AmateurRadio.com

If your better half complains that you have too much radio equipment, just show her this article.

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

You’ve all seen it: a new or prospective radio amateur joins a web forum and posts: “I’m looking for advice on how to get started in HAM radio.” HAM is not an acronym. What do they think it stands for? I consulted the Acronym Finder and could find nothing remotely relevant.

Having been in computing for more years than I care to remember, I know that the avoidable acronym is not a new invention. The one that really used to bug me is HELP, as in “Software includes full online HELP.” For goodness sake! Help is a word, not an acronym. I don’t think it was meant as a cry for assistance: HEEELLLPPP!!!! though I have come across a few programs where that would be appropriate.

Another example is FAX. Again, I can’t think of three words it could be an acronym for. It’s short for facsimile, so it’s just fax.

And ham is short for amateur, so capitalization is not required. There are many suggestions as to why amateur radio became known as ham radio. No-one really knows. Some say it has the same origins as “ham actor”, though that’s a pejorative term for an actor who overacts and generally isn’t very good. Others suggest it comes from British English. Cockneys (working class Londoners) drop the leading H from words like “hurry” or “have”, so they would often insert it in front of words where it doesn’t belong when trying to “speak posh.” Hence “amateur” would become “hamateur” and then “ham”.

Who knows? But whatever the origin, ham certainly isn’t an acronym.

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

The dog days of summer are here and the contester’s mind begins to drift toward…contest season, of course.  What preparations need to be made?  Here at K8GU/3, there are a couple of hardware goals I have to get ready:

1. Finish building K9AY loop.  I have this scheduled for this weekend.  I want to at least be able to use it on 80 meters in the CW Sprint on 11 (12) September.  This needs one or more W3LPL filters to prevent blowing up my IK4AUY preamp or the RX radio when I’m doing SO2R.  I’m going to implement 80 meters on the left radio to begin with.
2. Finish building the 50-MHz transverter in time for ARRL VHF on 11-12 September.  I’ll be happy with 3-4 watts from this—just enough to move a couple of locals (e.g., W3ZZ or K1RZ) for easy points/mults.

And, as far as mental preparation, I’m operating the weekly NS Ladder.

Ethan Miller, K8GU, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Maryland, USA. Contact him at [email protected].

I used to be an ardent participant in the NCCC Sprint Ladder competition when I lived in the Central time zone.  Now that I’m back in the Eastern time zone, 10:30 pm local is a little late for me.  But, W9RE conned me into doing it.  After some fits and starts last night (including using the NAQP module for TR instead of the Sprint module, which caused me to QLF my first two serial numbers), I had a good time.  Here are the numbers:

NCCC Sprint Ladder - Aug 20

 Call: K8GU
 Operator(s): K8GU
 Station: K8GU

 Class: Single Op LP
 QTH: MD
 Operating Time (hrs): 0.5
 Radios: SO2R

 Summary:
 Band  QSOs  Mults
 -------------------
 160:
 80:   9      7
 40:   8      7
 20:  12      9
 15:
 10:
 -------------------
 Total:  29     23  Total Score = 667

 Club: Potomac Valley Radio Club

So, I have some work to do.  I was getting up into the 40s of QSOs when I left off two years ago.  More sprints!

Ethan Miller, K8GU, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Maryland, USA. Contact him at [email protected].

Now into the third week of my sabbatical, I am surprised how much I want to get out and operate my QRP portable gear. Guess I have deprived myself over the years of being a confirmed workaholic and avoiding time off, vacations, and time for my favorite hobby.

This should be a good weekend for QRP portable. The Polar Bear QRP Group will be out for another Polar Bear Summer Picnic Event and Polar Bears from Spain to the West Coast of the US will be out looking for BSO’s. Grrrrr! I am PB #173 and we’re over 200 members now. With the new Twitter and APRS connections to QRPSPOTS.COM which also point to the excellent spotting site of K3UK with a section for FISTS/QRP Ops to spot and sked one another, there are plenty of ways to use technology to help find each other. Add in a few other contests and state QSO parties, and there should be some buzzing going on this weekend. Makes me wonder when the FOBB results will be announced! Buzzzz Buzzzzz

I’ll be out and if all goes well I will be field testing a new C Pole antenna based on the suggestion I received from Neil W0LVZ. I added some switchable capacitance to my BLT+ and have rewound the main toroid to see if I can push the range a bit more with it so will have a delta loop and probably my W3EDP in the air too. I love playing with antennas and am still amazed when the ones I build actually make contacts!

Give a listen for me on the QRP watering holes on 40m, 30m and 20m Saturday morning. I’ll be self spotting on QRPSPOTS and the K3UK sites to make it easier for you to find me. Let me know how my newest antenna is workin’.

