Today was a MAJOR snow storm. 12" of snow in 10 hours and it is still coming down! So, with nothing better to do, I decided to get caught up on some old projects that have been hanging around. You can click on any photo to see a larger image.
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| Looking Out my Front Door |
The first project I decided to tackle was to build a couple of Common-mode Chokes for Jimmy, W8JA. The one I built was 3-1/2 turns through two stacks of four Mix-43 toroids. These are available from Fair-Rite as Part No. 5943003801. This choke's impedance should exceed 1-K Ohms from 1.8 to 18 MHz. and dropping to 550 ohms at 30 MHz. The full description can be found in an April 2006 document called "Common-Mode Chokes" by Chuck Counselman, W1HIS. You can find it on the Internet.
It's a pretty simple job to build this choke. It is just a 36-inch piece of RG8/U type coax passing 4 times through the upper group of four toroids and three times through the bottom four. My first job was to build a 36-inch piece of coax with PL-259's on each end. I used Belden 8267 cable. Below is a photo of one of the connectors after it was soldered to the cable.
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| PL-259 Soldered to Cable |
Below is a photo of the completed choke. You can wind the choke through the toroids with the PL-259's already connected. So, instead of building a 36-inch piece of cable from scratch, you could just purchase one and wind it through the toroids. I used a couple of Ty-Raps to secure the windings so they did not "un-wind." An Amphenol PL-258 double-female connector with Teflon insulation is connected to one end to simplify the installation of this choke either at the antenna or at the rig.
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| Completed Common-Mode Choke |
Still, I got one project off my "To Do" list today while "snowed-in"! On to the next!
