Table of Contents
07 : Blog
2 Post(s) for March 2025
| Sun 09/03/25 : Tweaking The Blog Setup | 09/03/25 14:29 GMT | John Pumford-Green | blogging |
| Sun 09/03/25 : A New Blogging platform? | 09/03/25 14:00 GMT | John Pumford-Green | blogging, chyrp-lite |
Mon 10 July 2023
- A catch up from yesterday to begin.
- Two periods of activity today, early evening on 30m and 40m, and later on 60m and 30m.
- Rig : 7200
- Using full 100W today - condx. seem a bit variable, especially at this northern latitude.
- Some Auroral sounding CW.
- Not much activity on 30m, despite many RBN spots of my CQ calls.
- Period 1
- 30m QSO : F5POJ : RSt
- 40m QSO : DL6LV/P : Hry, nr Keil. BVp. Short ~RC. Should look for him again for a longer chat.
- Period 2
- 60m QSO : G0IIK : Nigel, nr Heathrow, RCh. BVp me: “Vibroplex Presentation 1957”, him : “McElroy Bug 1940 same age as me, 82” Another nice chat w/ Nigel
- 30m QSO : DL4ST : RSt
- 30m QSO : IK2MMM/QRP : RSt “QSL only electronic” = LOTW confirmation
- 30m QSP : M0RQD : Steve, Isle of Wight : SKh. RC. slow and pleasant “beginner” QSO - hope for many more and for Steve to find CW improves rapidly with use.
Finding many RBN reports from my CQ calls - as far as Australia and Hong Kong, but very often no replies. Will endeavour to reply to any/all CQ calls I hear.
— John Pumford-Green 11/07/23 08:00
Sun 6 Aug 2023
A quick visit to the shack in the morning and I heard SM5COP - Rune - calling CQ. I always like to say hello so I called for a brief QSO, I couldn't stay long as I had to go out - swimming with friends, a regular Sunday morning activity. We had a nice, short QSO. It's always a pleasure to work Rune.
I had a few hours in the shack later in the afternoon.
I had a think about the higher bands - I don't often stray beyond 30m, occasionally going to 20m.
I had a quick tune around and wondered if I need to use the Pre-Amp on my IC-7200 or not. On the normal lower bands it's certainly not needed, and would be counterproductive.
The accepted wisdom is that “if the noise level increases when you connect the antenna then you have enough RX sensitivity, and you don't need the Pre-Amp”
I thought I'd see which bands (if any) would warrant the Pre-Amp:
| Band | p-p mV noise / Test Load | p-p mV noise / Antenna | Pre-Amp needed? |
|---|---|---|---|
| 160 | 260 | 800 | No |
| 80 | 280 | >300 | No |
| 60 | 240 | >600 | No |
| 40 | 250 | >800 | No |
| 30 | 280 | >1000 | No |
| 20 | 280 | >1000 | No |
| 17 | 260 | >600 | No |
| 15 | 260 | >600 | No |
| 12 | 260 | ~300 | Marginal Yes |
| 10 | 260 | 260 | Yes |
It appears that only 12m and 10m would warrant use of the pre-amp using my existing Inverted-L antenna.
on 12m and 10m I re-did the experiment with the Pre-Amp ON
| Band | p-p mV noise / Test Load | p-p mV noise / Antenna | Pre-Amp needed? |
|---|---|---|---|
| 12 | 330 | >1000 | Yes |
| 10 | 360 | >600 | Yes |
Sat 5 Aug 2023
The day's radio action started slowly, with what looked like very difficult propagation conditions.
The data as of 0905z:
| SFI | 171 |
| A | 13 |
| K | 5 |
The K index was still rising, up to K=7at 1015z
Solarham https://www.solarham.net/index.htm showed there had been a solar flare at 0936z reaching M2.1.
All pointed to a poor day's radio - STORM G3 - and the bands were very quiet, only one or two weak signals on 30m.
I sent a few CQ calls on 30m at 1030z, and despite the poor condx I still got spotted on the RBN system at 15 different locations around Europe.
After calling CQ for a few minutes without any replies I gave up and did some other work in the shack (trying to tidy some space for comfortable operating, and to make the work area clear in preparation for building my new K2 if/when it arrives).
Later in the afternoon I tuned around and heard SM5DAJ calling CQ at 1438z and we managed a short QSO, with RST 569 reports both ways, but deep QSB which sent signals into the noise at times. Still, it was a QSO when there didn't look like much chance of anything.
As part of the tidy-up I'd re-installed my homebrew 60m transceiver and connected it for RX only (using a feed from the Wellbrook loop) and heard G4AFU calling CQ on 5262kHz, not very strong, but certainly workable. I swapped to the IC7200 and replied.Then followed a QSO with Paul in Bedale, N.Yorks, not a great signal report from him (RST449) but at least we exchanged details ok. I tend to find 60m is difficult during the day inter-G from this more distant location, much like 80m, with D-layer absorption. Nice to have a daytime CW QSO on 60m.
I came back to the shack in the evening.
The solar data looked a bit better
| SFI | 171 |
| A | 13 |
| K | 2 |
but there was evidence on Solarham of another big flare at 1910z reaching at least C6.7!
