that we bloggers never get on the air and just sit behind the keyboard all the time ……

I had a very FB QSO with fellow blogger Dan KB6NU on 30 Meters tonight.  I was calling CQ and Dan answered.  Dan is working on his Extra Class study guide, so we chatted for a bit and reminisced about our own exam experiences.  Dan and I have actually worked numerous times on the HF bands – it’s always nice to run into him.

That was followed by two more rag chews, one with Tom, N8TL and Jim NH4C.  Both were on 30 Meters, also.  The 88′ EDZ antenna seems to do a very good job for me on 30 Meters.  A far cry from the G5RV.  Not to say that the G5RV wouldn’t load on 30 Meters – it did.  But I get much better signal reports with the EDZ and I feel like I’m warming up the ionosphere instead of just the antenna wire.

I was going to go to the NJQRP meeting tomorrow; but received a request to help out at a VE session with the Raritan Valley Radio Club at the Somerset County Fire Headquarters building in Hillsborough, NJ.  It’s been a while since I have participated in a VE session and I do want to keep my credentials up.  Besides, it’s a much closer trip for me to Hillsborough, than it is to the NJQRP meeting.  I’d say the trip to the VE session is about a 1/2 hour to 40 minute (if there’s traffic) ride from here. The ride to the NJQRP meeting is an hour and a half from here – easy.  With gas prices going up yet again, I think I’ll stay closer to home.

72 de Larry W2LJ
QRP – When you care to send the very least!

It was a tough day at work, but ……

I was really lucky tonight and both Foxes in the 20 Meter QRP Fox hunt were loud into New Jersey. I got both their pelts quite quickly and they were both VERY honest 599s into NJ.  This was kind of an unexpected surprise, and a quite welcome one at that. Tuning around 20 Meters a few minutes prior to the hunt, I saw that the ambient noise level on the band is around an S7. I was expecting to be skunked as a result.

But TJ W0EA and John K4BAI have superb ears and both heard me really quickly. And as a side benefit of working them so early, I can now sit here and relax and listen. It’s like listening to a fine piece of music. Both are masters of their frequencies – firing off QSOs with liquid ease.  If not like a symphony, then it’s certainly like a fine ballet; or perhaps akin to enjoying a piece of velvety smooth chocolate.

Bravo to both Foxes. It was not only good working both of you; but a joy to listen to your efforts working others.  Fine codesmanship (new word?) is a wonderful thing.

72 de Larry W2LJ
QRP – When you care to send the very least!

In 2012 bulky power transformers that work directly from the power grid at 50/60 Hz have mostly disappeared. My objective here is to modernize the power supply for a one-tube transmitter in the same way.

The circuit is based on an electronic transformer for LED or halogen lamps. Electronic transformers usually have a minimum power rating, below which they will not start. This one can tolerate a lower load than most and gives out 12 Volts for a load from less than 10 W and up to 60 W.

My target circuit is the AA8V/W8EXI 6CL6 one-tube transmitter (5 Watts or so). It needs 6.3 Volts for the filament (0.65 A), about 350 Volts DC for the plate and a regulated voltage of 200 Volts DC or so for the screen.

First I was inspired by DL2YEO and his Power Supply for small Tube Amplifiers. His approach was to redesign and rewind the high-frequency transformer (hmm, also a transformer, albeit a tiny one) of the circuit in order to get the desired high and low voltages. It takes some research to find the number of windings per volt and then to fit two secondary windings on the transformer which originally only had a single one. I tried this, but ended up with a burnt, shorted circuit. I concluded that it is too easy to make a mistake in this way.

My second approach was to reuse the small transformer from the burnt supply. I had to wind the original secondary back on it. The transformer is now reversed so the old secondary is used as the primary winding in order to step up the 12V AC. Then with a voltage doubler and filter capacitors I was able to get a DC voltage of 330 V. A series resistor and two 100 V Zener diodes in series gave me the regulated screen supply.

The filament voltage is obtained from the 12 VAC, which is rectified and regulated with a LM317 voltage regulator to give 6.3 VDC. This is shown in the lower part of the veroboard where a load resistor that simulates the tube’s filament is attached to the green terminal block.

Because the whole circuit runs at about 45 kHz, only fast-recovery rectifiers can be used, not the ones that are used at 50/60 Hz. The electronic transformer is from the Nordic retailer Biltema (part no 46-273, sorry no English web page).

I only hope now that this power supply won’t generate a lot of noise for the receiver.

