Observations From Norway  15 September 2009

Think You've got problems?

 Some time ago, LA2QAA moved to 'new premises' in the township of Ornvika on Frei Island. Although his last QTH at Bolgaveien was restricted from an 'antenna farm' point of view, this one is far worse.  Outdoor antennas are not permitted and the one small antenna he placed outside his window was immediately pounced on by the authorities who demanded that he remove immediately, forthwith and tout-suite!  So, what to do about getting a signal out when antennas seem to be banned? The only option available is indoor antennas.  Such is modern life and town planning in the 21st century.  A clear case of 'marching backwards, not forwards'.

LA2QAA took a look at the problem and came up with a solution. It's far from ideal..... ideal would be an outdoor mast with a rotator and a pair of antennas for 2M & 70Cms but the reality is that they all had to go indoors. To this end, an upturned 'whirly' formed a tripod on which antennas could be mounted.

The rotator is a homebrew job, (and quite a nice one too GM1SXX).  On top of this is the 'business end'.

In the background you can see another antenna, this time an Arrow, mounted on a pan-tilt camera tripod.  Since this flat doesn't have a huge living-room, one antenna sits on each side of the TV set!

A simple 2 element phased beam (AKA HB9CV) was also fabricated, from material scavenged from a faulty Wimo X-Quad antenna. The eagle eyed among you will note that the phasing line is still to be fitted.  Since in Nog Philips 30pf 'beehive' trimmers can't be had... remember, it's 'the richest country in the World!'.... a 100pf variable was substituted.

The final photo shows the completed system.... note the TV in the middle showing the obligatory football match. A man's paradise..... well almost!

What more could you need?  (A case of beer perhaps... GM1SXX!)

There's only one fly in the ointment.  Running more than a milliwatt of power wipes out the TV's digital box, and that of the neighbour. It also makes the laptop PC unhappy :-(    Still, it's a small price to pay to get on the air.  Hopefully it'll be just about possible to operate AO51 with this setup. Not ideal... LA2QAA is a fan of linear birds, but FM beats nothing at all.

73 John,

PS Apologies for the poor picture quality of some of the photos. Taken with a mobile phone camera in tricky condx.