Having finished work a little early today I was sat in the shack, I only had a few minutes as the YL wanted me to take a short walk with her. I decided to call CQ on CW on 15 metres. Now at the moment I am still using a straight key and I would estimate my sending speed at around 12 to a maximum of 14 words per minute. I was only running 25 watts to my 80/40 metre dipole so I wasn't really expecting any instant replies but immediately UR8IB came back to me. Great.............but hold on, I think he was sending at about 20 words per minute. Well I am pleased to say that I got the basics of the QSO, name and report etc but it was a struggle. His CW was good but a bit too fast for me! Still I am making progress it seems.
On my trip home from work today I was also lucky enough to work on 20 metres SSB R50YG in honour of the Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin.
The mystery of the TS830S goes on. Opening the PA compartment I could see nothing that had obviously blown. I removed and reseated the 6146 PA valves and checked and adjusted the bias adjustment as the manual states. I was then able to get a reasonable RF output on 80 and 40 metres into a dummy load. Attempt sat trying to tune on 30 metres and 15 metres resulted in another blown fuse and a dead rig.I am lucky in that we have locally here an amateur who is experienced in working with electronics and particularly valved gear. He has suggested the trying a replacement pair of 6146's first (I have a few spares) if this doesn't make any difference he has offered to take a look at the rig.
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