The M0TTB / M6BBC Shack

My lovely YL bought the leather chair for me as a birthday present a couple of days ago... I love it, numb buttocks are no more and I can pretend I'm important. I have banned far more people from our forums since sitting in this chair ;-)

Oh, the clocks... yeah a bit naff , something 'Carry on Cruising' about them but it's good to see a proper clock face. I don't bother about local or UTC, I know that anyway. Picked the clocks up for about £10 for the 3... not ebay this time.

Where's the Kenwood TS-711E ? It's now indoors, where I'm allowed one plug-in the wall radio. So, unlike HF, if you work me on 2m, you are unlikely to hear me scream as a spider appears on my desk.

I must admit, I do like the TS-711E it comes from a time when Kenwood had a beautiful line-up of radios (R-5000, TS-440s, TS-811E). It's a good solid radio, big buttons and a decent size.... you're not going to misplace it in the shack, unlike most of these miniture marvels of today. It's how a radio should look ... even my Icom IC-756 Pro III doesn't compare to my eyes and taste.

A Sommerkamp/Yaesu FC-102 tuner is found, as has a good old, reliable and heavy Welz SWR/Pwr meter. Maybe it's just me but I always thought those brushed aluminium Welz meters looked really good back in the early 80's and still do. Icom PS-125 is added, A cheap find on ebay...again, who in the right mind would buy one new Icom PSU? Even at less than half price, it's still 50% more than it's really worth. Drake R8E receiver having a second life, with a surprisingly sensitive VHF module fitted.

Things are looking up a bit now, new desk and a shelf unit housing the Icom IC-756 Pro III, Kenwood TS-711E, an equally old Realistic scanner, plus psu units. External keyboard added, which lives under the Icom. Picked up a cheap Icom IC-SP23 external speaker on ebay... surely nobody would buy one new?

The area is very secure but even so, some serious alarms now fitted to the shed. A number of radio amateurs have asked me about the wooden unit to house the radio equipment. It's item #11899 at www.furnitureatwork.co.uk

To the left the aerials. The G3TPW Cobwebb 20-10m (6m at a pinch). If you are unfamiliar with the design, it's basically just squared horizontal dipoles for each band. It's no magic antenna but it is efficient, full 1/2 wave dipoles so no traps/coils, and for the footprint I don't think you can do much better.

Atop is the ubiquitous 'white stick' in the form of a 2m/70cm Comet GP9 3x 5/8ths on 2m and 8x 5/8ths on 70cm colinear. Not quite ot the build standard of a Diamond Antenna, but close.

As the keen eyed may have observed, there's been a

bit of a change in the shack of late. Out goes my trusty

IC-756 Pro III, and in comes the large and heavy IC-7700

Joining the new transceiver is the Palstar AT2K tuner, which should help in allowing me to cover some of the band extremities. The microphone is now the Heil PR-781, as I could never get my old SM-20 to sound good, no matter what in-radio adjustments I made. Initial reports indicate the audio from my station with the PR-781 is a league above what I produced before. Currently set at Bass -1, treble +3, with ssb AF spread of 200-2800Khz.

Out goes the old SP-23 external speaker, again it was always a bit lightweight and tinny, where-as it's replacement, the SP-20 is far larger and produces a more pleasing sound, but with the ability to resolve speech from very weak signal if need be.

Yep, the clocks have gone, but not too far, they are now on a side wall, as they were just taking up too much desk real estate. Although the big IC-7700 looks a bit out on a limb on top, it is actually at a perfect operating height for me, the display at eye level and the vfo knob at just the right height for my hands, as I'm an 'elbow on desk' operator. The hefty SP-20 speaker is also a nice fit.

I had designs on an external lcd monitor for the 7700, but upon reflection, it would serve no real purpose as the display on the radio is large enough. If I pursue the built-in psk31 and rtty features in the future, I may revise that... but for now, I'll do without what would have only been 'eye candy'.

I do have a second mini keyboard for the IC-7700, but more for easy voice memory sending than anything else.

Oh, and a glimpse of the ACOM 1000 over to the side, although not really a new addition to the shack.

Update to my house 'shack', a few months ago I purchased a Kenwood TS-2000. Impulse 'buy it now' job on ebay, I got it within minutes of it being listed at a very good price. As it turns out, it was an immaculate example, and a very late serial number as well. OK, it no beauty to look at but not quite as bad in the flesh as you'd imagine from photos. It's quite compact, about the same footprint as that of my TS-711E, albeit I have to have an exteernal psu unlke the 711E.

I like the TS-2000, it's surprisingly easy to use and just beats the TS-711E in resolving weak signals on 2m, although it's marginal. I really only bought if for 2m and 70cm. It's 'jack of all trades but master of none', but it is master of 'jack of all trades' transceivers ;-)