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International Ham Radio News & Opinion

CQ 17m…

12 January 2010 | by Paul Lannuier | Leave a Comment (0)

Having grown tired of 20m, I’ve been monitoring 17m during the daylight hours over the past week or so. I’ve largely ignored 17m, even back in the old days — there are only 6 DX countries in the log from New Jersey, and no US or Canadian QSOs. This must change!

The band is mostly quiet but with spurts of activity when the waterfall will light up for a minute or two before resuming room temperature. Since November I’ve logged digital QSOs with 8 DX countries and 16 states. So far all the DX has been from the south and east — EA8, F, KP4, OM, ON, PJ2, PZ, TI.

One day last week I left SuperBrowser running on 17m while I was out of the shack. When I later checked the history I saw that there were a few JAs on the list just before sunset. I filed this away for future reference. Yesterday I sat down at the rig at around 2330 UTC to do some CW listening on 40m, when I noticed it was getting dark outside. I tuned the Tarheel up to 18100 and found the band dead quiet. What the hell, I thought, might as well fire off a quick CQ before QSYing down to 40. My first call was returned by JA8GLZ on Hokkaido — my first Asian DX on 17m. With a big signal, too! (One look at his QRZ page will explain the big signal.)

After that QSO… nothing. Not a whisper of activity. QSY to 40m…

My big issue with 17m is hearing the DX. I hear other statesiders working into EU but cannot hear the DX side, not even a trace on the waterfall. I’ve received broken responses to several CQs but have been unable to pull a callsign out of the garbled text, a sign that my Tarheel is getting a signal out but just not receiving quite as well. What to do? Perhaps a dipole in the attic? Might be a little quieter than the vertical. On the bright side, this is not exactly an ideal time to be QRV on 17, so I can anticipate better results as the days get longer and the sunspots multiply.

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LHS Episode #031: Linux Journal Invasion

12 January 2010 | by Russ K5TUX | Leave a Comment (0)

Linux in the HAM Shack has arrived in 2010! It's hard to believe that 2009 is over already. We've have so much fun putting together the podcast for everyone, the time has literally flown by. Soon it will be time for the snow to melt, the world to turn green once again, and for LHS to travel to Dayton, OH for the 2010 Hamvention in May. We're so ready we can almost taste it.

In this episode, we had the honor of interviewing two prominent figures from Linux Journal magazine. David Lane, KG4GIY, is the magazine's eminent blogger and ham radio advocate. He is a large part of the reason the January 2010 issue of LJ is all about amateur radio. Shawn Powers is the magazine's associate editor, which gives him the dubious honor of being a guest on our show. He's the go-to guy when the editor, publisher and just about everyone else needs something done. We have to say we were greatly honored to have the LJ folks join us, and we sure hope we haven't scared them off so they'll come back and talk with us in the future.

Hope everyone is having a fantastic 2010 so far, and thanks for downloading LHS in the new year. And if you have a couple of dollars leftover from holiday binging, please drop us a donation as the deadline for acquiring a booth in Dayton is coming up fast. And remember, we appreciate our listeners, each and every one. Thank you!

73 de Russ and Richard

Russ Woodman, K5TUX, co-hosts the Linux in the Ham Shack podcast which is available for download in both MP3 and OGG audio format. Contact him at [email protected].

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PSKFest 2010

10 January 2010 | by Paul Lannuier | Leave a Comment (0)

A half-hearted effort, 7 hours in two shifts (1000-1500 & 2200-2400). Made 82 QSOs, (51 on 40m, 30 on 20m, and 1 on 80m). I just wasn’t as focused as I could have been this time, was doing some work on the Mac while calling CQ on the Dell, doing my best Rick Wakeman impersonation…

Still, I was able to check off a few needed squares on my 40m WAS grid (IA, MA and MI). Also worked TF (Iceland) for a new one from Texas.

This was the second PSK contest I’ve worked (the PSK Deathmatch in December being the other) and have to say I really like PSK as a contest mode, even more so than RTTY. The bandwidth savings are obvious — a whole lot more PSK signals can fit into a 100 kHz swath of spectrum, but also the copy on weak signals is vastly superior to RTTY, and the 100w maximum output levels the playing field to allow anyone with a modest antenna to be competitive.

