AmateurRadio.com

…..the long spell without rain that is. We had over a 100 mm during the last 24 hours in Longtan, but the south of Taiwan was worse off with some serious flooding. The temperature has dropped to a cool 22 degrees Celsius, but the forecast tells us that it will be back up to 35 degrees in no time and it will stay that way for the next week.

Despite it being hot and muggy I did spend some time in the shack on Sunday. Tried to fix the fan in the radiation shield of my weather station, but then my digital multi-meter refused to cooperate. Put the fan aside and spend an hour searching for the problem, but without a second DMM it is kind of difficult. I’ve had this DMM for the last 20 years and it was a gift from my father. It gave me a lot of joy during that time, but there is an end to everything so I am not too sentimental about retiring it. Besides, 20 year old technology is rather dated.

But what to buy as a replacement? The market is flooded with Chinese equipment delivered directly to your door. I am not a professional and only use a DMM for basic measurements and one of those Chinese ones should be good enough for me. On the other hand a nice Fluke would make my future measurements look a bit more professional. So I turned to the internet and the EEVblog website for some advice. Dave has made a buyers guide special on digital multimeters and it is both fun and entertaining to watch. Funny to see my 20 year old instrument in a slightly updated version passing by, but Dave makes pretty convincing points to not buy a similar model again with safety (actually lack of) as the main point. So go for quality and higher specs, but do I really need accuracy better than 0.5% and true RMS measurements? Probably not. But maybe once I get more options or better readings I find that they are really handy and then why have I waited so long in getting them?

Usually I try to find the best value for money. By searching RS and our local eBay site I narrowed down my list to the Agilent U1232A and the Fluke 115, because they are brand names and come out great in tests without being shabby on features. I also looked at lesser known and Taiwanese brands but funnily enough Taiwanese brands like Brymen are hard to get here Taiwan. Chinese brands, on the other hand, are not and one brand stood out a bit, namely Uni-T. Martin Lorton had very indept review of the Uni-T 61E on YouTube and I guess I will go with one of those. They are not the latest greatest, not the fastest, but they seem well build, accurate, safe and only a third of the price of a Fluke 115. A Sunday afternoon well spent and another problem solved.

Just before lunch, Richard G3TFX called in on his bike. He was on the way to his granddaughter’s birthday party in the village.

This is a photo of us in my shack. Richard is on the left. He is a regular visitor.

It was Richard’s alertness that probably saved my life a year ago. I shall always owe him a debt of gratitude. Richard has recently returned to the hobby. He is usually on 40m SSB, but is fighting a very high noise level on RX. Already he has worked some impressive DX.

Series Seven Episode Nineteen of the ICQ Amateur / Ham Radio Podcast has been released. The latest news, Martin (M1MRB & W9ICQ) and Colin (M6BOY) discuss changes to Ofcom licence changes and Martin (M1MRB & W9ICQ) and Chris Howard (M0TCH) review the Leixen VV-898,

• New RSGB Youth Committee
• LTE test transmissions in amateur / ham radio 2.3 GHz band
• SB6 Ultra Portable 6m Beam
• Noble Radio NR-4SC 4 Meter SSB/CW Transceiver
• US Amateur Radio vanity callsign fee set at $21.40
• Friedrichshafen presentations available online
• Send your message 'from the Moon'
• The Ham Radio Un-Club
• California QSO Party
• International Air Ambulance Week 2014
• Voodoo Contest Group in Kuwait
• Ofcom Consultation - licence changes from April 2015

Series Seven Episode Nineteen of the ICQ Amateur / Ham Radio Podcast has been released. The latest news, Martin (M1MRB & W9ICQ) and Colin (M6BOY) discuss changes to Ofcom licence changes and Martin (M1MRB & W9ICQ) and Chris Howard (M0TCH) review the Leixen VV-898,

• New RSGB Youth Committee
• LTE test transmissions in amateur / ham radio 2.3 GHz band
• SB6 Ultra Portable 6m Beam
• Noble Radio NR-4SC 4 Meter SSB/CW Transceiver
• US Amateur Radio vanity callsign fee set at $21.40
• Friedrichshafen presentations available online
• Send your message 'from the Moon'
• The Ham Radio Un-Club
• California QSO Party
• International Air Ambulance Week 2014
• Voodoo Contest Group in Kuwait
• Ofcom Consultation - licence changes from April 2015

Once again, I have no knowledge of this supplier or if the goods are genuine, or “ripped off”, but the prices are very good. My thanks to Steve G1KQH once again.

