Absent friends?

It is odd how you do not see postings from people you know about for a while and then realise they are not there. Many times there is a good reason and they pop up again. For some time I have not heard from Mike Rainey W1TJ or Jay Wilson W5OLF. Just wondering if they are OK? If you have any news please let me know. They're kind and generous people. 

News of W5OLF - Jay?

Some weeks ago, I sent Jay (Wilson) W5OLF an email and got no reply, which is unusual. Has anybody any news please? He has been a great help to me and others.

W5OLF SK?

My fears are growing. I have written to Jay twice and not had a response. 

He may just be on a long vacation, but I have heard no news. In the past Jay has been very helpful to me and I owe him a lot. 

If he is around and reading this, please be assured that I wish him well.

Has anyone had any news please?

Jay, W5OLF?

 As regular readers will know, Jay', W5OLFs 10m WSPR beacon is a small stand-alone 500mW WSPR beacon that I have used for many years. It is still in use this very minute.  With it, I have reached all parts of the planet.

Despite writing to Jay some days ago, I have not got a reply. Does anyone have any news please?

10m WSPR QRP TX (Sunday)

It is now 1504z and I have been on 10m WSPR TX with 500mW with the W5OLF beacon for about 10 minutes. No spots yet.

UPDATE 1615z:  It helps to connect the PSU! Still no spots of me yet.  

UPDATE 1705z: Still no spots.As it is dark here shortly after 1700z, this may be a day with no spots of me.

UPDATED 1850z:  QRT. No spots all afternoon.

10m QRP WSPR (Tuesday)

I keep forgetting that if I an RXing using the Wellgood active loop, my 10m antenna is free and I can go on 10m WSPR TX with the W5OLF 10m WSPR beacon! This puts out 500mW 100% of the time, but randomly moves the TX in the 200Hz WSPR window on every TX period to avoid being clobbered by a strong station. It was turned on about 0950z.

UPDATE 1816z: 3 unique stations have spotted me. I still have some doubts about the authenticity of FY5KE (7110km).

10m WSPR QRP TX

When not using the 10m antenna I keep forgetting that I can go on 10m WSPR TX with my W5OLF 500mW WSPR beacon. It is on now. 

So far, just local spots from G4KPX (14km).

UPDATE 1835z:  6 unique stations spotted today. Furthermost was EA8BFK (2880km).

14.037MHz crystals for the 10FT8R

Jason M0NYW has just forwarded me some 14.037MHz crystals that came originally from Jay W5OLF. These are for use in my ultra simple 10FT8R receiver for 10m FT8. This should simplify the oscillator and allow me to remove a toroid inductor. I hope to try this shortly.

WSPR Snake

Jay, W5OLF has produced a new version of his WSPR beacon (see photo). It is simpler than his earlier version, the WSPR-AXE-CW.

He writes:

 "I have finished my WSPR-Snake stand-alone transmitter. The snake name is because it is programmed in the ‘Python’ language and, as with the WSPR-AXE-CW, the repeated random 2min intervals on the spectral display to me look like the trail of a snake.  Differences between it and your‘s are that it only puts out 375mW (on 10M) but runs off of USB 5V sources. One can plug it into the common wall cell phone charger or into the cell phone recharge batteries they sell. It uses the Adafruit Trinket micro board which has a 3.3V regulator on it for the VCO.  Like yours you turn the PA off when not actively checking propagation and you can even put in a switch to turn the VCO off (reducing standby current to 10mA). That allows transport (say backpacking) without loosing the precise time you set back at the shack. Speaking of the precise clock, this version uses the clock circuit for both WSPR symbol timing (exactly) as well as 2min interval timing; expected drift when set - and the crystal aged - is about 0.5sec per month. Otherwise, I use the same single 2N7000 for the final in a class-E, high efficiency, design. "

WSPR idea

 Jay, W5OLF, has asked me to forward this:

"At the end of last year I designed the Retro-WSPR exciter around an Adafruit Trinket microcontroller and a 74HC4060 counter chip (see photos below).  Retro- I guess because it is at a single frequency and you rely on up/down conversion to get it to the WSPR band you wish.  It uses only one chip besides the microcontroller that is a 4.194304MHz oscillator and buffer, which is the RF out square-wave, and a counter that counts down to a 256Hz clock.  The 256Hz clock is input to an I/O pin ‘software interrupt’ of a very simple Python program on the Trinket.  This provides WSPR symbol timing and 2min timing by counting the beats of this clock.  I have never heard anyone proposing such a design in that the WSPR symbol time interval is 8192/12000; if we divide numerator and denominator by 32 we get 256/375.  Thus if we count 375 beats of a 256Hz clock it is one WSPR symbol time interval.  The next trick is that the clock at 4.194304MHz also is modulated with its mean frequency preserved - for long-term good timing - with the WSPR symbols by slightly changing the VCC to the counter chip (it takes very little voltage change to increase the frequency by 5Hz) using the A/D converter pin from the microcontroller.  This setup puts out a 0Hz drift WSPR signal with average low delta-t drift for months once the oscillator is adjusted to the correct parameters and the crystal ‘aged’; although, it is only the exciter. 

