AmateurRadio.com

I have been having serious radio withdrawal – I am really itching to get on the air and operate!  Unfortunately, life is happening and I have had zero time to operate.

When this happens I usually watch a lot of videos and read blogs.  This then leads a big list of “I wanna do that” type projects.

So I thought I would list the top 3 or 4 here and set a goal of getting them done by Christmas:

1.  Get a long wire inverted L 9:1 UNUN antenna installed at the house.  I have the UNUN built and I have the small gauge “stealthy” wire from the Wire Man – just need to get it up in the trees!

2.  Rockmite 40 – I have had this kit along with the Mitybox for several years – just need to get it built.

3. DIY Powerpole Distribution Block – There are some great plans for this here: http://www.qsl.net/wd4bis/connect.htm

4. Magnetic loop antenna with automatic controller.  I have the board, just need some components to get the board built up and working – I really want to get this going early this fall!

The list is much longer – but this is the top four I want to get done right now.

What is on your project list?

Burke Jones, NØHYD, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Kansas, USA. Contact him at [email protected].

I have been having serious radio withdrawal – I am really itching to get on the air and operate!  Unfortunately, life is happening and I have had zero time to operate.

When this happens I usually watch a lot of videos and read blogs.  This then leads a big list of “I wanna do that” type projects.

So I thought I would list the top 3 or 4 here and set a goal of getting them done by Christmas:

1.  Get a long wire inverted L 9:1 UNUN antenna installed at the house.  I have the UNUN built and I have the small gauge “stealthy” wire from the Wire Man – just need to get it up in the trees!

2.  Rockmite 40 – I have had this kit along with the Mitybox for several years – just need to get it built.

3. DIY Powerpole Distribution Block – There are some great plans for this here: http://www.qsl.net/wd4bis/connect.htm

4. Magnetic loop antenna with automatic controller.  I have the board, just need some components to get the board built up and working – I really want to get this going early this fall!

The list is much longer – but this is the top four I want to get done right now.

What is on your project list?

Burke Jones, NØHYD, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Kansas, USA. Contact him at [email protected].

With the fresnels in hand, a pair of plywood box enclosures were built...one for the receiver and one for the transmitter. Eventually they would be coupled together so that both would be pointing at the same distant spot.



The next step was to use John's design to mount the receiver and transmitter modules so they could be locked into position once aligned properly. His system used the 1/4" split shaft locking mechanism removed from an old Allen-Bradley potentiometer to hold a short length of rod fastened to the module's case.







This allowed the shaft to be moved forward and backward for focus while the slot in the mounting plate allowed for vertical centering. The plate mounting mechanism itself allowed for lateral centering. This system allowed for the locking of the receiver's photodiode at the exact focal point of the fresnel lens.The same scheme was employed for the transmitter's LED as well, since accurate focusing was critical there also.







In order to focus as much of the LED's light onto the primary fresnel lens, a small inexpensive (secondary) collimating lens was required. This assured that the fresnel was properly illuminated out to its edges and no further. Any light spilling over the edges of the fresnel would just be wasted.


Our particular fresnel had an effective aperture of 260mm and a focal length of 200mm, producing an F-number (f/D ratio) of .76.... Clint suggested that our collimating lens should have an F-number of ~ 1 - 1.2 and be a PMN (Positive MeNiscus) type and that we hedge our bets by trying lenses above and below that value. Ideally the collimator should be at least 25mm in diameter for ease of mounting and, when perfectly illuminating the fresnel, be as close to the LED as possible, if not touching it. Just placing a less than ideal secondary too close to the LED would end up over-illuminating the fresnel, while having it too far away would under-illuminate it.

Accordingly, four small glass collimating lens of various F-numbers were purchased from Surplus Shed at around $4 each. Each lens was then mounted on a drilled-out piece of PCB material using 'JB Weld'.


Once cleaned-up, the lens board was then positioned directly over the center of the LED on a machine-screw carriage mount. The carriage allowed the lens to be locked into position once it was correctly positioned. All four lenses were tested to see which one would correctly illuminate the fresnel while still being as close to the LED as possible.







