AmateurRadio.com

 I toddled into the radio room this afternoon and flipped on the radio and most of the time I have my PC on and head over to DX Summit spotting network to see what's happening on the bands.  I did notice right off the bat the RTTY contest was up and going fast and furious. I did notice some spots for POTA (Parks on the air) I headed over on my PC to the POTA website to see how many active POTA stations there were. I found some that were operating CW and I spun the dial to see if I could hear anything. I first tried KD3D he was in Allegany National Forest in the state of PA. He was around 559 coming into me and I gave him a call and was answered on the first call. We made our exchange and he was in the logbook with that I thought I would give a few other POTA stations a go. 

I saw K4SWL was spotted and the call rang a bell so I looked him up and he has I blog that I follow and read regularly.  I followed him around as he moved from band to band but I just could not hear him and if I did he was way down in the noise floor. I did hear other stations calling him and sending their reports. I did not want to try a call if I was not able to really hear him. 

I then went after AI6ZD who was in California on Bolsa Chica State Beach.....it's -18 C here and just to think here is a ham on the beach in sunny California. Sometimes I feel the U.S/Canada border should have run north to south and not east to west! AI6ZD signal was down at the noise floor but now and then he jumped up to about S5. I hung on for a while and his signal slowly crept up and I was able to make contact and get him in the log. 

I then noticed K4SWL was on 80m and I thought that could be my chance to make contact but it was not meant to be for today. 

Mike Weir, VE9KK, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from New Brunswick, Canada. Contact him at [email protected].

Many of us hams, SWLs, and makers buy inexpensive electronics from China. It’s become a bonanza for small, cheap and surprisingly good radio-related gadgets and parts on eBay and other vendors. I buy a fair amount, most recently a recommended project box for a set of HF bandpass filters I purchased from a small company in Australia. It finally arrived and is superb for a very cheap price!

But there’s a dark side. I love a bargain more than most. But when it’s an illegitimate clone of another genuine manufacturer’s product, that’s no fair. Yep, there’s ways to legitimately copy another design with various hardware licenses and beaucoup software licenses (if that’s relevant to the product). One of the ongoing issues in the Pacific Rim to the rest of the world has been the taking of the intellectual property from others, making a cheaper product offered for sale, and using the trade naming and hardware/software designs of the originating manufacturer. In short, stealing for profit.

So be careful. The fake copies may not work with the latest SDRplay software including SDRuno. There will be no technical support even if you get some limited functionality using out of date software.

Jon Hudson SDRPlay.com

For those in or interested in the SDR receivers available, there are a number of prominent names. I’ve had an Italian Perseus SDR for over a decade. Paid the asking price (a lot by today’s standards). It’s a terrific product although aging in the technology of the design. The SDRPlay company in England has risen to the top in terms of performance, continued innovation and the software they purchased for a free download to their legitimate customers. SDRUno is a terrific software package which they continue to update. They have an API so other software makers (like Simon Brown with SDR Console) can drive the SDR car, too. Their price points are very good and appropriate for the various receiver models they have on the market. A third-party individual has written code for a continually updated package that implements a Spectrum Analyser for most of the SDRPlay receivers. I’ve used an old (no longer in production) RSP1 with it and it’s very cool! And don’t get me started on their tech support and education. Mike Ladd KD2KOG is the Dude on social media for SDRPlay and related products. Mike creates new markets for SDRPlay products by educating hams and listeners on creative new ways to use them.

Individual preferences for one SDR product or another aside, SDRPlay is a legitimate company that plays more than fair in the marketplace. They do a lot to support the various elements of the radio hobby that we all enjoy. We should return that favor so that they can continue without the eroding effects of illegal clones undercutting their market, n’est-ce pas?

In Episode 344 of the ICQ Podcast, we covered a news story about illegal fakes of the RSP-line of SDRPlay receivers being sold through various online sales venues. I made the suggestion that there’s a means for honest members of the amateur radio and SWLing community to help. On both eBay and Amazon (Ed DD5LP pointed out Amazon), there is a simple quick procedure to report fake or illegal clones or deceptive use of trademark identification on items for auction. I actually reported six (6) during the recording of the podcast!

Here’s what you do. I’ll pattern it after Jon Hudson’s blog post at SDRPlay.com that he published after I sent him a note of my statements on the podcast that drops today. It only takes one minute to do.

