AmateurRadio.com

I enjoyed the drive to see the K-3 station of Art Ellis (W8PBO) in Ravenswood WV. I also enjoyed talking to Eric (AC8LJ) as we drove up the Interstate to Arts home. It was a very enjoyable trip and I was pleasantly surprised with the entire days events.

Art uses the latest Elecraft K-3 K Line gear at this home. A brief demonstration had me hooked with the first note coming from the speakers. I’m very impressed with the “graph” feature on this radio. Being able to visually “see” the signal on the band, and automatically “tuning” the radio to this frequency is VERY useful. With the accompanying “signal strength” displayed on the screen, it would be easy to spot “QRP” signals.

Every new day I spend on the CW portion of the bands makes me appreciate the development of Morse Code equipment. We’ve certainly advanced from the original “straight key” days of early radio.

I’m looking forward to another visit to Art’s radio shack. I had no idea there was such a fine display of both a good CW station and a collection of great keys in West Virginia. I’m overjoyed to find the small Code Mite key and Eric came home with a “Sideswiper” which has a very distinctive sound.

Art will be at the Dayton Hamfest in March; I’ll be looking forward to seeing him there.

Art and his wife were perfect hosts to our visit. His wife served us coffee, tea, and cookies before we left for home. They were both teachers before retirement. You won’t find finer folks anywhere in this state. They were both a real joy to meet.

QRPp with WSPR is the new trend. A lot of my fellow bloggers doing the same thing. Here my results this morning on 40 meter with 50mW.

And 10 meter yesterday with 50mW for a short while.

Shackbox is a Linux distro for us ham radio fans. So if you fancy using Linux in the shack (and why not) then after a long time in development (Which I understand from those in the know, that this means the developers had other things to do) there is a new release based on Ubuntu 12.04 LTS or Long Term Support.

I haven’t managed to download a copy as the servers were complaining but if you’re feeling lucky then head on over to http://shackbox.net/ and grab a copy.

I’m guessing but I’d image its a Live DVD that you can run on your normal machine without having to install anything. Like most Live versions you can install the distro after playing about either as a complete OS or as a dual boot.

I was actually able took get on the air for a bit today! A Saturday that’s not full of obligations and chores is a rarity for me.

And I got a new one via QRP! Paraguay, by working ZP6CW on 12 Meters. And I got a 579 report to boot, so since it wasn’t the automatic 599, I will take him at his word. The antenna was the Butternut HF9V.

A little while later, I worked KH7Y in Hawaii, so the bands were open. With the NAQP SSB, going on, the CW portion of the bands was not as crowded as usual.

I worked a few QRP Polar Bears today, as well – WA8REI, VA2SG and K3Y/1 who was Pete N1ABS, who is also a Polar Bear.

I have decided that I am going to be countercultural, and I am NOT going to try and work all 50 W1AW stations this year. A few years ago, I worked 48 states for the K6JSS anniversary event that QRP ARCI held, and besides, I have two ARRL WAS certificates already. I earned one as N2ELW, and I got another as W2LJ. The W2LJ certificate was earned by working all 50 via CW and QRP. I don’t need another, even though having a special certificate for the ARRL’s Centennial would be nice. I’m just not in the mood to break another 50 different pileups for another WAS certificate. Bah humbug!

I have tomorrow and Monday off, so hopefully, I will get more air time this long weekend.  Oh! I just remembered …. tomorrow is the third Sunday of the month. Join us for the Flying Pigs Run for the Bacon tomorrow night.

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

Chris, G0FDZ, the beacon keeper of the GB3VHF 144MHz beacon reports it as off air at the moment.

Unfortunately, there has been an equipment failure of the power supplies. No particular problem – Chris has the bits to mend it! However, unfortunately, due to the very wet weather, it’s not possible to get in the door, as it has swollen!

See the service updates page for GB3VHF

From the pictures, particularly the fallen oak tree, it would appear that the weather at the site has been very bad recently.

WSPR never loses its ability to astound. Today I’ve been WSPRing on 10m, still with 0.2W. My signal was decoded by 5 different Stateside stations.