AmateurRadio.com & NooElec have teamed up to give away
SDR (Software Defined Radio) receiver packages to TEN hams!

If you haven’t had the chance to play with an SDR receiver, here’s your chance! Using freely available software (SDRSharp, HDSDR), a modest antenna, and an inexpensive USB SDR dongle (the NESDR Mini or NESDR Nano), you can tune from 25 MHz – 1750 MHz right from your PC.

If you want to listen to MF/HF, just add the inline Ham It Up upconverter to tune down as low as 500 kHz. There’s even an Android app (SDR Touch) that allows you to plug these USB SDRs into your tablet (Android 4.0+, must support USB OTG)!

These little USB SDR receivers are amazing and extremely affordable (under $20). They are a lot of fun to play with!

Prize Packages

We’re giving away TEN prizes including:

Two (2)
Complete HF sets including:
NESDR Mini receiver
Ham It Up upconverter
SMA to MCX cable
SMA to BNC adapter
SMA to PL259 adapter
SMA to F adapter

Two (2)
Complete Touch SDR sets including:
NESDR Nano receiver
SDR Touch license (for Android tablets)
USB OTG micro & mini cables

Three (3)
NESDR Mini receivers

Three (3)
NESDR Nano receivers

Eligibility

All licensed Amateur Radio Operators worldwide
(Worldwide shipping is included!)

How to Enter

It’s simple!
Leave a comment to this post.
(e-mail address will not be shared)

Entry Duration

Only 1 week!

You may enter only once from
4 December 2013 18:00 UTC
to
11 December 2013 20:00 UTC

(multiple entries from the same entrant will be discarded)

Winner Announcement

11 December 2013

We will announce the winner on AmateurRadio.com.

You can get the winner announcement by
subscribing to our free Amateur Radio Newsletter via e-mail,
following our posts via RSS feed, or via Twitter (@amatradio).

Sign up so you won’t miss our next prize drawing!

Please tell your friends about this giveaway!

Thank you to NooElec for offering these fantastic prizes!

Learn more about their cool USB SDR receivers!

Visit their website at NooElec.com / eBay store / Amazon store

For more information about SDR, check out the SDR sub-Reddit (/r/RTLSDR), Ham Radio Science and RTL-SDR.com.

Just before the weather got cooler and the snow fell I was able to take my manpack setup outside in the backyard and do some pedestrian mobile communications, this was the week of Nov 11-16 2013. 10 and 12 meters were in great shape and 10 meter FM simplex was even better.

My manpack consists of a frame I bought on eBay from China, it is attached to my Alice Pack. In the frame I have a FT-857, LDG AT-100 PROII tuner, PBox LiPO batteries(x2) ran in parallel. My antenna for HF is a Chameleon Hy-Brid Mini with a V1L whip or a PRC-271 10’ whip. Power out was typically 10 watts for all contacts. I worked into TX and CA on 29.600 FM Simplex with a 60 over report. I worked Northern Ireland and South Africa as well.

This is a picture of my setup:

It works quite well and I use a comet antenna for 2/440 on it as well. It has a jack on the front for a morse code key and I have connections on the back for the computer for soundcard digital modes.

A video of the setup in operation can be seen here on YouTube:

I am waiting for a CHA CAP Hat so I can tune on 80 and 160. I use a counterpoise as well of 25’ with a quick connect/disconnect in case someone trips on it or when I am walking I get it snagged. The pack is continually taking on new changes. I have a strip of LED lights I want to use for night operations to lessen current draw and want to put a fold down tray on the pack for my logbook as well.

Hope to work you this winter from the cross country ski trails pedestrian mobile.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tnDoq9sRZpk

It’s great to see exposure for the FUNcube project in the major world media. Congratulations to the FUNcube team!

I thoroughly enjoyed G4VXE’s post about his experience downloading AO-73 telemetry. Has anyone else been playing around with this?

Hanz W1JSB and I hiked to Knox Mountain this afternoon. There was ice on the pond, but we worked St. Martin, Cape Verde Island and Curacao.

We were lucky to cross the first bridge. After crossing it, we noticed that one of three main supporting logs had collapsed. This was no surprise because we’ve seen holes developing in several places, and we were always careful where we stepped.