If you search eBay for the term “sdrplay,” you can get a string of hits returned, some of which are completely legitimate. For instance, SDR-Kits in the UK is a bona fide reseller of SDRPlay receivers (and another really good international seller of VNA and related test equipment!). Some might be individuals offering personal units for sale. But many are effectively selling fake clones. Here’s the first hit I got when I just did this search on eBay. Heck, it’s even a SPONSORED auction!

Clearly, it’s labeled as an SDRplay RSP1A but real owners who have looked at the SDRPlay website will recognize that it is a “black box” clone. Here’s the next step:

Once you find the Report Item tab, here are the options you should select to report it as a fake clone in violation of eBay’s stated terms of sale. I’ve added a brief narrative in the Brief Description that gives eBay your claim and the website through which to validate that it’s a clone:

Don’t think that just repeatedly filing a claim on the SAME clone auction is doing even more good. It won’t. It will just slow down the process.

After you click the Submit Report button, your submission will be greeted with the following response:

While this action on your part might appear to be vindictive, it’s not in light of what the nefarious seller is doing to the legitimate amateur radio and SWL marketplace of legitimate products. IF enough of us engage in this public service, it will greatly help eBay and companies like SDRPlay continue to provide legitimate products to the marketplace. It only takes a minute!

Frank Howell, K4FMH, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Mississippi, USA. Contact him at [email protected].

In this episode, Martin (M1MRB) is joined by Chris Howard (M0TCH), Martin Rothwell (M0SGL), Ed Durrant (DD5LP), Frank Howell (K4FMH) and Bill Barnes (WC3B) to discuss the latest Amateur / Ham Radio news. Colin (M6BOY) rounds up the news in brief and in this episode’s features is the Joy of VHF and Above with Tim Kirby (GW4VXE) followed by your listener feedback.

ICQ AMATEUR/HAM RADIO PODCAST DONORS

We would like to thank Terry Perry and our monthly and annual subscription donors for keeping the podcast advert free. To donate, please visit - http://www.icqpodcast.com/donate

- Amateur Radio on Hackaday - French Military Seeks Radio Receivers / Jammers - A New Version of WSJT-X is Now Available - Beware of Fake SDRplay Devices - Using Powerline Noise to Map Sporadic E - Extension to Field Day Rule Waivers from 2020, Add Class D and E Power Limit - RSGB's 'Get on the Air to Care' Construction Competition Winners - Additional Free UK Ham Radio Foundation Online Course Planned

Colin Butler, M6BOY, is the host of the ICQ Podcast, a weekly radio show about Amateur Radio. Contact him at [email protected].

WC - 332 White Rock, BC

 

When tuning for NDBs, put your receiver in the CW mode and listen for the NDB's CW identifier, repeated every few seconds. Listen for U.S. NDB identifiers approximately 1 kHz higher or lower than the published transmitted frequency since these beacons are modulated with a 1020 Hz tone approximately.

For example, 'AA' near Fargo, ND, transmits on 365 kHz and its upper sideband CW identifier is tuned at 366.025 kHz while its lower sideband CW ident can be tuned at 363.946 kHz. Its USB tone is actually 1025 Hz while its LSB tone is 1054 Hz.

Often, one sideband will be much stronger than the other so if you don't hear the first one, try listening on the other sideband.

Canadian NDBs normally have an USB tone only, usually very close to 400 Hz. They also have a long dash (keydown) following the CW identifier.

All NDBs heard in North America will be listed in the RNA database (updated daily) while those heard in Europe may be found in the REU database. Beacons heard outside of these regions will be found in the RWW database. These databases have recently been re-vamped and are slicker than ever before!

From CLE coordinator Brian Keyte (G3SIA), comes the following CLE info:

 

Hello all

We have something special for our 265^th Listening Event, now less than a week away.

     Days:      Friday 19 February - Monday 22 February

     Times:    Start and End at midday, your LOCAL time

 

It is just 20 years since fully-organised CLEs started.  Encouraged by Alan, to mark the anniversary Joachim and I have five separate, new, and mostly gentle ‘Challenges’ for you!

They are all based of ’20-ness’.   Whether you have enjoyed 20 years of our CLEs, or are thinking of trying your very first, this CLE should be a good one. 

