AmateurRadio.com • Ham Radio Blog

Paradoxes

8 September 2011 | by Hans BX2ABT | Leave a Comment (2)

An interesting news item on Taiwanese television: people were complaining that they had to run USB extension cables from inside their home, through the kitchen, over the washing machine, onto the balcony, to get some decent wireless internet access from their dongle. Why couldn’t Chunghua Telecom provide decent coverage inside their apartments? “Because this is not why it is called wireless, is it?”

I love these NIMBY (not in my back yard) paradoxes: people don’t want antenna towers close by, but still expect a perfect service from their mobile phone or WiMax providers. But it made me ponder and come up with a theory.

We recently moved into our own semi-detached house. After emigrating from the Netherlands to Taiwan we were living-in with mother-in-law. It wasn’t that bad, but there’s no home like your own home, right? Back in the Netherlands we had a 90 year old town house. The kind of a house where you point your finger at the brick wall and there is a hole in it. Despite the soft walls, I could take any radio or HT and have clear reception throughout the house. So late at night I monitored 40 meters, practised taking morse code or talked some on my HT in bed before going to sleep. Heaven!

Here in Taiwan I am lucky to get any radio signal inside our new home. Shortwave is completely empty. Mediumwave too, apart from one or two local stations. FM is not much better, even though we live only kilometres from the nearest broadcasting facility. And it wasn’t much better in mother-in-law’s apartment. On the roof top or balcony things are fine and I can hear the world and some more. In the reinforced concrete cage that we live in now it is no dice.

So what is my theory? Radio is dying because we can’t receive it any more! We amateur radio operators know how to, but we are being curtailed by antenna restrictions. And potential hams? They don’t even get to discover the magic of radio waves, because they live in boxes that keep radio waves out. I started out with shortwave listening after accidentally finding Radio RSA on an old radio I found in the attic. I doubt that my son will ever make such a discovery on his own. But luckily he has a father who is heavily into radio, so he will turn out right, don’t worry.

For now I put up an old CB antenna on the balcony – with the railing acting as a counter poise – and I am enjoying myself. I was just testing the whole set-up when KA5PNX called me, so the first QSO was some good DX as well. Things are looking good so expect more reports from the Far East in the future.

73 de BX2ABT a.k.a. Hans “Fong” van den Boogert

Hans "Fong" van den Boogert, BX2ABT, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Taiwan. Contact him at [email protected].

» Leave a Comment (2)

California QSO Party, Dude

8 September 2011 | by Rich KB2MOB | Leave a Comment (0)

The last 24 hours here in Upstate NY has been flood warnings and weather watches, and I want to get away from that for a bit. A good place to go, I think, is California. So why not join in on their 45th running of their QSO Party which is probably the largest in the U.S.

Image of Flag of California/Wikipedia

So the object of the party is of course to work as many stations in the Golden State as possible on phone and CW. Stations may be worked once per mode/band combination for points with California Counties (58 of them) as individual multipliers. And California stations will get credit for working stations inside and outside of the state with US States and Canadian Provinces as their multipliers. The party runs from 16:00 GMT October 1st till October 2nd at 22:00 GMT.

The Northern California Contest Club sponsors the CQP and offers a variety of awards open to stations inside and outside of California. Some of the awards include plaques for the top operators in the Youth (under 18) and YL categories. California QSO Party chairman, Rick “Rhino” N6RNO, says that last year the contest attracted a record number of log submissions, and they are hoping to beat the previous record this year, by as big a margin as they can.

The rules for the contest, as well as a complete list of awards can be found on their website.

73.

Rich also writes a Tech blog and posts stories every Tuesday and Thursday on Q103, The Rock of Albany’s website, as well as Amateur Radio stories every Monday thru Friday on AmiZed Studios and hosts a podcast called The Kim & Rich Show with his fiance’ Kim Dunne.

Rich Gattie, KB2MOB, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from New York, USA. Contact him at [email protected].

» Leave a Comment (0)

Ham Nation 16

8 September 2011 | by Bob K9EID | Leave a Comment (1)

N7HPR And ARISSat-1

Elecraft’s new toy, more about ARISSat-1, adding a regulator to George’s DC power supply, and more.

Guests: Steve Bible, N7HPR and George Thomas, W5JDX

Download or subscribe to this show at http://twit.tv/hn.

We invite you to read, add to, and amend our show notes at wiki.twit.tv.

Thanks to Joe Walsh who wrote and plays the Ham Nation theme.

Thanks to Cachefly for the bandwidth for this show.

Video URL:

http://dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp4/twit.cachefly.net/video/hn/hn0016/hn0016_h264b_864x480_500.mp4

Video URL (low quality):

http://dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp4/twit.cachefly.net/video/hn/hn0016/hn0016_h264b_640x368_256.mp4

MP3 feed URL:

http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/twit.cachefly.net/hn0016.mp3

People:

Leo Laporte

Dr. Bob Heil, K9EID, is the founder of Heil Sound and host of TWiT.tv's Ham Nation which streams live each Tuesday at 6:00pm PT (9:00pm ET) at http://live.twit.tv. Contact him at [email protected].

