NT1K – Page 7 – NT1K

My FT-950 Now Has SDR!

When I first saw the FLEX3000 in action while I was at W1AW, I was suddenly interested in Software Defined Radio (SDR) and didn’t really have much idea about it. After playing around with it, I was amazed that you can see 96Khz of bandwidth. That means I can potentially see up to at least 24 SSB QSOs all at the same time. After leaving W1AW, I wanted to buy a flex but the problem is that I just spent a lot of money not to long ago on my FT-950. So I put the FLEX radio in the bin of dreams with the rest of the toys I wanted. When I was looking up the FT-950, I notice the DMU-2000 which provides a “Band Scope” which is like SDR. However the $1000 price tag and multiple negative reviews made that decision quick to make. Now I’m certain that I wouldn’t be using SDR.

Then one day I was looking around Youtube and saw a video of someone tuning around a FT-950 with SDR. I got excited thinking that I can finally have a SDR. After doing some more reasearch, I found that there is a company that makes a board that installs where the DMU-2000 would be installed at and it will provide an IF out signal. For $200 I was thinking that it would be well worth the money. What I didn’t know is that I still need another piece of hardware that takes the IF Signal from the radio converts it and sends it to the computer for processing. The same company (RFSpace) sells that hardware (SDR-IQ) for $524.00…. WOWZAS!!! It has great reviews and nothing but praise but it’s too rich for my wallet. That’s $724 to look at signals on a screen (it does more than that, I’ll explain later). The DMU-2000 is starting to look promising again.

There must be a cheaper way. I have to live up to one of the stereotypes of an amateur radio operator and find a cheaper way. Well… There is… Sort of. I already know that In order for me to play with SDR and my FT-950, I would have to buy the RF-Space IF-2000 card. But there was no way in hell that I am going to get the SDR-IQ. So I went ahead and purchased the IF-2000 as it’s a must. The next best thing that kept coming up was the LP-Pan. For $225 (Now $250) I thought wow, I can do the same thing for half the cost. YES!!! Then I kept reading… You should always keep reading! I found that in order to get full use of the LP-Pan, I would have to purchase a Sound Card. Not just any ol’ sound card but one that has 192KHz of bandwidth on the input. Those can get expensive so now you have to tack on another $100 and more cables to run back and fourth. Unless you already have a 192kHz card, you can get away with the one built into your computer. However you’ll only get 96 or most likey 48kHz of bandwidth.

CHEAPER!!! CHEAPER!!! CHEAPER!!!

If I were to get the LP-PAN, I would get the costs down from $724 to $550. I’m also sacrificing features as the price goes down. Is there anything out there that is cheaper? Is there? Yes there is and it’s called SoftRock. You can purchase the Softrock Lite II (For 30M, Just tell him what you’re doing and ask for the correct crystal) for around $20. There are many SDR receiver options out there now. As long as it can receive a 10.55MHz signal then it can be used with the IF-2000 card. I ended up using a Softrock Ensemble II as I had one at the shack. With my computers built in sound card, softrock rcvr and IF-2000 board, I was able to add SDR to my FT-950 for around $220. THAT’S CHEAP!… Well is it? It’s cheap but you get what you pay for. Most of the money is spent just getting the IF signal out of the FT-950. You can use the softrock indepently. Since I didn’t invest in a decent sound card, I am stuck only receiving 48kHz of bandwidth. That means if the radio is on 14.160MHz, I can see anything going on from 14.112Mhz thru 14.208Mhz. If you were to get the proper sound card, you would be able to see from 13.968Mhz thru 14.352MHz which is the entire 20M US amateur band.