72,

Kelly K4UPG

PB #173

Kelly McClelland, K4UPG, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Florida, USA. Contact him at [email protected].

Kenwood Corporation recently announced the October launch of the long-awaited TS-590 HF/6m transceiver. Described in some quarters as a “K3 killer”, the new transceiver uses the novel (for modern Japanese radios) approach of a single conversion receiver with a low (11.374MHz) IF on the amateur bands to give what is claimed to be exceptional dynamic range.

The news release bears careful reading, as what it doesn’t say is as interesting as what it does. The receiver will have a 6KHz roofing filter directly after the mixer, followed by a 500Hz or 2.7KHz filter (both included as standard) after the post-amplifier. But a footnote states that “For 1.8/3.5/7/14/21MHz amateur bands, when receiving in CW/FSK/SSB modes down conversion is selected automatically if the final passband is 2.7kHz or less” which suggests that a conventional (for the Japanese) up conversion will be used for the short wave bands, AM or FM modes, the WARC bands, 10 and 6m.

I think the current obsession with receiver performance figures is absurd. I am far from being a member of the Elecraft fan club, but even assuming the TS-590 does turn out to outperform the K3 on the main amateur bands, I think anyone considering swapping their K3 for the Kenwood on that basis would be foolish.

As far as I know, the Kenwood will not have an option for a second receiver, nor one for a panadapter. It will not have the transverter and external preamp interfacing (which I use to insert the MFJ noise canceller) nor an independent receive antenna input. I doubt that it will have fully isolated audio inputs for data nor a soft ALC in digital modes that allows you to vary the power output in PSK31 without fiddling with computer mixer settings to avoid IMD problems. I’m sure it won’t have an internal 144MHz option either.

Whenever I look at the features of the K3 that I am currently using, I realize that there is nothing else on the market at a price I am willing to pay, nor which would fit on my operating desk, that could do what my K3 is doing.

The price of the TS-590 will be 228,900 Yen, or about £2,000 by the time you have added on VAT (never mind the usual exorbitant UK dealer mark-up.) If it goes on sale here at £2,499 I will not be surprised. Compared to currently available HF radios and Kenwood’s previous HF models including the TS-570 to which this new rig bears a considerable similarity, the TS-590 looks overpriced for what in the end is nothing more than a compact HF/6m radio.

A K3 killer? I don’t think so!

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

During my radio and computer-free getaway on the high seas last week, I read World Made By Hand by Howard Kunstler.  The fictional novel takes place around perhaps 2030, several years after oil has run out or has become so scarce that essentially our entire modern infrastructure has ceased to function and we're thrown back into a lifestyle reminiscent of medieval times.  The electrical grid is non-functional, the telecom network is gone and forget about the Internet.  Transportation is entirely by animal or on foot.  Food is locally grown and no longer benefits from petro-chemicals or irrigation.  The government has broke down and civil wars have broken out in most of the major cities which are uninhabitable due to overpopulation.  Disease is rampant due to a lack of medicine or readily available medical care.  Overall, it's a rather bleak picture.

The main character of the story, Robert Earle, has lost all of his family due to epidemics and other bad stuff, but him and others in the town of Union Grove, NY are attempting to get back to normalcy, or the best that can be expected in this new world.  Radio surprisingly doesn't get much of a mention in the story.  At the beginning of the story the electricity comes on once every few weeks or months and for very short periods, sometimes seconds, with a household AM radio left on to signal its arrival.  Earle is only able to find a few AM broadcast stations carrying evangelists and unfortunately he lacks a shortwave radio.  Eventually Earle breaks with the past and his hopes for the old world to return and symbolically turns off the AM radio.

Being the radio artisan I am, my mind began to explore the technical side of this.  I think in this post-apocalyptic world some form of amateur radio would survive and would likely be the only network for information and communications.  We've proved over the years beyond a doubt that low power operation works, and with energy in such short supply, low power would be a necessity.  Even a simple low power radio fashioned much like a Pixie or a Rockmite would be priceless.  I envision radio communications networks forming, much like they did in the early 20th century, to pass messages.  When the Big One (tm) hits communications won't involve florescent yellow vests and go kits, it will be scrounging wire and parts from landfills and making homemade batteries and generators.  Who knows, maybe even spark will make a comeback.  In the story it's clear that those with food, energy, natural resources, and people are those with power.  Communications would undoubtedly be another source of power and those with the ability to communicate long distances would be an asset to their community, or as was often the case in the story, a feudal lord.

Despite being a story of gloom, pain, and despair, there were times of great joy, beauty, and simplicity.  It certainly made me think, especially while reading on a huge hunk of metal in the ocean with nearly 5,000 people on board and enough fuel to power a small city.
Anthony Good, K3NG, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Pennsylvania, USA. Contact him at [email protected].