                  CHALLENGE 1.   20  NDBs ( N )   Log any 20 NDBs located in any ONE RADIO COUNTRY of your choice. 

  

    CHALLENGE 2.   20  Radio Countries ( C )   Try to log ONE NDB from each of:

        listeners in Europe:       20 different EU radio countries

        listeners in N America: 20 different USA/CAN States/Provinces

        listeners elsewhere:     20 different radio countries

 

               CHALLENGE 3.   20  re-logged OLD NDBs ( O )  Try to log any 20 of the NDBs that were also logged in our first formal Event - CLE003, 20 years ago.

       In the Final Details a list will be provided of the 80 CLE003 loggings of NDBs in Europe and N America that are still probably active.

      

               CHALLENGE 4.   20  ‘n20 kHz’ loggings  ( K )   Try to Log a total of 20 NDBs on the ‘n20’ kHz frequencies

        i.e. on 220 kHz and 320 kHz and 420 kHz and 520 .. .  . up to 1220 kHz (as possible!)

       (The other four challenges can use the whole NDBs frequency range)         

  

    CHALLENGE 5.   20 loggings at 20:-- hrs  ( H )   Log a total of 20 NDBs between 20:00 and 20:59 LOCAL time during the CLE.  

       (If you find the challenges a bit too gentle, there will be an alternative hard version of this 5^th one.

        We will explain in the Final Details)

How will you set about tackling those different kinds of listening?   Some ways are good, others not-so-good, perhaps prompting some questions from you!

About two days before the start, the Final Details will have some answers and suggestions and full advice on tackling your listening and log-making.

So the Final Details will explain how one logging CAN satisfy more than one Challenge without any problems, but, as always, each NDB must appear only once in a CLE log.

 (If you are interested in what was going on 20 years ago I’ve added a short ‘Background for Historians’ below)

Background for Historians!  

Alan Gale still has archive information about what was going on 20 years ago.

At that time several of us were thinking about trying out some coordinated listening.

For example, early in 2001 Bill Hohnstein wrote “What would seem interesting to me would be to have a weekend (certain days) where ndblist would sponsor concentrated monitoring of a 10 – 20 kHz segment of the LF NDB range with everyone reporting their results” and Lionel Roithmeir organised an event for 2182 kHz monitoring.   Andy Robins, Michael Oexner, Morris Sorensen, Kathleen Redding, Brian Keyte and others contributed further ideas.

We were talking about ‘Coordinated Monitoring Events’ or CMEs.

We had an informal ‘CME’ on 20-21 January listening on 380-400 kHz.  There were logs from Alan, Kathleen and Brian (all ENG), Roger Caird (IRL), Andy, Bill, Dave Tomasko, Douglas Klein, Ken Zichi and Phil Atchley (all USA), and Morris (CAN)

Phil rescued us from the ‘CME problem’!   He wrote “I have one big suggestion. Let's change the name from CME to CLE, Coordinated Listening Event".  Every time I see CME in a message subject line I think a CME "Coronal Mass Ejection" has just taken place.”

Then on 3-4 February we were also joined by Bo Nenson (SWE), Christoph Mayer and Norbert Reiner (both DEU), Lionel and Mike Trodd (both ENG), Bob Parsons and Chris Steele (both USA) for a second informal Event which we called a ‘CLE’.

It was three weekends later, 23^rd - 25^th February 2001, and exactly 20 years ago, when we had our first ‘recognisable’ CLE (335 – 344.9 kHz), later labelled CLE003.   A grand total of 23 of us joined in with good participation from Europe and North America.  196 different NDBs were logged and ‘Combined Results’ were made, looking a bit like our present ones.

