AmateurRadio.com

Hanz W1JSB and I hiked to the cabin at Knox Mountain this afternoon. We set up a 20 meter dipole as a vertical and worked London, Ontario on SSB and Guadeloupe on CW.

The first bridge has nearly collapsed. Two out of the four main timbers have fallen into the brook. We took a chance and scampered across the far north end of the bridge which still has some cross-boards attached. We went one-at-a-time and made it safely across. My guess is… the bridge won’t be here in the spring.

We had a grand time hiking to the pond. We hadn’t seen each other since sometime in July. At several spots along the trail, we could see where a bear had scraped up the earth, perhaps in search of food below.

The pond is always a beautiful sight after the darkness of the woods.

We had brought two rigs and one antenna. Hanz had his Norcal Cascade, an SSB rig set up on 20 meters. I had the little DSW by Small Wonders Labs.

We tossed a line over a 40 foot branch on the wild cherry tree behind the cabin and set up the dipole as a vertical. The bottom end was weighed down with a water bottle.

Hanz took the first turn.

There were plenty of stations to choose from. VE3LHU was calling CQ from London, Ontario and had a very strong signal. David answered and gave Hanz a 56. “You’re doing a fine job with 3 watts,” he sent. With that Hanz handed the antenna to me.

I went down toward the bottom of the band and right away heard TO10RR in Guadeloupe calling CQ. He had a hard time copying me on the first call, but came back on the second. We exchanged quick 599s and I considered myself lucky to have made the contact. Right away a large pileup formed. Had I waited, I would have missed the QSO for sure.

By now the shadows were lengthening and we were anxious to get back before dark. We couldn’t have had a better outing… it was 52F, and perfectly pleasant for a great radio adventure and hike.

Jim Cluett, W1PID, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from New Hampshire, USA. Contact him at [email protected].

Stories you’ll find in the November, 2014 edition:

TSM Scanner Buyer’s Guide 2014
By Chris Parris

Are you interested in buying your first scanning radio, or are you planning on adding a newer model with the latest features to your radio room? The current choices of scanning receivers available today offer a wide range of features and capabilities that have not been seen in the consumer market previously. TSM Federal Wavelengths columnist, Chris Parrish looks at some of the better scanners on offer today.

TSM Review Follow-up: Uniden 563 HP – Six Months Later
By Chris Parris

In April Chris acquired his Uniden BC-536 HP scanner and published a review of it in the May 2014 edition of The Spectrum Moni-
tor. At the time, he had not had a chance to truly explore all of the capabilities and potential that this new Uniden scanner offered. But, over the last six months he dove into the radio’s Dynamic Memory Architecture (DMA) and discovered how it can be useful for someone who travels around various regions of the country.

TSM Radio Buyer’s Guide: “Round up of Amateur HF Transceivers,” and Price Guide: “The Good, the Better, the Pricey”
By Kirk A. Kleinschmidt NT0Z

It’s a fantastic time to buy an HF transceiver: Features are up, RF performance has never been better and, adjusted for inflation, prices have never been better. But, the radio technology we’ve depended on for the past 50 years has passed the performance baton to software-defined radio (SDR). And there’s really no going back.

TSM Shortwave Radio Buyer’s Guide: Portable, Tabletop and SDRs
By Thomas Witherspoon K4SWL

Although many large government shortwave broadcasters are departing the shortwave radio scene, there’s no shortage of great prod
ucts being introduced to it. Indeed, growth in the portable and SDR (software defined radio) markets is reasonably rapid. This suggests, perhaps, a new kind of future for shortwave. Thomas Witherspoon looks at all of the best sets in each category.

TSM Reviews: Elad FDM-S2 Software Defined Shortwave Radio
By Thomas Witherspoon K4SWL

At this year’s Dayton Hamvention, Thomas Witherspoon made a point of checking out Italian radio manufacturer Elad’s SDRs, He
found himself interested in the FDM-S2 receiver as he instantly liked the GUI (graphical user interface), the features, and the specifications of this model. Elad provided a demo unit for review and Thomas gives you plenty of reasons to consider the Elad FDM-S2 for your listening post.

