The Pixie and Micro-80 transceivers

Many years ago I wrote about these simple 80m CW transceivers. In recent years 40m versions have been available from China at very low prices. My website is very old now (at least 6 years old in the main).

See https://sites.google.com/site/g3xbmqrp3/hf/pixie

Laser information

In the past, I only tried 481THz (red light) transmissions with LEDs, but Peter Thornton G6NGR kindly sent me a useful link. There is lots of other interesting stuff on that website too.

See http://maxmcarter.com/lasrstuf/concentrator2.html

Daytime 2m FT8

2m FT8 (2.5W to the big-wheel omni antenna) was turned on just before 0900z. A CQ call was spotted by 3 stations with the best being GI6ATZ (479km). On 2m FT8 RX nothing yet spotted.

UPDATE 1148z: On 2m FT8 RX 22 stations in 7 countries spotted so far today.

2m FT8 RX spots here to 1725z

UPDATE 1725z: On 2m FT8 RX 50 stations in 8 countries spotted today so far with best DX being DL3TX (655km).

Night off

Overnight all my radios were off. For several nights I have tried 2m FT8 but most activity starts at breakfast so being on overnight seems pointless. I may try 630m WSPR again tonight.

Sunspots - Saturday October 26th 2019

Solar flux is 69 and the SSN 0. A=29 and K=3.

Very old - NOT amateur radio

Snailwell church is one of 2 in Cambridgeshire with round towers. This one was built in 1070 just 4 years after the Norman conquest so is almost 1000 years old.

Getting older - NOT amateur radio

Whilst clearing boxes in the loft we came upon this photo, which is about 35 years old. We have aged! This is my wife with her brothers.

Farm shop lunch - NOT amateur radio

As we have one of our grandsons with us at the moment we went out for lunch at our local farm shop. As might be expected, they had lots of Halloween stuff on sale. Here is our elder grandson with a toy spider on his arm.

Old magazines online

In an email received earlier today an old colleague reminded me of this amazing online resource. It contains pdf versions of many magazines and publications of interest to amateurs. I can highly recommend it. If you are looking for it, it is probably here. Despite its title there are magazines from across the world here.

See https://www.americanradiohistory.com/index.htm

2m FT8

Yet again, laziness meant I remained on 2m FT8 RX overnight. As before, most spots were after breakfast. At the moment (0852z) 13 stations in 3 countries spotted on 2m FT8 RX today so far.

UPDATE 1425z: Now 27 stations in 7 countries spotted on 2m FT8 RX today.

Stations spotted on 2m 

FT8 RX today to 2007z.

UPDATE 1756z:  Now 39 stations in 9 countries spotted on 2m FT8 RX today. An FT8 CQ (2.5W) earlier this afternoon was spotted by 6 stations in 4 countries with best DX spot being by GI6ATZ (479km).

UPDATE 2007z: Now  46 stations in 9 countries spotted on 2m FT8 RX today.

Sunspots - Friday October 25th 2019

Solar flux is 65 and the SSN 0. A=18 and K=4.

Pumpkins - NOT amateur radio

It is Halloween season. As our elder grandson is with us before Halloween night we are celebrating it early. He still wants a party!

Poppy Day - NOT amateur radio

This morning on Breakfast Television was a piece on the making of poppy badges. These are sold about now to support the work of the British Legion. I came in late so missed most of the piece. At first I thought "how odd to be featuring poppies at this time of year". Then it dawned on me that this is the time of year when poppies are sold. Doh! Time certainly flies as in my mind it was still summer.

Active RX loop kit

Southgate News has a piece about a new active RX loop kit that retails in the UK for £44.66 inclusive of shipping.

See http://southgatearc.org/news/2019/october/loop-antenna-amplifier-released.htm

2m FT8

Overnight I remained on 2m FT8 RX. As on previous occasions, most stations were spotted around breakfast time or later. Little was copied overnight. In fact there is little point remaining on 2m overnight.

By 0925z 16 stations in 7 countries were spotted.