 

Michael Oexner, Roschbach	Morris Sorensen, Winnipeg
Jean Jacquemin, Merville	Rodney Valdron, New Brunswick
Pat Vignoud, SE France	Phil Atchley, Merced, Central CA
Tore Ekblom, Nr Helsinki	Dave Tomasko, Chicago
Lionel Roithmeir, Guernsey	Andrew Robins, Kalamazoo
Alan Gale, Lancashire	Doug Klein, Hastings
Brian Keyte, mid Surrey	Bill Hohnstein, Nr Lincoln
Kathleen Redding, NE London	Bob Parsons, Gloucester City, NJ
Mike Trott, W. Sussex	Jack Woods, Oregon
Robert Connolly, Kilkeel	Chris Steele, while at Ft Worth
Costas Krallis, Athens
Roger Caird, Dublin
Bo Nensen, Ornskoldsvik

 

Good listening
    Brian & Joachim
---------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Brian Keyte G3SIA          ndbcle'at'gmail.com
Location: Surrey, SE England     (CLE co-ordinator)
---------------------------------------------------------------------
 

If you are interested in some remote listening - maybe due to local difficulties - you could use any one remote receiver for your loggings, stating its location and with the owner's permission if required.( e.g. see  kiwisdr.com ) A remote listener may NOT also use another receiver, local or remote, to make more loggings for the same CLE.

These listening events serve several purposes. They

• determine, worldwide, which beacons are actually in service and on-the-air so the newly-re-vamped Rxx online database can be kept up-to-date

• determine, worldwide, which beacons are out-of-service or have gone silent since the last CLE covering this range

• will indicate the state of propagation conditions at the various participant locations

• will give you an indication of how well your LF/MF receiving system is working

• give participants a fun yet challenging activity to keep their listening skills honed

Final details can be found at the NDB List website, and worldwide results, for every participant, will be posted there a few days after the event.


The NDB List Group is a great place to learn more about the 'Art of NDB DXing' or to meet other DXers in your region. There is a lot of good information available there and new members are always very welcome. As well, you can follow the results of other CLE participants from night to night as propagation is always an active topic of discussion.

You need not be an NDB List member to participate in the CLEs and all reports, no matter how small, are of much value to the organizers.

Remember - 'First-time' logs are always VERY welcome!

Reports may be sent to the NDB List Group or e-mailed to CLE co-ordinator, Brian Keyte (G3SIA), whose address appears above. If you are a member of the group, all final results will also be e-mailed and posted there.

Please ... give the CLE a try ... then let us know what NDB's can be heard from your location! Your report can then be added to the worldwide database to help keep it up-to-date.

Have fun and good hunting!
Steve McDonald, VE7SL, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from British Columbia, Canada. Contact him at [email protected].

As a follow-up post from my last post entitled  "What has happened to Elecraft" in that post I wrote how shocked I was when I visited Elecrafts order page and the results, I had found. I was surprised to see the K3S had been retired and the lack of availability of their other products. My post had only been up for a short time until a comment from Eric Swartz WA6HHQ who is the co-founder (Wayne Burdick N6KR being the other founder) of Elecraft was posted. To be honest I was shocked and pleased to see that Eric was a reader of the blog. I emailed Eric asking him if it was ok to repost his response with a new post as some folks do not always read the comments.  I felt it to be very important to highlight Eric's response in a post for all to see.  He emailed me back and agreed without issue and below is Eric's comment. 

Hi Mike,

While the last year has been challenging due to the Covid crisis, the CA wildfires near us and related supply issues, we are not now shut down by CA for COVID and are financially healthy. We are alive and kicking - shipping radios, amplifiers and accessories every week.

You mentioned the backlog on the KX2, KX3, KXPA100 and K2, for which I apologize. All of these are still in production and shipping. Orders for all of our products surprisingly have been much higher than we expected during the Covid crisis, which has contributed to the current backlog on these products. (It looks like hams had more time this past year to enjoy the hobby, which has helped sales!) I just checked our shipping report for the first ten days of this month (through today 2/10) and all of these are shipping along with their accessories, the KPA500, KPA1500 etc.  We certainly have seen intermittent production delays due to parts shortages, but to date, nothing has shut us down. We've gotten pretty good at quickly finding alternate parts when one is delayed.

I see you were disappointed the K3S was no longer in production. We formally discontinued it in May of 2019 when we introduced the K4, after a close to 13 year run for the K3 and K3S. We've also previously discontinued the K1 and KX1, which also had a long run. In general, we discontinue products as sales decrease over time and when new products replace them. Fortunately, we've been able to continue production of the K2 since its first ship in Jan of 1999. No that's a long run :-)

We are also ramping up production and shipments of the K4, which also competes for production resources. I noted in my recent live video Q&A session on the K4 that we had just received 100 full PC board sets for the K4 from our local assembly subcontractor and these are winding their way through production. (See the Elecraft YouTube channel for the Zoom recording.) We received a huge response to the K4 and as a result, have a very large number of backorders that will keep us busy and financially healthy for some time.

