AmateurRadio.com

Oliver is keeping an eye on things

I was on the radio this afternoon and not much was on the WARC bands   (CW contesting on the other bands) it was time to spin my chair 180 degrees to the project desk. I am in the process of building another Elecraft K2 that when done will be put up for sale. This was supposed to be a winter project but the bands were busy and I was on the radio and not the soldering iron. Now the K2 build has become a spring project. A few years ago if I was asked about kit building I would not ever considered it....BUT...I have been bitten by the bug!! Along with my QRP and QRPp operating I also find kit building to be a very relaxing way to spend time. There are some kits which I have sold such as my Elecraft KX1 and

Control board completed Some tricky lead forming

LP-Pan. Funny thing is after building something you attach a personal ownership to it that over the counter commercial equipment does not have. I have sold many items purchased but not built and thought nothing of it (other than it was money to get another kit with...maybe time for kit builders anonymous). As for the kits when it came time to say goodbye to make some coin it took some thought before they were put up for sale.
As was said I am in the process of building another Elecraft K2 and I have another blog that deals with the build. I wanted to blog the progress but also highlight other areas such as toroid winding, what was needed to be a kit builder and so on. There are specific posts about the K2 build it self making mention of tricky sections of the build and how it was handled. It's now time to see if the bands have come alive!!

Mike Weir, VE9KK, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from New Brunswick, Canada. Contact him at [email protected].

If you were wondering why you hadn’t seen any more about the Iler 40 transceiver kit I bought then here’s the reason. First I was distracted by making contacts using the new JT9-1 mode. But I also decided to get a solder fume extractor so I have been waiting for that to arrive.

It’s probably a bit late in the game to start worrying about the carcinogenic effects of flux and lead solder fumes. But as the price of peace of mind was only £20 on eBay, I thought “better late than never” and decided to get one.

I was a bit surprised by how big it was. I was expecting something more the size of a 12 volt computer fan. But it sits nicely on the filing cabinet next to my drop-down workbench. I just have to think of somewhere to put it when it is not in use!

Julian Moss, G4ILO, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Cumbria, England. Contact him at [email protected].

If you are a new visitor who found my site via my letter in the May Practical Wireless (PW) welcome to my blog!

What’s this all about? In the March 2013 issue of PW the editor Rob, G3XFD, happened to mention that he had just taken delivery of a new Elecraft K3 or, as he put it, “joined the K3 Klub”. He also mentioned the difficulty he had in using a morse key due to disability. I sent an email to Rob welcoming him to the K3 owners’ fraternity, and mentioned that he might like to try my simple logging program KComm written specifically for Elecraft radios which allows you to send Morse from the computer keyboard using a built-in capability that Elecraft rigs have.

Rob also wrote of his pending retirement once they had found a new editor to take his place, so I mentioned that it was a position I would have been interested in myself if circumstances had been different. I have been technical editor of a computer magazine, launch editor of a Linux magazine and had made a living successfully as a freelance writer for best part of 20 years so I was probably quite well qualified for the job. It would have been exactly the right move for me at that point in my career, something I would have enjoyed doing, I could even have worked from home, but my health disqualified me from serious consideration of it. I said as much in my email to Rob.

I forgot about the email until a few weeks later when I received an email from Rob asking permission to publish an edited version of it in the next issue of PW. I hadn’t expected that but agreed to it and also sent a picture of me in my shack. I was quite surprised when my letter appeared almost word for word as I had originally written it. I was even more surprised to find it was the star letter for that month! I hope you found it interesting. I’m sure the £20 when I receive it will be put to good use!

Julian Moss, G4ILO, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Cumbria, England. Contact him at [email protected].

And if I wasn’t so tired, I’d probably stay on the air for a little longer; but alas, I am just about ready to call it a day. As soon as I finish this post, I will turn in.

I have read and heard reports of the big flare that occurred, and how we’re supposed to get hit tomorrow with potentially huge geomagnetic disruptions.. Main stream media news outlets are saying that we might see aurora tomorrow night, even here in NJ.  If that  is true, then tomorrow’s HF conditions will probably be, how shall we say, less than optimal?

