AmateurRadio.com

I have changed the shots to try to make them larger as some readers were wanting to see more details. The original pictures were done with Windows Print screen key. Not a very good option if one wants to see detail....lesson learned.These are not the greatest but the best I can do with the original prints.


Well I'm off work today and tomorrow I was off last week with a very bad cold and sinus infection but went back to early and am off again. Now I'm on med's and things seem to be turning around. Oh one thing the doctor asked me to try was a Neti Pot. In a nut shell you flush out your nose with water, it goes in one nostril and flows out the other!! I have heard of this and my son actually does it but there is just something funny about running water all the way through your nose up and into the sinus cavities and out. You just have to be careful and not use tap water and only the solution that is advised to use..........any way what does this have to do with WSRPing.......NOTHING.......I again have set up my Elecraft K3 for WSPR and it works better than ever. I set it up on 20m this afternoon to see how my 5 watts could venture out and about. I was very surprised that my signal made it over into Europe. A fellow blogger Paul PC4T in the Netherlands has hoped to have a WSPR signal meeting....up to this point it has been a no go. But this time around I did make it into the Netherlands to PA0SLT and PA3EDR as well as Italy, Switzerland, Finland and France.

You think a deal is deal....NOT

Over a week ago I blogged that I was having some trouble with my home PC and was getting this error message whenever I wanted to run some ham software. I was not able to open the software at all I was just shown this error message. I did lots of searching on the web to see if there was a work around or a solution other than re-formatting my hard drive. In my travels on the web I came across this site that said their software dealt specifically with removing Windows error codes. I did some reading and they did have a free trial software so I downloaded it and gave it a go. Sure enough it did identify the problems on my PC and namely it pointed out that ERROR 2908 was a big one and could be cleared......BUT.........to do so the software had to be purchased! Well I did some looking around the net again about this software in particular and it did get some good reviews. So I sent the money via PayPal  and soon after had a email with what I thought would be the key code to unlock the program and allow me full access. Well a 1-888 number was given and I was asked to call the get the key code. So I did and sure enough a person answered and gave me a code and the program was up and running. While on the phone with me this person wanted to make sure I knew how the program worked and the problem I had to want me to purchase the program. I thought "well this is customer service" After about 10 minutes on the phone with me and paying 50.00 for the software' I was told that my problem was "complex"........BUT........he could fix my problem via having control of my PC in about 20 minutes. Again I thought "this is great customer service"........BUT........then he added for 200.00 via PayPal it could be all looked after!!!!
Well that was the end of that call and my PC was not fixed at this point, as a matter of fact he never even used this software to see if a fix could be done. So I ran the software and it finished, it removed my ham programs and would not allow me to download them again. I have contacted PayPal to dispute this product and get my money back so we will see what happens there. They are in the final steps so I should know soon.
My solution was to re-format my hard drives and get a good Mal-ware/spyware tool!!

After becoming very frustrated with this error I decided to re-format my hard drives. I dug up the XP install CD and all the drivers needed. I then transferred  all (so I thought at the time)  items from my drives before starting the re-format. The process went very smooth there was only one "are you kidding me" moment when the Win XP CD said there was an error loading a file. It was a matter of cleaning the CD and I was back in biz.
The error is now gone and most if not all of my ham programs have been loaded, now it's time to get them running the way I want them too. This is the part that takes time up to this point  my only trouble has been getting N4PY radio control program and N1MM contest logger to talk to each other via VSP manager!! I can remember having trouble with this in the past and I just can remember what I did for them to get along. Once the system was up and running it was then I had some "you can't be serous moments"....I did not save a backup copy of my log from DXlab, I did not save any of my contests in N1MM nor all my macro setups.........oh well at least the PC is healthy again........until that is another virus or malware decides to play games with me that is!!

Interference caused my AOC monitor

Nothing from the LG monitor.

This has been the longest stretch I have gone without posting something up on the blog. Have really not been on the radio all that much as the conditions have not been all that great....BUT... there have been some happenings around the shack. Back in February I posted on the blog the problem I was having with my new monitor. It was affecting my Elecraft P3 with all kinds of interference. I tried all kinds of fixes but it just brought about frustration. Last week I went out and purchased a new monitor and this time I did not go for the cheapest! This time I did some reading online of monitors other hams have and worked well for them. One of the monitors mentioned was the LG line of monitors, so I purchased a 24 inch one and gave it a go. It's working just find and does not affect the P3 at all.
At one time but sold the LP Pan and the Creative Labs E MU 0202 USB external sound card. This combo worked great and gave me a super pan-adapter. I was able to with the click of a mouse (using PowerSDR software) control my K3 and also click on signals on the bands scope and the rig would go there. Well I
purchased a used LP Pan and E MU 0202 device. I have not as of yet hooked it up I have gotten as far as
to download the software I am going to use with it which is NaP3 software. At this point when I tried to install the software (or any other SDR software) I get an error message entitled 2908. This error message and what I have tried to cure it is a whole blog post on it's own. This is still a work in progress and I hope I don't have to resort to reformatting my hard drive!
 The final happenings here have been....working on my Elecraft K2 kit and the accompanying blog where the progress is being shown.

