Wednesday, April 21, 2010

April 21, 2010 B-17 Radio Work Day

Spent some time at the Mighty Eighth Air Force Museum today planning the logistics for a special radio event that we are having there on Armed Forces Day, May 15th.  Steve-K4SDJ, Mac-KF4LMT, and I arrived at the museum around 2:00pm.  No radio work today as we spent our time surveying suitable spots to set up a radio station, run feedline, and put up an antenna.  Looks like the perfect spot to set up the station will be under the left wing tip.  We'll run our feedline up on top of and along the wing then out the doors that open out to the courtyard.  Looks like we can use a couple of light posts to hoist a dipole antenna (probably a G5RV for multi-band) between.  Next week we'll install some pulleys and cleats on the light posts. 

We have secured Special Event callsign W2W for the event.  I'm working with Jane and Brenda at the museum to create some QSL cards.  Jane is also going to have some photos of the radio compartment blown up for display under the wingtip.  In addition to our amateur radio station, we'll also set up the BC-348Q Reciever that we've been working on so that visitors to the museum can listen to a real WWII radio.  Should be alot of fun!