Sunday 17th November 2013

A bloody fire alarm went off in the emergency power house at seven am and everybody had to muster while Ashley and I had to go and investigate. It was a false alarm so all the sore heads went back to bed. A clear 60 knot blizzard turned into a white out 100 knot blizzard by the afternoon.

I adjusted the bias on the new tube in my amplifier and it tested all OK, but if I only had a radio to use it with, what a bummer. I decided to have one last look at my radio and I stripped it down again and I tried several different things to no avail. I needed some specialist test equipment we didn't have to calibrate it so I was screwed. I kept studying the circuit diagram and decided to have one last attempt. The PA was shutting down due to high swr even into a dummy load so it must have been a component failure in the swr bridge or the software has gone out of calibration.

I stripped down the radio for the 4th time and applied an earth to the reflected side of the swr bridge and hit the PTT and hey presto, full power. I had done the impossible again and got it working once more. The software power meter is still out of whack but who cares as long as it’s working, so VK0JJJ is now officially back on air. I tested the radio through my amplifier and it was putting out 2 kilowatts full steam so we’re back in business. 

I was pretty burnt out by now and so I went and had a spa, relaxing while reading my book for an hour and a half. After getting a few scraps together for dinner I went back to my room to clear all my emails and to write up my blog.