Progress on the truck rack, motorized fold-over antenna mount

I have been really busy with the rack for my truck. The past 2-3 weeks I have been working on the mechanism that moves the antenna. Before that I was working on cutting the rack pieces out. The tubing is galvanized so all the points that were to be welded needed to be cleaned down to the bare metal. It has been a real challenge - and very time consuming.

Here is a picture I took about a month ago of some parts I was working on:


I don't have any pictures of the tubing in the cutting process, but here is one of all the tubes and parts laid out to give you an idea of what the rack will look like:


One of the big problems I have been constantly running in to is equipment and tool related. Either we don't have the right tool or machine, or something breaks and I am delayed trying to fix something. For example - I have broken two 8-32 taps while working on my parts. That really is a pain in the butt because the tap has to be extracted somehow from the part. The first one my instructor got out and the second one is, well.. still in the part. If I can't get it out Monday then it is time to make a new part - thats another day down the tube.

Aside from the problems, I finally got the assembly to do something when I run the motor. I was hard at work Thursday and Friday making the lever arms and machining the parts that attach them. My goal was to get the lever arms attached and moving when the motor ran before I left from school Friday - and I did!

Here is what the motor mechanism looks like right now:




This sequence shows how the lever arms and the screw/nut move together:






There is a monthly gathering at Universal Radio for a QRP club here in Ohio on the first Saturday of the month (today). Lots of people from the 146.760 repeater around central Ohio gather there, so it is a great place to get together with people I talk to all the time. I wanted to have my lever arms moving for the get-together this morning so I could demonstrate its function. Lots of people were impressed with the mechanism. I have been saying that if I hang my truck from it I could spin the truck around HI. The assembly is mostly 1/4" steel and has a 1"x8 pitch lead screw rotating at 88rpm from a 12v gear motor. I had people press down on the lever arms real hard and turned the motor on to demonstrate its power. It slows down with a lot of pressure, but you sure can't stop it! (and that is with a non-greased lead screw) I think it has enough power to lift my dual band antenna - a Diamond SG-7900A. Heck, I could probably put my full-size screwdriver antenna on it and lift that one just as well.

Dayton Hamvention starts in 13 days!

If you don't know what the Dayton Hamvention is and you are a Ham radio operator... Shame on you! It has the claim of being the largest Ham radio gathering/flea market/event in the world. There is so much to do and see there that you can't do and see in a normal day. People gather here from all across the country, and the world, so it is a great place to meet in person people you have talked to on the radio or people you have talked to through the Internet. The flea market is an experience all itself - you can walk around there the entire three days of the event and still not see everything. The inside exhibitors are just about anything you can think of - from major radio manufacturers (Icom, Kenwood, Yaesu, Ten-Tec, Elecraft, and on and on) to custom hat embroidery and T-shirt printing. Anything and everything you could possibly think of that would relate to Ham radio in one way or another is represented. This will be my 7th year in a row going - I wouldn't miss it for anything!

I am a member of the HFPack group. We talk about anything and everything related to portable Ham radio, and Ham radio in general, on our Yahoo mailing reflector. The group has one of their yearly gatherings at Hamvention each year. Last year I didn't make it to the meeting fast enough to get in to the group picture, but I still got to meet several well-known Hams in the HFPack world - W3FF, WB6MLC, and a few others. This year I am really going to try and make it to the gathering ON TIME - that is my main goal.

Last year I tried to rush my /PM setup and I didn't get everything working in time. The plan was to use my TS-2000 with a BlueLink/BlueSMiRF bluetooth interface hooked up to my PDA for rig control. I got everything built but I got some bad transistors with my interface board kit and I wasn't able to replace them in time. I have since fixed that so this year I should be in great shape. I need to re-load my control software on to myPDA , other than that I'll be good to go. Also, I used a tractor battery for power last year - WAY too heavy (as if the rig isn't heavy enough). This year I am going to try an SLA. I have a couple, but they are old and probably won't hold a charge very long. We have some 18ah's at school for robots that I might try and borrow for the weekend. I need to get one myself so maybe I can order one before or get one at Hamvention. The antenna will be my Crappie Pole Antenna. I seem to have good luck with that one.

I hope to see everyone there! Look for the guy with the 16' black pole and white coil with a yellow flag that says "HFPack 18.157.5USB" on it - that will be me!