Shack connected finally

Today I ran all 50m of LMR400 between the vertical and the new shed. I'm glad I didn't buy the 40m that I thought I needed.. to be honest, I could have done with an extra 2m. 

I was more than a little concerned due to a couple of kinks that pulled tight as I dragged it around.

Still, the SARK100 on the end of the cable gave me the results exactly as I was expecting for that antenna despite the ridiculous cable length. 

I took the Xiegu G90 down to the shed and hooked it up. It seemed to receive OK, but I was putting up with the late afternoon noise. 

I tried hooking up to the PC and wasted quite some time not being able to get the radio to talk to WSJTX. No useful combinations would let it get control over the radio. 

Eventually - after about 2 hours, I decided to fiddle with FLRig. Low and behold, a workable option - and one that lets me actually control the mode. Kinda useful for moving between LSB and USB on 40m - especially given that I'll probably be using the radio remotely more than anything. 

The answer to the question of whether or not the antenna works:

 

I certainly seem to be heard in the US tonight.  The waterfall is pretty busy. 

I need to actually do something about mounting the radio still. Right now it's a bit of a mess, but it's a start. 

I've had a cold all week and I can't say that I'm all that energetic to be sorting out anything like that just at the moment.

In unrelated news:

The home network is becoming more Unifi based - the PoE switch that drives the cameras is about to become Unifi. I managed to find someone selling a used switch at a price that isn't the ludicrous amounts people have been passing off Unifi gear at the moment. Hopefully it'll be here in the next week. It's not entirely necessary, but I'm mindful of the age of the old switch - at 15 years old, it's well past its anticipated used by date. 

I had an outstanding order for a small 5 port switch that could run from USB. They're back ordered up the wazoo, but there are a few sellers with 3 packs. In the end, I grabbed a 3 pack, and when it arrives, I'll take what I need, and sell the rest. I don't foresee loosing any money on that one. 

Right now there's CAT5 running out to the shed with an access point connected and an old router connected to the secondary port so the cameras can get hooked in. Not the long term plan. Until the UAP-AC-M-AU gets back in stock, I'm stuck doing this. I might need to hook up some fence wire above head height and hang the cable off it just to get it out the way. It's not terribly kosher to be running CAT5 outside, and I certainly wouldn't be doing this if I had mains power in the shed.