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Monday was a holiday here in Ontario called family day Julie is taking some photography course's and with that comes homework. Today she had to get out side and take some pictures we came up with the idea of a raptor bird sanctuary not to far from home. I also got to thinking that while she was snapping I could be dahing and ditting on my KX3!! This was a win win for the two of us we were out spending time with each other (kinda) and doing our hobby's  to boot. My setup was the Elecraft KX3, mobile whip on a diamond trunk lip mount. The temperatures outside were way to cold for me to venture out. During the evening it dropped to -17C and during the day was up to -10C. I opted to stay in the car with the sun shinning in it was very comfee and a little to warm at times. We were there for about 2 hours, I was able to make just one contact. But it's all about having fun with the radio and getting out. Joe W2KJ is from North Carolina and was also running a KX3 (my first KX3 to KX3 QRP QSO) at 4 watts. I found Joe calling CQ on the 20m QRP frequency. We gave each other 559 reports and some antenna info, name, QTH, power and then it was time to move on.  My KX3 being set at 1 watt gave me a miles per watt contact of 644.

So why did I title this post "To close for CW comfort" this has to do with the other CW "events" that I was exposed to! I have read about this in other blogs from other op's which are CW operators who seem for some reason to blend letters together regarding their call. I had at least 6 op's who's call I had a very very hard time making out. There was one DX station who's call ended in WVR BUT for the longest time I was not sure if it was W##, even the code reader on the KX3 was having a real hard time. I then ran across 10+ on the S meter  European station but I could not give him a call as I had (and I mean NO CLUE) what his call was!! It was very hard to tell were the CQ  stopped and the call was being sent. Now folks for any of you reading my blog and who also have had a CW QSO with me I know my code elegance has left you scratching your head at times.....but I just can't understand how code that has no spaces and just runs as one long word how these op's ever get answers to their CQ requests.
When I got home I put my Elecraft k3 into test mode (meaning no code is sent over the air) and tried to send some sloppy code and watched to see if the K3 was able to decode. (you can setup the K3 to not only show incoming code but also your code as you send it) The only reading the K3 would give me were not letters or numbers just lots of  *****......translation...the K3 also has no idea. As with most CW op's out there you also have your code being sent to you through  your headphones. Does the code not sound odd to these op's???
Anyway time to get off my soapbox now.............
Mike Weir, VE9KK, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from New Brunswick, Canada. Contact him at [email protected].

Pat Tice, WA0TDA, is the manager of HANDI-HAM and a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com. Contact him at [email protected].

Google Earth is so cool!

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].

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].

As I’ve mentioned before, KD2CHE and I belong to a local transmitter hunting group.  We get together one or two times a month.  One member will hide the box and give us a general area, which is usually a radius from a point (i.e. 2 miles from the intersection of routes 1 and 2 in Anytown, NY).  We are the only ones without doppler equipment, yet we almost always find the transmitter.  Here’s some pointers for those of you that enjoy a bunny hunt every now and then, but may not think you can participate without sophisticated direction-finding equipment, or for those of you with dopplers that want to refine your techniques.

First of all, when I know the area, I print a map from the computer, and draw a circle for the hunting area.  Then, using either our knowledge of the area, or a combination of Google Maps, and Bing Maps, I find a large building that I can drive all the way around, as close to the center as possible.  I mark the spot on the map as our starting point.  KD2CHE drives, while I navigate.  When the time comes to leave for the location, I load up the equipment:

• The mobile in the car, for communicating with the other hunters, an Icom IC-207H
• An older Kenwood all-mode 2 meter mobile, with an RF-gain control, attached to an OPEK micro mag mount antenna
• A smartphone with Google Maps, or a laptop with a broadband connection
• Bright flash-lite
• 1 HT set to the third harmonic of the hunt frequency, usually my Icom IC-T90A with a good antenna
• 1 HT set to the hunt frequency with the antenna off, usually my Baofeng UV3R MkII
• 1 HT set to the hunt frequency for KD2CHE to use out of the car

Once the transmitter is activated, KD2CHE drives slowly around the building at the starting point, stopping when the transmitter stops, and starting up again when it comes back (the one we use is usually 30 seconds on / 30 seconds off).  I mark the points in our loop where the signal was strongest and weakest, drawing a line with an arrow to get our initial vector.  Then we navigate in that direction, using Google Maps as a guide.  As the signal changes I mark the observed strength on the map.  When we reach the point where the signal strength goes back down, we determine the high point, and KD2CHE drives as close to perpendicular to the original route as she can.