UPDATE 1555z: Now 34 stations in 10 countries spotted on 2m FT8 RX today. Best DX on 2m FT8 RX is EA2BFM (1030km) in northern Spain. This station was strong, suggesting aircraft reflection perhaps?

Self Importance - NOT amateur radio

Several times recently I have travelled by train and observed people in work talking with their colleagues. Usually there is a more senior person with someone more junior. Often the older person has to impress the younger member of staff or look "cool". The younger person looks in awe of the senior person and has to set a good impression as future advancement may depend on what his impressions of you are.

Having been retired now for 11 years it is amazing how silly all this looks. Work matters seem so important at the time, when really they are not.

I guess this is how we all behave or have behaved in the past. I am not saying it is wrong, but when you can stand back, it does look posed.

Sunspots - Thursday October 24th 2019

Solar flux is 66 and the SSN 0. A=2 and K =2.

Spelling Mistakes - NOT amateur radio

From time to time I make spelling mistakes. Today as an example I had Octeober  instead of October. Most times these are simple typing errors, but occasionally I just miss these because of my 2013 stroke. Where possible these are corrected as soon as I spot them. Don't be afraid to tell me if you spot any I miss!

2m FT8

So far today, 15 stations in 6 countries spotted on 2m FT8 RX, including, Ireland and Germany. This is using the FT817ND and the big-wheel omni antenna. I have not tried calling CQ yet.

AMSAT-UK Colloquium

Southgate News has a report of a recent AMSAT-UK colloquium and links are being made available on YouTube to some presentations including one on Oscar 100.

See http://southgatearc.org/news/2019/october/report-on-eshail-2-qo-100-ham-radio-geostationary-satellite.htm

Move to groups.io

Several of my groups had a home on Yahoo, but they are winding down their groups service, so I have migrated these to groups.io.  Many people have now moved.

Starting groups "from scratch" is free in .io, whereas transferring old Yahoo groups costs $110 in the first year. I started new groups and asked people to transfer files and photos they believe are needed, but to keep the size to a minimum. The historical messages will be lost though.

See https://groups.io/

Sunspots - Wednesday October 23rd 2019

Solar flux is 66 and the sunspot number 0.  A=3 and K=0.

Cactus Day - NOT amateur radio

Our younger grandson is quite creative. Here he is with his little sister baking the cake to celebrate Cactus Day (see photo).

In case you are wondering what Cactus Day is, it was invented by his little sister on October 22nd last year, inspired by a cactus on a cardboard box.

It is now an annual event!

Windose Defender Crappery - NOT amateur radio

Recently Windose 10 did a big update. When I tried to log into Windows Defender all appears to have changed. It is no longer clear if Windows Defender is trying to protect things or not. In the past this was very clear and it told me that my other anti-virus program was providing protection.

This was sneaked in without my knowledge. I am getting more "big brother" conscious than ever.

Microsoft, just what are you playing at? If you intend to make things worse, just tell us!! We are grown up!  When it works, Windows 10 is good, but if it is so darn good why is it forever changing?

Licking the bowl - NOT amateur radio

After baking a cake earlier, 2 of our grandchildren busy licking the bowl!

2m FT8

Just before 1000z, I switched on 2m FT8 again using 2.5W to the big-wheel omni. Already 6 stations in 4 countries spotted on 2m FT8 RX. My own CQ call on FT8 was spotted by 4 stations in 2 countries with my best DX on 2m FT8 TX being GI6ATZ (479km).

UPDATE 1545z: Currently 37 stations in 7 countries spotted today on 2m FT8 RX.

UPDATE 2151z: Now 65 stations in 9 countries spotted on 2m FT8 RX today. Off to bed now, but still monitoring 2m FT8 RX.

Sunspots - Tuesday October 22nd 2019

Solar flux is 64 and the SSN 0. A=5 and K=0. As far as I am aware this is the lowest solar flux this solar minimum.

BREXIT deal near? - NOT amateur radio

The UK pound continues to appreciate in value against the euro. It seems the currency markets have already assumed a deal will be done, even if there are delays. I am not sure if this is or is not good for the UK, but many will prefer certainty.

