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Monday, December 14, 2009

The 160m Net was all HEATED UP!!!!!


Here is Del's summary of tonites net
The topic for our Sunday night's APRNet was what do the net members use for
Emergency Soldering jobs. There were a lot of comments and I enjoyed this
net very much.

Most of the guys have or use one or more of the following items:
1. Use an inverter or generator to supply current to a conventional 110 vt
soldering iron.

2. Butane or propane torches, especially for outside RF connectors. One of
the points several guys made on the use of these tools was that they get
very hot and will burn what you're wanting to solder if you're not careful.
One tip was to shut the torch off for a second or two before you use it.
Another good suggestion was you can heat up a screwdruver held in a set of
pliers and do some soldering with that.

3. 12 volt battery soldering irons work pretty well and don't use too much
current. One idea was to use powerpole connectors on the iron and battery
for easy hookups.

4. There are smaller battery powered soldering irons using several AAs or
other types of batteries. Those are of limited use, taking a lot of
batteries with their high current draw.

5. Wood fired or charcoal fired old style soldering irons can be used for a
lot of jobs not requiring more delicate equipment.

Several of the guys have handpowered mechanical drills and the like. They
mentioned that sometimes you can find old style hand equipment at yard sales
and such. Obviously the APRNers as a group think this kind of equipment is
important, even tho most folks would say its old-fashioned. When the grid
is down old-fashioned will look good! I might add that everyone who checked
into the net has some form of emergency power, except for yours truly. I'm
workin on it. Really. Honest.

Some other contributions were that we're heading into a 35 mph world,
meaning we'll be using more battery powered vehicles and such. We need some
new reqs to enable this kind of vehicle to be used more safely in traffic
etc.

10 years ago one of the guys heard this comment made at a municipal meeting
in a local town. If the grid was down and/or transport was interrupted,
people would start dying in 3 weeks. Those weren't the exact words but you
get the idea.

Thanks to all who checked in tonight.

AC0BG Dean

N8BIT Dave

KD8USA Ty



WA1HHN Walt

W8UZZ Russ

NW8I Del

73s till next week

Del nw8i
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