ABOUT NR6CA

Randy Bynum was first licensed in April of 1965 as WN2SZK in Southern New Jersey. The very first station was a Hallicrafters receiver and a Heath Kit transmitter that was connected to a 40 meter dipole antenna. The station was used mostly on 40 meters but occasionally on 15 meters as well. After only a few months the General License CW and written tests were taken and passed. The call sigh then became WB2SZK. Shortly after obtaining a General Class ticket my interest in VHF started. The very first VHF radio was a Heathkit Twoer. Does anyone remember those things? It was connected to a small vertical antenna located in the basement but was a good enough station to work another ham in the local area on 2 meters. He also had a Twoer. Then the 6 meter bug set in. The first 6 meter equipment was a homemade crystal controlled AM transmitter and receive converter. The transmitter had a 5894 final amplifier and ran about 50 watts input. The first antenna was a simple dipole.

After a year or so of operating the Twoer, and listing to very strong 2 meter SSB signals that I could not copy, Joe, W2EIF became my mentor. He helped me build equipment that got me set up on 2 meter SSB with a homebrew transverter. About this time I also was able to upgrade my 6 meter station to SSB using a Heathkit HW-101 SSB rig. Now it was time for the first tower in the backyard. Up it went with a small 6 meter and a small 2 meter beam. But wait, I had not forgotten HF so I also installed a 2 element used Tribander JR. beam for 10 - 15 & 20 meters. Now I had a "hot" station.

Joe took me to a VHF club meeting to further introduce me to VHF operating and many of the locals that frequented the VHF bands. A short time later I Became a member of The Mt. Airy VHF Club better know as the Pack Rats. At this point things really started to get going for my VHF station. I was active on 6 and 2 meters SSB and even had a receiver capable of receiving 220 MHz. Then it was time to get some RF generated on 220 (well it was 220 back then when we had 220-225 MHz). I ordered some Hamtronics boards to build a FM transmitter and receiver for 220 MHz. The Pack Rats had installed a 220 repeater so this system had crystals for the 223.5 simplex frequency as well as the Club repeater frequency. Boy was that sweet! Now I had 3 bands.

The next big change came after getting married and moving to a new home. This new home was quickly set up with the radio gear and a tower. But then we moved from that home twice more in about 4 years time. Each move brought a little more radio equipment to the station and better antennas. Then in 1977 we moved to Berlin, NJ and had a nice 1/2 acre lot in a wooded area to work with. About this time solid state equipment was becoming quite common but the arm glow of tubes was still predominant. Since I was operational on 80 meters through 10 meters plus 6, 2 and 220. At this point the VHF Contest bug was getting pretty strong. I was now looking for a better VHF Contest station. One way to do that was to move to a new band so 432 was added. Again, this was with homebrew equipment. Then the quest for additional power was undertaken. Kilowatt linear amplifiers were built for 6, 2 and 432. Six meters had three 4CX250B tubes, 2 meters was a state-of-the-art 8877 and the 432 amplifier was a modified version of the Dick Knadle (K2RIW) parallel 4CX250B amplifier. At this point my station was almost completely homebrew except for a TS-600 for 6 meters and a TS-120 for 80-10 meters. The TS-600 also drove the transverters for 2 and 432.

The antennas at this point were 8 elements on 6, stacked 14 element beam on 2 and four 16 element yagis on 432. No 220 SSB equipment was avaiable so only FM was used on that band. This station netted me a top 10 finish in a January VHF Contest and a Section Award in a June Contest. But it was all about to come to an end.

There was an opportunity to relocate to California with my then current employer. I had made many business trips to CA and knew the area pretty well. So after some discussions with the family we packed up and moved to San Jose, CA in January 1981. Most of the radio equipment came with me though it would be a year or so before any of it was to be used. Then up went a few of the antennas that got connected to some of the old equipment but I also ordered some new Icom radios to expand the station.

Since VHF and above operation are very different in CA (mainly due to the mountains) there was less incentive to set up the high power station I had used in NJ. To make matters worse, we had purchased a home on the eastern side of the valley. The house is at 400 feet ASL with the mountins to the east peaking at around 1600-1800 feet. The path to the east is nearly nonexistent. Actually, from the NE through south the path is blocked. Now to the west is a different story. Line of sight to the Santa Cruz mountains, which are all of 20 miles away. Getting over them to Asia is easy on HF. In fact, I have even been able to work Hawaii on 2 meters. That was an exciting VHF Contest contact!

In 2001 I decided to get into the microwave frequencies in a big way. Contacts were made with some people in a few of the groups operating microwave frequencies in the Bay Area. As it turned out, most activity was 10 GHz and above. There is also quite a few 1296 stations on but sparse activity from 2304 through 5760. The Central Valley has quite a bit more activity on the lower microwave frequencies since they have a alley that is over a hundred miles long to work up and own without having mountains in the way. But that did not deter me since I figured someone has to get the ball rolling.

As I talked with more people it turned out that there was equipment out there for the lower microwave bands but there was not concerted activity going on. That is slowly chaging as more people build stations for 2304 through 5760.

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