Field Day 2015 round-up

All female amateur radio group on Field Day
The Southern Mississippi YL Amateur Radio Club formed in 2008 to encourage women to get more involved.
WLOX

W3AO Field Day
Wind and rain cannot stop us from broadcasting. Even a “little” rain, like close to four inches on Saturday. Our annual weekend emergency ops practice, aka Field Day, went on as planned.
W3AO

(photos) W3AO Field Day 2015
W3AO

(video) Field Day 2015 – QRP with the Yaesu FT-817 in the pouring rain
How many contacts can be made with QRP SSB during Field Day using a modest station in bad weather? Join me and let’s find out.
YouTube

Field Day Results
Field Day is not really about A-list operators, it’s an event for the every-man.
KE9V

(video) Chattanooga Amateur Radio Club practices in event of crisis
It’s mostly for fun, but this radio field day has a purpose too, and that’s to keep everyone prepared in the event of a crisis.
WRCB

Top links

FCC invites comments on rules for new LF and MF amateur allocations
The FCC is inviting comments on its recent proposals to authorize Amateur Radio operation on two new bands – an LF allocation at 135.7 to 137.8 kHz (2200 meters), and an MF allocation at 472-479 kHz (630 meters).
ARRL

FreeDV 700
We’ve just released FreeDV v0.98 GUI software, which includes the new FreeDV 700 mode. This new mode has poorer speech quality than FreeDV 1600 but is far more robust, close to SSB on low SNR fading HF channels. Mel Whitten and the test team have made contacts over 1000 km using just 1 Watt!
ROWETEL

Hawaii, Washington State QSO on 2 meters
The difficult and rare path between Washington state and Hawaii has been worked in the past … lastly in 1995, when some alert ‘7s’ found themselves in KH6HME’s logbook.
VE7SL

HamShield for Arduino (VHF/UHF transceiver)
The HamShield supports both voice and packet radio modes through a wide range of VHF and UHF frequencies: 2 meter (144-148 MHz), 1.25 meter (220-225 MHz), and 70 centimeter (420-450 MHz).
Kickstarter

A Maker’s introduction to Ham Radio
First, you’re a Maker, so you already have a lot in common with the ham radio community. Hams are tinkerers, builders, fixers, and inventors by nature.
Make:

RF Breakout Kit for the Raspberry Pi
An expansion board supplied as a self-assembly kit, designed for experiments with the Raspberry Pi as a radio frequency source or radio transmitter using the programmable clock generator built into the Pi’s processor.
Kickstarter

(podcast) 100 Watts and a Wire
100 Watts and a Wire is a program celebrating amateur radio through the eyes of a new ham. The show will feature topical conversation and interviews, news and an entertaining look at the adventures of a ham trying to figure it all out.
K0STH

Senate sponsor of Parity Act said bill promotes equality
US Senator Roger Wicker (R-MS), who sponsored “The Amateur Radio Parity Act of 2015” in the Senate, had said the bill he introduced, with original cosponsor Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), would allow for transparency and equality in the regulatory process.
ARRL

How to

Building an APRS IGate
Setting up an IGate is an easy way to contribute to the strength and utility of the APRS network without overwhelming the RF side of things.
WCARES

Using the RTL-SDR as a transmitter
After performing the hack the RTL-SDR is able to output a signal anywhere between 1.8 GHz to 3 GHz.
RTL-SDR.com

2015 Field Day locator
Field Day is June 27-28, 2015. This page is intended to show public Field Day sites that members of the public and media can visit.
ARRL

How do you choose where to go for Field Day?
The “get on the air” station is designed to get new hams and members of the general public on the air and let them make contacts.
KB6NU

Good operating habits on Field Day
Give a listen and notice how K5PO keeps the contacts short and to the point, clearly communicating using phonetics.
K0NR

Significant solar event may impact Field Day
SWPC has issued a Moderate (G2) geomagnetic storm watch for June 27 and 28. This is significantly weaker than the storm that peaked at Severe (G4) levels earlier this week.
Indiana Section ARES / NOAA

