The Amateur Radio Station of Richard Akelewicz

I became a Novice in the summer of 1968. My mentor lived about 8 miles away and I would ride my bike to his home to take lessons and learn to operate a receiver and transmitter. I took the code test and written test at my mentor’s home and passed easily. Building my station was quite a project.

I mowed lawns at $1.25 each to purchase a Knight Kit T-60 transmitter kit, (~ $60.00).

Building the kit was my first real experience with electrical work. I found it challenging. The Radio didn't work the first time I powered it on. My Dad found the problem (I had put a primary power wire one tab over on a terminal board). I went through the transmitter four times and didn't see it ;-(. My mentor also moved to Texas to live with his son while I was building the T-60. ;-(

My Dad surprised me with an HQ 170 receiver for my birthday, what a great surprise, a real Boat Anchor at 60 to 70 lbs. I had acquired an old receiver and was in the process of troubleshooting it when the HQ 170 arrived. What a great birthday that was.

I made a few contacts before I graduated from high school and then off to the service. My two brothers took over the station.

Now 40 years later a friend of mine and I had breakfast and he told me that he had just passed his General test and challenged me to get mine. We had talked about Amateur Radio several time over the 30 years we have known each other, well the gauntlet was down. I ordered the book 'Ham Radio License Manual' and began reading it. A month later I scheduled up a test for the Tech license and passed it easily. The examiner then gave me the test for General since I had only missed one question on the Tech test and completed it in 15 minutes. I took the General test and passed it also. ;-)

I also passed my Extra exam in May of this year.

From there I began setting up a station. I obtained a Heath HW 101 and began repairing it, (wanted one for my first station but at ~ $300. it was a pipe dream). It was really in very good shape for a unit about 35 years old. After cleaning, inspecting, and reflowing several solder joints and replacing a few wires it worked. The receiver picked up several stations on the 80 M band with just a 20' piece of wire pushed into the antenna connector. I hooked up a 100 Watt light bulb to test the transmitter and it worked as well, I just barely illuminated the bulb since I didn't want to really put out a signal just get some idea if it would work at all.

My station now consists of the HW 101, a Dentron Super Tuner, Station Console & SWR / Power meter. My first antenna was a 40 M inverted V on a pole 10 feet above my roof. I did a lot of listening and when I got comfortable I picked up the mic and gave it a go. I had a lot of fun talking to folks with my most interesting QSO being with a Tug Captain pushing a barge across lake Huron. I enjoy working 80M, 40M and 20M on the dipole up about 40 feet and cut for 80M. I feed the dipole with 450 ohm ladder line so I can make it multi band. My rig makes 100 Watts which has been sufficient to work Europe, England, South America, Cuba & the Caribbean Islands. My next antenna will be a loop fed with ladder line and about 300 feel long. I am also building test equipment. I have built an RF oscillator ( 2.5 thru 30 MHZ) that also contains a bridge so I can find the resonant frequency of antennas and will be building a frequency counter soon as well as building a bench power supply for experiments. In the wings is a 40 and 30 M Soft Rock, Software Defined Radio which I hope to build this fall. So far my most enjoyable activities are working Special Event Stations and participating in the "Rainbow Bay connection" which is a long standing net of boaters originating in Rainbow Bay, Eleuthra, Bahamas. The participants extend from Virginia through South Florida and the Bahamas.

Enjoy Ham Radio and I hope to see you down the Log.

73 and best wishes,

Richard Akelewicz KI4UZI

80 Meters on top fed with 450 ohm ladder line / 40 meters on bottom fed with coax.