The eventual winning secondary lens was #L10016 (.9 f/D) which allowed for a sharp and fully-illuminated fresnel while being just a few millimeters above the LED.



The next step was to adjust the entire LED and secondary carriage for the sharpest focus on a distant flat surface. This was done over a distance of about 200' and was a fairly fine adjustment.


Once done, it was actually possible to see the two fine wires connecting to the LED die on the distant projected image.


With the final focusing taken care of, the tone modulator and MOSFET LED driver were installed. This used an IRF540 switching FET, driven by the digital tone signal to control the current through the LED.


All we could do now was patiently wait for a nice clear evening to put the system to work.
Steve McDonald, VE7SL, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from British Columbia, Canada. Contact him at [email protected].

John KK4ITN left a comment on my post "Conditions" over at AmateurRadio.com. Here's a line from it:

"Seems when the bands are down every person with a ‘bug’ is out calling cq. Wish they would put code oscillators and dummie loads on sale. Dits at 20 wpm and dahs at 5 wpm."

I guess it's not directly related to band conditions, and I'm not sure that John's claim is 1,000,000% accurate, however - he makes an excellent point.

Not to dump on bug users, because I have a bug. I like using a bug. Using a straight key makes the arthritis in my hands go "Hey! Stop that!" But unless I've practiced with my bug (off the air) for a while .... my sending can be pretty bad.  So I try to make it a point to take the KX3 "off the air" and practice sending with my bug on a regular basis.  Not as regularly as I should, but I try to keep in decent practice.

I agree with John and I would posit that listening to someone use a bug (or even a straight key or paddles, for that matter), who doesn't know how to use it properly, is akin to listening to nails being scratched across a blackboard. NB: For any younger readers, a blackboard is what we used in school before the advent of whiteboards and smartboards.  If you scrape your fingernails across the surface of a blackboard, it makes a sound unlike anything you've ever heard. It literally hurts to listen to it.  It will make your teeth ache. There's something about human fingernails and slate that just don't mix. Listening to someone scratch a balloon is almost as bad. But .... I digress.

The phrase, "Dits at 20 wpm and dahs at 5 wpm" resonated with me.  Morse Code sent like that is not only unreadable - even worse, it's unbearable.  No one is asking that all Morse be sent so that it sounds like it's coming from a keyer or a computer - but for Pete's sake - at least make sure your sending is copyable!

I would suggest that anyone who is inclined to use a bug perform this little exercise.  Send some Morse and record it, either with a tape recorder (do they still make those?), or, I believe most smartphones have a voice recorder feature. Do it off the air. Either send your RF into a dummy load or turn off your "VOX" - that usually will put your rig into code practice oscillator mode.

Send some Morse, listen to it, and copy what you sent. Be honest and critical with yourself. If you can honestly copy what you've sent, then you're probably good enough to go live. It might even be a good idea to wait a day or two between the sending part and the listening to yourself part - just in order to make it a bit more objective.

I can tell you for a fact, that I have done this - I have listened to my own bug fist - and have said, "Oh my!".  It was a rude, but necessary awakening. I am totally glad that I did not subject my fellow Hams to what I had thought was decent sending.

72 de Larry W2LJ
QRP - When you care to send the very least!
Larry Makoski, W2LJ, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from New Jersey, USA. Contact him at [email protected].

Steve G1KQH has found a link to this new transceiver https://www.facebook.com/pages/LnR-Precision-Inc/229134337165152?hc_location=timeline. It looks a bit like the Elecraft KX3 but I hope it is much less expensive as it only covers 5 bands on TX.

LNR are the people that make the Par line of antennas now. They hope to start taking orders in September. Apparently they had quality issues in China with the 4-band version.

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

Earlier in the week, the nice people from Flightaware got in touch and mentioned they had some software called PiAware. This software runs on a Raspberry Pi which has an RTL-SDR dongle and antenna attached and the Dump1090 software running.

Flightaware say:

If you are running an inexpensive Raspberry Pi ADS-B receiver with dump1090 then you can install the PiAware Package from FlightAware to freely view nearby flight traffic and transmit this data to FlightAware’s tracking network.  Most aircraft within Europe by 2017 and USA by 2020 will be required to have ADS-B transmitters onboard.

