The building bug

I cleaned out the shack yesterday. It is now actually somewhat organized ; and you can do things in there without knocking all sorts of things over. As a result of the general lack of clutter I seem to have gotten the kitbuilding "bug" back, I have re-started building my ATS-3 for the umpteenth time tonight. Yes, that's the ATS-3 (not the ATS-3A or 3B for that matter) just to give you an idea how long this has been sitting on my bench.

Building with SMT (surface mount technology) is not exactly my cup of tea; but I'd like to finish the radio to possibly take to Lake George this summer vacation. I got the last of the inductors mounted and have started on the capacitors. I figure if I get a few devices soldered in each evening, then I stand a chance to get this done some time soon (like maybe this millennium).

I'll tell you that at age 51, my eyes are definitely not what they used to be. Through hole kits may be a thing of the past; but then so is my vision! Hi! On top of that my muffin tins with all my parts fell on the floor. I am 99 and 44/100ths percent sure that I have recovered everything; but a trip to the electronics store may be in my not too distant future.

40 Meters was good again tonight. I had a nice chat with Earl K4BSK down in North Carolina. I thought we were going to get skunked by some S40+++ idiot who started sending Vs on top of us without identifying, of course. But Mr. V decided to QSY after getting his antenna tuner adjusted - or whatever.

Shortly after, I worked ZF2GU (Cayman Islands) who was down at the low end of the band. I've worked Cayman before; but there was a little bit of a pile up and I just HAD to see if I could break through it. I did.

I was also amazed at how little QRN there was on 40 Meters tonight, considering that we had a Nor'Easter or some kind of big rain storm blow through here this evening. It was actually pleasant to tune through the band.

73 de Larry W2LJ