‘Ham’ing it up
By Mike Jastrzebski
Ten years ago, when we were wrapping up plans to move aboard Rough Draft, Mary and I both got our General Class Ham licenses. We bought an Icom IC-706KIIG transceiver with an AH-4 antenna tuner with the intention of mounting the radio on the boat.
After living nine years on the boat, I’m one wire away from being ready to go on the air. All I need to do is connect the tuner to the backstay antenna and if all goes well we’ll be ready to go live.
One of the reasons it’s taken so long to hook up the radio is that we didn’t really need it. There were so many projects that the radio kept being moved to the bottom of our to-do list. After spending a month in the Bahamas we realized that it would be nice to have long range communication available so when we started preparing for our next trip it quickly moved up the list.
The other reason I put off the installation was that I thought I’d have to run copper foil under the floor of the boat for a ground plate system. I have a dynoplate ground on the boat but I’ve been told that’s not enough, so that left the foil. I was not looking forward to the backbreaking job of running that foil, and then one of the boaters down the dock mentioned the KISS-SSB counterpoise radial system.
This system replaces the ground plane system, cost only $139.00, and involves nothing more than connecting one wire to the tuner and laying out a ten foot cable. The KISS-SSB is designed for the marine SSB, Winlink, Sailmail, or Ham frequencies from 2MHz through 28MHz.
Will it do the job? All my research says it will, but only time will tell. I’ll let our readers know what the results are sometime in the future when we’ve had a chance to use the radio for awhile.
By the way, the radio is not the only project I’ve put off for the past nine years. Before we left Minnesota we bought a radar unit and it’s still sitting, waiting to be installed. I just bought everything I need to build a radar mast, and as soon as I get the davits installed I’ll put up the radar unit.
I never would have guessed when we bought this boat that it would be such a time and energy consuming project. I’m not complaining, but if your thinking of buying a boat and have never owned one, be prepared to put in some long hours before taking off for distant shores.
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