The weather started off fine for the June 5.7GHz Cumulative and unexpectedly I had a couple of hours spare so decided to play radio. It seemed like a good idea at the time to put the 60cm x-WiFi grid dish onto the 5M telescopic mast, to see if I could work anyone from the back garden on 6cm with the Pluto SDR and a Yellow FPV Amp providing about 1.5W.
It was a bit windy so I decided to use 5M of LDF-450 and put the Pluto box on the ground next to the mast. Band conditions were poor. I tried with lots of stations in all different directions with no success. The only signal I heard and worked easily on the band was Dave G1EHF/P up at Walbury Hill (IO91GI, 43Km) who was very loud, turning the SDR Console screen bright red and yellow.
Andrews LDF-450 is perfectly usable at 5760MHz with 0.984dB of loss on a 5M run (excluding connectors) so a loss of 20% using this coax attenuation calulator. On 9cm (3400MHz) the loss reduces to 0.724dB (15%), at 13cm (2320MHz) 0.583dB (13%) and at 23cm (1296MHz) it's just 0.422dB (9% loss).
During the afternoon it rained 4 times and I got a bit wet from carrying the gear (includng the laptop) indoors then outdoors then back indoors! After doing that a few times I decided to throw in the towel - in fact I needed a towel to dry everything! With the Covid-19 restrictions easing and RSGB VHFCC and UKuG allowing portables to enter contests from July 6th, this will be my last GHz attempt from home.
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| 6cm fun, inbetween the rain showers |
It was a bit windy so I decided to use 5M of LDF-450 and put the Pluto box on the ground next to the mast. Band conditions were poor. I tried with lots of stations in all different directions with no success. The only signal I heard and worked easily on the band was Dave G1EHF/P up at Walbury Hill (IO91GI, 43Km) who was very loud, turning the SDR Console screen bright red and yellow.
Andrews LDF-450 is perfectly usable at 5760MHz with 0.984dB of loss on a 5M run (excluding connectors) so a loss of 20% using this coax attenuation calulator. On 9cm (3400MHz) the loss reduces to 0.724dB (15%), at 13cm (2320MHz) 0.583dB (13%) and at 23cm (1296MHz) it's just 0.422dB (9% loss).
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| About 80% of my 6cm RF arrives at the aerial |
During the afternoon it rained 4 times and I got a bit wet from carrying the gear (includng the laptop) indoors then outdoors then back indoors! After doing that a few times I decided to throw in the towel - in fact I needed a towel to dry everything! With the Covid-19 restrictions easing and RSGB VHFCC and UKuG allowing portables to enter contests from July 6th, this will be my last GHz attempt from home.