Author Topic: Humor is the best medicine  (Read 7026 times)

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ToeJam

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Humor is the best medicine
« on: March 12, 2012, 10:24:20 PM »
Ok, I hope this makes everyone laugh.
10th Monday in a row. Been having nothing but antenna problems the G5RV is in antenna heaven.
Ruined 4 pl259s, and lost at least 1 foot of rg8x .
Went out to string a fan dipole this afternoon, couldn't find my roll of trotline so used what I had from the g5rv, put a 2 ounce sinker on it and winged it over a tree branch, it sticks,wont pull the line down towards the groung, OK NO PROB, I am also an avid Catfisherman I have MUCH bigger sinkers, go to the tackle box, discover that my 3 year old Grandson has been going thru it to "help" Grandpa. I have exactly 2 6 ounce egg sinkers left ( I bought 12 after it got cold and I stopped fishing) tied one to the end of the line and winged it again,,,missed 5 times,, 6th time is a charm went right where I wanted it but I stand there saying some choice words as I discover that the line isnt long enough to make it and the loose end follows the sinker over the branch,, OK I have more line, so I tie on another chunk and tie it to the top of the chain link fence, miss 4 more times, finally KIND of get it where I want it. (arm is getting sore by this time) The line needed to come back over a small branch so that it would be over only 1 branch, so I pull it up and it wraps a half a million times around the small branch..
I could go on even more but you get the gist, I finally got it partially strung as the sun went down. aaaah tomorrow,, ONCE MORE INTO THE BREACH GENTS.. lol

AD

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Re: Humor is the best medicine
« Reply #1 on: March 12, 2012, 10:33:42 PM »
Time to sell the radio and start knitting  ;D

I use a 4 inch long 3/8 dia carriage bolt for my tossing on my slickline. Heavy enough to toss overhanded and get it where you want it.

I have the slingshot, but have not used it.  I will for reconfig my 40 m end fed from a inverted L and toss the end all the way in the top of the pine tree so its more true vert. 
The only dumb question is the one that did not get asked!!

RazorCityDen

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Re: Humor is the best medicine
« Reply #2 on: March 13, 2012, 08:06:04 AM »
I operate 'portable' most of the time and getting the antenna strung up is half the fun! :o

I use some slick poly 'sportsman' twine tied to a sinker, though 'tied' might not be the right work since the stuff won't hardly take a knot. I would just throw it away if I wasn't so cheap, but it is slick and doesn't hang up when it comes out of the branches. I'm a big 550 cord fan and carry several hanks to suspend and tie off with, but it doesn't work so good sliding though the branches.

I've got a wrist rocket and use it as well, unmodified without a fishing reel so it's still handy for emergency 'foraging'. It works good under the right conditions, it can really throw some line.

I know my dog, at first intrigued by my interest in the trees keeps a good safe distance when the twine and heavy sinker comes out! She doesn't relax till she hears the rig come on and then she finds a nice spot to settle in and growl menacingly (low and rumbly) when she sees folks. She enjoys that part so much that I try to find spots with line of sight above public trails so she has folks to watch. I play my games and she plays hers ;D

Good luck out there! 


ToeJam

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Re: Humor is the best medicine
« Reply #3 on: March 13, 2012, 01:10:05 PM »
OK got her hung, got in a hurry and cut it too short, 1.7 swr at 7.35000   
OOOOOPS,,, lol, no problem the onboard atu will tune to the bottom of the phone band but no further, I'' take it back down later today or tomorrow, measure it and add a foot on either side and start over, then shorten the exsisting wire to 20m,,, have GOT to get a lighter coax that 2817 thats about like pulling a brick up, besides need more that 50 feet, need 80-100 so I can wind a 1-1 ugly balun into the feedline.

W.Lynn

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Re: Humor is the best medicine
« Reply #4 on: March 15, 2012, 12:43:49 AM »
Someone please describe slingshot use for antenna-stringing in detail?  I need to know (just a harmless ol' grandma here.)

But I feel so prepped for this part, now I have a legit use for the slingshot in my range bag!

Hamsexy

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Re: Humor is the best medicine
« Reply #5 on: March 15, 2012, 06:34:55 AM »
Someone please describe slingshot use for antenna-stringing in detail?

http://ezhang.com/  is the gold standard for the slingshot technique.

Personally, I use my baitcasting rod with a fairly heavy sinker but the principle is the same.  Cast over the limb you want to use, let the sinker fall to the ground.  Tie your 'pull line' to the fishing line, reel it back over the limb.  Tie 'pull line' to antenna wire and hoist antenna wire into place and tie it off.

I used that method to hang my 570' 'skyloop' antenna in the woods behind this cabin.  It was quite a chore but I had Misspiggy's help...g.  It looks like the Wreck of the Hesperus, but works quite well!


