Snow - NOT amateur radio

We still have a bit of snow on the ground, but it remains very cold. Already there are signs we are in for a colder winter than we have had for some years. Already we have had many more frosts than last winter and it is still 2 weeks to Christmas.

630m OPERA RX last night

LA3EQ (769km) was the best DX on 630m OPERA RX last night. No transatlantic DX copied here. I have now QSYed to 6m FT8 RX.

Sunspots - Monday December 11th 2017

Solar flux is 72 today and the sunspot number 11.  A=3 and K=3.

uBitx kit

A useful resource for the uBitx kit is http://miscdotgeek.com/

477kHz OPERA RX

I decided to give 477kHz OPERA RX another go this evening and overnight. Nothing yet spotted. Because the FT817 is used in split mode I need to set up another memory which sets the TX frequency to 477kHz too via the transverter. With my brain as it is, this is less easy than it once was.

UPDATE 2110z: Just G6AVK (78km) spotted so far on 477kHz OPERA this evening. The best place to look for spots seems to be http://spots.microwavers.es/index.php .

UPDATE 2125z: Now G0NDB (259km) has been spotted twice.

HF vertical antenna

Somewhere, I have a Sandpiper vertical made some years ago. I think it is an X80. It is hardly used. It has been up briefly years ago. As I recall, it acted like a Rybacov antenna and was a vertical fed via a un-un so it provided a reasonable match on several HF bands. HF vertical antennas can pick up noise from nearby things more easily than horizontal antennas, but it might allow me access to several bands, so I might be able to WSPR on several bands sequentially. It probably won't be erected until the spring.

Snow - NOT amateur radio

Today we had our first "proper" snow since 2013. Snow is quite rare here these days due to our warming world. Someone explain this to President Trump in words of one syllable. Silly me, this is all a Chinese hoax.

It has been snowing all morning although I suspect it will soon go. It could turn to ice. Nice as it lasted.

6m FT8

For a change, I am on 6m FT8 RX today. Really I am hoping for G stations and any EUs would be a bonus.

UPDATE 1350z: Nothing at all spotted so far on 6m FT8.

UPDATE 1546z: One Belgian station spotted on 6m FT8 - ON8DM (237km). Aircraft?

UPDATE 1815z: Quite a few central and eastern Europeans spotted on 6m FT8.

Faith or lack of it - NOT amateur radio

Rational thinking tells me "this is it" and all religions are just Man's attempt to come to terms with a finite existence. There are many religions in the world and their adherents are often firm believers in their particular faith. All the recent evidence in my life says we are not born for an eternal life. Before we were born we knew nothing. Were we happy? Arguably, yes, as we were unaware of anything.

And yet....

Perhaps all religions hint at something. Maybe there is more? The only certainty seems to be that we all die and not one of us really knows what then happens. Does our consciousness somehow live on? Who knows.  What underlying thing sets our moral compass? What makes us follow certain paths and tells us what is right and what is wrong? If this is all there is why do we not follow a path of pleasure for ourselves at the expense of others?

630m WSPR last night

My 10mW ERP was spotted by a new Norwegian (for me) - LA9NKA (930km). In all, I was spotted by 6 unique stations. I spotted 9 unique stations in the last 12 hours.