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How long have I had my FT-8900? Four, five years, maybe? Of course I knew it received AM on air band and have used it on there from time to time, but it never occurred to me that it would work on 29MHz.

This afternoon, I noticed a tweet from Richard GW1JFV saying that he’d worked K1GUP on 29MHz AM and went on to say that he used his FT8900. I happened to be in the shack at the time and had the instruction manual to hand.

Menu item #45 was quickly found AM on | off – which allowed me to toggle AM on to 29MHz.

I fired it up and it sounds ok. Not brilliant on the monitor receiver – perhaps a little harsh, but it’s AM nevertheless.

Another option for using AM on 29MHz. Thanks Richard!

Update: Oh dear – this turns out to be wrong! The 8900 is receive only on AM. After an interesting conversation with Chris G3VEH, I checked this. Although the 8900 transmits when AM is selected, if you listen, it’s actually FM. When Richard made his QSO, his QSO partner must have slope detected his FM!

Interesting news that I’ve picked up over the last couple of days is that both Wouxun and TYT will be offering a version of their quadbander mobiles which will include 70MHz.

In the case of the Wouxun KG-UV950PL you lose 28MHz, which makes good sense to me, giving you 50/70/144/432MHz. Although 28MHz is a great mobile band, – FM only is maybe a bit restricted. Martin Lynch & Sons’ website carries a link to the new rig, which is not yet available – but hopefully not far off. There’s talk of 50W output on 70MHz.

I have it on good authority that the TYT TH-9800 will also be available in a configuration which includes 68-88MHz. In the case of the TH-9800, this is at the expense of the 50MHz band – so you would have 28/70/144/432MHz. The TYT version will hopefully be in the UK from mid-December.

All of this sounds good for 70MHz FM activity – particularly being packaged with other bands – whereas PMR boxes used for the band tend to be big and don’t do anything else for you (albeit they are the right price!)

I wonder if we’ll see triband 70/144/432MHz mobile antennas available?

Interesting news that I’ve picked up over the last couple of days is that both Wouxun and TYT will be offering a version of their quadbander mobiles which will include 70MHz.

In the case of the Wouxun KG-UV950PL you lose 28MHz, which makes good sense to me, giving you 50/70/144/432MHz. Although 28MHz is a great mobile band, – FM only is maybe a bit restricted. Martin Lynch & Sons’ website carries a link to the new rig, which is not yet available – but hopefully not far off. There’s talk of 50W output on 70MHz.

I have it on good authority that the TYT TH-9800 will also be available in a configuration which includes 68-88MHz. In the case of the TH-9800, this is at the expense of the 50MHz band – so you would have 28/70/144/432MHz. The TYT version will hopefully be in the UK from mid-December.

All of this sounds good for 70MHz FM activity – particularly being packaged with other bands – whereas PMR boxes used for the band tend to be big and don’t do anything else for you (albeit they are the right price!)

I wonder if we’ll see triband 70/144/432MHz mobile antennas available?

It was with much sadness that I read of Julian’s death last Friday on Twitter and then on his blog

Like many others who have tweeted or blogged about Julian’s passing, I found his blog an inspiration and there was always something of interest for me.

On the air, I think I first worked Julian on 2m CW back in the 1980s when he was still ‘down south’. I remember it well, as G3ILO was local to me and working G4ILO made me smile. We didn’t have many on air QSOs in recent years, although we emailled and commented on each other’s blogs quite regularly.

A memorable communication from Julian was an APRS message he sent me, bounced off the ISS. We also had a nice Echolink QSO one evening, when I was on the train and he was in his shack. We never worked on DSTAR, a mode that it fair to say, did not appeal to Julian at all, and he was quite happy to say so!

Happy memories of a very interesting man who I shall miss. Sympathies to Olga for her loss.

Julian’s last blog post reminds us to hold our loved ones close…

It was with much sadness that I read of Julian’s death last Friday on Twitter and then on his blog

Like many others who have tweeted or blogged about Julian’s passing, I found his blog an inspiration and there was always something of interest for me.

On the air, I think I first worked Julian on 2m CW back in the 1980s when he was still ‘down south’. I remember it well, as G3ILO was local to me and working G4ILO made me smile. We didn’t have many on air QSOs in recent years, although we emailled and commented on each other’s blogs quite regularly.