W.Lynn

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Re: Humor is the best medicine
« Reply #6 on: March 15, 2012, 08:14:20 AM »
So, find a way to get a sinker tied to a slick line that doesn't take knots well, get it up over a limb, and pull your wire up.

Great, I don't do well with slick lines either. 

ToeJam

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Re: Humor is the best medicine
« Reply #7 on: March 15, 2012, 09:11:50 AM »
WLynn, do you fish? a simple blood knot will hold in all fishing lines quite well or the old standard fishermans knot.

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Re: Humor is the best medicine
« Reply #8 on: March 15, 2012, 09:21:36 AM »
I use white nylon mason line.  You might try a "nail knot" http://www.netknots.com/html/nail_knot.html. It works on very slick flyline
The only dumb question is the one that did not get asked!!

RazorCityDen

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Re: Humor is the best medicine
« Reply #9 on: March 15, 2012, 02:43:25 PM »
WLynn, do you fish? a simple blood knot will hold in all fishing lines quite well or the old standard fishermans knot.

That's what I have done with my 'pull' line to sinker and it works good. I tie on the 550 cord to 'pull' line with a hitch I saw in an ARRL antenna manual used to tie non conductive rope to the end of the wire antenna's when you don't have anything for an insulator.

A wrist rocket slingshot is no joke when it comes to lofting the 'pull' line WAY up and over the tops of brushy tree's. When I'm out 'portable' I don't get too fancy putting line though the 'perfect' crotch and just launch over the top and hoist up as high as I can get and just tie off and call it good.  :o

Take care,

Sky Pilot

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Re: Humor is the best medicine
« Reply #10 on: May 04, 2012, 06:02:03 PM »
Second the nail knot.
When the aurora is tilted just right I can wing that fishing sinker precisely through the fork of the very branch I want to use.
When propagation is poor, I let go of the drawn back fishing sinker, it impacts the rubber covered Y-fork of the wrist rocket and bounces back to belt me in the face.
I think I am pulling it to one side or the other instead of straight back.
Either that or I need to hire the neighbor kid to do my slingshot work for me.
As far as humor, aye, I had my good friend the padre chuckling over my account of rebuilding my antenna.
Wind storms up this-a-way (Yankee flat country, south shore of Lake Erie, flat as a file and nothing between here and there to break the wind but a bobwarr fence with two strands broke) ... last winds we had gusted over 78 miles an hour, which politely removed my stealthy magnet wire vertical.
I ran a diagonal across my little postage stamp of a back yard, tied off on an oak branch thick as my thigh, ran a 132 ft horizontal delta loop at 8 ft above the sod; ran reflector wire under it by unzipping lamp cord, laid it 24" apart under the delta and staked down with wire staples in the belief that other correspondents haven't been pulling my leg ... supposedly grass will thatch over it and the rotary mower won't grab it.
So far it hasn't.
Anyway.
I told the good Parson that if he ever set up a step ladder in the back yard, and it was the least little bit tippy, teetery or rocky, to stop operations until he had it rock solid and steady.
Then I described how this misbegotten spawn of a spavined, pig eared, big nosed, sway backed, ill tempered, intemperate son of a bucking bronco (alias stepladder) not only kicked out from under me, but fell on top of me and wallowed me about on the ground:  how this fiberglass beast tried to pin me, pummel me and bruise my dignity, along with other choice portions of my long tall and rotund anatomy, and how I finally fought out from under it, kicked it a good one, hopped about the yard on one foot holding the other, and finally addressed it (the ladder, not my foot!) briskly with a tree branch, screaming vile imprecations on its recycled soul, to the mirth and merriment of the next door neighbor, who was leaning against his yard shed wiping his eyes he was laughing so hard.
The Parson and I regularly meet for coffee and I think he keeps these meetings for the same reason my doc schedules me as the last appointment of the day:  so he can get a good laugh before he goes home.
Can't imagine why.
Maybe it's because a co-worker called me a commodion ... he said I was so full of it I needed flushed ...
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Quietus

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Re: Humor is the best medicine
« Reply #11 on: May 04, 2012, 07:33:01 PM »
Sky Pilot:  Nice account there.  Antenna work, will devolve to the worst possible outcome it seems like.  At least you are still above ground... or are you posting from Hell and just tweaking us?
 
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KC9TNH

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Re: Humor is the best medicine
« Reply #12 on: May 07, 2012, 04:27:28 PM »
I will for reconfig my 40 m end fed from a inverted L and toss the end all the way in the top of the pine tree so its more true vert.
Late to this thread so apologies. I'd be very interested to know how this compares, end-fed, vs the Inv-L understanding it is now.
Thanks.
 :)