Biography

I first became interested in the radio hobby at the age 8. I built my first crystal set, a code practice "buzzer" and finally graduated to my first serious project, a one transistor radio ( a CK-722 , one of the first commercially available transistors) only to be heart broken when the collector lead broke off! My elmer, W9VAG helped my "spot solder" it back on.

I first got on the air at age 12, received my first FCC citation at age 13 and was then licensed at age 15. I was KN9UMD! That was in Lombard, Illinois back in 1959. I upgraded to Technician and later to General & Advanced. Though I've had a commercial First Class ticket since the late 60s, I finally "caved in" and took my KNOW CODE Extra exam in 2000, (and passed) just weeks before it became a NO CODE test!

As a youngster, I was a real VHF fanatic. To quote my dad, "our house looks like a battleship!"
In the early 70s I became a television engineer, working for KHOF-TV in LA and later for NBC on Mt. Wilson. There I had my experience with "California Kilowatts and monster antennas" (another story) I also worked for ABC TV during the Innsbruck 1976 Winter Olympics.

In LosAngeles, my call was W6SFG, with station licenses for WA6YLT and WB6NHZ.
I spent some time in England where I was G5DBM and in 1977, after moving to Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, I was assigned the call W4OSH. In July of 1996 while visiting amateur radio friends in Wels, Austria (OE5YPO / OE5BVM, Elfi & Erich Bajc) and (OE6MBG / OE6YWF, Mike & Sissy Schwab in Graz, Austria) I operated with my Austrian call: OE5ZBO. In July of 1996 I requested my old call sign of W6SFG. That year I was director of TV broadcast operations for the Titanic Expedition and operated as W6SFG/MM.

For nearly 25 years I was president of my own Video Production company, writing, producing, directing, and editing TV shows or doing custom 3D computer animation. In 2008 I became the VP of New Media Communication and Land Mobile Radio manager and recently the Exec. Director of Technical Operations at Liberty University.
In March of 2014 I retired from 50 years of working!


Most of my ham activity is now done from the mobile. I've worked over 299 countries with my 100 watt rig and Outbacker mobile antenna!
I am also accused of mixing business with pleasure by producing promotional, training and sales videos for some of the major Amateur radio companies such as Yaesu, Standard, and Outbacker. This gives me a chance to at least see and play with some of the newest products in the course of my "business".

One day I plan to write a book about some of my unusually, educational, dangerous and funny experiences as a ham for over 55 years!

In 2000 my wife Barbara and I traveled to Austria to visit some wonderful amateur radio friends, OE6MBG, OE5BVM, OE5YPO and OE6YWF.

That's it for now. . .
More to come later as we hope to provide some "EYE CANDY" for this page.
Hereis one of my favorite LINKS:
Http://bfn2.net

Worked DXCCs:

Equipment

FLEX 6400M -Icom PW-1 solid state amplifier, MFJ 3KW tuner.
M squared (KT-34) 4 ele. 10-15-20 meter beam on 72' telescoping tower
G5RV, 80-10M OCD @ 60' R8, Vertical, 160 M Vertical, Low noise Receive Loop.

W6SFG -FT-1000 MP running 24/7 - 365 as a remote base using HRD and Remote Hams RCForb.