Now that I’m done cussin’ at the software (which was doing what it was supposed to, I just didn’t realize that), I have some time to reflect.

First off, 15 and 20 meters were awesome.  10 meters stunk for me – lots of calling from CA, but nobody was hearing my 25 watts from Ohio.  40 meters looked good as well.  More on that in a second.

I netted 960 points in 40 QSOs.  Two new DX – Cuba and the UK.  One #WATwitter – @VA5LF.

I started on 20 and got several.  Went to 10 (I think I got one Q there), went to 15 and tore it up.  Back to 20, found a few new.  Jumped to 40.  On my 3rd QSO on 40 my rig quit.  Just quit.  I thought it had folded back (like it had high SWR).  So I turned the rig off and back on.  The rig lit up for a split second before dying again.  Tried it again, same result.  Again.  Again.  Put my hand on the heat sink on the back.  I did NOT yell “ouch!” (or anything of the sort).  It was warm, but not hot.  Did the same to the power supply, and the same result.  I unplugged everything and took the rig over to the bench and removed the covers.  Nothing looked burned or bad, but I couldn’t see in the finals.  Figuring that’s where the problem would be, I uncovered the finals.  Nothing.

So I replaced the bottom cover and moved the rig aside and got the power supply.  I tried to pull a pass transistor off the back, but after trying to pry it off with a knife I realized it was soldered on.  So I replaced the screws on the pass transistor and plugged it back in to try and put a load on it.  After plugging it in at the bench and turning it on, the transistor that I was trying to pry popped from the location I tried to pry it from.

So at least I know I have a bad pass transistor.  Maybe two.  The rig condition is unknown.  I’m going to get a battery and hook the rig to it and see if the rig runs.  I honestly don’t want to hook my Astron PS to it, as I don’t want it to blow if there is something wrong with the rig.

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Today is going to be my first RTTY contest. I’ve never done RTTY before last night. Fortunately, one of our Milford Amateur Radio Club members, Bill WS6K helped me (and others) out by creating macros and doing some how-tos. We talked through the setup on the club 2m repeater, and he even kept with me after my HT died, and my second HT had a dead battery, so I hooked my second HT to my little Astron power supply which caused a lot of hum on my signal.

So we got things working and tested. Hope to put a lot of people in the log today.

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