N0XOC

Doing my part to put the 'amateur' in amateur radio; musings about HAM radio with an e-prep twist.

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It's long overdue for a post and, now that it's cold out, I thought I'd start documenting and sharing some of my projects. It was a race with winter to get the last of my outside [sic. antenna] projects complete, and with a week of vacation, I decided to switch my focus to exploring new modes, namely digital.

FLDIGI is setup, fully integrated into my station, and I've made my first 30 QSOs on PSK31. For those who are interested in digital modes, FLDIGI is the program to use; what it lacks in UI is makes up for in broad support for digital modes and supported rigs.

This is a great video to help those who are interested get started with FLDIGI and digital mode operation.

73

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Comms Up!

During our trip to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area, I wanted to solve having emergency communications. There were two main reasons for this; one, I was the designated and trained crew lead and thus responsible for the group, and also, there were sever storms through the area the week prior that required Forest Service evacuations of campers, so the need was true.

We were base camping on the fringe of civilization in an area with no electricity, no cell phone service, and on the edge of the Ely LSAC repeater site. During our trip, we also had to portage and paddle everything in and plan for a week of rugged conditions including rain and possible gear submersion.

For a comms solution, I used a Yaesu VX-8DR and was able to make a weak, but copyable connection if I connected a wire slim-jim antenna, which was pulled up into the trees on the bear-bag line. For power, I used a Powermonkey Extreme 12v battery/solar charger setup. I chose this because of its light weight, rugged and water resistant nature. Though this wouldn't keep up with heavy contesting-style use, it was more than adequate to keep the radio charged for back-country use.

Finally, a good comms plan was the final piece to pulling this all together. We designated an emergency contact with a fellow ham and followed the ARRL/ARES recommend wilderness protocol which was making contact for 5 minutes, every three hours, from 7:00AM through 7:00PM.

Overall, this was an excellent solution and solved for in-bound, out-bound emergency communications as well as weather and weather alert notification. I would have liked to play with APRS a bit, but will save that for another adventure.

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Running field day the proper way; low power, portable, battery and from a cabin tent at Tomahawk Scout Reservation.

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TSR Summer Camp Comms Plan

2m Plan

I plan to use the Polk County Amateur Radio Associations repeater system. This has proven to be a useful repeater system. Many people in the Twin Cities have reported being able to successfully contact the N9XH site, which is cross linked with the KC9NVV (Barron County) site, which I should be able to access with my cross-band repeater running at TSR.

Polk County access information:

- N9XH repeater (East side Twin Cities accessible) - 147.195 + (110.9)

Further info - http://n9xh.org

- KC9NVV repeater (TSR accessible and linked to N9XH) - 146.715 - (110.9)

FRS Plan

For local comms the troop will be operating on FRS. We generally start at channel 4 (462.6375) and step up one channel until we find one open. If you’d like to contact me just call for Troop 817 ASM, I’ll be listening.

HF Plan

My primary portable operations is 40m and 20m. I’ll be working field day to some extent, and may switch bands if I feel like doing antenna reconfiguration.

For operations throughout the week, if you’d like to log a QSO, start looking for me at 7.222. If you’d like to call on VHF first, I plan on having my HT with me at all times, we can figure something out. You can also try texting me at 612-418-3865) but I plan to avoid my phone as much as possible during the week.

Eyeball

Finally, if you are interested in visiting, I’d welcome some company. Please may contact with me prior to a visit so we can sync on scheduled.

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I'm at the rig operating W1AW/0 on 40m this morning. I've logged one contact in Indiana thus far. I've got to think that trying to broadcast in the middle of these storms is having some impact on signal getting out. I should be logging QSOs instead of complaining on my blog about it, but these are forces beyond my control or influence.

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Tonight I had the privilege of operating W1AW/0 ARRL Centennial QSO Party station from my QTH. I operated side-band on 14.272 and listened up 5 kHz.

Out of the gate, I called CQ for a few minutes and started getting calls. After a few minutes I found myself a bit overwhelmed in the middle of my first pileup. The band wasn't in the best of conditions so throughout my two hour shift the band took me in and out of pileups tapering down and finishing at a slow pace. I logged a total of 124 QSOs in my first two hour shift.

All in all, this was a great station test and more importantly a great exercise in learning to suck less with operator skills... which I just chalk up to doing my part to put the amateur in ammeter radio. I'm looking forward to my next shift, tomorrow morning, on 20m phone; considering the most recent solar event, I'm curious what conditions will yield. 

73

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After playing with several different wire antennas including OCF dipoles, doublets, and a G5RV, I decided to order an antenna for my QTH. I decided on an Alpha Delta DX-LB Plus which is essentially a trapped dipole for 160m -40m with the addition of fan dipoles for 20m and 10m.

Some initial observations include:

With the experience from building several wire antennas, I'm pretty impressed with the design and material quality of Alpha Delta's product.