P25 for Hams: Amateur Radio and Project 25
By Cory GB Sickles WA3UVV

Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials International Project 25, known also as “APCO 25” or “Project 25,” has been around since 1989. But, for some reason, P25 hasn’t been covered all that much within ham radio publications. Even the ARRL’s “VHF Digital Handbook” has only four pages of its seven chapters dedicated to it. Once you read this article, Cory hopes you’ll be motivated to start exploring P25 as another interesting digital voice methodology on the air.

Linkbox 8000 Local Premium FTA Receiver has Terrestrial Advantage
By Ken Reitz KS4ZR

With the loss of the Manhattan RS-1933 receiver, is there a replacement Free-to-Air satellite TV receiver? Yes! But, the Linkbox 8000 Local Premium FTA receiver is even better; it has added local Over-the-Air digital TV reception to an already packed list of features.

The Spectrum Monitor is available in PDF format which can be read on any desktop, laptop, iPad®, Kindle® Fire, or other device capable of opening a PDF file. Annual subscription (12 issues, beginning with the January 2014 issue) is $24. Individual monthly issues are available for $3 each.

Ken Reitz, KS4ZR, is publisher and managing editor of The Spectrum Monitor. Contact him at [email protected].

Two things have happened over the last week. The first was that after what must be 10 years I had a decent crash on my mountain bike. Nothing too bad, just a reminder that I’m not 16 any more and that duckboards have 2 parts. One part grippy, one part slippy. The grippy bit is for the tyres not hands, kness, elbows and shoulders. The slippy bits are not for tyres. Enough of that though.

This forced lay off has had me googling rather than building stuff (that occasionally works) and I found what looks like a nice idea. From the video it looks like a simple, portable qrp hf transceiver. There isn’t much detail on the functionality but a quick dig revealed gerbers etc so a build-it-yourself could be on the cards. Without further ado, take it away Mr Colton

 

There’s a bit more detail here a the hackaday.io project page and a block diagram below

Alex Hill, G7KSE, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Cumbria, UK. Contact him at [email protected].

See http://www.kanga-products.co.uk/ .

Kanga is one of the classic names in QRP kits both in the UK and the USA. They make some fine products at quite reasonable prices. Shown below (linked from their website) is their OpenQRP transceiver.

http://www.kanga-products.co.uk/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=76&Itemid=78

Roger Lapthorn, G3XBM, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Cambridge, England.

It's always interesting to use one of the many 'audio viewing' software programs, such as 'Argo', 'Spectran' or Spectrum Lab, driven with receiver audio, to dig deep into a section of the spectrum using very narrow bandwidths. The narrower the bandwidth becomes, the greater the signal-to-noise ratio, increasing sensitivity in effect. The use of digital signal processing software can create the extremely narrow milliHertz  filtering needed to view signals buried deep in the noise...the deeper the search (20db, 30db or more into the noise), the longer the time needed to build up the visual display of signals that would be far too weak to detect aurally.

Recently, rather than using Argo to view a slice of spectrum I set up the Perseus waterfall display to have a deep-look at 1240kHz. This is one of the broadcast-band's 'local' channels and one that BCB DXers refer to as a 'graveyard channel'. Almost all stations on the various graveyard frequencies run a maximum of 1kW day and night. According to the Medium Wave List, there are presently 166 stations in North America operating on 1240kHz...one of the reasons that 'DXing the graveyards' is so interesting.

With this in mind, I recently took a mid-afternoon listen. Just one station was audible to my ear, likely one of the stations to my south in Washington state. Centering Perseus on 1240kHz, the waterfall was set to display a ~50Hz slice of the spectrum...1240kHz +/- 25Hz. The screen below shows the display, ranging from 1239.976kHz to 1240.024kHz. After letting the waterfall visual display slowly build up, it revealed 26 separate carriers. The remaining signals, although propagating to my location, were too weak to be detected aurally.

