"Our" windmill - NOT amateur radio

Well, it is not ours, although our elder granddaughter thinks the land around it is part of our garden. When we say, "play in our front garden" she makes a beeline to the windmill! Not many can overlook a lovely windmill whilst eating breakfast!

This is the windmill this morning in bright, winter, sunshine. Next year it is 200 years old. The hedge at the bottom of the photo is in our garden.

Best night this season on 472kHz WSPR TX (10mW ERP)

Spotted in Norway 33 times and Poland twice! Still using the earth-electrode "antenna" in the ground and my homebrew transverter.

Stations spotting me on 472kHz
WSPR (10mW ERP) in the last day

Sunspots - Monday December 23rd 2019

Solar flux is 71 and the SSN 0. A=4 and K=2.

QSY to 472kHz WSPR TX

At about 1950z I went QRT on 2m FT8 and a now on 472kHz WSPR TX with my usual 10mW ERP from the earth-electrode "antenna" in the ground. Already 3 stations spotting me.

Irish 60MHz (5m) beacon on-air

Apparently the new Irish 60MHz beacon is now active:

"Back in early 2018, the 60 MHz (5-metre) band was allocated to radio amateurs in Ireland (EI) on a secondary non-interference basis. Now we have news that the very first beacon on 60 MHz is operational! The new beacon is operational since the 16th of December 2019 and has the call EI1KNH. It is on 60.013 MHz and runs 25 watts into a vertical folded dipole. This is currently the only 5-metre beacon operational in the world."

See https://ei7gl.blogspot.com/2019/12/new-irish-beacon-on-60-mhz-now-on-air.html

The site is near Dublin.  An 8m (40MHz) beacon should be on the same site in Q1/2020.

eHam

Whenever I think of buying something (OK, not often!) I check the reviews on this site.

It is a good idea to ignore the very bad and very good reviews and look to see what most people think. Often very bad reviews are written by someone with a very bad experience. Likewise very good reviews are sometimes written for the wrong reasons. If there are pages of reviews and most of these are good, it is a fairly safe bet that most users are happy.

In the end it comes down to personal tastes though.

See https://www.eham.net/

At home - NOT amateur radio

Yesterday we had a party for some of our neighbours. We did this last year too and it was a great success. Here is our next door neighbour showing some of her needlework. She is very good.

2m FT8

OK, it is sheer laziness!

This morning I am again on 2m FT8. As usual, my 2.5W CQ was copied widely with the best being Eire. On 2m FT RX (at 1214z) 27 stations in 7 countries spotted. These sort of ranges are always possible on 2m FT8 RX with the big-wheel omni antenna.

UPDATE 1412z: Now 42 stations in 10 countries spotted today on 2m FT8 RX with the omni antenna. Best DX spotted so far is OK2WO (1165km). RX nis still the FT817ND.

UPDATE 1755z:  Now 65 stations in 19 countries spotted on 2m FT8 RX with the omni antenna.

Sunspots - Sunday December 22nd 2019

Solar flux is 71 and the SSN 0. A=4 and K=0.

Prolonged quiet period on the Sun

We have already exceeded the previous record for the number of days without sunspots and the period continues. The sun has been spotless for what seems like ages. If I recall correctly, the sunspot number briefly touched 11 early last month. Since then nothing!