Amateur Radio Station K6JEB

So a few years ago I bought what I thought was a Cushcraft A3S Tri-band Yagi, used, on Eham.net classifieds. When I received it, I recall trying to set it up but being mystified since the traps were marked quite differently and the boom diameter was thicker.

Well I finally got around to figuring-out what I have, and here’s my best guess:

The whole thing is definitely a Cushcraft, but it’s an A3S driven-element and director, and the traps for and A3S reflector but the tip sections are longer and seem to be from the A4S. The boom is, as I said, from an A4S. The separate 10m element from the A4S is not present.

In essence, an A3S which can do more spacing.

When I bought this originally I was planning to take it out as just a two-element antenna for portable operations. But now I’m tempted to use this for contest season 2010.

Next step is to put it up on the crank-up tower and test-out gain and front-to-back. First, it seems I should try and get the director and especially the reflector (since it is a bit longer than an A3S reflector) resonant on their particular frequencies.

SO I’m thinking of using the driven-element center piece for the reflector and driven element to test their resonant frequency. I have a vague memory of these being 5% below the driven element for the reflector and 5% above the driven element for the director.

Call: K6JEB
Operator(s): K6JEB
Station: K6JEB

Class: Single Operator All Band (Assisted) High Power
QTH: Richmond, California
Operating Time (hrs): 16:57

Summary:

Band QSOs Zones Countries
——————————
160: 4 2 1
80: 1 1 1
40: 62 19 22
20: 78 19 20
15: 15 7 12
10: 1 1 1
——————————
Total: 161 49 59 Total Score = 42,768
Club: Northern California Contest Club

Comments:

I was a casual participant in this year’s CQ WW DX. Even with 500 watts, a wire
antenna on the low bands and a Butternut are not pile-up busters with this
contest. But there were some great new ones on the bands for me and it was
always fun trying to make a few more points. Glory be to all the JA’s!!!!
Heard some terrific operators working massive pileups with ease.

Even with some casual effort, I came away with a few new DXCC entities. Here’s a screen capture of my Ham Radio Deluxe Logbook totals (as K6JEB) before and then after this weekend’s casual operation:

Call: K6JEB
Operator(s): K6JEB
Station: K6JEB

Class: SO Unlimited HP
QTH: East Bay
Operating Time (hrs): 23:08

Summary:
Band QSOs
————
160: 0
80: 155
40: 99
20: 71
15: 40
10: 0
————
Total: 365 Sections = 70 Total Score = 51,100

Club: Northern California Contest Club

Comments:

The bands were reflective of the season: mashed potatoes and gravy all of
Saturday. Thanks for the spots! That makes a huge difference when you’re a
little gun.

Used my Yaesu FT-857D and Dentron GLA-1000 (500watts max) into an Inverted-L for 160m (about 35 feet high) and a ground-mounted Butternut HF9V along with Writelog. I did fire-up my Yaesu FT-840 early-on to try my hand at some Search and Pounce on other bands but since I didn’t have the CAT cable connected, I had to log each QSO manually, and so it became easier to just go to that band (barefoot) on the FT-857.

Because I lent my amp cable to a fellow EBARC member, I could only control the PTT on my amp with a foot switch, instead of automatically from the rig and computer. In other words, if you heard me at all this past week on the bands, that was actually me, not a recording (though I was able to call CQ from the computer barefoot, but that was not very productive). So a big note for next year: make sure you have all your cables and computer stuff set up weeks before to ensure the suffering is not repeated at this level.

My eyes and body and especially my legs were just tired and exhausted. I’ve been on party benders that have left me more lucid than I felt after this contest hi hi!

73 and KB
Jack, K6JEB