The difference in pulling a 9 lb. antenna in air between my previous 3 lb. antenna is significant.

160m has a really nice low SWR point but the bandwidth is extremely narrow. I'll need to decide where I want to talk on 160m and tune the antenna appropriately.

Unless you have a mast, a completely clear lot and are above a perfect ground, plan on tuning the antenna if you expect to get the optimal SWR this antenna can provide. Also, it is designed to be tunable.

It performs a better than my G5RV but the G5RV was far simpler to design, tune and install. If you're a new ham looking for a single-wire multi-band antenna, from my testing the G5RV (or variant) is a better starting point.

With all that said, for a single wire in the area of 100' length, which happens to be about the longest strait run I have between trees on my lot, this is the least of a compromise for the primary bands of 160, 80, 40, 20, 15 and 10m. Don't expect anything great from 60, 30, 17 or 12m.

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Checking to the 20m AmRRON net.

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A list of tasks that are applicable to the basic Army Communicator MOS.

I'm using this as one of my baselines for skill development as I study for my Extra ticket.

(via Sparks31)

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This past weekend I ran a proper feedline for my (now) G5RV. After moving things around for a couple of weeks, I settled on trimming my 135" doublet to a G5RV. I'll run this for a few weeks and likely replace it with a EZNEC modeled variant of the G5RV, the ZS6BKW.

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Just QSOed Svalbard, the northern most city in the world running 10 watts into a homebrew G5RV. If you haven't QRPed, it's a great challenge of both station and operator skills.

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Happy Memorial Day

As you enjoy the sun this weekend, likely involving some grilled meat, barley pop and yard time, make sure take some quite time to honor the men and women who died while serving in the US Armed Forces, many defending the American State of Mind. With that, GORUCK HQ sends: 

At our Events, their main task is to teach you how to overcome adversity by working together as a team. Anyone can lead a bootcamp for civilians, anyone can tell you to do a million push-ups in a row and watch you fail. I always thought that was stupid and a waste of everyone's time. GORUCK works because our Cadre teach you how to succeed together whether you're black, white, young, old, male, female, pink, polka-dotted, civilian, military, or none, or somehow all of the above. Race, religion, politics, sex, nationality, and orientation are irrelevant because American is a state of mind that cuts across everything, it's a state of mind that does not allow for defeat. And we believe in that state of mind and our Cadre teach that state of mind.

If you came to GORUCK to challenge yourself as an individual, you stayed with GORUCK because of the people, because of your team. And your team became part of a family called GORUCK Nation and in every way you are the proof that the lessons our Cadre teach make it back to your daily lives, that they transcend the events themselves. That American is a state of mind, and one worth living.

Watch our Cadre Building Better Americans here.

As always, thank you for the support,

Jason McCarthy Founder, GORUCK

Now, suck it up princess, get over yourself, respect and take responsibility for your freedom and go do something exceptional. Happy Memorial Day 2014.

Eric - N0XOC GORUCK Tough US Army Combat Infantry Vet Husband, Father and Freedom Loving American

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The command center project is finally coming together.

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During some work travel this week, I drove past the WLW antenna site in Mason, Ohio. It looked interesting so I stopped to take some pictures, and I'm glad that I did.

The WLW site transmitted at 500 kilowatts or half a million watts for some time. It was (one of) the most powerful AM stations to ever transmit. There are some great videos with further information about this site.

I liked the one by K7AGE at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CbHjcwIoTiY

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It was a great weekend for portable operations at Interstate State Park; grid EN35pj. I made a few QSOs on 40m and 20m running the Mini-Buddipole in a 40m NVIS and 20m 'V' configurations.

A few random observations from my trip:

It continues to surprise me how much of an impact field operations has on noise levels. If you are able, driving even a few miles out of town and operating can make a significant impact on RF noise levels.

I'm pleased with Yaesu's internal batteries for the FT-897D. There are plenty of negative reviews about cost, amp-hour rating, etc. I was able to operate on and off through the entire weekend on the two batteries without an issue. Plus, Ni-MH delivers stable voltage, is lighter weight than lead-acid and can tolerate cold unlike lithium batteries.

The more I learn about portable ops the more I become a NVIS geek. DXing is fun, but there are just so many reasons to dedicate some experimenting to 40m NVIS.

Finally, it was so nice to NOT be camping in the cold. I'm glad the warm weather has revisited Minnesota.

[f4czd]

Request an Azimuthal Map with your Locator

Link

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Quality vector image PDFs. I've printed a few at ANSI D size; one for my shack and few more for friends.

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A properly designed Near Vertical Incident Skywave (NVIS) antenna will have a directivity pattern that will maximize transmission and reception at high angles while rejecting low angle, long range noise. 

HF isn't just for DXing, sometimes the challenge can be making a contact only a state or two away. Understanding how to properly design and deploy a cloud burner (NVIS) is a fun and potentially very useful project.