Skeeter logs are trickling in. So far, I’ve received 29. I know there were a lot more than 29 participants; so don’t be shy about getting your log in.  You have until September 12th – but why wait?  Beat the last minute rush.

Full logs (adif and cabrillo files) are not necessary. The following is more than enough:

Name
Call
Skeeter number (if you had one)
Number of Skeeter QSOs
Number of Non- Skeeter QSOs.
Number of S/P/Cs that you worked on all bands. For example, if you worked GA on 20 and 40 it counts twice.
Your station class multipler:
X1 Home stations – commercial equipment
X2 Home stations – home brewed or kit built equipment
X3 Portable station – commercial equipment
X4 Portable station – home brewed or kit built equipment

And whether or not you’re claiming the homebrewed key bonus of 1,000 points. Remember, the key had to have been built specifically for the Skeeter Hunt and you have to send me a picture. (So far, three entries have claimed the 1,000 point bonus and have sent photos).

All soapbox comments and photos will be posted.

On another note (totally unrelated to Ham Radio) I have recently taken efforts towards living a more healthy life style.  I was looking at some of the pictures that Marianne took while we were on vacation and I saw one of myself and thought, “You have GOT to be kidding!”.

For the past month, I have gotten out of bed extra early before work and have been going out for a daily two mile walk (about twice as far on Saturday mornings when I have more time). I have cut out sweetened beverages (still allow myself the very occasional cold 807, however!) and unhealthy snacks.  I am eating more fruit and fresh vegetables.

I have lost about 5 pounds so far; but my goal is to lose 30 by the time we head back to Lake George next summer. The ultimate test came today, when I got home from work. The kids wanted to indulge in a rare trip to Burger King.  While they ate their cheeseburgers, I munched on a grilled chicken salad with (zero fat) honey mustard dressing. I shouldn’t complain as it was quite good; but I was so in the mood for a Whopper!

I recently went for a physical and everything turned out well; except for the fact that my cholesterol is a tad high. The upper limit is supposed to be 200 and I came in at 211.  I am hoping the change in diet and the increased physical activity will take care of the cholesterol level as well as lowering my blood pressure, too.

I remember when I was a kid and was in such a hurry to be a grown up.  Sometimes, it ain’t what it was cracked up to be!

BTW, Doug Hendricks announced today on the QRP reflectors that Hendricks QRP Kits is re-opening as of tomorrow, 8/16.  For those of you who were unaware, Doug’s wife passed away a month ago on 7/16. It will be good to have him back; and it will probably be good for him to be back.  Our thoughts and prayers are still with you and your family, Doug!

72 de Larry W2LJ
QRP – When you care to send the very least!

The $3.79 antenna

Among users of the Baofeng dual band UV-5R HT a popular topic of discussion is what antenna to buy for improved performance. The general consensus sees to be that the stock Baofeng antenna is not much good. But no-one wants to spend $30 on a $40 radio to buy an antenna made by Diamond or Comet. The trouble is that half the antennas sold on eBay seem to be fakes that are about as much use as a piece of wet string.

A popular choice recently is known as the “$3.79 antenna.” This antenna – which also goes by the name “$3.42 antenna” after a recent price cut by one eBay vendor, has an SMA-F connector and a very flexible 6.5″ whip. It’s very similar to the Nagoya NA-666 but with a different base. You can find sellers by searching eBay for “female universal antenna for Kenwood”.

Both the Baofeng stock antenna and the $3.79 jobbie appear to be made by the same manufacturer. Printed round the SMA connector of the Baofeng antenna is the words “FM/136-174/400-480MHz”. The $3.79 antenna has the wording “FM/136-174/400-470MHz” in identical print but on a red not a black background.

UV-5R stock antenna

Despite the aspersions cast on the effectiveness of the UV-5R stock antenna, I found that it isn’t half bad. In fact, it is one of the most accurately tuned rubber duck antennas I have come across and performs remarkably well for a 12cm (4.5in.) long antenna. As the SWR plot shows, the VHF resonant point is exactly at 145MHz. I am unable to plot SWR at UHF but I can measure it at a fixed frequency and it was 2:1 at both 145MHz and 433MHz.

$3.79 antenna

The $3.79 antenna appeared to be tuned to 154MHz. The tuning is not as sharp as the Baofeng antenna and the SWR at 145MHz was just over 3:1. I measured a similar SWR at 433MHz. The actual SWR of handheld antennas will vary depending on whether the radio is standing on a desk, being held in the hand or worn on your belt so an SWR of 3:1 is nothing to be alarmed about. Even the best HT antenna will exhibit a poor match in some situations.