The operating chair

The Skeeter hunt   is a great QRP contest that has really caught on with the QRPer's. It's only a 4 hour contest and offers extra points if you want to take on a challenge. Last year it was to brew up a home made key and use it in the contest. If you did this (supporting photo's needed) then you picked up huge bonus points! Well last year I was not able to come up with a homemade key so the bonus points were out the window for me. This year the challenge was to operate beside a body of water......no problem for me as there are 3 rivers within 5 minutes or less for me.

Storm clouds

I scooped up my bonus points (passed along the pic's to back it up) but I was not able to make the same amount of contacts that I did last year. There were some factors to this, conditions had changed from last year, I worked an all nighter on Saturday so I was operating on more that 24 hours without any sleep and thus I did not spend as much time in the test........well a 1/2 hour less. I used my Elecraft KX3 operating on the internal batteries. The antenna was a mono band 20m whip from my car. I was going to use the Alexloop so I could take advantage of more bands...but...the weather conditions were looking very stormy. I did not want to take a chance and have the Alexloop damaged from rain.
The weather turned out to be great it did not rain but the storm clouds over head kept it cool and the sun off me. I operated from Riverside park which is a great park about 5 minutes from my QTH. Funny thing I never had anyone come up to me wondering what I was doing! In the past this has happened and it gave me a chance to explain ham radio. Something new in the contest this year is operating SSB, I did not take advantage of this and stayed CW and just single band.

A look towards the river

Some of the highlights were contacting TF/LX1NO (who was in the WAE contest) for whom you get bonus points for! Also I brought along an extra external battery just in case the AA internal rechargeable batteries died on me. To my surprise they lasted for 3 hours with me constantly calling CQ BZZ.

Another shot of the river.

So I was able to make 18 contacts with a total score of 1396. Funny thing my last years score was 1392.....So technically I did better than last year by 4 points!!!

The dreaded toroid...

Getting ready for solder blob

A. Use a lighter to burn off the coating
B. Use sand paper.
C. The solder blob method.
D. Use a razor knife to scape the coating off.
E. I have heard some dipping the wire in var-sol....would not recommend it.  

I use the solder blob method and I have tried the sandpaper (find it just to rough for the delicate work that is needed) I have tried the lighter method but found on the smaller toroids I am not able to control the heat and end up burning off to much insulation. The razor blade scraping I have not tried and really don't want a razor knife that close to my fingers. SO....it's the solder blob for me!! I find if I put the toroid in an alligator clip to hold it I can in a very controlled fashion remove the right amount of enamel from the toroid.
I change the tip on my Weller soldering iron to a larger tip and use a .030 diameter solder. Most of my board work is done with a .020 diameter solder.

DO NOT SKIP STEP 7.....
7. Once the toroid wire has been stripped I use my DMM to check to make sure the coating has been removed and there is good continuity. Oh and for toroids that have more that one winding I check to make sure there is not shorts between the windings as well.

8. It's now time to solder the toroid in place and I find once the toroid is soldered in place before the leads are trimmed you can heat each solder blob up again and give each lead a LIGHT pull with a pair of pliers. This will allow the toroid to sit firmly on the board.

Some tips
1. Practice practice practice......it's like CW it's an art and over time you will get the idea and look forward to it.
2. Some toroids have nice rounded edges but be aware of those with sharp 90 degrees edges. These toroids can if your not careful remove the insulating coating from your wire and potentiality cause a short.

Using a paper and pencil to count

3. When  you have a toroid with 20 turns or more you can go buggy trying to check the turn count. What I do is lay the toroid on a sheet of paper and pencil make on the paper each turn. I then count the pencil marks and sometimes ticking them off as being counted.

4. Use two sizes of soldering tip's one (I use the Weller ETC 1/8 tip) for the solder blob used to melt the insulation off the wire. Then a thinner tip (I use the Weller ETR 1/16 tip) for soldering the toroid to the board.

ETR and ETC tips

Coming soon how to wind the bi-filar toroid and transformer toroid.

This past weekend was a long weekend up this way with Monday being the holiday. My plans were to get involved in the North American QSO party contest on Saturday. This is a short 10 hour CW contest  and when conditions are not that great a North American contest can be very attractive. To make a long story short I started and ended the contest on 15m. It was rough going and I found the bands  really not be all that busy. The other contest problem was it was a gorgeous day outside!!! For some reason this year I just was not getting into the contest mode.

One observation I made before surrendering  to the great weather outside was in Ontario our section is no longer ON. This changed a short time ago when the province was divided into 4 sections Ontario North (ONN), Ontario East (ONE), Ontario south (ONS) and finally greater Toronto area (GTA) In the contest I would attempt to send ONS but most of the time I could only get to ON....my "S" was interrupted with TU.

This is really was not the fault of the contester as I found N1MM  auto filled my section as ON and not ONS. Not sure if my N1MM is up to date and that change has been made but it was tough getting the ONS across during the contest. My contest effort stopped about an hour into the it. I made 17 contacts but the weather was calling my name. I figured the good weather days are going to become limited and soon the snow and cold weather will be here.....then lots of time to spend on the radio.

This coming weekend is the Skeeter hunt contest. This is the second running of the contest. I found it was a nice way to spend 4 hours of your Sunday afternoon. You are encouraged to get out into the out of doors for this contest. This year if you can operate beside a body of water you get bonus points!! I have scouted out two locations close to home were water (river) is....have to make my mind up as to where I will be heading. I had a look at the long range forecast today and Sunday is looking great!