23CM EME - Squeezing the Juice

May 25, 2025

The slew drive is a huge improvement, it just works to keep me fully struck by moonbeams. :-) 

After reading how LMR-400/LMR-600 cable deteriorates over time I replaced the very old and suspect LMR-400 jumper at the dish feed with a fresh length of LMR-600 Superflex. The SWR dropped to 1.2:1 and my TX signal was just a tad ( the correct technical term would be modicum) better. 

Fresh 7/8 inch hardline is on the way to replace the 15 year old LMR-600 main transmission line. The bank was kind enough to second mortgage the condo for it. A half db here, a half db there, and it starts to matter. 

On the receive side things just continue to work well. I'm still impressed by the OK1DFV septum feed - I'm pondering adding a choke ring. I worked ON4MU today who also has a 2.4M folding dish but just 150 watts on transmit. Q65-120D to the rescue.

Is the juice worth the squeeze? Sure, why not - the improvements I've made in the last two months have opened a another tier of stations to work - just now, while the moon was at perigee, In the last week I've added nineteen new stations for a total 23cm EME station count of 217.

 

ON4MU in the log. Click on image for hi-res