W1AW Field Day Bulletin schedule
All classes of Field Day stations can earn 100 bonus points for copying the special Field Day bulletin transmitted by W1AW.
ARRL

MF demonstration for ARRL Field Day 2015
Many of us that are active Part 5 stations on 630 meters are planning on repeating the Field day greeting event during ARRL Field Day.
NJDTechnologies

Field Day publicity
Club members attempting to tell what’s happening at their Field Day site need to avoid ham radio jargon. “Be ‘less hammy’ about it.”
ARRL

ISS voice contacts for Field Day 2015?
Possibly no FM voice contacts like we enjoyed last year for Field Day, but program Region 1 and Region 2/3, Packet, and SSTV and be ready–just in case!
Southgate

Camping and talking this weekend during Field Day
Hams, who set up radio stations outdoors and run them on generators, will try to contact as many stations as possible during a 24-hour period.
The Advertiser

Video

2014 Field Day
Contacts were of a secondary concern this year, as we all focused on experimentation with radios, power, and antennas.
KF7IJZ

Field Day from space
Astronaut Reid Wiseman (KF5LKT) describes his experience working Field Day from space.
AMSAT UK

2014 Field Day ISS contact
Surrey Amateur Radio Club makes contact with ISS during last year’s Field Day event.
YouTube

FCC announce agreement to scale back field office shutdowns
Offices already slated to remain open are New York City; Columbia, Maryland — the site of the Bureau’s HF Direction-Finding Center; Chicago; Atlanta; Miami; Dallas; Los Angeles, and San Francisco.
ARRL

Old VHS recorders could cause long delay echoes
Over the next few weeks, Tommy heard several LDEs, some with separations as much as 3 or 4 days and during this time made several recordings of the events.
VE7SL

A look inside the NR5M super-station
The sun was just setting and I’m sure I had a stupid look on my face as I saw the towers rise over the horizon. What a sight to behold.
W0EA

Another June VHF Contest In the Bag
6m had sporadic-e openings very late both evenings, about the time I was ready to give up. Fortunately, I stuck with it and made quite a few contacts late into the evening.
K0NR

The MS Bike Tour on APRS
Each of the mobiles that were assigned to the various checkpoints with an APRS tracker on board had their APRS trackers programed with a tactical callsign that appeared on the screen of my netbook running APRSIS32 with open-street-maps.
VE6AB

Texas Ham Com – A nice fest that should be the country’s biggest
Look at Hara and then tell someone: “It’s an exciting hobby, just look at this, our biggest event of the year!”
K5PO

When all else fails
The chaos that would ensue would be mind boggling. Not a happy thought.
W2LJ

Baofeng battery test results
The tests were conducted to determine the best long life back-up AA battery solution for the Baofeng HT.
Fo Time! The Other Ham Radio Podcast

Letters to Congress offer biggest boost to Amateur Radio Parity Act
The most useful action radio amateurs can take is to contact their members of Congress, urging them to sign on as a bill cosponsor.
ARRL

Ham Radio can bring Morse Code back to the high seas
Recently, the FCC granted amateurs access to a portion of the historic maritime radio band where most Morse code communication took place. This grant means that people will once again communicate regularly using Morse code around maritime channels at 472, 476, and 478 kHz.
KC4LMD

How to

APRS configuration and testing for a balloon project
We have developed a Pi add-on board and software that together add APRS capability to the Pi In The Sky telemetry board.
Pi in the Sky

Video

Amongst the kilowatts: 14 MHz SSB QRP DX with a delta loop
Have we stumbled across one of the great low-cost antennas for over water portable QRP DXing?
VK3YE

Newsline Co-Founder, Editor Bill Pasternak, WA6ITF, SK
A well-known voice in the Amateur Radio news media has gone silent.
ARRL

Icom IC-7851 HF/50MHz Transceiver
With the design of the IC-7851, Icom’s engineers focused on a new Local Oscillator (LO) that drastically reduces the phase noise. As a result of this design, the purity of the LO achieves a Reciprocal Mixing Dynamic Range (RMDR) of 110dB.
Icom