FlightAware’s user-hosted worldwide ADS-B receiver network tracks about 90,000 unique aircraft per day and feeds this live data into the FlightAware website in combination with other public/private flight tracking data sources.  FlightAware has over 500 user-hosted ADS-B sites online across 60 countries, with top contributors tracking over 10,000 aircraft per day.  To see how ADS-B data is put to use, check out the FlightAware Live Map.

The PiAware installation process takes only a few minutes.  If you don’t have PlanePlotter, you can download it and then send FlightAware your installation’s serial number and we’ll buy you a license.  FlightAware will also give users a free Enterprise Account ($90/month value) in return for installing PiAware.

So, if you don’t have a copy of PlanePlotter and would like one – this is a nice bonus for setting up and sending your data into Flightaware. I had a copy of PlanePlotter anyway, but this looked like a fun challenge to get working.

The instructions from Flightaware are good and comprehensive and can be found here

It was a while since I had run Dump1090 on my Pi, so I had to do a bit of work to get things in a state where PiAware would work.

– After some issues, I decided to ensure that Raspbian was updated: sudo apt-get upgrade (this takes a while!)

– I then refreshed rtl-sdr

git clone git://git.osmocom.org/rtl-sdr.git
cd rtl-sdr
mkdir build
cd build
cmake ../ -DINSTALL_UDEV_RULES=ON
make
sudo make install
sudo ldconfig

– Having read around a little, I decided to install a Flightaware specific version of Dump1090. It appears that this shouldn’t be necessary and you can use a ‘regular’ version of Dump1090, but I decided that my chances were improved of getting it working if I did this!

cd ~ 
git clone git://github.com/MalcolmRobb/dump1090.git
cd dump1090
make
sudo apt-get install pkg-config
make

Having compiled this – assuming you have installed RTL-SDR and have your RTLSDR stick, with an antenna (the little antenna which comes with the stick should work fine), plugged into the Pi – or a connected USB hub, it’s time to see if you can receive any ADS-B transmissions

Navigate to your dump1090 directory (dump1090_mr in my case)

cd dump1090_mr
./dump1090 — interactive

If everything is working, you should start to see some data coming through from the aircraft in your area.

Having got this going, you can install the PiAware software. Goto this page and you can start from step 2. I had some issues (mostly my fault!) with PiAware versions prior to 1.7-1 – but that is working fine.

Before you start PiAware up (in Step 4), stop your Dump1090 if it’s still running and restart it as follows:

./dump1090 –quiet –net

I used the quiet parameter to keep resource usage to a minimum. The net parameter ensures that Dump1090 makes the data available to other applications (PiAware in our case).

Start up another LX Terminal window and type

sudo piaware start

Hopefully, you will shortly see a message saying that PiAware has started. You can get a good idea of what is going on by checking the Piaware log file

tail -f /tmp/piaware.out

With any luck, you will see a bunch of messages including ‘Connected to Flightware – logging in and so on).

You should then see a message every 5 minutes detailing the number of messages that Flightaware has received from your receiver. If you run into problems, there is a helpful forum thread here

After all this, my Pi is feeding date into the Flightaware network successfully!

It’s intriguing to note, running the Pi/RTLSDR combo at the same time as PlanePlotter and the LZ2RR microADSB receiver (on similar antennas). In the same time interval, the microADSB receiver has seen 488 aircraft and the RTLSDR has heard 329. So, the RTL_SDR is not quite as sensitive, but it’s not bad at all! It may be worth trying different versions of Dump1090 and see if this can be improved.

Great fun to try – thanks in particular to Max at Flightaware for letting me know about PiAware.

Finally, if you want to see the map that your spots feed into – it’s here

Tim Kirby, G4VXE, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Oxfordshire, England. Contact him at [email protected].

Earlier in the week, the nice people from Flightaware got in touch and mentioned they had some software called PiAware. This software runs on a Raspberry Pi which has an RTL-SDR dongle and antenna attached and the Dump1090 software running.

