Hustler tilt-over mast + Superantennas MP-1 adjustable loading coil + 4 foot mobile whip. It tunes on the 12m - 40m bands. The antenna is 10 feet long which is too long to resonate on 10m. I often operate from Cedar Hill cemetery, 110 feet above downtown Oakland. Signals are stronger on the hilltop than at my house or on most roads. Closer view of the cockpit. The radio is a Yaesu FT-817 with Collins SSB and CW filters and W4RT speech processor. My left thumb operates PTT. My right thumb operates tuning up/down/fast switches. A headset is attached to my helmet and plugs into the switchbox on the right. Under the radio is a Palm mini CW paddle. I write log information on the tiny Post-It pad above the radio. The cyclocomputer has a clock. On the rear of the bike is a small pannier containing a 14.4V 8AH NiMH battery (12 D cells) and a Tokyo Hy-Power 50W linear amplifier. The antenna mounting plate is made from a scrap of 1/4 inch thick aluminum. I'm pretty sure it won't break! I've worked 39 states and 48 DXCC entities on the bike so far. |