Now the next question is the up/down conversion circuitry which I have not experimented with personally but would use standard gilbert cell IC and transistor amplifiers and bandpass filtering.  If any of your readers of your blog want to experiment with doing this I can provide a unit or PCB and crystal for shipping postage only as well as emailing the software to them.  The I2C interface is brought out from the Trinket micro and can easily be used to initialize a SI5351 board to an up/down conversion frequency to feed into the mixer.  Please feel free to post this email on your blog.

73’s, Jay, W5OLF"

10m WSPR TX

As my 10m antenna is not being used, I am again on 10m WSPR TX (500mW). This W5OLF 10m WSPR beacon is on 100% TX, but randomises the TX frequency for every transmission. This ensures you are not always underneath a strong carrier. I have had this for many years and it has been faultless. It is tiny and totally self contained with no PC needed. Apart from initially syncing the clock, nothing is needed. Truly wonderful.

UPDATE 0700z: 3 spots from Germany already. These were by DC7TO (888km).

UPDATE 1035z:  18 stations have spotted me so far. All are in Europe. Nothing from South America yet.

UPDATE 1314z:  No further spots. Odd.

10m WSPR TX (500mW)

When I am on 6m FT8, I keep forgetting that my 10m antenna is not in use!  So, I am on 6m FT8 (2.5W) and 10m WSPR with the 500mW W5OLF WSPR beacon. Much to my surprise I got 3 spots on my first transmission with the furthermost TF4X (1995km) on 10m WSPR.  I shall leave the 10m WSPR TX running to see what other reports come in.

UPDATE 1242z: Glad I went on! Now being spotted in South America with 500mW.

UPDATE 1337z: Plenty of WSPR spots on 10m today. 

UPDATE 1534z:  Spots today on 10m WSPR by 13 different stations with the furthermost FY5KE (7110km).

UPDATE 1737z:  32 different stations have spotted my 10m 500mW WSPR beacon today so far. Did someone say everyone now uses FT8? If so, they are wrong!! I like FT8, but have been blown away by the WSPR spots.

UPDATE 2000z:  My 500mW WSPR on 10m spotted by 42 stations today. See table.

10FT8R in RadCom (August)

All being well, my simple, low cost, RX for 10m FT8 should appear in RSGB RadCom in August. This is not certain.

My thanks go to Jay W5OLF for kindly doing the schematics. Jay is developing the circuit further. I hope it brings him success.

10m WSPR beacon

A few years ago I bought a 500mW (TX only) WSPR beacon from W5OLF. It has been copied in every continent including Antarctica even with my poor 10m antenna. I am not sure if these are still being sold but I was very impressed. It is small, simple and works.

Once sync'd to time (either using a BC receiver or internet time) it is totally stand alone and does not need a PC or external audio. It means I can operate on 6m WSPR or other modes (with the FT817 and PC) at the same time as using the WSPR beacon on 10m.

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

UPDATE 0820z: The 10m WSPR beacon has just been turned on.

UPDATE 0932z: No spots, as yet, of my 500mW 10m WSPR beacon.

UPDATE 1630z: With 8 different stations spotting my 500mW 10m WSPR beacon, the Es season is definitely here! Best DX today, so far, is OH2VMP (1734km).

6m WSPR - doh!

I knew I had to offset my FT817 on 6m WSPR but it helps to be on the correct frequency! I realised I was set to 50.292700 whereas I should have been 50.292970. As soon as I corrected my stupid error of the last few days I was immediately spotted by G0LRD (25km) at +5dB S/N. I feel so stupid. Maybe now I'll see some 6m Es!  Silly boy.

Meanwhile my fully stand-alone W5OLF 10m 500mW WSPR beacon continues to be spotted across Europe and beyond. This little beacon has given me so much fun - it beats everything I have ever owned. It is so tiny too. If everything else had to go this is the one bit of kit I would want to keep. In terms of DX per pound spent this is incredible value. It is so small it can be overlooked, but boy does it pack a punch.

UPDATE 1835z: My first DX Es spot on 6m WSPR this season: EA1CCM (1301km) spotted me at an incredible +4dB S/N at 1832z. Yes, it definitely helps to be on the right frequency!

UPDATE 2135z: OH7AZL (2000km) was spotted on 6m WSPR earlier this evening.

On 6m and 10m WSPR

Local G4NUA (12km) was exchanging strong spots with me on 10m, so I decided to swap to my W5OLF 10m WSPR beacon (500mW) and use the FT817 to go on 6m WSPR at the same time (1W ERP vertical). The W5OLF beacon takes about 20 minutes to settle before I start getting reports.