Lastly, you mentioned the 'TBD' on K3S option boards and accessories. We recently asked for interest from our customers on a special run of all of these and received a very large response, which makes it economical to build another run of most of these. We've now received the quote updates from our suppliers and we will be contacting everyone starting next week who expressed interest in these items.

We're still in business, healthy and enjoying designing and building exciting products for the amateur radio community, and we hope to continue doing so for some time!

73, Eric - WA6HHQ

Mike Weir, VE9KK, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from New Brunswick, Canada. Contact him at [email protected].

 For the first time in a very long time, my radio shack is without an Elecraft product.  I was and still am a big Elecraft fan and had 2 Elecraft K2's that I built, KX1, K3 and finally a KX3. The only rig I had left was the KX3 and a short time ago that rig was sold off. As with most hams sold equipment becomes ham bucks for new things. I may regret selling my KX3 but at this time that has not happened.  I really needed to upgrade my PC and it was the KX3 funds that allowed me to do that. 

My KX1

I was on the internet this afternoon and wanted for old time sake visit the Elecraft website and what I found was shocking! I went to the order/shipping status page as I was feeling the fuzzies for maybe another K2 to build.  I saw the K4 and its ongoing status update link but then I saw "K3S no longer available" I took a double-take! That was the flagship of Elecraft.  It gets better......the K3/K3S add-on kits are for the most part " availability TBD" so much for an upgradable radio. 

Then there were the back orders KX3, KPA100 amp,  KX2 and K2. I am not sure if it's COVID that has put things in a tailspin but as an Elecraft fan, I was shocked to see this.  

One of my K2's

Mike Weir, VE9KK, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from New Brunswick, Canada. Contact him at [email protected].

Way back in the Wayback machine, when I was working on getting my Technician license (in the 20th century), I recall looking at the frequency bands available to Techs. Technicians had operating privileges for everything above 50 MHz, which looked like a lot of useful spectrum to me. The idea at the time was that Technicians were exploring the new frontier of amazingly high frequencies. Since then, the Technician license has morphed to be the entry level license.

ICOM has a good graphic that shows all of the ham bands and shows the common subbands for various modes. I snipped out the portion that covers the most popular VHF/UHF bands (below). Wow, look at all the stuff you can do! Also, it is 4 MHz of spectrum, big enough to fit eleven 20 meter bands inside it. (Yeah, yeah, the propagation is a lot different.)Speaking of bandwidth, take a look at the 70 cm band, with 30 MHz of spectrum. (Not shown is the 23 cm band, which spans 60 MHz.) The higher you go in frequency, the more spectrum there is.

Most people think of the 2-meter band as just FM and repeaters, but it is much more than that. I copied the 2-meter band graphic and added my own notatation on the various uses of the band.

Much of the band is allocated to FM, which is consistent with the popularity of the mode. I didn’t mark all of the FM segments, so refer to the color coding to see them. But there is much more than FM simplex and repeaters. Down on the low end is the CW-only segment and EME activity (Earth-Moon-Earth or moonbounce). The “weak-signal” enthusiasts tend to use the SSB portion, with the SSB calling frequency of 144.200 MHz. You may often hear CW in the SSB subband and radio hams flip back and forth between the modes depending on propagation.  Meteor scatter is mostly done via the WSJT-X mode of MSK144 around 144.140 MHz.

Automatic Packet Reported System (APRS) activity is mostly on 144.390 MHz, using FM-based 1200-baud packet radios. Other packet radio usage is not shown but is usually around 145.01 MHz. The 2m band is very attractive for satellite use, with VHF propagation properties and manageable doppler shift for Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellites. The downlink from the International Space Station (ISS) is usually 145.80 MHz.

Over time, I’ve used all of these 2m modes mentioned above, with the exception of EME. I am still working on that one and I hope to have a new 2m Yagi installed sometime this year that will enable it.

73 Bob K0NR

The post The 2 Meter Band: Much More Than FM appeared first on The KØNR Radio Site.

Bob Witte, KØNR, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Colorado, USA. Contact him at [email protected].