The owners tore down the second bridge a couple of years ago. Hanz and I placed a board across some rocks last spring. It’s served us well for a crossing, but today we notice ice hanging down from the board.

We knew this was treacherous… and we were right. The top of the board was slick with smooth ice. We quickly thought to spread some dirt across the surface and that worked like a charm. We crossed with no trouble.

At the pond, we were a bit surprised to find it completely covered with ice.

Today it was in the mid-thirties but the sun kept us from feeling the chill. I set up under some tall pines behind the cabin. I chose the spot because even though the sun was low in the sky the shadows hadn’t reached there yet.

I threw the line nearly 40 feet over a branch and pulled up a wire. I operated exclusively on 15 meters and the band was full of DX. I had to work split on two of the stations, but the KX3 was up to the challenge.

I worked three quick stations in barely five minutes. First I heard FS/K9EL in St. Martin calling CQ and I answered. I received a quick response and we exchanged 599 signal reports. The second was D44AC in Cape Verde Island off the coast of Senegal in East Africa. Again the exchange was 599. Finally, I worked PJ2/N7WA in Curacao just north of Venezuela. Again we exchanged 599s. Hanz didn’t feel like operating, so we packed up and headed back down the trail.

The forecast is calling for rain or snow tomorrow. The warm days are probably past.

I found myself in the unenviable position of having to place a small parts order from one of the larger electronics distributors. Often you find a decent price on the component, only to get hit by an outrageous shipping charge. I usually try to wait and group my items so as not to be hit too hard.

Here’s the little item I needed, a little 1mW Digi XBee for a project I’m working on (similar to this):

Here is the pricing for one, shipped to the northeastern U.S. via USPS:

• Digi-Key: $19.00 + $2.92 shipping = $21.92 *
• Mouser: $19.00 + $4.99 shipping = $23.99
• Jameco: $24.95 + $2.43 shipping = $27.38

The more expensive option (Jameco)  is almost 25% more than the cheapest (Digi-Key).  Sometimes it’s worth shopping around a little bit.

Have you found a good (and inexpensive!) source for electronics components?

* I did a little research and found that Digi-Key will give you free shipping if you mail in an order form with a check or money order:

When a check or money order accompanies your order, Digi-Key pays all shipping and insurance (our choice for method of shipping) to all addresses in the U.S. and Canada.

With  smoothed sunspot number of  282 nd a solar flux of 177 we are continuing to enjoy great conditions on the higher HF bands. I can’t remember the last time the sunspot number has been that high – though that joins a long list of other things I can’t remember either. I’m surprised that more bloggers haven’t commented on it – they were happy to spread gloom and despondency when the predictions said that this solar cycle ws going to be a dud.

I’ve spent most of my operating time on my favourite mode – PSK31. Truth is, I’ve always felt more comfortable at the keyboard than in front of the mic. But I really should try to get some time in on phone while conditions are this good. Who knows how long it will last?

WebProp– my solar weather web widget is proving to be a bit of an embarrassment with its prediction that HF band propagation will be poor. The algorithm clear places too much emphasis on the effect of high A and K index values.It would be better for users to use the condx=no option which will show only the raw ininterpreted data.

This afternoon I took a quick hike up Shute Hill. I had a great two-way QRP QSO with N0UR and then I worked J88HL on three bands.

I walked down the range road and turned into the woods. Farther on I came to Will Ellis’s field. I sat down near the east edge and turned on the KX3. I heard Jim N0UR in MN calling CQ on 14.060. He was booming in, and he gave me a good report too. “UR portable ANT doing FB,” he sent. I had the ten meter wire over a branch with the earchi.org 9:1 unun. He was running a K2 at 5 watts to a 3-element beam. His signal was over S9. What fun to have a 2-way QRP QSO.

After that I went up to 15 meters. A group of Polish operators was running a DXpedition from St. Vincent. J88HL was working split with a pretty large pileup. But it was orderly and his signal was strong. I had no trouble making the QSO.

When I switched to 10 meters, there was the St. Vincent station again working split. So I worked J88HL on 10 meters and moved to 17 meters. I was surprised to hear them again on another band. Once again I made the QSO. So I worked them on 3 bands in the course of 15 minutes.

With that I packed up and headed back down the hill. What a beautiful afternoon for a quick outing… sunny with temps at nearly 50F.