IF-2000 Installation

For the FT-950, the IF-2000 is a must. At this point in time, there are no other mass produced boards that can hook into the FT-950 (or FT-2000) that will give you an IF out. Here is the installation of the IF-2000 into the FT-950

IF-2000 In box form…. Whoopie dooo. Well, it’s not just going to sit there

Insides of the box. Doesn’t look like much for $200. But at least you get a serial cable to hook up the FT-950 to either the computer or SDR-IQ. This is if you didn’t hook up the radio to the computer for control (CAT)

To get at where you have to install the IF-2000 in the FT-950, remove all the many screws (except the feet) that hold on the bottom cover on. Once removed you will see this void with the taped wire. That is where the DMU would go. Bah! We’re putting the IF-2000 there instead.

Look at that pretty board installed. Not even 5 minutes of work.

Cable from the IF Out of the IF-2000 is hooked directly into the Softrock. You also can’t go wrong with the gold plated Radio Shack patch cable. Gold plated cables is what keeps Radio shack in business (Sense my sarcasm?) What you see is the USB cable that controls the Softrock, Audio cable that is hooked up the the Line input of the sound card, Power cable and the BNC cable from the IF-2000.

I am not going into detail about getting the SoftRock going as it’s a project by itself and not the point of this article. There are so many different SDR related software, it’s very hard to give you a how-to on each software. Please refer to other sites that provide help with getting the Softrock going.

Now that I have the Softrock hooked up to the computer and I have the IF-2000 hooked up to the softrock, time to have some fun!

I’m using SDR# as a panadapter. As you see (above image in green), I tuned the Softrock to 10.55Mhz which is tuned to the converted signal that the IF-2000 is putting out. So now if I spin the dial, I can see 24Khz of activity on each side of the center frequency which is giving me 48Khz of bandwidth (see above image in red). This is now just a basic panadapterY. If you have a decent sound card, you can display 96kHz or even 192kHz of bandwidth which is possibly all you need. The software (SDR#) doesn’t have rig control so it’s pretty difficult to link your transceiver to the software. Other software like SDR-RADIO, HDSDR, SpectraVue, Power SDR-IF and some others will allow you to link your rig and allow complete control so when you click around on the waterfall, the radio will be in sync for TX

As I mentioned before, you get what you pay for! Even though the softrock is a great and cheap way into SDR, it has it’s problems. If you look at the above picture, you will notice that in the center of the waterfall there is a big line (or sets of lines). The big line is the result of the SoftRock picking up groundloops. If you were to “Listen” to the hump you will get instant feedback which is very annoying. There are ways to combat this (using batteries instead of wall-warts amoung other things) to where it’s more manageable. Most operators offset the signal away from the DC offset.

I WANT MORE!

At this point all I have is a Panadapter that can see 48KHz. An extra $100 on a sound card would get me 96kHz or 192kHz which would be great. Just having the Panadapter capabilities allows me to find and tune into signals much faster. I can also find “Holes” in a packed band where I can setup shop and talk (or contest) much faster. I tried it in a contest and it made search and pouncing much more faster. It improved my Q rate by almost half. Well worth the money just having it as a panadapter. But depending on the software and your computer, you can do a lot more with SDR than just displaying signals. The software is now doing most of the filtering. You can adjust the filters really quickly to grab that SSB or CW signal. I am not saying in any way that the FT-950 w/ SDR is better than Flex-3000 or Flex-5000 but you now have similar features. A really good feature that I like compared to a Flex radio is that I still not dependent on having a computer hooked up to the radio. I can simply disconnect the IF out cable and will be able to still use my radio out in the field or during emergency power situations. I would lose SDR but I can still have a usable radio.

I am satisfied with that setup but I WANT MORE!

I hate having 48kHz of bandwidth and I hate having that DC Hump in the middle of the screen. I also want the software to control my rig and allow me to know exactly where that signal is. So I want more bandwidth. Well I could spend around $100 for a sound card to get 192kHz of bandwidth but I’m still stuck with the DC Hump in the middle of my screen. I could add toroids and use a battery pack to power the softrock which would dampen the DC hump. It would be okay if I were just using as a stand-alone receiver but when combining it with a radio, it makes it difficult to know what frequency your listening to than what is displayed on your VFO for TX.