» Leave a Comment (1)

Handiham World for 07 September 2011

7 September 2011 | by Patrick WA0TDA | Leave a Comment (0)

Welcome to Handiham World!

I don’t know how it is for you, but in our household Labor Day here in the USA marks the unofficial end of summer. Yes, I know that by the calendar September is still really a summer month. Autumn isn’t official until Friday, 23 September 2011. But if you are an early riser like me, you can notice quite a difference week to week as the morning daylight retreats and it is really quite dark when you make that first pot of coffee or take the dog out. analemma: Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, no Front-Cover Texts, and no Back-Cover Texts. A copy of the license is included in the section entitled GNU Free Documentation License.

analemma: Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, no Front-Cover Texts, and no Back-Cover Texts. A copy of the license is included in the section entitled GNU Free Documentation License.

Image: The analemma as depicted for the northern hemisphere. A typical globe of the world has an analemma to help describe the Earth’s progress through its seasons.

The reason for this quick change in daylight hours is, of course, that the Earth is reaching that portion of its orbit around the Sun where the tilt of its axis favors direct sun over the equator instead of here in the northern hemisphere. We call this the Autumnal Equinox, and it means that our daylight hours are roughly equal to our night time hours – depending on location, of course. If you look at the analemma on a globe of the world, you can see that it looks like a rather tall figure “8”, with the very top of the 8 representing the summer solstice in the north and the very bottom representing the winter solstice in the north (or summer solstice in the southern hemisphere.) The center of the 8, where the lines cross, represents the two equinoxes, autumn and spring. The thing about the length of the days is that as we make the trip around the top of the figure 8 the days are long and there is little change, but once we start our wild ride down the steep slope of the 8, the roller coaster really seems to speed up and the days get shorter fast!

For amateur radio, this has some interesting implications. Since the days are getting shorter, there is less direct sunshine, which in turn means less absorption on the lower HF bands like 160 and 75 meters. Those bands are also hard to use in the high summer months of July and August because of the thunderstorm static. Thunderstorms are ultimately driven by sunshine that heats the ground and builds huge clouds from rising air. The jet stream pulls storms through the upper Midwestern United States all summer long, creating a cacophony of noise on the HF bands. As the sun appears to retreat to the south at this time of year, the storms and RF noise also retreat. This makes the HF bands much more useful. During the winter months the long nights will mean better conditions for long-distance contacts on 160, 75, and 40 meters. If you have not considered getting on these bands, you might think about it now while the weather is still pleasant enough to allow for some serious antenna work. Most of us use either simple wire antennas or verticals for these bands because of their wavelength and the obvious problems one encounters constructing directional antennas for such frequencies. A one half wave dipole for 3.9 MHz would be around 120 feet from end to end, which makes it pretty impractical to try to put on a tower and rotate!

So what that means is that for a few bucks and a little elbow grease, you can get on the air and have an antenna that isn’t that different from what everyone else is using. This is certainly not the case for highly competitive bands like 20 meters, where some stations are equipped with large directional antennas on tall towers. You will get a chance to be as competitive as you like on the lower frequency HF bands, but you have to get your antenna work done now!

For Handiham World, I’m…

Patrick Tice
[email protected]
Handiham Manager

Help us win the Dr. Dave Challenge!

Thanks to everyone who has helped us with donations to the Dr. Dave Challenge so far. I don’t have an update this week due to the high volume of phone calls and the holiday weekend. Money is tight these days and we desperately need your support. Now, thanks to a generous challenge grant by Dr. Dave Justis, KN0S, we have a chance to help fill the budget gap. Dr. Dave will donate $5,000 to the Handiham System if we can raise a matching amount. That means we need to really put the fund-raising into high gear! If you can help, designate a donation to Handihams, stating that it is for the “Dr. Dave Challenge”. We will keep you posted in our weekly e-letter as to the progress of the fund.
Nancy can take credit card donations via the toll-free number, 1-866-426-3442, or accept checks sent to our Courage Center Handiham address:
Courage Handiham System
3915 Golden Valley Road
Golden Valley, MN 55422
Be sure to put a note saying “Dr. Dave Challenge” somewhere in the envelope or on the note line of the check. If you donate online as detailed toward the end of your weekly e-letter, be sure to designate to Handihams and then send me an email letting me know you donated to the Dr. Dave fund: [email protected].
Thank you so much for your support!

W0GLU License Plate

W0GLU amateur radio license plate - Minnesota circa 1971- Gift of Miriam Kiser.