But tonight was a good night.  20 and 30 Meters were exceptional.  On 20 Meters, I worked E74UB in Bosnia-Herzegovina, LZ1QI in Bulgaria, TF3JB in Iceland (with 2.5 Watts!), and the topper – the prize for the night A71CM in Qatar.  I have never worked Qatar before, ever  -and to get him in the log with 5 Watts had me doing the happy dance.

On 30 Meters, I actually had two honest-to-goodness QSOs with Lin G4DZE in England and Viorel YO6LV in Romania.  When you can have a civil QSO with more details that RST and TU, it’s always special.  Special thanks to Lin and Viorel for that.  I also worked SP6EIY in Poland and UY5BA in the Ukraine.

40 Meters was a little tougher, but I managed to work H70ORO, a special event station down in Nicaraguan to finish out the evening.

For the record, all tonight’s QSOs were completed with the KX3, using the HF9V on 20 Meters and the 88′ EDZ on 30 and 40 Meters.

I am making so many typos here that it’s ridiculous – thank God for spell check!

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].

AmateurLogic.TV Episode 53 is now available for download.

George answers the question ‘Can you work PSK31 on the Raspberry Pi’.
We bring you a behind the scenes view of ‘The Making of AmateurLogic.TV’.
Peter visits the Canberra Deep Space Communication Complex and gets a special tour just for our viewers.
Plus we announce our exciting Field Day Giveaway Contest with great gear from Icom, GigaParts, MFJ and Heil Sound. More details at amateurlogic.tv/contest.

1:02:24 of ALTV goodness.
Download

View in web browser: YouTube

George Thomas, W5JDX, is co-host of AmateurLogic.TV, an original amateur radio video program hosted by George Thomas (W5JDX), Tommy Martin (N5ZNO), Peter Berrett (VK3PB), and Emile Diodene (KE5QKR). Contact him at [email protected].

There’s a bunch of stuff I wanted to cover today.

The first is totally unrelated to Ham Radio; but I found it fascinating.  Today, the Congressional Medal of Honor was awarded posthumously to Fr. Emil Kapaun, a Catholic priest and Army Chaplain who courageously served our country in WWII and the Korean Conflict.  He died a POW at the hands of the Chinese in North Korea.  The story of how he conducted himself as a POW and as a leader of men is, to use an overused word, awesome (in the truest sense of the word). After finishing reading the eight part story, all I could think of was “Wow!”.  Follow this link for the story about the humble, brave and holy man : http://www.kansas.com/kapaun/

Secondly – this comes from the “I ordered me one” department.  The Four State QRP Group introduced a new kit today. I immediately ordered one. It’s called the “Force Link” but is spelled 4S-Link.  It is an interface between your radio and computer for the digital modes. All you need in one totally complete kit for $40.  You can’t beat that with a stick!

Larry Makoski, W2LJ, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from New Jersey, USA. Contact him at [email protected].

I meet some very interesting people in radio circles.  My friend Harold Johnson (W4ZCB) is undoubtedly one of them.

Last year at my local ham radio/DXer club meeting, members were asked to bring photos of shacks and rigs, and describe our evolution as ham radio operators. In the series of photos that arrived at the following meeting, one in particular stood out: Harold Johnson’s radio tower in post-war Japan.

Johnson’s tower stood almost thirty feet tall and supported a 20 meter Yagi which you can see in the above photo.  Johnson, who at the time operated under the callsign JA7HJ, also had a little ham shack built. The shack materials–including the tower, Johnson recalls–cost him “three bottles of Scotch for the army quartermaster…I paid the Japanese builder $15 or $20 for the complete  enchilada.” This tower was built entirely of wood: the vertical members were 2′ x 4’s, the slats were 1′ x 3’s.

Of course, the tower didn’t have a mechanical rotor; instead, Johnson climbed inside the tower, lifted the wooden boom, rotated it manually, and placed it back on the uprights.

When asked how he powered his station, Johnson pointed to the wheeled generator in front of the radio shack in the photo. “The generator was called a B6B–it produced 24, 120, 240, and 480 volts, and was rated 10 kW.” When I asked how he managed to procure the generator, he replied that he “borrowed it from the flight line, which was about 300 feet away.”