That means I have to upgrade to a new SDR unit. As mentioned before, If it can tune to 10.55MHz then I can use it. I could get the LP-Pan or the SDR-IQ which was designed for my situation but that was a couple years ago. There are now other products out there that will give you similar or better results for a cheaper price and possibly while your reading this article, someone somewhere is making even something better. I ended up buying the AFEDRI SDR-NET.

Here it is! Awww so sweet. I lived up to the cheap ham stereotype and purchased the unit without a case to save $50. If you happen to buy one, I strongly suggest to buy it with the case. The case is made out of extruded aluminum and is well worth the the $50. Let me repeat, I strongly urge you to buy it with the case.

The AFEDRI SDR-Net costs around $250 (with the case). That is the same price as a LP-Pan. Why didn’t I just get the LP-Pan? Because the AFEDRI has much more to offer for the same price. With the AFEDRI, there is no need for a sound card which saves me an extra $100. It also samples at 1.2MHz!!! That means if I’m centered on 14.200MHz, I can see from 13.600Mhz to 14.800MHz!! I Can see activity on the entire 20M band and more! I can see almost 6X more bandwidth compared to the LP-Pan and SDR-IQ. The AFEDRI is compared to some of the more expensive SDR units and it can hold it’s ground.

Hooked up and ready to rock.

Getting the AFEDRI to run could be a little difficult. If it wasn’t for a fellow ham that owned one walking me through it, I would’ve had a hard time even though there are instructions sent over from the person selling these boards. To get full use (1.2Mhz bandwidth) you want to use the AFEDRI on your network (that is if you have one) or hooked directly to your LAN port on your computer. You can use USB but your limited to around 200KHz of bandwidth. That’s like buying a HF/VHF/UHF multimode base rig just to talk on a repeater. I have the AFEDRI hooked up to my switch/hub located in my office. When you first program the AFEDRI, you will need to also have it hooked up the USB on the computer. After it’s programmed and working (through the network), you can disconnect the USB. If you can make or get your hands on a 7.5V LINEAR power supply, that would work great on powering the AFEDRI (It does come with a DC plug). DO NOT FEED THE AFEDRI WITH 12V !!! I got lazy and had a bunch of cell phone chargers that had the Mini USB plug and 5V . I powered the AFEDRI through the USB port. It works but the problem is that it’s a switching power supply that creates noise. It is noticeable but not as bad as the softrock.

The AFEDRI is great but it does lack one thing… On board filtering. Due to the lack of filtering and being near (within 2mi) of 3 AM broadcast transmitters, The front end is overloaded when using the AFEDRI SDR-Net stand alone (without the FT-950)

YIKES! The Image above shows exactly what my problem is. What your seeing is 1.2Mhz of bandwidth showing the same 3 AM broadcast stations that are near my QTH. That almost makes the SDR useless unless I add filtering to get rid of the AM BCB signals. But when I hook it up to the FT-950, it shows something different.

Much Much Better… This is showing the 80/75m band even though the display says 10.56 (should be 10.55). At this point I am still using the software as a panadapter tuned the converted IF output frequency of the IF-2000 . I’m assuming it’s better because the signal is passing through the FT-950’s bandpass filters before the signal is sampled. I am assuming this because If I made adjustments to the Attenuator and pre-amp on the front of the rig, I can see instant changes on the screen. If you are going to use the AFEDRI by itself. Don’t be alarmed. You can purchase or even make your own high pass filters that will solve a lot of the issues.

You will also notice that I am sampling at 1.2MHz even though I am using the FT-950 w/ the IF-2000. The reason why I brought this up is that RF Space claims on their website that the IF-2000 adds a 190KHz of display. That was my biggest fear when I was purchasing the AFEDRI that when I hooked it up to the FT-950 and IF-2000, I was only going to get 190KHz of bandwidth due to any limitations on the IF-2000. When I hooked it up, I was glad to see that I am taking full advantage of the AFEDRI.