A memorable communication from Julian was an APRS message he sent me, bounced off the ISS. We also had a nice Echolink QSO one evening, when I was on the train and he was in his shack. We never worked on DSTAR, a mode that it fair to say, did not appeal to Julian at all, and he was quite happy to say so!

Happy memories of a very interesting man who I shall miss. Sympathies to Olga for her loss.

Julian’s last blog post reminds us to hold our loved ones close…

I was very conscious, having been playing with the rig that I really hadn’t put it on any sort of decent antenna. Well, I still haven’t, but at least it was something horizontally polarised!

A few weeks ago I ordered a Moonraker 70MHz HB9CV. I wanted to have an antenna that I could use for some meteor scatter and I was also very interested to see what I could hear over tropo paths with a simple antenna.

Today I had the chance to put the antenna together, which didn’t take more than about 30 minutes. I mounted it on a spare pole in the garden, held up by a stepladder, so the HB9CV was probably no more than about 8 feet above the ground.

Of course, the first signal that I listened to was the GB3RAL beacon, just a few miles away from me. I was pleased to see that the signal strength varied substantially as I rotated the antenna – anything from about S8 to S1, so the pattern of the antenna was reasonable, despite the low mounting height.

Next I listened for the GB3BUX beacon. I heard nothing and a quick look at the Beaconspot database suggests that it may be off air. Then, I pointed the antenna to the south west to listen for GB3MCB in Cornwall. Very pleasingly, I was able to hear it, just out of the noise, peaking up every few minutes. This may have been tropo or it may have been aircraft scatter. Either way, I continue with my assertion that the NR4SC has a nice quiet receiver. I’ve not, yet, tried this path with the Spectrum transverter. Interestingly, I have not heard GB3MCB on 144MHz very often. I’ve always assumed that is because of Faringdon Folly – a hill to my south west a mere 4 or 5 miles away. So it’s interesting that the path works ok on 70MHz, even with a low antenna.

I also listened for the GB3ANG beacon near Dundee in Scotland. I cannot be certain whether I heard it – certainly nothing concrete, but I’ve a feeling I heard a fragment at one point. More extensive listening would reveal, something I am sure.

This was a very pleasing test and one of the benefits of having the compact NR4SC was that it was easy to bring down to the lounge, with a PSU and connect up to the coax coming in through the patio doors! The NR4SC is very compact and would make the basis of a nice portable station. Just need a matching 150W PA now!

I was very conscious, having been playing with the rig that I really hadn’t put it on any sort of decent antenna. Well, I still haven’t, but at least it was something horizontally polarised!

A few weeks ago I ordered a Moonraker 70MHz HB9CV. I wanted to have an antenna that I could use for some meteor scatter and I was also very interested to see what I could hear over tropo paths with a simple antenna.

Today I had the chance to put the antenna together, which didn’t take more than about 30 minutes. I mounted it on a spare pole in the garden, held up by a stepladder, so the HB9CV was probably no more than about 8 feet above the ground.

Of course, the first signal that I listened to was the GB3RAL beacon, just a few miles away from me. I was pleased to see that the signal strength varied substantially as I rotated the antenna – anything from about S8 to S1, so the pattern of the antenna was reasonable, despite the low mounting height.

Next I listened for the GB3BUX beacon. I heard nothing and a quick look at the Beaconspot database suggests that it may be off air. Then, I pointed the antenna to the south west to listen for GB3MCB in Cornwall. Very pleasingly, I was able to hear it, just out of the noise, peaking up every few minutes. This may have been tropo or it may have been aircraft scatter. Either way, I continue with my assertion that the NR4SC has a nice quiet receiver. I’ve not, yet, tried this path with the Spectrum transverter. Interestingly, I have not heard GB3MCB on 144MHz very often. I’ve always assumed that is because of Faringdon Folly – a hill to my south west a mere 4 or 5 miles away. So it’s interesting that the path works ok on 70MHz, even with a low antenna.

I also listened for the GB3ANG beacon near Dundee in Scotland. I cannot be certain whether I heard it – certainly nothing concrete, but I’ve a feeling I heard a fragment at one point. More extensive listening would reveal, something I am sure.

This was a very pleasing test and one of the benefits of having the compact NR4SC was that it was easy to bring down to the lounge, with a PSU and connect up to the coax coming in through the patio doors! The NR4SC is very compact and would make the basis of a nice portable station. Just need a matching 150W PA now!