K8MN

I'm  Dave Heil.  I was born February 28, 1949 south of Wheeling in the little Ohio River town of Glen Dale, West Virginia.
My wife and I returned to the United States in mid-2000 after having spent over a  decade-and-a-half  with the U.S. Department of State.   I was twice assigned  to the American Embassy in Helsinki, Finland and have had  embassy tours in  Bissau, Guinea-Bissau; Freetown, Sierra Leone ,  Gaborone, Botswana and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, arriving three weeks after the embassy was bombed in August, 1998.

My "ex-calls" through the years include OH2 and OH0/K8MN ('85-'87 and '95'-98), J52US ('88-'89), 9L1US ('90-'91),  A22MN ('92-'95) and 5H3US (1999-2000).  I was also a member of the week-long OH0MD/OJ0 Market Reef operation in July, 1986.

I've been on the air since 1963 and have held the call K8MN since 1977.  The callsign honors the gentleman who helped me become a ham--Andy Timberlake W8MN (sk) of Hinton, West Virginia.  I grew up in Lake Worth and Miami, Florida, in Lexington, Kentucky and in the southern West Virginia towns of Hinton and Oak Hill.  Cincinnati, Ohio and nearby Fort Thomas, Kentucky were home for nearly twenty years before I began work in the Foreign Service.

My wife Leila and I make our home a little south of the village of  Cameron, West Virginia.  Cameron has a population of about 1200.  It is located about thirty miles or so southeast of Wheeling on U.S. route 250.  Our home, Signal Hill is high on a hilltop about 3.5 miles south of the town near  the Pennsylvania state line.  Cameron was once a bustling rail center and hub for the area's farmers.  It boasted a machine tool company, a pottery mill and a glass plant.  These days the town retains a  foundry operation and a number of small businesses.


The antenna farm at K8MN is nearing completion.  Though we're in the countryside, we have only an acre of land.  It sits  at one of the highest points in Marshall County, West Virginia at about 1,520 feet.  There are currently two towers installed on the property.  One is a Tri-Ex 51 foot crankup with nine feet of chrome-moly masting extending from the top.  It  supports a large Bencher Skyhawk trapless tribander (3 element each on 20 and 15 and 4 elements on 10m on a 24 foot boom) along with boomers for 144 and 432 MHz and a five element M2 6m yagi.  The tower also supports inverted vees for 80, 40 and 30m. I've installed  separate 1/2 inch Andrew hardline runs for the HF and VHF/UHF antennas.

The second tower is 70 feet of Rohn 25 supporting  a Cushcraft 2 element 40m yagi and topped by a homebrew duoband yagi with 2 elements each for 12 and 17m. The 12 meter portion is of the "parasleeve" design and is "shock excited" by its driven element's proximity to the 17m driven element.  A Hazer tram system has been installed for raising and lowering the yagis and Tailtwister rotor.  The tower supports a coaxial inverted "L" antenna for 160m and a conventional inverted "L" for 80m.     Roughly 6,000 feet of radials have been installed for the latter two antennas.   Among the miscellaneous antennas are a 5 foot diameter shielded receiving loop for 80 and 160m hidden amidst a thicket of quince bushes.  A W1FB preamp gives the loop a boost.  My chimney supports a five element yagi for two meters and a six element yagi for 70 cm FM.


 My interests in amateur radio are DXing and contesting, rag chews and the collecting, restoration and use of vintage gear, and accessories from the 30s through 60s.  I'm quite interested in the history of amateur radio and have collected a large amount of material  on the subject including QST magazine complete from 1920 through present and almost all of CQ Magazine from its beginnings in 1945.


The new Ten-Tec Orion transceiver and  a Ten-Tec Titan amplifier make up  my primary rig.  The backup rig is a Ten-Tec Paragon which also serves as the IF  for a Ten-Tec 1208 6m, 1210 2m and and Microwave Modules 70 cm transverters.  A 300w output single 4CX-250B 6m amp and  KW amps for both 2m and 70m round out the lineup.  A Ten-Tec Mode B station is used for satellite work.

It isn't all amateur radio with me...
Click here to see a few of the things I'm interested in.