Orionid meteors

We are reaching the peak of the Orionid meteor shower. These are the result of Halley's comet. I have no idea how good this shower is at enhancing 2m propagation.

Making parkin - NOT amateur radio

Our younger grandson making parkin in our kitchen with my wife earlier. He loves it! Eating and making I mean.

Breakfast - NOT amateur radio

One of our sons is staying with us for a few days. Here he is at breakfast with his two children.

Oscar 100 geostationary satellite

As regular blog readers know, every few weeks I look at activity levels on this satellite. At the moment activity looks similar to a month ago. I am certainly still seeing plenty of space on the narrowband transponder.

It would appear many people enjoy the challenge of getting a signal through the satellite, then lose interest. If all those who had gear were on, it could get quite busy considering the footprint. By now, I was expecting it to be very busy, although the lack of black boxes may keep numbers moderate.

See https://eshail.batc.org.uk/nb/

Yet again on 2m FT8

At the moment I am on 2m FT8 RX.

In the last 6 hours 9 station in 4 countries spotted including the Isle of Man and Germany. Best DX so far today on 2m FT8 RX is DJ9IE (515km). 2m FT8 never fails!

UPDATE 1929z: Today, 26 stations in 7 countries spotted on 2m FT8 RX. For some reason my time server (not the internet) is not working so nothing spotted in recent minutes.

Sunspots - Monday October 21st 2019

Solar flux is 65 and the SSN 0. A=6 and K=3.

Singing - NOT amateur radio

Our granddaughter loves singing. Here she is in our lounge - singing and dancing.

Web SDRs

This was mentioned not long ago, but if you are unfamiliar with web based SDRs I recommend them. It is like a window on the world and many of these support multiple users. Great fun.

See http://www.websdr.org/ for a list of some. Martin G8JNJ knows of some others.  I think he gave links in a comment on an earlier post.

Family - NOT amateur radio

This is half-term week, so we should see all the grandchildren one way or another. In our household October 22nd is "cactus day", so called as our youngest granddaughter named this after a cardboard box and our youngest grandson decided to decorate a cake with cactus decorations last year! It is a bit of fun. The photo shows us last year.

10m WSPR

My antenna blew down in the spring, so apart from a brief outing with a tiny magnetic loop on the back of the transceiver, it is some time since I've been on the band. With JT65 and WSPR I have literally spanned the globe with a low end fed wire antenna and QRP.

When my antenna is up again, I hope to resume WSPR beaconing on 10m. For this I use a 500mW stand-alone (no PC needed) WSPR beacon by W5OLF. This works really well.

When good, 10m is a great band and perhaps my favourite. Antennas are small and often just low power is needed. It is good every summer for Es propagation. Well over 100 DXCC countries have been worked here on 10m QRP SSB.

See https://sites.google.com/site/g3xbmqrp3/hf/w5olf

UPDATE 1247z: According to feedback from Keith, my original link to Jay's page may not be there any more, so it has been removed. A similar unit is available from https://www.sotabeams.co.uk/wsprlite-antenna-tester/

2m FT8

Overnight, I stayed on 2m FT8 RX. So far, 6 stations spotted in 4 countries, with most of these after breakfast.

A 2.5W FT 8 CQ to the big-wheel omni antenna was spotted by a couple of stations with the best being G4RRA (334km) in Devon. No QSOs resulted from the CQ call.

UPDATE 1058z: Now 19 stations in 7 countries spotted on 2m FT8 RX today. Best DX on 2m FT8 RX is GI0ITC (561km). As far as I can tell, conditions are flat and this is the sort of range I get most days.

2m FT8 spots this morning

UPDATE 1137z: The map shows the stations spotted to 1101z today on 2m FT8 RX using the big-wheel omni antenna. At 1137z still 19 stations spotted.

False decode

Ah well, it beats BREXIT for excitement. Just now, on my PC screen was this supposedly on 2m FT8 RX:

075345 -24  2017Hz TO2MJR   WA9RRX R  LM80

At first I was puzzled. Then I checked to see if anyone else had spotted him. Just me! Conclusion: false decode. It happens sometimes.