W8ECG Repeater in Fostoria. MI 443.450
What's been happening by date: 2007 entries
08-02-2007 - As mentioned in an earlier post the AC power costs to run a 100 watt repeater is not outrageously expensive, we used a Mastech Digital Power Meter that figures Power Factor and KW used, idle the repeater uses .0076/hour, transmitting (80watts) - .0228/hour.
06-26-2007 - Bill and Joe2 at the Lapeer Field Day controls (Picture1), Joe2 on a Tech union break (Picture2).
06-19-2007 - AC unit failed and temps were up due to unusually hot weather, Joe1 and I installed a old new AC unit. Thanks to Jimbo for the last AC unit, it served us well.
05-30-2007 - As stated earlier our tech contacted Henry Amplifier and they sent us the parts to fix the 100 watt amp, well they send the wrong parts so we fixed it ourselves and it is in-line and working correctly, Battery backup is in place for both the repeater and the other critical stuff, here's what takes place, the AC is lost, the KW repeater's internal built-in battery backup/battery charger circuit detects this and powers up on battery, at the same time our AC relay loses coil voltage and switches the CAT controller, CAT port switch, WX1000 weather radio, Antenna pre-amp and bypass relays in the Henry amp switch.
05-16-2007 - We are in the process of installing a battery backup in the wood shed to power the repeater in the event of a power outage, we do not want to drive the 100 watt amp while on battery backup so we constructed a switch to bypass the amp.
05-15-2007 - We removed the notch portion of our Phelps Dodge duplexer to peer inside and we found a definite problem that was probably an issue from the day the duplexer was manufactured, the receiver port on the duplexer was never soldered!!!
05-14-2007 - Our Tech made a call directly to Ted at Henry Amplifier and explained what our problem was and the cooked resistors and Ted stated this could be the cause of our issue, Ted is sending the replacement parts free of charge for the fix.
05-10-2007 - On the issue of the Henry UHF amp model CDR100D30R, I had a qualified tech look into the self oscillation and what we discovered was unbelievable, the amp construction namely the circuit board construction was terrible, not quality work, one resistor was chipped and 2 large power resisters were burnt and their values had changed, this after coming back from Henry service, the paperwork with the amp returning from Henry stated the amp was ran for 2 and 1/2 hours and worked to factory specs, Henry also stated that I should check my output cable or antenna relay, the amp when attached to any antenna (I tried 2 different antenna's with different Andrew jumpers) goes into a self oscillation, the only way this does not occur is to connect the amp to a dummy load, and I suspect this is how Henry tested it. The amp cost around 1000 dollars and was repaired under warranty, the amp is now out of warranty, our plan is two replace the bad resistors and hope for the best on the main output transistor.
05-02-2007 - On the issue of the erratic squelch I changed the system to separate receive and transmit antenna's to see if the duplexer was causing the problem, so far squelch is OK, now on to the Henry amp problem. Amp is self oscillating in the repeater building. I changed some settings in the repeater and the COS dropping has ceased also.
04-05-2007 - Squelch has been acting weird as of late and it seems to be attributed to flexing of antenna, while wind was blowing yesterday I switched to side arm antenna and the squelch was back to normal, I will switch back to top antenna and try this test again on a windy day, if the second test shows the same results I will have CEF climb with our new Tech and replace the antenna with our backup.
04-02-2007 - New arc plugs installed in surge suppressors at ECG, worked with MF'ers (Mayville, Fostoria' Emergency Radio Service) - ground crew in Mayville on replacing antenna and hard line, the question of the day - How many will fit in a 5 x 8 repeater building? how_many.jpg
03-28-2007 - Had some issues with repeater receive being down and one of the culprits was a bad Arc Plug in the lightning arrester. I have some other things to do but the Easter bunny is coming and I must wait, also on April first a new technical adviser is joining our staff.
02-06-2007 - The amp came back from Henry and they said there was nothing wrong with it, it is too cold to play in the wood shed right now so the amp will wait.
01-15-2007 - In the process of buiding a new computer for the repeater building, also the weather from the weather station can be viewed directly from the text file, refresh as necessary.
01-05-2007 - The C100D30R repeater amp's output transistor (UF28100) was weakened by the high SWR and was sent for repair, Received the repeater amp back from Henry Radio Inc., I took it to the wood shed (repeater building) and placed it in service, I monitored it working and observed it sticking when it should have un-keyed, it was definitely malfunctioning, I called Henry and Tom said it is going into self oscillation and needs to go back to service, he said they check them a little closer when they come back a second time. Shyster loaned us a Mirage 100 watt mobile amp so we are still amping. Thanks again dude...