Flightaware say:

If you are running an inexpensive Raspberry Pi ADS-B receiver with dump1090 then you can install the PiAware Package from FlightAware to freely view nearby flight traffic and transmit this data to FlightAware’s tracking network.  Most aircraft within Europe by 2017 and USA by 2020 will be required to have ADS-B transmitters onboard.

FlightAware’s user-hosted worldwide ADS-B receiver network tracks about 90,000 unique aircraft per day and feeds this live data into the FlightAware website in combination with other public/private flight tracking data sources.  FlightAware has over 500 user-hosted ADS-B sites online across 60 countries, with top contributors tracking over 10,000 aircraft per day.  To see how ADS-B data is put to use, check out the FlightAware Live Map.

The PiAware installation process takes only a few minutes.  If you don’t have PlanePlotter, you can download it and then send FlightAware your installation’s serial number and we’ll buy you a license.  FlightAware will also give users a free Enterprise Account ($90/month value) in return for installing PiAware.

So, if you don’t have a copy of PlanePlotter and would like one – this is a nice bonus for setting up and sending your data into Flightaware. I had a copy of PlanePlotter anyway, but this looked like a fun challenge to get working.

The instructions from Flightaware are good and comprehensive and can be found here

It was a while since I had run Dump1090 on my Pi, so I had to do a bit of work to get things in a state where PiAware would work.

– After some issues, I decided to ensure that Raspbian was updated: sudo apt-get upgrade (this takes a while!)

– I then refreshed rtl-sdr

git clone git://git.osmocom.org/rtl-sdr.git
cd rtl-sdr
mkdir build
cd build
cmake ../ -DINSTALL_UDEV_RULES=ON
make
sudo make install
sudo ldconfig

– Having read around a little, I decided to install a Flightaware specific version of Dump1090. It appears that this shouldn’t be necessary and you can use a ‘regular’ version of Dump1090, but I decided that my chances were improved of getting it working if I did this!

cd ~ 
git clone git://github.com/MalcolmRobb/dump1090.git
cd dump1090
make
sudo apt-get install pkg-config
make

Having compiled this – assuming you have installed RTL-SDR and have your RTLSDR stick, with an antenna (the little antenna which comes with the stick should work fine), plugged into the Pi – or a connected USB hub, it’s time to see if you can receive any ADS-B transmissions

Navigate to your dump1090 directory (dump1090_mr in my case)

cd dump1090_mr
./dump1090 — interactive

If everything is working, you should start to see some data coming through from the aircraft in your area.

Having got this going, you can install the PiAware software. Goto this page and you can start from step 2. I had some issues (mostly my fault!) with PiAware versions prior to 1.7-1 – but that is working fine.

Before you start PiAware up (in Step 4), stop your Dump1090 if it’s still running and restart it as follows:

./dump1090 –quiet –net

I used the quiet parameter to keep resource usage to a minimum. The net parameter ensures that Dump1090 makes the data available to other applications (PiAware in our case).

Start up another LX Terminal window and type

sudo piaware start

Hopefully, you will shortly see a message saying that PiAware has started. You can get a good idea of what is going on by checking the Piaware log file

tail -f /tmp/piaware.out

With any luck, you will see a bunch of messages including ‘Connected to Flightware – logging in and so on).

You should then see a message every 5 minutes detailing the number of messages that Flightaware has received from your receiver. If you run into problems, there is a helpful forum thread here

After all this, my Pi is feeding date into the Flightaware network successfully!

It’s intriguing to note, running the Pi/RTLSDR combo at the same time as PlanePlotter and the LZ2RR microADSB receiver (on similar antennas). In the same time interval, the microADSB receiver has seen 488 aircraft and the RTLSDR has heard 329. So, the RTL_SDR is not quite as sensitive, but it’s not bad at all! It may be worth trying different versions of Dump1090 and see if this can be improved.

Great fun to try – thanks in particular to Max at Flightaware for letting me know about PiAware.

Finally, if you want to see the map that your spots feed into – it’s here

Tim Kirby, G4VXE, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Oxfordshire, England. Contact him at [email protected].