SDRs and amateur radio

Southgate News has a piece about the impact of SDR on our hobby, mentioning that it will soon be possible to buy a 3.5GHz transceiver for about £50. As the piece says, we live in exciting times.

See http://www.southgatearc.org/news/2019/december/foundations-of-amateur-radio-07-12.htm#.Xetv3eiTLnE

Sunspots - Saturday December 7th 2019

Solar flux is 70 and the SSN 0. A=4 and K=0. Sunspots seem pretty rare!

Trinity Street, Cambridge - NOT amateur radio

On my way to my relativity course in Cambridge, I walked down this street, Trinity Street. This is one of the most famous streets in Cambridge. About 200m behind me is Kings College Chapel.

Day off

As I have my U3A course on relativity in Cambridge on Fridays, I am not active currently.

Websites - NOT amateur radio

Being fairly sedentary these days, I tend to do things that I can do from home. I created and maintain several websites and blogs not all amateur radio related. One of these is for my wife's choir www.cambschoral.org.uk . Others are mainly amateur radio related.

Sunspots - Friday December 6th 2019

Solar flux is 71 and the SSN 0. A=3 and K=1.

Choose your sweets - NOT amateur radio

To be honest, I am not a great sweet addict. If I never had another sweet in my life it would not be a disaster.

My wife noticed this machine in a Cambridge supermarket. It allows you to fill a tin with the sweets you like. I did not even notice the machine!

2m SSB in the 1970s

When I first started in VHF amateur radio it was in the early 1970s, when most rigs were AM. Gradually people started using FM gear and this mode really took off with the coming of repeaters.

My first 2m SSB rig was a Liner-2. It was a revelation, with distances I could only dream about being workable even with very simple antennas. Nowadays many prefer the "rubber stamp" FT8 QSOs. Back in those early days 2m DXing was real fun and ranges of several hundred kilometres were possible most nights on SSB.

See https://sites.google.com/site/g3xbmqrp3/vuhf/liner2

Delta-T - NOT amateur radio

Delta-T is a company in our village focusing on plant measurement gear and environmental science. They work from offices that were originally built in the 1500s. At one time they were a worker's co-operative although I am not sure of their business model today.

See https://www.delta-t.co.uk/

2m FT8

All day, I have been on 2m FT8 RX. So far (1304z) 39 stations spotted in 8 countries spotted.

UPDATE 1839z: 64 stations spotted today so far in 8 countries on 2m FT8 RX.

UPDATE 2216z: 86 stations copied today on 2m FT8 RX. Soon be time to go QRT.