AmateurRadio.com

Series Seven Episode Thirteen of the ICQ Amateur / Ham Radio Podcast has been released. The latest news, Martin (M1MRB & W9ICQ) and Colin (M6BOY) remember Amateur / Ham Radio Podcaster Tom Samacicio KB4HQA of HQA Radio who is now Silent Key. Martin (M1MRB & W9ICQ) interviews Sue Pycroft, G6DDS regarding Museums on the Air.

• Revalidation Figures of UK Amateur / Ham Radio Licences
• 13cm Amateur Radio Band Threatened in Holland
• New mode trial for VK medium wave beacon
• 27 MHz SSB CB legal
• Changes to Amateur Service Part 97 Rules
• Queen Shown Radio Ham’s Raspberry Pi Balloon  

Colin Butler, M6BOY, is the host of the ICQ Podcast, a weekly radio show about Amateur Radio. Contact him at [email protected].

I was too busy and tired yesterday to update my blog, that's because it was a busy day. I attended the Ham Fair in Friedrichshafen for the first time and was favorably impressed. The Ham Fair is very well organized and in addition to the goodies I was able to meet some old friends and make some new ones.
Mike Crownover, AD5A, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Texas, USA. Contact him at [email protected].

The excellent Southgate News page reports that SSB and AM is now legal on UK CB from June 27th 2014.

I have only briefly operated on CB many years ago and was very disappointed.  I suppose 12W pep of SSB will greatly increase the DX potential on CB. AM is also legal.

We need to watch out for more reports of TVI and hi-fi breakthrough as FM, especially at 4W legal limit, is rarely a problem whereas SSB and AM make such issues more probable. Of course,  some CBers like to use (illegal) add-on amplifiers making matters worse.

I don’t think this move will encourage me onto CB any time soon, but it may result in lower cost 10m rigs.

UPDATE 2015z:  Nevada are now selling the President Lincoln 2  (3rd improved version of this model) covering 10m only (as sold – but expandable illegally to cover CB bands) with a £10 discount.

Roger Lapthorn, G3XBM, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Cambridge, England.

There is little doubt now that we have passed the solar peak and we are now on the way to the minimum. This is still years away mind you. This graph (located at http://www.solen.info/solar/images/solar.png) illustrates this well. As I said before, it is too early to say just how poor HF conditions will get.

http://www.solen.info/solar/images/solar.png

Roger Lapthorn, G3XBM, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Cambridge, England.

This is a photo of me in the shack just before lunch today. Since lunch, I have had to disconnect everything because of an approaching lightning storm. At the last count (flashes to thunder) it was about 2km away but I think the storm is now moving away.

G3XBM in the shack today

For storm maps see http://www.lightningmaps.org/realtime?lang=en . The storm seems to have moved off: I can still hear thunder (to the east) but no nearby lightning. We have heavy rain, which will do the garden good.

Just a moment ago there was a flash and thunder almost overhead.  This showed up on the lightning map. Storms still rolling around. I shall not reconnect the antennas and radio gear for a while yet.

Roger Lapthorn, G3XBM, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Cambridge, England.

Listening and working on 630m over the past few weeks was not my first exposure to this part of the spectrum. Years ago I spent many hours listening to maritime traffic on 500KHz CW on a little Sony ICF-2010 and an outboard ferrite bar loop antenna. 500KHz was the International MF distress frequency as well as the calling frequency for ship-to-shore CW traffic. Ships calling land stations would be directed to 'QSS' to a working frequency once they had established contact on 500. These working frequencies were smack in the middle of what is now our 630m amateur band.

On winter nights with good propagation, I could often hear ships out near Hawaii or down in the Gulf of Mexico. Even better nights would produce ships along the eastern U.S. seaboard. Our new band has great potential for some exciting DX opportunities...much more so than the 2200m LF band. Hopefully the U.S. will get the band soon. In the meantime, it is up to Canadians to get the North American ball rolling!

Big signals from the land stations, particularly those operated by the USCG, dominated the band. Digging into my old QSL collection turned up a number of cards from '500'.

WNU - Slidell Louisiana

From what I could tell, most of the ship Radio Officers used a hand key on the MF transmitter while on HF, most used bugs or keyers. The quality of hand-keyed CW ranged from perfection to abysmal and some nights it sounded as though the ship's oiler had been strapped to the seat and told to send CW. Most traffic consisted of provisioning requests or berthing information, as ships usually only used MF when arriving or departing their port.

The ship's RO would often respond to a 'reception report' and happily fill in a prepared QSL. The cards were often returned with pictures and long handwritten letters, describing their radio equipment or life at home.

M/V Belforest - Bulk Carrier

Although CW Maritime operations have long been discontinued, the 'Primary' user of the 630m band is still the Maritime Service!

In the US and in Canada, the 472-479 kHz band is part of the larger 435-495 kHz segment allocated on a primary basis to the Maritime Mobile Service and on a secondary basis for government Aeronautical Radionavigation.

I'm not exactly sure what the Maritime is doing on MF these days or what they plan to do, but I suspect it may be related to DGPS activity down the band. Canadian amateurs are Secondary users of 630m and as such, must not create interference with the primary user. I suspect that it might not be a great idea to create interference with the secondary users as well, although there are no NDB's in this section of the band in North America.
Steve McDonald, VE7SL, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from British Columbia, Canada. Contact him at [email protected].

That font of all knowledge 🙂   Steve G1KQH has just informed me that Maplin has changed hands for £85M. Although not a frequent customer, I do use their shop in the Beehive Centre, Cambridge.

See http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/retailandconsumer/10930541/Electronics-retailer-Maplin-sold-for-85m.html

Not sure what it will mean for the business. One of the two stores in Cambridge is always busy, the other less so. Maybe less profitable shops will close?  A bit like Jessops?

Not sure if they still sell them,but I used to buy their small aluminium boxes for QRP projects.

Roger Lapthorn, G3XBM, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Cambridge, England.