Irv Finkleman VE6BP wrote in
:

Try a camping goods store -- find a camper's clothesline
reel. They are plastic and might just be what you need.


Neat, and I like the totally enclosing design, but I think maybe too hard to
modify in useful ways. The kite winder looks most useful, I can mount a
socket on it, and hardware to anchor it easily in various ways. I even have
space to mount a small DC motor with idler wheel drive to the rim, and mount
a NiMH cell or two to operate it.

That sounds like overkill, but tonight after discovering just how amazing 50m
of stainless wire on high ground in open country can be, I found that my one-
night bodge with the scrap parts is ok for unwinding, just, and terrible for
winding. After ten metres I decided it was better to scrap the unwound wire
and bundle it into a pocket for later disposal, than to try to make my cold
fingers try to guide any more of it back onto my awful spool design in the
dark while stumbling on rough ground. I decided then and there that 100 quid
would not be too much to spend to never have to face that again. I think
I can get luxury for less than fifty, too. The main thing I want to figure
out will be stowing it at speed, even at a run. That will leave much more
time to be spent much more usefully.

For anyone reading this, and having any interest in the Tecsun PL-390 radio
and anything I said about it in other posts recently, here's the context so
far: With 100 turns on the end of the ferrite rod to modify it so the ring
terminal on the RF input jack is used for an AM longwire, instead of barely
detecting a Southampton NDB from Bristol, I now get several from France, the
furthest being Poitiers. As the Southampton NDB was detected by the
unaltered PL-390 with no possibility of external AM antenna, at 48 miles,
having only a 15nm range, the PL-390 is better at LW DX than many people
claim, and with the modification and a longwire, it's amazing.