Online BATV Convention (amateur TV)

The BATC convention this Saturday October 24th will be online and on Zoom. What follows is as I received it and may be hard to read on some screens.

Saturday 24 OCTOBER : NOW ONE DAY AND ONLINE ONLY

BATC CONVENTION FOR AMATEUR TV 2020 (CAT 20). BATC CAT 20 will go ahead as an online and on-air event. The interactive parts of the meeting will use Zoom, and all lectures will be streamed on the BATC Streamer with the opportunity for questions. More details at https://forum.batc.org.uk/viewforum.php?f=128.

A list of rallies can be found at http://rsgb.org/main/news/rallies/

10m FT8 QRP again

Once again I am on 10m FT8 with the FT817ND and the poorer indoor loop. It is currently 0910z and I am RX only. No spots yet.

UPDATE 1012z:   Just spots of 9A6R (1542km) and G0PQO (50km).

UPDATE 1050z:   Now on TX at 2.5W. No spots of me yet. 4 stations spotted on RX.

UPDATE 1425z: 1 person spotted me on 10m QRP FT8 TX and I have spotted 11 so far, all in Europe. Now gone back to RX only.

UPDATE 2050z:  10 S.American stations spotted. QRT. 

Cactus Day - NOT amateur radio

For the last few years we have celebrated Cactus Day invented by one of our grandchildren. The photo shows one of our grandchildren working on the Cactus Day cake. 

Sunspots - Thursday October 22nd 2020

Solar flux is 74 and the SSN 11. A=10 and K=3.

Great grandmother - NOT amateur radio

This is a photo of my great grandmother. It must date from the early 1900s. 

Baojie mobile photos inside

A few days ago I was told about a low cost dual band mobile by Steve G1KQH. This Russian site has some internal photos.

See https://www.qrz.ru/catalog/reviews/bj-218_971

SAQ (17.2kHz CW) reminder

On October 24th there will be a transmission from the historic SAQ in Sweden. Quite a few test their VLF systems with this. I have a QSL card from them from a transmission several years ago. It is on my shack wall.

See https://alexander.n.se/category/news/?lang=en

10m FT8 RX

At the moment I am on the poorer indoor loop, which is the one used on 20m, 17m and 15m. It sits on the shack windowsill. I reckon it is about 6dB inferior to the dedicated 10m loop made with copper thin bore pipe. Although I think my chances are low, I have left the kit running on 10m FT8 RX "just in case". It would be good to spot something!

UPDATE 0840z:  Not surprisingly, nothing spotted.

UPDATE 0855z:  Amazingly, EI9JF (488km) spotted.

UPDATE 0821z:  Now G0PQO (50km) and G0FWX (160km) also spotted. No real DX yet, but I am pleasantly surprised to spot these stations already on 10m FT8.

UPDATE 1358z: 18 stations have spotted me today on 10m FT8 RX. 

UPDATE 2035z: 5 people spotted my 2.5W 10m FT8 to the poorer indoor loop antenna and I have spotted stations in the USA and South America as well as all over Europe. 

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Earth-electrode "antennas" in the ground

Quite often I hear people tell me they have no space for LF or MF antennas. Rubbish!  

For many years I have used my earth electrode "antenna" on VLF, LF and MF. It won't be as good as a big antenna, but it works remarkably well.  Even my wife does not know it is there!  Neither do the neighbours. 

On 472kHz WSPR I get copied in Norway most nights with less than 10mW ERP with mine.

See https://sites.google.com/site/g3xbmqrp3/antennas/earth-electrode-antennas

Sunspots - Wednesday October 21st 2020

 Solar flux is 75 and the SSN 11. A=4 and K=2.