Hello Group,

For a few weeks now I am reading the rsgb lf group mailings. It's quite interesting, thanks to you all. We 've done some experiments with kite antennas, which were (for the transmission part of it) very succesfull. Due to grounding problems in the field the reception was not too good. The kite we use now is a 'para-foil' and its size is about 1 square meter. The antenne wire is specially made copper litze with a kevlar core. The total length is abt 450 meters!!. Due to statistic discharging we don't use the maximum length. Last time (feb 20th) we produced abt 31 watts erp power ! Although we got some very good reports, mostly from listners who could hear us, we wonder if more ham's have noticed our signals. As a matter of fact we also transmitted in Slow CW last time, but we only got one reception report. The output power was reduced in our SCW experiment, due to a bad SWR caused by connecting a PC (It changed the earthing). We transmitted SCW on feb 20th from 9:35 to 10:00 gmt with a dot length of 10 secs. Freq in use was 136.495 kHz. Field locator was JO33HK which is close to the sea dike in the northern part of Holland.

The test dates were oct 10th, nov 21st and feb 20th . The transmitter we use is the proto type of the 'First', good for 130 watts output. Wim Pieterman /pe1pfr has disigned it and is a commercial product now. Nico Nienhuis/pa2njn is our CW operator and also qrv at home with a 'normal' antenna (11 meter vertical with top loading, home locator JO33FI). The receiver we use is a Kenwood TS570D with 270 Hz IF filter and DSP for audio. We use a Loop aerial, and active antenna for receiving; At home I use a G5RV ( for 136 a T-antenna) with base loading coil for reception.

Today I received some signals on the SCW part of wich i made a graphical plot. Received (saw) ON7YD (Rik) and ON4ZK (Gaspard) transmitting simultaniously 8 Hz apart. Later on I 'saw' Mike Dennison G3XDV. I will sent the plots to Rik and Mike directly. Next experiment will probably take place on a boat at a inner sea (Wadden Sea) to achieve better earthing and mho (radiation) , will let you know when it will take place. We also plan to SCW again but now in the SCW part of the 136 kHz band . What will be the best time for a transatlantic trial ??? Any suggestions? We have a website, where you can see us and read abt the experiments. It is still under construction and development. http://www.qsl.net/pd1aot

73's Nico Nienhuis/pa3njn (cw opr)

Wim Pieterman/pe1pfr (Tx designer)

Richard Middel /pd1aot and Jeroen de Rijber/pd1apa (Kite crew)

Jaap Valstar/pa3guc (Rx opr, home locator jo33ei)

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