Sunspots - Wednesday April 21st 2021

Solar flux is 78 and the SSN 54. A=7 and K=1.

We have not seen sunspot numbers this high for some years. 

Shopping - NOT amateur radio

Why is it that when I go shopping the bill is so much less? 

This was my wife earlier.  I don't know what she gets!  She goes in "geriatric hour" very early when it is very quiet.

Pye Telecom - NOT amateur radio

In my working life I worked at Pye Telecom, later Sepura, retiring in 2008. You may be interested in Pye Telecom. Most of the products were PMR radios for the police and similar.

The photo shows my pass when I was at Philips Paging in California back in the late 1990s. I worked for Philips Paging for a few years. Unlike Private Mobile Radio, pagers were consumer products. We made more in one night than we made certain PMR products in a product lifetime. Every penny really really mattered as did the slightest of blemishes. We made pagers in Cambridge, Mexico and Singapore.

See http://www.pyetelecomhistory.org/index.html .

Start them young?

Looking through some old photos I came across this one taken in 2013 at the old QTH showing our grandson, who is now 13, in my workshop at the time in the back of the garage. 

At the time he must have been pretty young.

10m FT8 RX

At 0720z I turned on the FT817ND and indoor loop on to 10m FT8 RX. In the last few days my results have been disappointing. I suspect the loop is quite a bit less efficient than a dipole.

UPDATE 0847z:  G0FWX (160km) spotted. As he was quite strong, I wonder if this was aircraft scatter

UPDATE 1330z: 4 stations spotted with some Es in the form of IK7LJZ (1664km).  After comparing my RX results with G0LRD who is using just a low dipole on 10m, I think my loop must be at least 6dB down.

PC, FT8 and IC-705

Thankfully, I have managed to locate (in the house) a lead that connects the PC to the IC-705, so may be able to try communicating later. This can only be to see if it works as I need the wire for other things. I shall have to buy a suitable cable longer term. 

The function of the new icons has been found after reading the manual again. One is speech recording and the microSD symbol flashes when it is being used. Possibly some of last night's 2m net is recorded?

Blossom - NOT amateur radio

 

The photo shows fallen blossom on a path a few years ago.  It was one of my FaceBook memories.  Most blossom has now fallen. Spring is one of the best times of the year with fresh green leaves, daffodils and blossom. It is as if the earth wakes up again and bursts forth.

Testing times

The photo shows me testing my 481THz optical gear 8 years ago. I have not tried optical work for some time. My interest was over the horizon beaconing and I was surprised by how far I could detect the signal with absolute absence of anything visible in the sky. 

Sunspots - Tuesday April 20th 2021

Solar flux is 86 and the SSN 36. A=18 and K=3.

IC-705 firmware updated

Following the instructions in "The RadioToday Guide to the IC-705", I have successfully upgraded the firmware from V1.12 to V1.24. All appears to have gone correctly. The next thing is to get a suitable interface cable from the rig to the PC and try FT8 and rig control.  Some have used cables with ferrite toroids on or isolators to minimise ground loops.

As you can tell, I am taking things very slowly. With my "brain fog" (probably as a result of my 2013 stroke) it is all too easy to make mistakes. Jobs that would once have seemed trivial are now quite hard. Even just unpacking the microSD card from the packaging was a challenge!

UPDATE 2029z:  Since doing the firmware update, a couple of new icons have appeared. The SD card is there, but flashing (why?) and there is an adjacent red circle. I am sure I shall find out what these are soon! I was able to have a 2m FM net OK this evening, but avoided touching anything just in case it all went wrong!  Investigation needed, HI.