The only issue I have at this time is calibration. If you spin the dial to a known frequency and listen it to it on SDR, you will notice compared to your radio that the signal is off. This can be fixed partially by calibrating the AFEDRI using the supplied software. I am now within 1-3Hz of a signal on LSB. However when I switch it to USB, I am off by .500KHz. Depending on the software, you can make a different correction (offset) for each mode.

Now I have a pretty Panadapter that allows me to view the entire band for most of the HF bands. It makes it easier to see if the band is “alive” and it allows me to dial in a station faster but what if I could just “CLICK” on a signal and have my radio automatically tune the VFO to that frequency so I can talk?

TRANSMIT TIME!

The AFEDRI by itself is a receiver. You can hook up your antenna to it and away you go! But I have it hooked up to my transceiver which adds a whole new element to having an SDR rig. by having it as a panadapter, I can just spin the dial to the signal on the screen and talk. But what if the signal is 100Khz away? I would have to spin the dial pretty quick. Depending on your rig and SDR software being used, it’s possible just to click on a signal that you see on the screen and the radio will automatically put will put it’s VFO right on or near the frequency you want to talk on. During contesting, that would allow me just to click on signals instead of spining the knob during search and pounce.

The ability to “Click And Tune” all has to do with the software. The software has to have a CAT control option. I ended using a slightly older version SpectraVue because of it’s ease of use but I also successfully used HDSDR and SDR-RADIO to where both the FT-950 and AFEDRI work together in RX and TX.

Here is a video of the FT-950 and AFEDRI in action

I find that SpectaVue is the easiest to use but lacks features found in both HDSDR and SDR-RADIO.

LOOSING A COM PORT

I like to use software such as N1MM, HRD and DX Labs Suite for logging, contesting and working “Digital” stations. However I won’t be able to use my SDR software because the port is being used by the logging/CAT control software and vise versa. For me, logging software is just as important as having SDR in my book. Have no fear but yet another piece of software to use to “Emulate” the com port allowing multiple applications to share the same com port. One such software I has success with is “Virtual Serial Ports Emulator”. If you happen to use the same software. “Create a new device” as a “Splittler”. Choose the regular comport that was normally used with the FT-950 and then choose the “Virtual” port. You will have to reconfigure all the software to communicate with the “Virtual” port. Another tip is to make sure the settings in VSPE are the exact same as what is used in the other programs used with your rig.

SO FAR SO GOOD

I’ve been messing around with this setup for about a week now and I am impressed. SpectraVue doesn’t allow custom offsets per mode (just has one main offset) but I fixed that by using the “Shift” feature on the FT-950. There are a couple issues that I see but don’t annoy me enough to get rid of SDR and I am sure it’s going to improve as more people get into SDR. The biggest annoyance is that when I TX, the software doesn’t catch on for a bit and I can hear my TX audio for a second. There is also a slight delay (as expected) between hearing the signal on the radio and the computer. I am not sure how it’s going to fair in a contest but the worst case is that I’ll use the SDR as a controllable panadapter and use the audio from the radio instead of the SDR.

Now I have to make a case!

Thanks for reading,
Jeff – NT1K

Resources:

IF-2000 from RF Space – Allows the FT-950 to become a whole different beast
Softrock Lite – A simple means of SDR with the FT-950 and IF-2000
AFEDRI SDR-NET – My personal choice for SDR. Alex is a great guy and is very helpful
SpectraVue – SDR software that I use. It’s also on RF Spaces website. I suggest getting a version previous to 3.25 if your using the AFEDRI.
HDSDR – Another SDR software that I use. A modified version that works with the AFEDRI is included on a CD that comes with the AFEDRI.
Virtual Serial Ports Emulator – Allows the FT-950 to be used with both logging/CAT control software and the SDR software at the same time

My First SOTA Activation – Mt. Norwottock (W1/CR-004)

I’ve been wanting to do a SOTA (Summits On The Air) activation for quite some time and I finally had the chance to go so I took advantage of it. For those who don’t know, SOTA is “Summits On The Air”. Take your equipment, climb a mountain (or hill) with your gear and make at least 4 contacts in order for it to be a successful activation. What’s great about SOTA is that it gets you off your butt and go outdoors. Another great thing about it is that there is a website where you are allowed to self spot so at least others know where you are. After you are done you upload or enter you logs into the website and you can start competing with others in the area and possibly get awards.

