Virtual Amateur Radio? - NOT yet

On the Southgate News page is a link to a French blog extolling the virtues of virtual ham radio such as HamSphere. These use the internet rather than the ionosphere, so it is not real radio, just a simulation. You can still communicate world-wide, exchange QSL cards etc..

At the moment this not for me: I prefer the challenge of real radio and have moved over to JT65, WSPR etc. to still catch 10m and 6m DX. It is definitely getting harder and I might turn to virtual ham radio for some QSOs in the quiet years ahead.

See http://southgatearc.org/news/2017/july/10-reasons-to-go-to-virtual-amateur-radio.htm#.WWcvIbpFzIU

See also: https://sites.google.com/site/g3xbmqrp3/virtual/hamsphere

Cellphone power harvesting

Southgate News reports on a cellphone design that uses power harvesting to minimise power consumption. I suspect this is a "proof of concept" project rather than a practical design. Clearly, it requires a major name to introduce power harvesting to minimise power usage. Most cellphones use milliwatts or even watts of power on TX.

See http://southgatearc.org/news/2017/july/battery-free-cellphone.htm#.WWT3UrpFxMs

Pixie CW QRP transceiver

Some time ago I bought a Pixie kit from China. It was really bought to test my building skills since my stroke. In years past this would have been trivial. The kit was so low cost that even if it had to be thrown away it would not matter.

As it turned out, it worked first time. A QSO with a local a few miles away proved all was well. The crystal supplied was 7023kHz, but a very kind person sent me a 7030kHz crystal, which is the 40m QRP CW frequency.

I see from Southgate News that the Banbury Club is running a Pixie Challenge.

See http://www.banburyares.co.uk/Documents/Pixie.pdf

Youngsters and amateur radio

This is a point I have made many times: unless we attract young people into our hobby and keep their interest, it will die with us. I see on Southgate News that the ARRL has been doing something about the growing crisis.

See http://southgatearc.org/news/2017/june/amateur-radio-needs-young-people.htm#.WUuA4LpFzmQ

New microwave records

Southgate News reports on new microwave distance records in the UK on high microwave bands.

See http://southgatearc.org/news/2017/june/new-122ghz-and-24ghz-uk-distance-records.htm#.WTUZ5LpFzIU .

SAQ transmission cancelled

Southgate News reports that the upcoming SAQ CW transmission on 17.2kHz VLF CW has been cancelled due to ongoing maintenance work.  This signal is often a good one to try if testing your VLF system. It is much harder receiving amateur VLF signals.

Often these transmissions result in a QSL card for reports. I have one from years ago.

See http://southgatearc.org/news/2017/may/saq-transmission-cancelled.htm#.WS2KmrpFzIU

New antennas for 6m/4m from Hy-Gain

Southgate News has reported that Hy-Gain is producing a new dual-band antenna for 4m/6m designed by G0KSC.

See http://southgatearc.org/news/2017/may/new-hy-gain-antennas.htm#.WSP_9bpFyP8

The person who usually creates the Southgate News postings is away, so someone else must be doing these.

Realtime HF Band Conditions

Southgate News reports on a real-time HF band conditions website. When I looked 10m was not even shown, encouraging the (often false) assumption that this band is a total waste of time for DX. OK, 10m is harder work now, but if no-one is there it will appear dead when in fact DX contacts can be made!

See http: //www.bandconditions.com/ .

ESEO satellite

Southgate News reports on testing of the ground control for this upcoming satellite. It has an FM transponder planned for 23cms to 2m.

See https://amsat-uk.org/satellites/communications/eseo/ for more about the satellite.

C5 solar flare

Southgate News reports that there was a C5 solar flare a few days ago. This was expected to mainly miss the earth, although conditions were disturbed yesterday.