This vintage automobile license plate was issued to Rex Kiser, W0GLU, in 1971 by the State of Minnesota. It has renewal stickers for 1972 and 1973. Rex is now a silent key, but had literally decades of volunteer experience for the Handiham program. The license plate was a gift to us from Miriam Kiser, Rex’s wife.
Rex’s specialty was repairing and modifying amateur radio equipment for the use of our members with disabilities. He soon became our crew leader, taking charge of shop activities. Back in the early days, the modifications to equipment included mounting clothespins on band-switch knobs so that people with muscle weakness could get enough leverage to change bands by themselves. The Handiham System also kept a “fleet” of loaner CW transceivers, Ten-Tec Century 21 models. These would be modified by Rex and his crew for use by blind hams. The mod included cutting away part of the plastic bezel covering the radio’s frequency display dial and putting tactile bumps on the dial to mark frequency intervals. The blind user could put his or her fingertips through the hole in the bezel and feel the raised markings on the frequency display dial. This was about as analog a frequency display as you can get! It was only in later years that frequency displays started going digital and the door began opening to voice frequency announcements.
In later years, Rex and his crew installed voice modules in radios like the venerable Kenwood TS-440SAT, a very popular radio that appeared in the late 1980’s. The VS-1 speech module made it the most blind-friendly HF radio of its day, and the built in automatic antenna tuner in the SAT version freed blind users from the hassle of fiddling with manual tuners. Needless to say, Rex and his crew knew these radios inside and out!
W0GLU was also a regular net control station on the PICONET, which meets daily except Sundays on 3.925 MHz. I would describe Rex as a well-rounded ham radio operator who enjoyed many aspects of radio and electronics. Injured serving his country during WW2, shrapnel pierced his spinal column and he never walked again. That didn’t keep Rex from driving his own car and maintaining his considerable upper body strength. I was surprised when he decided to take up adapted skiing with his disabled vets group, but I shouldn’t have been. As I said, Rex was a well-rounded guy, interested in helping others by volunteering and in living a good and worthy life.
Rex Kiser, W0GLU – A great ham radio operator who inspires us still.

Image: Rex poses for the camera in the Handiham repair shop.

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

» Leave a Comment (0)

MMVARI – a skimmer for RTTY

7 September 2011 | by Tim G4VXE | Leave a Comment (1)

I enjoyed a drink and a meal with Justin, G4TSH on Monday evening. One of the things we talked about was some software called MMVARI. This software to decode RTTY has the ability to decode a number of streams. Ideal if you’re running a pileup from a DXpedition. Or, for those of us at home, to have a display of RTTY activity across a portion of the band.

You can see it in action from CE0Y/I2DMI in this video

From some quick googling around it looks like the software can be integrated into the N1MM contest logging software for RTTY contesting. I know one DXpedition group who are planning to use it too…

Haven’t downloaded this and tried it out myself, but it definitely looks of interest.

Tim Kirby, G4VXE, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Oxfordshire, England. Contact him at [email protected].

» Leave a Comment (1)

Two new 2m repeater channels

6 September 2011 | by Juilian G4ILO | Leave a Comment (0)

According to the UK repeaters website, two new 2m repeater channels have been internationally agreed:

144.9750MHz input / 145.5750MHz output (RV46)
144.9875MHz input / 145.5875MHz output (RV47)

Though these channels are not available for use in the UK yet, the wording of the announcement suggests that they eventually will be.

Looks like we dinosaurs who still insist on calling the calling channel S20 are going to have to give up QSYing to S23!

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

» Leave a Comment (0)

A day of ham radio

6 September 2011 | by Mike VE9KK | Leave a Comment (0)

It is a very rare event when I am able to spend a majority of the late afternoon and early evening on the radio. Julie and rose this morning to do a much needed house cleaning once that was done it was time for a walk. It's September and the weather is starting to change on Saturday it was 38C with the humidity but Monday it was a nice 18C. After our walk it was hobby time for both Julie and I, her with photography and me ham radio. I began by starting the PC and opening up the QRP spot website. I noticed a spot for VA2OTA who was activating a summit for summits on the air. I tuned to 14.060 for a listen but was not able to hear anything...... according to the spots he was there and looking for contacts.

So I setup VFO B on the k3 for 14.060 using my new Grove HS-900 antenna. This way I was able to listen for VA2OTA with in my right ear and on VFO A cruise all the other bands for contacts with my left ear. While waiting for VA2OTA my left ear picked up 4O3A at 14.019 I gave him a call and he came right back with a 599...not bad for 5 watts and an attic dipole. It was a very short QSO as he had many in line
waiting for him. I was hearing some action in my right ear but it was only other stations working VA2OTA so it was off to VFO A again to see what was out there. 40 meter was not to busy as it was still early so back to 20 meters. I came on a QSO that was just ending so I waited and called Vito ON6VL he came back to me and gave me a 559 report. Conditions were changing and Vito was starting to loose me so we ended our QSO. It was back to the computer and someone who posted a spot for VA2OTA said they had to use the audio peak filtering on their K3. That got me thinking and I not only used the APF (a link to YouTube for an example) but diversity mode as well. BINGO it worked at 14.060 VA2OTA jumped out of the noise floor. Now mind you it was...JUST....above the noise floor. I waited for my turn as there was a line up wanting to make contact. I gave him a call and he came back to me we exchanged reports and that was it. So over all the radio time was a success.

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

» Leave a Comment (0)