Optical over the horizon

This was 2012.

Sunspots - Monday February 12th

 Solar flux is 180 and the SSN 144. A=14 and K=1.

Short-term memory - NOT amateur radio

 Not sure if this is old age or another artifact of my 2013 stroke, but my short-term memory can be poor. When I record the solar indices, I often have to go back and recheck the figures.

Spring coming - NOT amateur radio

We still have plenty of winter left, but today is very springlike.

Fine motor skills - basically now crap

 

This morning, I came across this memory on Facebook showing a 4m transverter I designed and made some years ago. It was published in SPRAT, the magazine of the GQRP club. 

There is absolutely no way I could do this now!  My fine motor skills are basically shot and soldering anything is unbelievably hard.

Not one to be beaten, I do experiments that I can still do that do not involve building as much as possible.

My voice - NOT amateur radio

 Although I still use my voice, it is a struggle. This is why I prefer FT8 and WSPR. They are also good weak signal modes too! I guess that is also why I like blogging. My voice is not involved and I do no have to struggle to be understood. 

Even my wife often asks me to repeat things. I try to go on the 2m and 70cm SSB activity contests each month and the local club net each Wednesday, but not for long.

630m WSPR overnight

Overnight, I was again on 630m WSPR with my 10mW ERP from the earth-electrode "antenna" in the ground. 18 stations spotted me (see table). No astounding DX, but a useful haul.

6m QRP FT8 (Sunday)

Yet again, I am on 6m FT8 with my 2.5W and V2000 vertical omni antenna. So far, 5 G stations have spotted me. 

UPDATE 1142z: 10 G and GW stations have spotted me. No DX from continental Europe.

500uW (0.5mW) 10m WSPR (again)

Rather than make an attenuator, I have decided to continue with 500uW WSPR on 10m, i.e. with the beacon PA turned off. I did a re-sync at about 0900z.

UPDATE 2104z:  No spots all day. As I said before, I suspect conditions have to be very good for WSPR to work at this tiny power.

Sunspots - Sunday February 11th

Solar flux is 194 and the SSN 146.  A=5 and K=3.