My SSTRAN story

Hello all Part 15'ers. I'm new to the part 15 site and have been reading all the information on the site. After looking over this site and the information highway, I decided to get me a SSTRAN AM3000. So, back in December I purchased the SSTRAN online. I wanted to broadcast to a small town so the SSTRAN with a base loaded antenna fit my needs and budget. I also noticed the rangemaster as a choice, but it was out of my price and I wanted the hobby of learning-by-doing, which is also why I wanted the SSTRAN kit. It had been many years since I touched a solder pencil so I was concerned about getting it together, but knew if all else failed, Phil was there to help out.

I received my transmitter as expected. It was packaged very good, and all the part were there. I picked up a solder iron and some solder from Radio Shack and got started. I worked on putting the transmitter together for a few hours at a time, on weekends. Who knows how long it took, I wasn't watching the clock. After a few weekends I had it all done. Power on - Presto - Worked like a charm.

After several email questions to Phil, I started on my base loaded antenna. I crafted the coil from #14 magnetic wire. All the other items were taken from the antenna plans on the sstran website. I decided to use the inline coil plans for my antenna. After a weekend or two, I had the antenna completed.

Next, I mounted the antenna to the corner of my fence. I used a 6 foot iron pipe for the mast and hose clamps to attach it to the corner fence post. I ran CAT5 for the power and audio. For the ground, I used the remaining copper pipe pieces and pounded them into the rocky soil. I used the #14 wire to connect the ground pipes. With this particular setup I was able to get it tuned to 13v without a problem. The sound was really good for about 1/4 mile, could be heard about 1 mile out, but was not clear (in a car). I decided to move the antenna for testing purposes.

So, I moved the antenna to a center fence post and ran an additional 75 feet of CAT5 for the power and audio. Built a ground system using standard ground rods and the fence post. I was only able to get about 4 or 5 volts and could not hear any sound on a radio. Not sure what happened, but things got worse....I knew I was going to have to go back to the drawing board. I move it back to it's original corner fence location and could not get power. That's when the bad news came...I tested the wall wart with my voltmeter...sure enough...it was dead.

I did some more research online and decided to get me a 10 foot mast and try the exact same setup as the sstran site shows. I moved the antenna near the house and mounted it up on a 10 foot mast. Grounded the mast to 2 copper clad ground rods, and the electrical box ground. Removed the power from the CAT5 so it will only supply audio.

Since my wall wart burnt out, I found a couple of 24VDC power adapters on ebay. I plan on running a separate power line to the TX. So, I'll have CAT5 for the audio and another cable for the power. The power will come from an outside electric plug that is about 6 feet from the bottom of the mast. This will allow me to plug the new adapter into the outside AC outlet without a problem. So, I'm waiting on my wall warts, but once they arrive everything should be ready to fire up again. Hopefully, with this particular setup I'll reach out about 1 mile with a good signal. So, that's my story with the almighty AM3000.

Part15.us and Phil have been a great help. I'll post my results with my new setup. If anyone has any comments or questions please let me know. I'm looking to achieve about 1 mile with a good listenable signal. If I get good results with my new setup, I'll post some pictures too. I'm happy with my AM3000 and am sure it will meet my needs once everything is fine tuned and my ground system is perfect.

UPDATE: 2/24/08 -
I received the 24vdc wall warts I won on ebay. I used the existing CAT5 for audio only and ran a separate line for the power. The audio is about a 80ft run and the power line is about 15ft. There is an outside electrical outlet about 5 feet from the mast so the job was pretty easy. After running the new lines and hooking up my 24vdc power, I tuned the TX to 1680 and fired it up. It sounded really good, no loopback problems. I pulled out my trusty voltmeter and fine tuned the antenna. I got it to peak at about 14V before bringing it down to recommended 13v. After tuning, I took a drive in the car to see how it was working. I was able to get it to auto tune at about 2 small blocks. Nice strong sound around 1/4 mile. Listen able at 1/2 mile. Heard at 3/4 miles but it fades out a bit. Could still hear it though. I noticed that driving under power lines created lots of static. Overall, test results were not too bad considering it was a bit later, around 7pm. I plan to test it out next weekend during the day when there is not so much noise on AM. I may change to 1610 since that is pretty quiet where I live. Thanks for all forum the help!