Do you remember that old Jack Daniel's advert, in which barrelmen show the secret ingredient of their recipe is giving their whisky the time needed to become one of the best? I think that every OM should be like JD employees: never too hurry to make "that special" QSO, never too willing to have in their shack the last radio. Rapidity is never a good advisor. In a previous post I explained how much I love to go vintage when it comes to work /P. Last week, I experienced the same feeling in a fixed QTH. I was at my elmer's home, and we both felt the desire to fire up one of his FT-101, that was unlit since too much time. A few radios can give you that "warm" and "plenty" sound, especially on low bands. To obtain the better result, we hooked the Yaesu to a magnetic loop my buddy built (he's miles ahead to me, as far as autoconstruction is involved) for 80 and 40 meters. If you never tried such antenna, please do that as quick as possible (you can find projects and instructions easily on the net). It's simply incredible. You tune the radio on the frequency/signal desired, then you regulate first its aiming, then its resonance via the capacitor on the loop, and you simply zero any noise, with the most perfect 1:1 ROS you've ever seen. It's not probably the main choice for DX, but for a local traffic (where local should be intended in HF terms) you can't beat that performance. Also because a magnetic loop really works high end with a reduced size: the 40/80 meters loop hasn't more than a meter diameter (and, consequently, it can easily be plugged to the banister of your balcony, not needing any bigger space). So, after choosing 40 meters (it was 17.00 UTC, yet a bit early for 80 mt.) we tuned on M0UNN working several stations. Fine regulation of the capacitor and, in seconds, he was coming in really well. The temptation to try a call, and see if the loop would made it with around 100 watts, was impossible to resist. The result is in the video below. Needless to say, yours truly enjoyed this QSO as much as working T32C. Why? First it was vintage true ham radio (my father isn't an ham, but I love to think he would have used one of those transceivers if he were in his youth), then it was smooth (and who said that with low than 5/9 you're not readable?!), and in the end it was made at the proper moment. Like Jack Daniel's. Cheers, and good CQ WW to everyone!
 

73,
Chris