UPDATE 1718z:  No reports, well not yet anyway, of my 500mW beacon on 10m WSPR. G8VDQ (93km) has been spotted several times on 6m WSPR.

Reverted to W5OLF 10m WSPR beacon

At 0950z I reverted to my 500mW 10m WSPR beacon by W5OLF. This is 100% 10m TX at 500mW but with randomised frequencies changed every 2 minutes. This does not need a PC and is entirely self-contained and tiny. With 6dB less power I wonder what difference it makes to spots? It will take about 20 minutes for things to settle.

Possibly, I may go on 6m WSPR later as I cannot go on another HF band as I need the antenna for the 10m beacon.

UPDATE 1344z:  Several spots of my 500mW 10m beacon by EA8/DL9XJ (2981km) today as well as spots by GM4WJA (624km). I wonder if my 500mW 10m WSPR beacon will be spotted in the USA later?

UPDATE 1440z:  Several spots received from Brazil this afternoon on 10m with the 500mW WSPR beacon. 6dB lower? - you'd never know! Perhaps I'd get more spots at 2W, but I'm getting plenty at 500mW from a tiny box not much bigger than a pack of cards. Fabulous fun for almost nothing.

No longer tell XYL about DX reports on 10m

As I get so many DX reports with my 500mW WSPR, I no longer tell my XYL. An Australian station was spotting my 10m WSPR again today. I think this is the 6th or 7th time this autumn.  With WSPR and a very modest, low, wire antenna I find DX easy. With SSB or CW you are competing against the "big boys".

10m has been good now for about 4 years. This time next autumn things are likely to be much harder. Sunspots are still high but this time next year they are likely to have fallen a fair bit. Somewhere I read that a solar flux of over 100 equated to "good conditions".  It is more likely solar flux will be in the 70-80 region next autumn.

The greatest danger is low activity on 10m as people leave the band for lower frequencies. Many times I have said this will be when 10m WSPR should be really useful winkling out those elusive DX openings. Please, still use 10m WSPR even when the band seems dead. I am convinced it will be "open" far more often than people realise. WSPR is so much better than SSB or CW. Using WSPRnet, you can instantly see who is copying your WSPR signal. Low power is all that is needed.

UPDATE 1254z:  I see that FR1GZ (9724km) has spotted me on 10m WSPR. This is no longer remarkable! WSPR really is amazing  - just 500mW to a low wire antenna. On SSB it is a battle against those using big beams and high power.  On WSPR just a few milliwatts and you can find out how your signal gets around the world.

UPDATE 1530z: VE3GEN (5593km) was spotted several times today.

In praise of Jay W5OLF's WSPR beacon

I received this email from Jay W5OLF:

"Hi Roger,

I was catching up on your blog and saw the comment about how much you like the 10M beacon. That warms the heart.  We all try and make a contribution to the hobby and guess I at least made one.

Cheers, Jay, W5OLF"

W5OLF WSPR beacon

To which I replied, with great pleasure:

"Hi Jay,

I can honestly say I have had more fun from your 10m WSPR beacon than from ANYTHING in all my time in amateur radio. Thank you!

73s
Roger G3XBM"

I was an SWL in 1961 and had a licence since 1966. The beacon needs no PC and is totally self contained. As a routine I reset to internet time every day but you could use a radio for this and once a day is probably far more frequently than necessary.  As you can see, it is very small. The last time I looked there were 1W beacons for 30m and 20m and a 0.5W one on 10m. If you enjoy this mode, I can recommend these. It never fails to amaze me how something so small to a small, low, wire antenna regularly gets spotted around the planet.

See http://w5olf.com/2014/12/18/new-wspr-axe-cw-beacon/ .

DT puzzle

As you may recall, I use (very successfully) on 10m a WSPR-AXE-CW beacon by W5OLF.  In the last 6 months this has served me well.  However I was puzzled by a second report last night that both DT was way out (around 4.7) and the frequency was sometimes outside of the lower end of the WSPR sub-band. I decided to check DT locally using my FT817/PC as a receiver. Sure enough, DT was very high. Setting the clock to internet time -4 seconds made almost no difference. This evening I set my beacon TX frequency about 150Hz higher (adjusted the multi-turn pot) and, for reasons I do not understand, my DT has dropped to - 1.4 setting to internet time exactly on an even minute. It seems resetting the frequency has also fixed the DT issue. Perhaps this is something to do with Wolf's software? Anyway, I am now waiting for local Nick G4IKZ to confirm my DT findings.

UPDATE 2216z:  For reasons I do not claim to understand, I needed a long hard reset (mains power off for 20 secs) to get modulation to appear after a small frequency adjustment. All seems to be working now but the beacon will be on overnight to see if the modulation remains on.