BATC Forum

Yesterday afternoon Martin G4FKK and I experimented with our 4m gear, spurred on in part by me testing my Portsdown4 on 6m and finding that I could easily decode myself across the shack. Unfortunately my 6/4 brick amp seems to have stopped amplifying so I wasn't able to raise more than 1/2 a watt on 6 to my colinear - the drive from the Pluto is noticeably smaller than on 4m. SInce I had a beam already pointing in Martins direction we moved to 4m and then tried various guard bands and FEC rates and video sources. I was getting a 10dB SNR with Martin running 2.5W at 500SR, about 7 miles obstructed path, a 4 element his end and a 5 my end. Somewhat encouraged by this, I tried sending 'barefoot' (about 1/2 a watt) using 150SR and he got a reasonable lock.
All good stuff
Gareth