Just seeing I didn’t report on this blog that my 2 m PA used for remote ops had failed. đ It happened right after the early October tropo. Returning from taking a nap on 4 October when switching on the amp remotely the 50 V power supply failed, no voltage anymore (easily seen even remote thanks to it’s great remote control software). Luckily I was local during the EA1 tropo but I missed the opening into Russia early last week (quite a lot of tropo openings recently!) due to that. đ
When I had holidays late October and was at the remote QTH I took the PA (an old model OM1002 by OM-Power) apart. Checking the built-in Cotek SPSU confirmed: all dead. A quick Google search revealed: a new fitting SPSU would cost ca. 550 EUR – ouch! đ
So we (Heiko, DG1BHA, was assisting) did some deeper investigations into the power supply itself and soon found the culprit: a small IC had burned and blasted away it’s top, see on the photo below the big transformer! Luckily we could still find the top inside the enclosure and identify the IC as a TNY280PN. It’s application notes on the web helped to understand what the circuit was good for and what else needed to be checked. Besides the TNY280PN an optocoupler as well as 2 diodes failed, too. Ordered new components and the rest is history now, since Thursday last week (just one day after the UA3 tropo ended, damn!) the OM1002 is working again, total repair cost less than 10 EUR. đ Many thanks to Heiko who soldered in the TNY280PN and put it all together again locally with me 700 km away just giving instructions. đ Hope it will hold a bit longer now.
Having a working 2 m station again I decided to at least hand out a few QSOs in this weekend’s Marconi Memorial Contest. There was a good chance for another tropo opening according to the F5LEN tropo forecast and indeed, there was a great lift between the U.K. and southern DL, OK/OM, HA, a.s.o. Unfortunately it never materialized in northeastern Germany so just bad to average condx in JO73 (and some really ugly QSB at times). Nevertheless among the few dozen QSOs done I worked these nice DX contacts > 700 km:
------------------------------------------------------------------ DATE TIME CALLSIGN BAND MODE LOCATOR QRB ------------------------------------------------------------------ 20151107 2219 TMĂW 2 m. CW JN36BP 929 20151108 1210 G8T 2 m. CW JO01KJ 928 20151107 2202 F6HPP/P 2 m. CW JN19PG 875 20151108 0843 S55M 2 m. CW JN65XM 853 20151108 1230 HB9CLN 2 m. CW JN37WB 817 20151107 1904 S53D 2 m. CW JN76BD 784 20151107 1913 UR7DWW 2 m. CW KN18EO 766 20151108 1200 F8KID 2 m. CW JN38AT 750 20151107 2312 S59P 2 m. CW JN86AO 744 20151107 1850 HB9FAP 2 m. CW JN47PH 741 20151108 1049 S59ABC 2 m. CW JN76TO 740 20151107 2309 S57M 2 m. CW JN76PO 737 20151108 0658 HG1Z 2 m. CW JN86KU 730 20151108 1009 PA5KT 2 m. CW JO11WL 727 20151107 2249 S57O 2 m. CW JN86DT 725 20151108 1043 HA6W 2 m. CW KN08FB 720 ------------------------------------------------------------------