ARRL June VHF Contest this weekend
For amateurs in the US and Canada to work as many stations in as many different 2 degrees x 1 degree Maidenhead grid squares as possible above 50 MHz.
ARRL

How to work a VHF contest
This is a brief introduction to operating during a VHF contest.
KØNR

[Video] June VHF Contest in action
QRP portable on top of Slide Mountain in the Catskills of New York.
K2FR

Monitoring FBI survielence aircraft with ADS-B
From reports on the internet John found out that FBI aircraft squawked with 4414 or 4415 codes, and used call signs like JENNA or JENA.
RTL-SDR.com

Summertime CBer
Strong Es on 11 meters usually heralds the possibility of 6m also opening via the same mode.
VE7SL

TV signals used to track aircraft as alternative to radar
Using special receivers, researchers said they were able to track up to 30 planes simultaneously flying at altitudes of up to 10,000ft (3km).
BBC

Dayton Hamvention – R.I.P.
The “laws of the market place” are taking care of the “Dayton as a hell-hole” problem.
With Varying Frequency

Semaphore + Morse Code + SSB + Twitter = Art
On Saturday, June 20 artist Philippe Druez ON1PHD will be performing at the Academy of Fine Arts, Ghent, Belgium with the iSemaphore installation using Chappe semaphore, Morse code and Twitter.
Southgate

Video

Tracking & receiving the LightSail cube satellite
Showing how to track the LightSail CubeSat on your own PC with free software.
YouTube

Video tour of a CubeSat satellite
AMSAT Fox-1C Engineering Model 6/6/2015
YouTube

Large plasma tubes confirmed to exist above the Earth’s atmosphere
These structures are the likely cause of unwanted signal distortions affecting both civilian and military satellite-based navigation systems.
io9

Britain’s pirate radio stations are not going down without a fight
Tied to a branch in the canopy of an old birch tree is the transmitter for Rage FM, Taunton’s only pirate radio station. Owning it could get Alfie, the proprietor, two years in prison.
Newsweek

Tytera TYT MD-380 DMR Handheld review
DMR, Digital Mobile Radio, seems to be taking off as the digital voice mode of choice, and the arrival of the Tytera TYT MD-380 DMR is great news.
Essex Ham

DMRUK: all digital worldwide TDMA repeater network
Time-Division Multiple-Access (TDMA) preserves the full channel width and divides it into alternating time slots that can each carry an individual call.
DMRUK

Switching power supply noise more common than power lines
LED-type lightbulbs that are becoming more common also can be noise-generators.
ARRL

Not all Jameco power supplies are linear and regulated
I cracked open one of these to see what was up here and sure enough it was using a MC34063A inverting switching regulator.
The SWLing Post

High performance radio – operating the Hilberling PT-8000A
The Hilberling PT-8000A Transceiver is much like a new high-end AC Cobra sports car – a classic format product fine-tuned to as close to perfection as the manufacturer can engineer, executed with near-jewelry precision & finish.
With Varying Frequency

Flex 6500: 11m band opening
I thought I had seen band openings before, but this is what I saw with the new Flex 6500 this morning.
AA6E

How to

Paper clip paddles [PDF]
The actuation is reliable and the contacts seem to be reliable as well. I plan to switch to this new paddle for at least my portable work.
K8AG / North American QRP CW Club

Ten steps to mastering Morse Code
James Altucher is one of those guys that seems to be able to do just about anything. Here’s how I’d apply his advice to mastering Morse Code.
KB6NU

Video

Testing the Yaesu FT-991 on 2m
We compare the FT-991 receiver performance on 2m with two other radios. Justin, G0KSC, from Waters & Stanton, puts them through their paces.
Waters & Stanton

Siru SDR20 Multi-Touch Software Defined Radio
Siru Innovation’s SDR20 multi-touch radio is a high performance scalable software defined radio platform for designing and deploying next generation radios.
Vimeo

Still amazes me
It still amazes me that 5 Watts of RF energy can span the globe. To quote my son Joey, “What sorcery is this?”
W2LJ