I always enjoy hearing personal histories in radio and I didn’t doubt for a moment that Harold Johnson’s would be intriguing, so I asked if he’d tell us how his interest in radio began. So, here’s Johnson’s story in his own words:

As a preteen, (and poor as a church mouse during our previous
Depression), I would visit my aunt and uncle in the summer, likely due to the fact that they were farmers and had food to eat. They owned an old Philco radio that had shortwave bands and I was intrigued with the phone amateurs on the 80 and 20 meter bands. Often, I could hear both sides of the conversation, after I found out that they were on various different frequencies, being crystal controlled back then! My…How times have changed.

In high school, I found another afficianado, and can recall melting “Woods metal” in boiling water and floating a piece of Galena on it until it returned to a solid and [thus] made my own crystal set. WWII had started by then, and I would listen to the ground-to-air communications between ships in Lake Michigan and pilots taking off and landing on them. Great DX, perhaps 10 miles away.

In 1943, I had graduated from high school and joined the US Army Air Corps. Went through training and was still in training (…to be a pilot until they counted airplanes and pilots and decided they had enough of each […so instead] turned me into a B-29 gunner). The war was over whilst [I was] still in training and I “retired” in November 1945. Went home and found my high school sweetheart, married, went back to school to finish my education and started the Johnson family. Still married, and
to the same girl. What a sweetheart to have put up with me all these years. [No kidding, Harold!]

Went back in the US Air Force in 1949, this time became a pilot, and just in time to go to Korea for a year. However, during training, had to learn the Morse and if you learned to 13 WPM, you had a free hour and didn’t have to attend class. That overcame my obstacle to amateur radio, and I took the exams in 1950 and became W9PJO. Our rules at that time were that you had to hold a “class B” ticket for a year before you could take the “class A” exams. That year I spent in Korea and Japan and managed to obtain my first foreign call, JA7HJ.

Returning home to wife and by that time two children, I took the class A exams and became W4ZCB. I decided that I enjoyed flying, (at least most of the time), and decided to make it a career. The ensuing years, I was always on and in the air, and usually spent the winters in Alaska and the summers in the Canal Zone, anything to practice how to be miserable. Lebanon in 1958, Vietnam in 1968 and by 1969 decided that I should start doing something else before my luck ran out.

During my last 4 years of service I flew an Army four star around the world four times. Fortunately he was Ted Conway, W4EII, and we mutually enjoyed operating under a couple dozen different call signs from a lot of exotic (and several not so exotic) places. Had G5AHB back when the 5 was reserved for foreign nationals. We were good friends after we both retired (on the same day; I always liked to say that he couldn’t stand to serve without me) until his death in 1990.

I started a small company manufacturing electronic test equipment for public utilities; spent the next 20 years doing that (and enjoying a much more stable life with family and radio.) Managed to work all the countries (entities these days) there are, win a few contests from a contest station I built and operated for 10 years. (80, 40, and 20 in the front room, 15 in one bedroom and since 160 and 10 were seldom open at the same time, they shared the other bedroom. To change bands, you just changed chairs. Five big towers and Yagis, a VERY  high maintenance hobby in the lightning prone state of Florida. (Let’s not mention hurricanes!)

Retired again to the beautiful mountains of North Carolina in 1986. A much more modest station these days, but active on all the HF bands. I really enjoy building homebrew radios and maintaining daily schedules with friends worldwide. Can be found daily on 21.203 with G3XJP and often joined by other builders of the magnificent PicaStar transceiver designed by him. Sixty-three years a ham, still enjoying it. It’s guided my careers and interests. What a wonderful hobby!

Over the past few years, I’ve gotten to know Harold Johnson; I must say, he has to be one of the very few hams I know who knows the inner workings of tube/valve radios as well as he does the highest tech radios on the market, a rare talent indeed. If you’re trying to learn a bit more about the BC-348 series of radios and trying to diagnose a problem with it, Johnson’s your guy. If you’re trying to build an SDR from scratch, he’s also your guy.  And clearly, if you want to hear a fascinating account of a life influenced by radio, this is most definitely your guy.

Thanks, Harold, for letting me share your story!

Check out Harold Johnson’s website by clicking here.

Tom Witherspoon, K4SWL, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from North Carolina, USA. Contact him at [email protected].