Wasn’t able to spend any time on this the past week or so, but today I finally tracked down the pesky problems that I was having with my temporary installation.

I’d damaged one of the original TNC pigtails used to connect to the filter, and that created a sometimes 30 dB additional loss. Also, I finally found a marginal to no-good TNC-f to TNC-f adapter that I was using temporarily to connect the TNC-m connector on the box to the UHF-m connector on the cable that runs from the roof to the shack. I don’t like UHF connectors of any type, but the discone has a UHF-f connection and this cable was originally connected directly to the antenna. Until I finish my next phase of project (getting LNA into a die-cast box as well) I will leave it this way.

Using the ICOM PCR1000 receiver, here’s a plot of 50 to 150 MHz. Pretty serious FM broadcast band suppression!

Still a few broadcast stations making it through, but much better than before. The plot below is the one from a few weeks back when I first got the filter assembled into the box.

 

The following is what it looks like today.

What’s changed? Certainly the filter/coax assembly is doing a better job of rejecting the FM broadcast stuff, but what’s curious is the new noise floor rise that wasn’t apparent before. That noise floor rise corresponds to the band notch characteristics of the filter, but I don’t know why I didn’t see it before.

Also, the installation needs to be rid of the coax adapters that I’m using while the project is midway. Once I get the LNA into a cast box, then both the LNA and the filter into a bigger cast box, I’ll install N-f connectors on the outside of the big box and will no longer need the adapters.

Finally getting somewhere…