Radio Contest? Why?
The basic objective of most radio contests is to make as many radio contacts as possible. This is influenced by the scoring method used for the contest.
Ham Radio School

Interview: KGB spy who relied on numbers stations
Jack Barsky held a job at some of the top corporations in the U.S. and lived a seemingly normal life — all while spying for the Soviet Union
60 Minutes

Les Paul’s pirate radio station in Queens
Not only did he build the first solid body electric guitar and invent multi-track recording but he was responsible for creating a pirate radio station in Queens in the 30s.
glasscapsule

Radio call saves SOTA climber following fall
A Littleton, Colorado, radio amateur and mountaineer was happy to have his hand-held transceiver along on May 17 after he slipped and fell from an icy ledge in Berthoud Pass while snowshoeing.
ARRL

29 MHz – the forgotten frequency for amateur radio satellites
Hans van de Groenendaaal ZS6AKV writes in the EngineerIT magazine about the potential for 29 MHz as a satellite uplink band.
AMSAT UK

Photos from the Voice of America Museum
Immediately after packing up our table at the Dayton Hamvention, my buddies Eric (WD8RIF), Miles (KD8KNC), and I made the 30 minute journey to Bethany, Ohio, to visit the VOA Bethany museum.
The SWLing Post

Video

Elecraft K3S Transceiver demo
First details of the new K3S transceiver, presented by Peter Waters G3OJV.
Waters & Stanton

How to wind a toroid inductor
The real trick is often how to hold the toroid core while doing the winding of the wire.
W2AEW

How to

3D print: 3 element 2m (145 MHz) ultra portable yagi
MakerBotThingiverse

Using the Raspberry Pi as an RTL-SDR streaming server
Do you have an unused Raspberry Pi lying around your bench somewhere and just can’t figure out what to do with it? You could build a wireless RTL-SDR streaming server.
/dev/thrash

WsprryPi: Raspberry Pi WSPR transmitter
The I/O pins provide access to a clock signal and it is possible to modulate this clock signal via software.
Gerolf Ziegenhain

FCC eliminates Amateur Radio vanity call sign fee
“The Commission spends more resources on processing the regulatory fees and issuing refunds than the amount of the regulatory fee payment.”
ARRL

Dayton 2015
The Hara Arena we all know and love continues to be, well, Hara Arena. The good news is renovations are in the works. A Hamvention official told me it’s for real and probably a three to four year project.
Radio Artisan

Pirate SSTV over US Navy satellites
Radio pirates often make use of the Fleetsatcom satellites to send and receive slow scan television (SSTV) pictures over a wide distance.
RTL-SDR.COM

Liquid metal antenna
Boffins have made a liquid metal device which can alter its shape through voltage alone, removing the need for clunky external pumps previously used to arrange such material.
The Register

Wireless door bell adventure [PDF]
433 MHz ASK signal analysis.
Paul Rascagnères

Fox-1 Operating Guide
Fox-1 Operating Guide released at the 2015 Dayton Hamvention. FM transmitter capability on 435 MHz and FM receiver capability on 145 MHz. A full-duplex radio (capable of receiving and transmitting simultaneously) is recommended.
AMSAT

Can I use my Ham Radio on public safety frequencies?
It is widely known that many amateur radios can be modified to transmit outside the ham bands. The answer to this question used to be that amateur radio equipment cannot be used legally on public safety channels because it is not approved for use under Part 90 of the FCC Rules.
K0NR

Enough already!
It’s yet another rant about how most hams nowadays dress like slobs and need to take a bath. I don’t know about you, but I’m getting really sick of this kind of talk.
KB6NU

How to

How to replace a noisy wall power supply
When you purchase a replacement power supply, you must make sure that several properties match that of the device it will power, else you could cause damage.
The SWLing Post

Video

First look at the Flexradio Maestro at Dayton
An early look at the new Flexradio Maestro interface for flex radios. All in one over Wi-Fi touch screen with two waterfalls and physical control interfaces.
YouTube