Measuring SWR can tell you whether an antenna is working as well as it should but it is no guide to on-air performance. After all, a dummy load will have a perfect 1:1 SWR and yet radiate nothing.

I measured the field strength of the signal radiated by the UV-5R at a distance of 1m using both antennas. I also tried a known genuine Nagoya NA-701 which is about the same length as the $3.79 antenna. There was nothing to choose between any of the three antennas at UHF. On 2m the $3.79 antenna was possibly marginally worse than the Baofeng UV-5R standard antenna. The Nagoya NA-701 was 3dB better, equivalent to doubling the transmitter power.

My conclusion after performing these tests is that buyers of the UV-5R (and the UV-3R which comes with an identical stock antenna) should save their money and use the antenna that came with the radio. To try to improve on this involves dabbling in the shark-infested waters of eBay and risking ending up with a worthless fake antenna that will need to be larger to give any improvement in performance. The $3.79 antenna is easily worth its price but it is 3 inches longer than the stock antenna and offers no significant improvement.

Welcome to Handiham World.

Changing times, changing Radio Camp

Radio Camp has been a core part of the Handiham program, but it has not always been the same over the years. How can it change with the times? How is ham radio changing?
For the two decades plus that I have worked for Courage Center, the Handiham Radio Camps have been changing, but they have always included licensing classes and have been around a week long. I think the shortest was five full days; most were seven or even eight if you counted the two halves of the travel days. We offered a California camp and a Minnesota camp each year. The last California session was in 2008, just as the Great Recession was peeking above the horizon. Little did we know at that time how devastating that recession would be and how it would cause us to pull back some of our services. California camp was an early casualty, but we have managed to keep the Minnesota camp intact. Now, with the June 2012 camp session behind us, we must consider what we can do to make Radio Camp successful in 2013.
Before I tell you my ideas, I’d like to take a look at some trends in ham radio and life in general, so bear with me. Remember that what constitutes a “trend” isn’t always easy to define. Sometimes things change gradually over a long period of time – many years or decades, even centuries or millennia – while others change over a matter of months or a few years. It can be hard to tell when something is a short term trend or whether it is “permanent” for all practical purposes. Here are some trends that I have noticed:

1. It is harder than ever to get people to commit to club meetings and organized group activities.
2. The city parks and playgrounds are often nearly empty on a nice summer day.
3. There are many two meter amateur radio repeaters with almost no activity. 
4. It seems as if every driver I see is talking on a cell phone. 
5. Two things that are getting hard to find are cassette tapes and photographic film.
6. “LOL” has entered the vernacular.
7. There is a lot of gray hair at ham club meetings.
8. There is a lot of gray hair at lots of non-ham meetings.
9. Most of us throw stuff out rather than getting it fixed.
10. Social networks like Facebook are growing. 

So what do I make of this and how does any of it relate to ham radio today and Radio Camp in particular?
Community:
Consider this: Ham Radio is a social network, and it predates Facebook by nearly a hundred years. It has many of the elements that web-based social networks do, including making friends and communicating with them on a regular basis, sharing news and information about other interests, and building technology. The “Amateur’s Code” was originally written by Paul M. Segal, W9EEA. in 1928. One of its main tenets is that the amateur is “BALANCED… Radio is a hobby never interfering with duties owed to his family, job, school or community.” Even in the early days of Amateur radio, it was observed that one could go overboard and miss out on real life by becoming too engaged in radio. Perhaps this wisdom should be applied to the digital distractions that empty out the city parks and playgrounds, and drain away participation from civic engagement. People are really, really connected these days. They cannot even drive around the block without making a phone call. Children have cell phones, and they communicate through interactive features in video games.
Computers:
Digital technology has married portability with computing. And NOTHING has escaped the long reach of the computer. It has gobbled up technologies like cassette tapes and photographic film and replaced them with digital audio and digital photography. It has transformed most areas of human endeavor. It has even changed our language to accommodate the compactness of texting. And with digital cellular service, all of this is available to nearly everyone near urban areas (which is most of us), at any hour of the day or night.
Overload!
Yes, we are digitized and connected. We can stay in touch with our circle of friends without ever being in the same place.
Is that good?
Well, yes, to a point. But the problem is that we are so connected that we get overloaded. No wonder we don’t look forward to a club meeting or a night out to dinner with friends. No wonder the playground is empty when the kiddos are thumbing away at their video game controllers in the family room. And no wonder the age of amateur radio operators is on the rise – there is lots of competition for engagement by other social networks and our ever-connected culture. Other clubs – not just radio clubs – have also seen their average age go up and up as young people just don’t engage as much as they once did in a pre-digital era.
How has ham radio changed?

