Month: September 2006

Need WY for WAS

…. why, yes I do! From the Second Class Operator’s Club… because so few really are First Class

Dale WC7S who is a member of the NAQCC is this week’s “bear” in the NAQCC Bear Hunt. The Bear Hunt is an operating event to help folks obtain their WAS awards.

Dale will be on the air for the next few days; and you can find his schedule at:
http://www.arm-tek.net/~yoel/wasproject.html

9/24
1300-1400 3.560$
1800-1900 7.030
1900-2300 14.060*

$ – 80m if open, else 7.030
* – 20m if open, else 10.116

In the following few weeks, we will be putting Connecticut and Washington State on the air. Not rare enough for you? Well, all 50 are needed sooner or later to complete WAS. It’s our goal at the NAQCC to get all 50 on the air in the upcoming weeks.

Keep checking the schedule!

—
Larry W2LJ
NAQCC #35

Unfinished QSO

Was having a nice 30M CW QSO with John, KA9DVX after a small non-radio related emergency. John was going just a little bit too fast, but I was mostly keeping up. Sorry about leaving you without an explanation John!

There’s a RTTY contest going on – seems to have taken up the traditional part of the 40M CW band.

I made two 40M SSB contacts in for the TX QSO party.

Saturday…..

Finally checked into the VA MARS net. The net started late and I had almost given up on it. I’m going to try and check in again tomorrow morning. I need to get around to raising the height of my inverted vee – I think it will better help my signal get out.

I was able to catch W1AA (Henry and Whitey) and their activation of the Highland Lighthouse (USA 110) out on Cape Cod. Whitey, K1VV, is usually out ever weekend doing a lighthouse activation – always has a nice signal.

Had a very nice Radio Merit Badge class for a young Scout out at Fort Monroe in the afternoon. I setup my 10′ x 10′ shelter and the ARSIB. Initially I planned on setting the G5RV (like during the W4M Memorial Day Special Event) but the wind was quite heavy, so I opted to put up the homebrew vertical dipole. To get some height on the antenna, I attached it to the top of the painter’s pole. Before I had a chance to tie down the pole, a gust of wind knocked the antenna down. The fall caused the feedline connection to break off. Not good. However, with a little bit of wire and some electrical tape, I was able to reattached the feedline connection. Now the antenna was low to the ground and I was a little concerned about it’s performance. The Scout arrived and we started reviewing the Radio Merit Badge requirements. I was able to easily tune WWV on 15 MHz and was also able to find a CW QSO in progress on 40M. Also demoed a bit of CW using my MFJ paddle that has a speaker built in. After we’d reviewed all the requirements, it was time for the HF QSO. The Scout called CQ and after a few tries, received a reply from Charlie, N1MUQ, in Stamford, CT. Charlie had a booming, solid signal and the Scout was able to successfully complete the QSO. We then moved to my mobile VHF rig and the Scout had a nice QSO with Randy, WB7URZ located up in Gloucester. Even with the antenna setup issues, the Radio Merit Badge session was a success and I think both the Scout and I had a good time.

My Bug – By Eric W. Stover – K0EWS

From eHam.com

On a fall day about six years ago, my Father-in-law presented me a very unique gift for my birthday. I had recently become a ham just a few months earlier, and my activities were restricted to VHF, but I had made plans to purchase a new HF rig, and become active, using my General class license privileges, and discovering the fun of HF. As I opened the box, which was quite heavy, I discovered a strange looking apparatus, and I’d never seen anything like it before. I asked what it was, and my father in law replied, It’s something to use for sending Morse code. I found it at an auction. A strange gift indeed, certainly an old, second hand thing, but nonetheless, I thanked him for it, and put this strange looking heavy thing on my shelf. I had known about straight keys, and paddles, as my relatives are hams, and had those. But THIS thing, well, it took some investigation. It had a big word on it.Vibroplexhmmm. Upon asking my Dad, he told me it was a semi-automatic key, or a bug and that back in the old days, lots of folks used them; some did nowadays, but mostly hams collected them. Knowing my Father-in-law, a collector of unique things, that made perfect sense.

A few days passed by, and I decided to play with my new toy, after reading up on it a bit on the Internet. The dits were very fast, and I couldn’t really get that thing to make code near as easily as doing a straight key. However, it wasinteresting. Back on the shelf it went. Well, time went by, and I got a set of paddles, and my Vibroplex paperweight kept it’s place on the shelf, standing guard over my activities. My code speed came up to the low/mid 20s, and I was looking for a challenge. I decided to give my paperweight another try. After some adjustment and practice, I could make some code. I cleaned it up, and after doing so, I discovered that the dull, tarnished base was actually a shiny gold color. I did some research on my bug, and it was something called a Vibroplex Presentation, manufactured in 1955. After even more research, I found that Vibroplex still made bugs! I even could get some weights for it and slow it down, which I did. As a musician, I found the challenge of taming that bug to be fun, but rewarding. Fast forward a couple of years, and now that bug sits proudly on my desk, and is my primary code-sending tool. It checks into nets, has QSOs, chases DX, and all kinds of fun things.