In my last article, I made a 3EL Yagi using a tape measure that I didn’t use other than waving it around like a mad man in my back yard. I built the Yagi so I can participate in outdoor activities like radio direction finding and SOTA. So for the past month or so I’ve been itching and looking for any excuse to use this antenna. Nick (K1MAZ) mentioned that he was going to activate Mt. Norwottock after he gets out of work alone. Since my night was free and available, I contacted nick to see if I can tag along which he said sure.

Since this was last second, I ran around the house trying to locate the things that I would think I need for a SOTA activation based off of what I’ve read from other peoples SOTA adventures. I took along my Yagi, Two 2M HT’s, adapters, lots of tape, extra stubby antennas, multi-tool, knife, stuff to keep me warm. Away I went into the dark to drive to “The Notch”.

Here is a map of the State park. The line is red is that path from the visitors center to the summit.

Here is the APRS map of our hike. You will notice that we sort of took a wrong turn. Trail markers are a lot harder to see at night! After we fixed our headings, the climb started and I realized a couple minutes into the “climb” that I am out of shape. I kept stopping, huffing and puffing while Nick was having no issue with the climb. I wasn’t sure if it was all due to being out of shape or wearing very thick clothing .

Once we reached the summit, I was hot to trot so I immediately got the Yagi going and left Nick to assemble his HF wire antenna. I should have helped him but I was a little to excited and wanted to get on the air right away. After making the bulk of my contacts, I’ve stopped to help him finish installing the antenna.

This was the setup that I was using. My homebrew 3EL Yagi and the Wouxun kg-uvd1p handheld.

Since there was cell/data coverage on the summit, I spotted my self on the local clubs FaceBook page and thought I spotted myself on SOTAwatch. Got on 146.520 Mhz (AKA National calling freq) and started calling CQ. As there is little to no activity around here on 146.520, I decided to stay on that frequency as it was not causing any harm. Not even a minute of calling CQ, I was contacted by ED (KB1NWH) from his QTH 22Mi away from my location as well as Mike (N1TA). At the point I was assuming that they and some of the SOTA regulars in the area were going to be my only contacts. I was wrong… One of the people that worked me or saw my post on Facebook went on the local repeater and announced that I was up there. That opened up the flood gates and I worked the following

AB1RS – Rich
KB1PWH –
WD1S – James
W1MSW – Matt (SOTA Jerks)
N1FDC – Phil
KB1VPN – Jake
K1YO – Bob (Mobile)
KK1W – Jim (SOTA Jerks)
WI1N – Charles
WC1Y – Rory
KB1JFQ – Chuck (SOTA Regular)
WW1X – Rockwell (SOTA Regular)
N1KXR – Rich

A total of 15 Contacts on VHF.

All these people coming out to work me made all the troubles I had getting up there worth it. I was going up there thinking that I wouldn’t have enough contacts to make the activation count but thanks to those listed above, I now have 1 activator point.

I’ve learned a lot by this one trip. The tape measure yagi turned out to be a success! Almost everyone that contacted me on VHF was strong and DFQ.

I plotted out all the contacts I made based on their address on QRZ.com, Two of them were mobile stations so I just put markers to area where they reported they were.
Everyone was pretty much “From The Valley” and all contacts I’ve had were crystal clear. I had a backup two meter radio and I should have used it to compare using the rubber duck to using the yagi but that thought escaped me.