See http://southgatearc.org/news/2017/april/massive-explosion-on-the-sun.htm#.WPm7WoWcHIU

Marconi Radio International

Although I have no more data, Southgate News reports that Marconi Radio International will be on the air tonight (Tuesday April 18th) and looking for SWL reports.

See http://southgatearc.org/news/2017/april/mri-on-air-on-tonight.htm#.WPXR1YWcHmI

Solar storm?

Southgate News reports that we might get a glancing blow from the results of a solar storm. This may hit us over Easter.

See http://southgatearc.org/news/2017/april/easter-storm.htm#.WO8_H4WcHIU
See also http://www.solen.info/solar/

Ham Radio Horizons

According to Southgate News,  this magazine is now available online.

See https://archive.org/details/hamradiohorizons

SDR receivers and transceivers

There is a real gap in my knowledge as I have never once tried an SDR based receiver or transceiver. SDR dongles are very low cost, so I really have no excuse.

On the Southgate site I read news of a new SDR 5W transceiver.

See https://sunsdr.eu/product/sunsdr2-qrp/

K7RA and propagation

Someone far more knowledgeable than me about propagation is K7RA. Southgate News has a piece about his latest review of propagation.

See http://southgatearc.org/propagation/k7ra/index.htm#.WM0pWIXXLIU

The Future?

Several things act as warnings about the future of our hobby. Today, there was a piece in Southgate News warning of the lack of youngsters entering the hobby in the Netherlands. Although not true everywhere, ours is a hobby mainly populated by older people. This is definitely the case here in the UK. Most club members are grey-haired!!

In general, young people fail to "get the magic" radio was to us years ago. I have discussed this before, but in the age of worldwide video conferencing for free over the internet, young people think radio old fashioned. Our hobby will die unless we attract and keep young people. Clearly what "turns on" youngsters is not the same thing that attracted us. In the early 1960s if you wanted to talk around the world you had to become a radio amateur.

See http://southgatearc.org/news/2017/march/shortage-of-young-dutch-radio-hams.htm#.WMZ8DoXXLIU

Amateur band intruder?

Southgate News reports that a military station, probably in the Falkland Islands has been copied within the 40m amateur band.

See http://southgatearc.org/news/2017/march/iarums-stanag-4285-in-40m.htm#.WMVrIYXXLIU

Cellphones and brain cancer?

There has been debate for years and years about whether or not excessive use of cellphones increase the chances of getting brain cancers. I guess that prolonged use of a high power VHF or UHF handheld may pose similar risks?

According to Southgate News a judge in California has asked for a 2014 report to be made public. A quick read seems to suggest some sort of increased risk. Basically, this is all relative, but prolonged RF exposure is probably not good and is best avoided. Another argument in favour of QRP?

See https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B14R6QNkmaXuRmJlZDRWME5lN2M/view

4m in the USA

Although the prospects of an amateur 4m band in the USA remains a distant dream - the FCC seem very very slow allocating 137kHz and 472kHz - Southgate News reports that the 3kW ERP 4m beacon in the USA, in FM07 square, has been granted clearance to continue for another 2 years. 6m openings to the USA occur by Es most summers, but 4m is much harder. This is a useful propagation indicator.

See http://southgatearc.org/news/2017/march/4-metres-and-wg2xpn.htm#.WLgpUoXXJMs

4m is a band I have hardly tried. I do recall working ZB2VHF with a few watts of AM by Es back in my university days as G3OUL from Liverpool - 1969? These days there are lots of European countries on the band and I would think it a decent band for inter-G QSOs. I recall doing one 4m contest in my early days at Pye Telecom. It was April 1971 and we were in the back of a Land Rover. It was freezing! We used a converted Pye AM Cambridge and a 3 el I seem to recall.

Smartphone mod into a walkie talkie

Southgate News brought this to my attention. How to convert a smartphone into a walkie-talkie without internal mods. A neat idea. Maybe this could be done using an amateur handheld?

See https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/linc-the-smart-walkie-talkie-smartphone#/ .