Ham radio is still a social network, but it is augmented by web-based social networks. Every ham radio operator on Facebook or Google Plus eventually uses these networks to discuss ham radio. Computing has transformed ham radio, with rig control, VoIP communications linking repeaters and computer users with smartphone users, and much more – too much to mention here. Digital technology has also made things cheap enough to replace rather than repair – and sometimes even to replace just because the new gear is magnitudes better, even though nothing is wrong with the old rig! All in all, while digital technology has been good to ham radio, it has sometimes been bad for ham radio in that it has buried everyone in constant connectivity that saps our will to participate in yet more communications. This gives us dead repeaters and sometimes poorly-attended meetings and events.
What about Radio Camp?
Radio Camp is quite a commitment for the campers, who have to take a week of their time at sometimes considerable expense if a lot of travel is involved, to attend. The camp session is also expensive to host, considering the preparation and camp rental along with a laundry list of other costs. Volunteers also incur similar expenses.  Clearly this is a high-stakes event, so we need to make sure we are understanding the trends here. Is increased ever-connectedness growing and here to stay?  It seems so. Is digital technology here to stay, along with increasing miniaturization and consolidation of functions?  That seems a solid long-term trend as well. Is the marriage between ham radio and computing going to last?  I’d say yes to that one, too.  As I type this, I’m listening to 2O12L special event station calling CQ. The signal is being received by the Handiham TS-590S radio, remotely controlled via the internet.
Trending at Radio Camp…
So what seems to be trending at Radio Camp?  For at least 10 years we have seen interest in the Operating Skills courses grow while in recent years it has become obvious that licensing courses are struggling. 2012 became a year without anyone attending camp to earn the Extra Class license. Operating Skills campers far outnumbered those who attended to study for a first license or upgrade. Let’s summarize and speculate on two camp trends:

• It is harder to attract campers who are interested in the licensing courses. We have to be careful here because we can’t assume that our Handiham members are no longer interested in licensing and upgrades to higher licenses, but they are less interested in doing so at a camp session and more likely to do it by using the on line audio lectures we offer at Handiham.org.
• There is growing interest in Operating Skills. This is at least a 10 to 15 year trend, and it may be driven by the new technologies and the desire to learn more about them as well as the need to simply meet other Handiham members in person and to have a week of fun. Camp has always been a place to meet old friends and make new ones, and our electronic connectivity can keep us connected after the camp session ends.  Campers understand the balance between the real and the virtual and know that virtual cannot be a substitute for the real-life experience of attending camp in person.  People are wanting to build real communities again!

A possible response:
So what do we learn from these trends? 
Let’s put it this way: “The customer is always right”, as the old saying goes. Smart businesses listen to their customers and give them more of what they want. And what our campers want is more ham radio fun and less studying for licenses. What I propose is this:

• We continue to serve all of our Handiham members with our audio lectures for licensing or upgrades. Even those without computers can get our audio on Library of Congress digital player cartridges. 
• This frees us to build and expand Operating Skills in the camp sessions.
• With more classrooms free because we don’t offer licensing classes, we can get our op skills people into separate spaces in small groups that make it easier to use the radios or have a discussion.
• Our instructors don’t have to worry about cramming an entire licensing class into a week and can concentrate on teaching operating procedures.
• We will have more time for traditional camp activities and the pontoon boat, plus field trips.
• We can set up more stations so that people with different skill levels and interests can get on the air more without waiting so long for a seat at the operating position.
• The Technician course would be replaced with a “Technician study group”.  This would be a way to include a small number of unlicensed Handiham members in the week of Radio Camp, but it would only be a study group, not a complete course. There would be no more “Go to camp and get your license in a week.”  Everyone there would have to be studying elsewhere prior to camp. 
• VE Session: Maybe we have one, maybe not. We will see how this idea develops, but dropping the VE session gives us more time on the last day of camp to do our regular activities. The low pass rates in recent years do show that our traditional model of licensing classes is not effective. It might be better to review at camp and send the Tech students home to finish their studies and take the exams from their local VE teams. 
• The emphasis will be on having fun through the week and being part of a community of friends. Learning can be fun, so we will learn about new things in Amateur Radio and learn how to be better radio operators. 

Email me at [email protected] with your questions & comments.   
Patrick Tice, WA0TDA
Handiham Manager