26 midday carriers visible on 1240kHz

Checking the MWList once again, it shows only 11 stations to be within expected daylight groundwave distance from here...Washington, Oregon and B.C. Evidently there is some mid-afternoon skywave involved or I am seeing some extended groundwave from Idaho, Montana and California. MW List shows a total of 27 possible candidates, assuming extended groundwave, so it would seem that most of them are making it here in daylight.


The screen above was made approximately one hour after sunset (looping E-W) and shows the same 25Hz slice centered on 1240kHz. There are ~70 carriers visible by now, with most of them fading. Some transmitters appear to be rock-solid while most exhibit a cyclical drift, no doubt the result of some form of crystal temperature stability attempt. I'm guessing that the rock-solid ones are using more modern synthesizers for frequency generation.

Listening on 1240 during this period reveals a boiling cauldron of audio, mostly unreadable until one station fades-up and becomes intelligible for a short period before fading to be replaced by another. Sitting on this frequency at the top-of-hour identification time can often catch a few idents with careful listening.


Even comparatively empty 540kHz reveals 22 different carriers, the only audible one being CBK in Watrous, Saskatchewan, the brighter trace at 540.002kHz. The one at the right looks as if it may have just come on the air for the evening. It's possible that many of these are low powered traffic information stations (TIS) running at 10 watts.
Steve McDonald, VE7SL, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from British Columbia, Canada. Contact him at [email protected].

See https://www.youtube.com/user/ve3cnu

It is always fun to take a peek into other people’s radio shacks. This YouTube channel is hosted by Canadian VE3CNU. He has a nice shack and some nice gear.

I am amazed by how much money some people seem able to spend on the hobby.  This is, of course, a very individual decision and I am not criticizing anyone. Some pay a lot more to play golf, for example.

What I would say though is the hobby can be enjoyed on a shoestring if you build simple QRP radios and/or buy good second hand rigs. My own approach has been a mix of some homebrew and a few commercial rigs.

Others prefer to buy their rigs new (often with long guarantees) and experiment with antennas and peripherals. This is a very individual hobby that can be enjoyed in a number of ways.

Others just enjoy chatting on the air.

Roger Lapthorn, G3XBM, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Cambridge, England.

I’ve been busy lately producing video of each talk at the ARRL/TAPR 2014 Digital Communications Conference, held in Austin TX this year in early September. There will be a total of about 24 of them when I’m done, and eight are online now, along with a few peripheral videos like operating mobile (HF, VHF, D-STAR) on the long drive home, and setting up a portable station at the beach (where I spent most of my time producing video instead of relaxing). So far you’ll get an update on stuff from FlexRadio (including new APIs for SmartSDR, the software that runs their new 6000 series); a rant from Bruce Perens K6BP on patents for the AMBE vocoder used by D-STAR and DMR; a couple talks on Digital Amateur Television (we don’t have to, but you’ll probably want to); a demonstration of bringing up three SDR receivers (where the problems are generally getting the Windows software and drivers to work); and updates on SDR products from Ettus Research and NWDigitalRadio.

Also on the way back, I was invited to stop by the North Carolina Mountain State Fair, where several clubs got together to stage a major ham radio demonstration tent. I’ll include that video here. For the rest, stop by HamRadioNow.tv and scroll down the list. I’ve added a link to a YouTube Playlist that has all the DCC videos I’ve done over the past several years.

Dig a little farther back for Episode 161, a supplement to my QST review of Yaesu’s FTM-400 and FT1DR System Fusion C4FM digital voice VHF/UHF radios.

73, Gary KN4AQ

Gary Pearce, KN4AQ, is the host of HamRadioNow.tv. If you enjoy this and other HamRadioNow programs, help keep them 'on the air' with a contribution. Contact him at [email protected].