PSKFest 2010 Results

QSOs: 82
US States: 32
Can. Prov.: 2
DXCC: 9
Score: 3526

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FCC 2, Republic of Texas Pirates 0

7 January 2010 | by Anthony K3NG | Leave a Comment (0)

In November I reported about Raymond Frank, the pirate radio station operator busted by the FCC who claimed that as "a citizen of the Republic of Texas" he wasn't subject to the laws of the United States or the Commission’s Rules. Frank allegedly operated a pirate radio station on 100.1 and 90.1 Mhz in Austin, Republic of Texas.

More Texans are attempting to use this problematic yet creative defense. Jerry and Deborah Stevens, who allegedly spewed RF on a frequency of 90.1 Mhz on your radio dial, also in Austin, the Republic of Texas, submitted a response to the Notice of Apparent Liability (NAL) denying that the Commission has jurisdiction over this matter and requested that "the matter be dropped". Mr. and Mrs. Stevens claimed the station operated only within the boundaries of the Republic of Texas, and questioned the FCC's jurisdiction over intrastate communications.

The FCC answered the question very clearly, giving essentially the same answer as Mr. Frank received, with a serving of Section 301 garnished with a $10,000 fine. We assume that has to be paid in US dollars and not Texan Republic currency. Once again 90.1 goes dark in Austin.

Anthony Good, K3NG, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Pennsylvania, USA. Contact him at [email protected].

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Critical Thinking

7 January 2010 | by Anthony K3NG | Leave a Comment (0)

As I have gotten older, while physically I'm not what I used to be, mentally and intellectually I think I have grown stronger. Looking back on the past decade I'm troubled that we've become a society that has abandoned critical thinking. Today with the Internet it's way too easy to have material that supports our already established beliefs and steadfast opinions available at our fingertips, and we're often all too eager to forward this information to others without giving the validity of it any thought. Critical thinking has been replaced with leading question asking, predetermined goal-oriented thinking, and political slacktivism.

This year one of my blogging goals is to engage in more critical thinking and present those views.

Below is a video on critical thinking that I think is excellent...

Anthony Good, K3NG, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Pennsylvania, USA. Contact him at [email protected].

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Handiham World for 6 January 2010

6 January 2010 | by Patrick WA0TDA | Leave a Comment (0)

Welcome to Handiham World!

Pat, WA0TDA, with handiham coffee mug.

This week is a busy one with back to back meetings all day Wednesday and Thursday, so that accounts for this late (and shorter) edition of your weekly Handiham World. I hope you all had a pleasant holiday season and are ready to get back into the routine of getting on the air every day.

I did want to let you know that Santa was good to me this year, because a brand-new Icom IC-7200 was under the tree on Christmas morning. I plan to learn a bit more about the 7200, then I’ll write a more thorough review from the our particular Handiham perspective. The best points about the rig so far:

Front-firing speaker
Easy to use numeric keypad
Built-in speech for blind users, no extra module needed
USB interface on the back panel
Easy to read display
Great receiver

So how’s that for starters? I’ll put together some more detailed thoughts later on, but I have to say that the new IC-7200 is really a step up from the IC-706 Mark 2 G that I had been using for HF. And I’m thrilled that manufacturers are finally including voice frequency readout that doesn’t cost extra!

Now, stay tuned for two new year’s resolutions. That means you!

For Handiham World, I’m…

Patrick Tice, [email protected]

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

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RTTY Roundup 2010

4 January 2010 | by Paul Lannuier | Leave a Comment (0)

First contest of the year for me but was only able to put in 7 about hours on 40m (0244-0952 UTC) and logged 103 QSOs.

Not much luck with DX but nabbed LA (Norway, a new one from Texas) and a few other Europeans (G, I, OK, PA, SP), plus EA8, FM, HI, JA, KH6, KP4, P4, VE and XE. Stateside, I managed three new states on 40m (HI, RI and WY).

I wasn’t able to do anything on Sunday, just exhausted. Final score: 4,532

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