Still on 60m, 5260kHz, I called CQ few times, and then heard Rupert G4XRV call CQ, to which I replied. We had a really good long ragchew starting at 2023z and ending at 2135z. We chatted about the Elecraft K2 and also K1 and K3 etc. Rupert has built several and still uses one as his main station rig. I built one in 2006 but sold it a few years later (and regret this) and I'm now awaiting a new K2 kit from Elecraft so that I can build another and this time I won't dispose of it! We had a nice long bug - bug chat and at the end we were called by G0IIK (Nigel) to say he'd enjoyed listening to a good Bug QSO. We exchanged reports a few overs (Nigel recommending a Cootie Key for an interesting alternative to the bug).
I was very pleased to have held up a long 2-way bug ragchew for an hour, very comfortable, informal chat, very little written down, all just “in the ears and straight to the brain” - as it's meant to be.
Later I tuned around the 30m band and found Ian IK4EWX and Jim SV8ANW in another bug-bug 2-way QSO. Conditions a bit more challenging on these more distant stations. The QSO was almost finished, both guys saying they were heading for bed… so at the end, just to say “Hello” to Ian, I called IK4EWX and we exchanged RST559 reports and a few short overs. Conditions not great, and getting worse. A good time to stop.
Ian's QSO with Jim SV8ANW is now on You Tube : https://youtu.be/MWvBj8R-PBw and at the very end you can hear my call to Ian!
I had a QSO myself yesterday (Friday 4th August at 2203-2225) with Jim SV8ANW - another bug-bug QSO, and it's contained in another of Jim's You Tube videos, this link should get to the point of the start of our QSO https://youtu.be/YYNCK6KCKds?t=2343
Saturday proved to be an interesting bug-related CW day, despite the poor conditions. I saw lots of RBN spots that were totally inaudible here, but fortunately I still managed to reach somewhere and have some QSOs.
Thu 27 July 2023
- Have been thinking about building a K2
- I built one in 2006 but sold it, along with the K1 I'd built in 2003
- The K1 #1672 now lives with Will GM0HKS, in a new wooden enclosure https://gm0hks.weebly.com/shack-photos.html
- I don't know where the K2 #5542 ended up, I'd love to find out where it is now….
- The K2 had several options : SSB / 160m & RX antenna port / 60m / Auto-ATU
- I contacted Elecraft yesterday - the K2 is shown as “Back order, waiting parts” - to check that they aren't going to discontinue it and received a reply confirming that they have no plans to discontinue it at present. Kits will be available as soon as the parts arrive from suppliers - typical of the global problem with semiconductors at the moment.
- I decided to “get in the queue” for back-orders and placed an online order for the basic K2 kit and the 160m/RX antenna port module. Sadly the 60m module is no longer produced, and I have no interest in using SSB or digimodes with this K2. I want it as a pure CW transceiver.
- I've re-joined the Elecraft reflector https://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft
- Looking at the archive, at June 2006, I see my own posts
- announcing the arrival of my first K2 kit on June 8th 2006 https://mailman.qth.net/pipermail/elecraft/2006-June/056712.html
- and announcing completion and first QSO on June 17th https://mailman.qth.net/pipermail/elecraft/2006-June/057085.html
- I remember having fun building it, but I didn't realize I'd done it so quickly.
- The next one will be done over a longer timescale, to enjoy the process more without rushing through it.
- I plan to document the build - perhaps even with some YouTube videos.
Thu 20 July 2023
- SFI = 189 A = 5 K = 1
- IC-M710 - set up serial control and my own Python control panel - modelled somewhat loosely on the Skanti TRP series control panel
The IC-M710 is a marine HF radio - SSB/CW/FSK - up to 150W. It's tuned by selecting pre-programmed channels, with separate RX & TX frequencies. There is no VFO tuning as we'd use it on the amateur bands - and this makes it awkward to use.
(There's a MIC plugged in mainly because the RX audio loops via 2 pins in the mic, so unless it's plugged in, or the link is made in another way, there's no RX audio!)
I wrote a few different control programs in Python to make things a bit easier. This one seems to work ok. There's also a user-programmable bank of presets - presets can be added from the main control panel by pressing the Store button.
- if I offset the RX tuning by +200Hz I can get a more pleasant 800Hz resolved CW tone.
- I'll do something in the code to do this automatically when CW mode is selected.
- 30m
- Heard CQ from SM5OMP and replied - with 60W from the IC-M710 & BVp
- QSO with SM5OMP - Georgios - Skaerblacka - BVp - RSt
- Using the M710 isn't going to be a frequent operation, but it's fun to do something different. There's no narrow CW filter - so it's 3kHz wide. The QSK works nicely though.
The desktop with both M710 windows open:
- Period 2 : 2015z
- IC-M710 @ 60W
- 30m : CQ call 10123kHz
- Answered by ON4KCD - Claude - Liege - BVp/BVc - RSt+ - Age 63, ham 40 years, Begali key
- Discovered major drawback with IC-M710 - not “single signal” CW reception due to SSB filter and the position of the BFO - during QSO on 10123kHz heard strong signal from 2E0ISD on 10121kHz. Not good in crowded bands - I think using IC-M710 for CW is a bit of a dead loss, really. I've come to this conclusion every time I try it. Time to accept it, and move on.
- Back to the IC-7200…..
- CQ
- Called by EA1ARW - Luis - nr Burgos - BVc - RCh - Age 46 - Nice long chat about keys, cooties, paddles, homemade keys, noise, QTHs, Summer & Winter in Shetland etc. Luis is on vacation away from his home QTH's urban noise and enjoying the bands noise-free.