My History

Hello everyone, I'm Enrico Radioamatore with License and Radio Operator License issued by the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications since 1988, my Call is IK1MNJ, here below my story, I became passionate about Radio in the 1970s as SWL n° 68967, later through a passionate work colleague of the City Band 11 m., slowly but effortlessly I must say he transmitted the virus and it is still present and there is no medicine to cure it hi hi, so from 1970 until 1986 I attended 11 m. , after which with a couple of other CB friends Nico now IK1JUS and Ermanno IK1LRR (SK) we decided to attend the theoretical-practical course to become a Radio Amateur, after passing the exams, finally at the end of 1988 the Special License arrives and the License to install an Amateur Radio Station.

Immediately with passion the first installation of a 22 m Tower. and an antenna, a Yagi 5 elements 10/15/20 m. (4 active elements for each band), a few years later I want to switch to the Cubical Quad, a 3 elements 10/15/20m. (3 active elements in 20 m. 4 in 15 m. And 5 in 10 m.).

In the summer of 1998 I replaced my small Tower with a 24-meter 50 centimeters-side Guyed Giovannini Tower plus GT 2500 rotator and an antenna-carrying trolley with an 8-meter mast, followed by a new antenna on this Tower, a MART Factory antenna by Bill KC4UZ (now SK), mod. King Diamond Antenna AMQ-5-6-150 ° -31 ', the antenna has 4 elements in 20/15/17 m. and 5 elements in 6/10/12 m. its main feature is the fact that the elements are positioned diamond-shaped with respect to the ground, the power supplies are individual for each band and use the Gamma Match, except in 10 and 20 m. where it is fed with matching trasformer due to the fact that on these two bands  where what was truly particular is the fact that it has two radiators powered in phase with a delay of 150 °, these radiator elements in 10 and 20 m respectively. they are not like two closed loop elements but they are isolated at the ends (like two dipoles arranged in a rhombus and isolated at their ends) yes it worked well but the coax delay line gave me practical problems when the antenna rotated 360 °around the Tower, so that one day I decide to modify it making it a classic Cubical Quad, eliminating the 150 ° phase driven delay system on the two bands concerned 10 and 20 m. to the test of the facts I cannot say that it was better before, have no way to compare it to before, however even so gives excellent results.

In 40 and 80 m. i tried many Antennas : Loop, Shunt Feed Tower, Inverted L, long Wire etc, actually i'm using in 30 m. 3 el Yagi wide spaced, in 40m 3 elements U-Yagi, and from 2020 in 80 m. and 60 m. a coupple of Inverted Vee Dipole hang at the top of the mast at a heigth of 32 m., the arms of the dipoles go down to the ends of the appropriately lengthened boom supporting all other Antennas at a heigth of 25 m, both working very well, at the moment i have no Antenna for 160m, i plan this spring to do some improvement, 1) reinstall the four square Dipole Array in 80 m. driven with Comtek ACB-4 Hybrid Unit, i use it in the past for some years with excellent results, (I had to remove it for renovations on my house), 2) in 160 m. i wish to reinstall an inverted L used for some years with good results.

I'm active in SSB, CW, RTTY and starting Digi Mode FT8 and FT4 from 2020 at the beginning of the covid pandemic, they are very efficient TX-RX system and I add relaxing and fun, I particularly like it because it is proof against various types of noise, especially my QRN which I have here due to a 30000 Volts line very close to me, problem never solved despite my commitment by involving the bodies concerned, first and foremost the electricity supplier ENEL and at an institutional level the MISE, without obtaining results. see on this page some record of my noise on varius bands, ...... to be continued