Did you ever have a project with that one little detail you just didn't get around to? In ham radio, sometimes I think that it is required that you always have at least one unfinished project at any given time!

For me, one of those projects is my Mast-From-Junk (if you want to read about this project from start to current, go back to part 1.) When I made this, I put an end on it that had painters-pole thread, so that I could easily attach things at the top.

While this was a great idea, it went until now before I got anything that could actually be used on this! My intention all along was to make this work with my Buddipole parts, so I finally ordered the adapter they sell to attach their components to this type of thread.

Strange how time can slip away during the busyness of life, and make it take 5 months to get around to ordering a $6 part! Now that I finally have it, my mast feels much more complete, and I have a whole additional range of antenna tricks available to me on my portable operations!

     Ah yes, 90's nostalgia.  I miss the sound of my 14.4k modem dialing out over my land-line, and that melodic voice announcing my messages when I finish logging on....

     Anyway, I didn't even intend to write about that kind of mail, I'm writing about snail-mail, because mine was awesome yesterday!

Here's what I got, for those of you that can't see the picture:

     Getting mail is exciting whenever it isn't bills or junk, but it's even more exciting when it's all radio stuff!

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     No, I don't mean manage your guys as in coach your baseball team. I mean manage your guys as in keep your antenna mast supports organized.

     A few months ago I wrote about my "Mast From Junk" which I made primarily from an extending pole that was bound for the trash.  I have used the mast several times now - on Winter Field Day 2017 (You can check out myshort YouTube video to see some shots of it in action) and on a couple of other portable operations.  The last time I used it I had to pack up in a hurry because I started to get rained on.  I tried to be organized about it, but I admit to not being as careful as I should.

     Since I am planning on using this mast during my WWFF Activation of Darien Lakes State Park next week, I pulled it out of the corner of the garage.  After an hour of working, my guy ropes still looked like this:

     Why am I sharing my horrible mess that I brought on myself?  Because this is how we learn!  Sometimes in ham radio we feel like we should know everything just because we passed a test.  The truth is, whether you learned something by reading, or by other people telling you, sometimes it just doesn't sink in until you experience it yourself.  This is the case even if it is something simple like organization, or something more challenging, like graphing complex impedance.  I've read about methods for neatly wrapping rope and cable, I've seen the little plastic kite winders that some people use, I've even seen ways to support masts without guy ropes at all, but I just didn't get around to any of these!  Now I'm paying for it, but I learned a valuable lesson first hand - take the time to neatly pack your gear!

     So, pardon me while I dust off my pride, and go back to my mess of rope in the garage.  For now I'm going to re-wrap this with the "over-under" method that someone in one of the ham radio Face Book groups recommended (Google it, you should be able to find a tutorial.)  While I do that, I'll be brainstorming some type of device to wrap my rope around - simply buying something isn't my style, so I'll let everyone know what I come up with using the scraps of stuff I have in my garage...

Bye for now!

P.S.  Those things on the end of my guy ropes are actually clothesline tensioners.  They work great for quick adjustments and keeping guys tight in portable setups! 

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.     It feels like everyone is headed to Hamvention!  As much as I'd like to go, it just isn't in the cards in my current situation.  Basically, as a young father that travels for work, the vacation time I get is a carefully guarded commodity that is saved exclusively for spending time with my family.  Even thought I'm sure they'd go with me to Hamvention if I asked, I'd rather them enjoy themselves as well during our vacations - looking at radio stuff just doesn't do it for them the way it does for me!
     Just because I'm not there, doesn't mean I'm not doing radio!  I have several irons in the fire.  If you follow me on Twitter or Instagram (check out the links in the sidebar!) you saw the pictures of my progress on the shack.  It now has a ceiling, and a good portion of it's electrical:

     I'll get into details of how I made the ceiling, in another post specifically about the shack, but I'm please with how it turned out.  I'm going for the whole "Old English Pub meets Mad Scientist Lair" look for my shack, and I love the way this turned out!
     I also have another very tall "iron" (hint hint) in the fire but I don't want to get into that too much, because if it works out I don't want to jinx it - just do me a favor and put your good vibes out into the universe for me!

     Are you at Hamvention?  If so, what are you up to?  If you're not, what are doing to keep busy?  Leave a comment and let me know!

P.S.  The next round of info that I'll need input for on the Crowd-Sourced project will be coming soon!

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the code is more what you'd call "guidelines" than actual rules
​-Captain Barbossa
​                                    (Pirates of the Caribbean)

     The Amateur's Code might not be as exciting as the pirate's code, but it is still a set of very good guidelines!  I'm writing about it, because our code reached out and smacked me the other night.  Let me explain:

     I love ham radio.  With the little free time I have, I get on the air whenever I can.  When I can't get on the air, I read about ham radio, I write about ham radio, I listen to Podcasts about ham radio, etc.  For the last semester, I haven't had much free time however, so I haven't gotten to do much radio, or radio related activities.  I did manage one park activation during a work trip, and some contacts here and there from the mobile.  I also wrote some blog posts and kicked off my crowd-sourced project.

     I'm hoping that in that last paragraph you caught my use of the word "semester."  Yup - that means that on top of everything else I do, I'm also an adult learner!  The company I work for does tuition reimbursement, so I've been slowly working at my Bachelors degree in Information Systems.  I'll be done by this time next year - all I have left is 3 more electives, and my senior research project (guess what topic I'll try to sneak in there...)

     Anyway, traveling for work, having a family, and going to school makes me a pretty busy dude.  This busyness is what led to the aforementioned time period with less radio activity than I would like.  I've been feeling bad about this.  Not bad like I "owed" something to someone, but bad like you feel when it seems like your missing out on something.  

     The section that jumped out to me was the section stating that:
​The Radio Amateur is:
...
​Balanced...radio is an avocation, never interfering with duties owed to family, job, school or community.
...

     Stumbling across that section, on the evening that I did, was perfect timing.  It reminded me that when life is busy, enjoy it, and know that radio will be there when times are a little less hectic!

     For me, that time is starting now!  Since I don't have class again till the fall, I'm hoping to get some more of my project work done (I've made some pretty decent progress on the basement shack - I'll share about that soon) and get more time on the air (maybe some WWFF activations at the parks near my house). Most importantly, I'll just have fun doing whatever radio stuff I happen to have time to do!