Garage Sale @ ON5ZO

Over the past 2 weeks I sold 4 items (actually sold 3 and 1 is spoken for) that had been lingering here for anything between 7 years and 5 weeks. No junk but very good stuff that I didn’t use anymore – if ever used at all. So why buy something and sell 5 weeks later? Long story… That particular item concerned a Palstar 1500W tuner, brand new (literally) and sold at a bargain price. That blinded me. Now what raised my interest in the first place? Regular readers know that my much touted 80m vertical is a killer antenna yet I can’t deploy it when the wind blows too hard. Those regulars also know that ‘contest’ equals ‘wind’ here so this is a problem for me. My plan was to make a new antenna, something ‘verticallish’ and put a matching network at the feedpoint. Make this matching network remote tunable from the shack et voilà: 80+160m vertical, not having to adjust wires when changing mode, independent of wind and tower height so universally deployable. Fact was that this tuner was cheaper than buying separate coils and capacitors. I saw myself mounting some motors on it and put it in a watertight box outside. So the idea of putting it to good use combined with the blinding bargain price made this fish bite the bait.

Of course soon after the purchase, when sobering up from the rush of having made the deal of the century, it dawned on me. I make many plans yet execute few. I envisioned the tuner packed in the box for a few years and then I’d finally decide to sell it. So I put it for sale online right away. And while I was at it, I decided to finally sell some other stuff packed in a box for a few years. As a result I find myself with some money for a brand new project. I have a plan. Better yet: I even plan to execute the plan. And I plan not to tell anyone about it just in case it doesn’t get executed….