Other valuable finds which may prove useful to constructors or groups:

 

5V 100mA regulators per 100 ( I had some of these).

http://www.banggood.com/100-Pcs-WS78L05-78L05-Voltage-Regulator-5V-100mA-Transistor-Triode-p-932782.html

 

Mixed Zeners pack:

http://www.banggood.com/300pcs-2V-39V-30-Values-1-Or-2W-0_5W-Zener-Diode-Assorted-Kit-p-87725.html

 

1N4148s

http://www.banggood.com/500Pcs-1N4148-DO-35-Switching-Small-Signal-Diode-p-943164.html

 

Precision Ref board (ideal for checking Cal of your DMM) could be used for stable VXO supply:

http://www.banggood.com/AD548-High-Precision-Voltage-Reference-Module-4-Channel-Calibration-p-932160.html

 

If you put the word “Transistor” in the search on Banggood quite a variety of well known general purpose come up at good prices..

 

Orders seem to take about 7 to 10 days to the UK

The North America SOTA Weekend coincided with the ARRL September VHF Contest, which I interpreted as a great opportunity to do a combination SOTA activation and QRP VHF operation. A few other folks thought that was a good idea so we all got on the air from SOTA peaks on the Sunday of the weekend. I decided to operate from Mount Herman (W0C/FR-063) in grid DM79. I hiked up the same mountain for last year’s September contest and got soaked by the rain. Fortunately, the weather was excellent this year, making it a great day.

View from the south side of Mt Herman

For radio equipment, I took a couple of HTs for 2m and 70 cm FM and the FT-817 for CW/SSB on 6m, 2m and 70 cm. Most of the SOTA action would be on 2m FM but SSB is critical for working the VHF contest. I did put out the word to the usual VHF contesters that there would be FM activity and did work a few of them via 2m FM. The 2m FM calling frequency, 146.52 MHz, is commonly used for SOTA but is not allowed for contest use. (Another example of how this rule is just a barrier to contest activity.) We used 146.55 MHz for the contest contacts. I had coordinated with Brad WA6MM who was going to be on Grays Peak (W0C/FR-002), one of the Colorado 14ers. When he made the summit, I had my 2m yagi antenna pointed in his direction and easily worked him on 2m FM at a distance of 65 miles.  Brad was using an HT with a 1/2-wave vertical antenna. Also, I worked Stu W0STU and Dan N0OLD on Bald Mountain (W0C/FR-093) , which sits on the east side of I-25 right at Monument Hill. Contest activity was light, as usual for the September contest in Colorado. We did have two rover stations that activated a few of the unpopulated grids in eastern Colorado: George AB0YM and Jonesy W3DHJ.

Band       QSOs X pt =  QSO pts.  X   Grids   =     Points
 -----------------------------------------------------------
 50         8      1      8             5             40
 144        23     1      23            5             115
 432        14     2      28            3             84
 -----------------------------------------------------------
 TOTALS     45            59            13            767

My contest score was not bad for a few hours of operating QRP portable. It turns out that I had set the Colorado section record for “single-op portable” back in 1990 with just 624 points (using my old callsign KB0CY). Oddly enough, 24 years later it appears that I set a new record. (This speaks more to the lack of QRP activity during the September contest and less about my incredible operating ability.)

All in all, it was a great day in the mountains to take a hike and play with radios. I will probably do the SOTA + VHF Contest activation again.

73, Bob K0NR