During this process, the RF gain control on the Kenwood comes in handy.  The box puts out a full 5 Watts, so as you get close to it, an un-attenuated receiver becomes useless.  For the signal readings with the RF gain all the way down, I write an ‘A’ in front of the s-meter reading on the map.  As the strength goes up again, we keep an eye on the 2 HTs.  When we’re within 1 or 2 blocks, one or both of them will become active.  The third harmonic will usually not work until you are almost on top of the transmitter, which comes in handy.  This is when we start looking for a good spot.  In many cases there will be a public park, or area of some sort nearby, and the rest of the hunt is done on foot with the HTs, and the flash-lite  if necessary.

Body shielding will get you a direction to walk in.  Hold a radio that is getting a weak signal (the IC-T90A has a fixed-level attenuator I can activate) close in to your chest and slowly turn around, and make note again of the weak and strong points in the circle.  Keep in mind though that sometimes, a good hider will put the box in a location that creates reflections and ghosts.  Sometimes you just need to use logic, or in the case of our last hunt, KD2CHE found the box simply by looking, while everyone else was wandering around the woods with Yagis and other fancy equipment.

Of course it helps to know the area, and to have some insight into where people like to hide things.  One of our hiders frequently hides in places he discovers while hiking.  Another likes to hide in very unique, and sometimes questionable places.  Once or twice we’ve had to explain to the authorities what we were doing.

I’m convinced that a doppler might enhance our abilities, but I’m afraid of relying on it too much.  We actually have one, but it needs some work.  We’ll see.

73!  Neil W2NDG

 

Neil Goldstein, W2NDG, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from New York, USA. Contact him at [email protected].

Transceivers with a power supply of 1 and 2 Volts, how much can one achieve with that? Well, actually quite a lot according to DL2AVH, Helmut, who together with DL4ALJ, Gero, wrote two articles about that in the German QRP-Report in 2011. I am impressed by the output power, up to 200 mW with one battery cell (1.5 Volts) and 0.5 Watts with two cells.

I wrote about this in April last year where I also mentioned that the 1 Volt design from 2000 later had been corrected. Those corrections can be found in the article in QRP-Report 3/2011: “Niederspannungs-Schaltungtechnik – der 1-V- und der 2-V-transceiver” (Low voltage circuit technology – the 1 Volt and the 2 Volt transceivers). The improvements are concerned with better input filtering at 14 MHz with a quartz crystal in the front-end filter and better efficiency in the mixer and removal of an audio stage in the direct conversion receiver. This design only uses bipolar transistors and no ICs.

This is different in the newer 2 or 3 Volt transceiver for 7 MHz. Here an impressive figure of only 5 mA power consumption for the receiver is achieved. The transmitter consumes about 250 mA. Several MC1496P balanced modulator/demodulator ICs are used for the mixers in the transmitter and the superhet receiver, and for the product detector of the receiver. They seem to run quite comfortably on only 1.8 Volts as supplied by a low-droput regulator from the battery supply. The TDA7050 is used for the audio output stage. This is a low voltage audio amplifier for headphones which can operate with  a supply voltage down to 1.6 V.

The design is said to benefit from low voltage technology of mobile phones. This is the case for circuitry like that of the output stage of the transmitter which consists of a pair of BFG21W transistors. However, both of the ICs have been around for many years.

I think this was a very inspiring read, and the final comment about power consumption from the second article is interesting. They say that with two AA-batteries, the receiver will last for 285 hours, which is the same as 70 days of listening of 4 hours per day. With transmission for 10% of the time, the set of batteries will last for 4 weeks!

• Related post: Whatever happened to the 1 Volt QRP Transceivers?

Sverre Holm, LA3ZA, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Norway. Contact him at [email protected].

I guess that a few folks who went places to operate for the ARRL DX Contest have stayed on a few days at their respective “vacation” spots.  On the air today, I was hearing a lot of the call signs that I heard in the Caribbean from over the weekend.  You would think that having completed major DX contest that these folks would be kicking back on the beach, soaking up the sun and sipping a cool libation from a coconut shell (complete with little umbrella, of course!).

I worked a couple of them; but the station that intrigued me the most was GM100RSGB, the Centennial Special Event Station for the RSGB from Scotland. At 1914 UTC, they were loud into New Jersey on 20 Meters, and I was able to work them with 5 Watts very easily. According to QRZ.com, this is what their QSL looks like:

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