It turns out that my Father-in-law had given me a very useful, and practical gift after all, and not just a conversation piece.

I asked him about it one day, and he said that it came from an auction. The auction was for the estate of the last land-line telegrapher in my town. When the railroad retired the code those many years ago, they retired the code operator with it. He was given the bug as a retirement present, and had it to his dying day. I look at that bug every now and then and wonder of all the messages that it sent. I like to think that somewhere out there, that old landline operator knows that his beloved bug is in good hands, and lives on in a new generation. The music that he sent, combined with the music I send, keeps the sweet music of Morse alive for perhaps another generation. Perhaps my bug will survive me one day and end up in the hands of yet someone else. One can only wonder. In the meantime, the bug sits in my shack and continues to send on.

SW Nostalgia!

Ian McFarland releases 2-CD journey into SW Nostalgia!

Colin Newell writes: Were you a shortwave listener back in 1974?

If you were a regular listener to RCIs popular SWL Digest programme, which went off the air in March of 1991 in the wake of a devastating budget cut at RCI, then you may remember the SW station Idents & Interval Signals Series that was featured on this award winning programme.

That series featured 160 identification and interval signals from SW stations around the world. Many of the ident signals heard in that long running series are no longer on the air.

If you feel nostalgic about the good old days of SWLing youll be interested to know that this unique series is now available in a two-CD set. The CDs are fully indexable and come with a hard copy listing all of these 160 ident signals.

The cost of this 2 CD set includes first class or airmail postage to anywhere in the world:

To addresses in Canada – $10
To addresses in the USA – $12 US
To all other countries – $ 15 in US or Canadian funds
The net proceeds from the sale of these CDs are being donated to the local
Food Bank in Duncan, British Columbia.

Send your order to: Ian McFarland, 6667 Beaumont Avenue, Duncan, BC V9L 5X8, Canada. Personal cheques or money orders are accepted from Canada & the USA. Money Orders only for orders from all other countries.

CW QSOs

Had two great 80M CW QSOs last night. The first was with John, K8JD, from Michigan. I asked him to slow down a bit and we had a good exchange. For slowing down, he lengthened the dits and dahs to make the letters longer. My real problem that I’m working on is reacting to a short space between letters. I can understand individual letters sent at about 10wpm, but I do need them spaced apart… at least for now. The second QSO was with Jerry, WA1ZFE. He called me when I had completed the QSO with K8JD. I’ve never had that happen before. Had a real nice chat with Jerry, who lives in Norwich, CT and is retired. Jerry kept his CW slow but steady and I got through the QSO pretty good.

I’m enjoying CW quite a bit. Playing tapes in the car during the commute to work on my listening speed. Making progress.

Keep your IC-706/MKII/MKIIG Cool!

Phil Salas AD5X (ad5x@arrl.net) http://www.ad5x.com
The ICOM IC-706 series of radios is very popular for mobile and portable operation. However, a lot of heat is generated in this small package, and with moderate-to-heavy use, the radio and heat-sink can get quite hot. The way around this is with additional airflow around the heat-sink. This project had three goals 1st, solve the heat problem. 2nd, the solution should be unobtrusive. And 3rd, make no mechanical changes to my IC-706MKIIG. There are many surplus computer fans available for very little money, so I figured that there had to be one that was perfect for adding to the IC-706G. I wound up using a 12-volt 40mm square fan available from All Electronics (www.allelectronics.com, part number CF-181 @ $3 each). Now, how to mount it to the IC-706G heat-sink? The answer turned out to be pretty simple. Refer to photos Fan & Anchors, Back View, and Top View. I used plastic wall anchors to hold the fan in place. The wall anchors I used are 1-1/4 long and use #10 or #12 screws. I used 1-1/2 long #10 machine screws for mounting. The 40mm fan mounting holes passed #8 screws, so I had to drill them out slightly to take #10 screws. I also needed to cut off about of the length of the wall anchors. Position the fan so that it blows air away from the IC-706 heat-sink, then tighten the screws.

I took the 12-volts from the IC-706 antenna tuner connector. I made a cable extension to let me pick off the +12V but still permit connecting an antenna tuner if desired. The maximum current available at this connector is one-amp. To protect the radio in case of a fan short, I connected a 100-ohm 1/2-watt resistor in series with a fan lead. The resistor drops the fan voltage in half, which gives a much quieter installation, yet plenty of air is still moved. The resistor is covered with heat-shrink tubing in the photo. How does this work? Absolutely outstanding. My IC-706MKIIG runs cool even during heavy use. Other size fans can obviously be used, though a 50mm square fan is about the largest will fit (a 50mm fan is actually shown in the Fan & Anchors photo). This 40mm fan is a perfect fit, though.

Click to access Fan706RevA.pdf