HF Side of Things

Nick was more interested in the HF side to the hike. He brought along his FT100, MFJ Tuner, G5RV and coax. When we reached the summit area, Nick when right to work putting up his antenna in the dark. He didn’t get the antenna as high as he wanted it (8-10ft off the ground) but used it anyways. Once everything was set, Nick spotted then went on the air.

Here is a little video I took.

At first all the locals were calling and then some of the SOTA regulars started contacting him as well.

Between 80M and 40M, Nick had 15 contacts and I had 7.

Lessons Learned

This was just a quick last minute thing for me so I didn’t have much time to plan. I quickly gathered anything that would fit in my pockets of my cargo pants and was more worried about staying warm than anything else.

Even though the Yagi I was using didn’t weigh much and it didn’t give me an issue during the climb, It started to “feel” heavy while I was using it. Holding that and the radio at the same time made logging contacts very difficult. Not sure if it was me or the cold weather but the radio kept changing frequencies which made things a little more difficult. I am going to modify the yagi so I can put it on a Tripod and I am going to make it so the radio can be mounted to the tripod as well and use a speaker/mic to make contacts.

Overall I had a great time and I want to do it again with VHF. If I keep doing it, I might pickup some portable HF gear.

Thanks for reading

VHF 3EL Tape Measure Yagi.

After seeing a lot of articles written about making a three element Yagi using PVC and a tape measure, I was interested but not excited about it. That was until I made a QSO with K1MAZ (Nick) while he was doing a SOTA Activation. I decided to try to make contact with Nick on VHF as it was spotted on the SOTA website. Nick was on top of Burley Hill in Union CT which is about 30mi from my QTH. He tried using his stock antenna on his Yaesu Handheld but it’s just a little too far out of range. I knew someone was trying to get in but there was no copy. A couple of minutes later I hear him again, but it sounded like he was in front of my house. He was S9+ and very clear audio. After meeting up with him I asked what antenna he used and he said that he was using his Tape Measure Yagi. I was somewhat amazed that it worked that well.

Now I want to make this antenna. It appears to be real easy to make and requires only hand tools. I ended going with a mixture of three designs

The first design I went with was from WB2HOL which appears to the origin of this particular antenna. It’s designed to be a RDF (Radio Direction Finding) antenna. It could also be used in portable operations like SOTA or Field Day. I obtained all the dimensions needed from his website.
http://theleggios.net/wb2hol/projects/rdf/tape_bm.htm

I got the boom design from the Camden County Radio Society’s website which is slightly different from WB2HOL. It replaced the tee used by the director with another cross tee and added a 5″ stub. I have no particular reason why I went with this book design. I just liked it and it avoids adding a different part even though it’s no big deal.

Finally I got the choke from an article published in QST Magazine (May 2007)
http://www.arrl.org/files/file/Technology/HANDSON.pdf

Is the choke/balun needed? I’m not experienced enough to give you a yes or no answer. I decided to use it because it wasn’t going to cost me anything to do it. If it didn’t work our or was causing an issue then I can just simply un-wind it.

I am not going to go into detail about making the beam as it’s already done for you in the those articles that I linked to above.
However I will provide a detailed blueprint that is a little better than what I’ve seen out there.

Please use all safety cautions while working with tools and parts!

3EL Tape Measure Yagi PDF

I tried as best as possible to get the exact dimensions of the PVC caps and cross tees but I found that the dimensions vary between manufacturers. That will explain the 0.060″ (1.5mm) differnce in element spacing as noted on the print.

Along with the instructions on the blueprint, I would like to share some of my personal experiences when it comes to building and using the antenna.

Working with PVC Tubing

I didn’t have a PVC cutter as I rarely do PVC work. I also didn’t have a vice or clamp setup to use a regular saw or sawzall with. I ended up using a tubing cutter that is normally used on copper tubing for plumbing. It worked but it wasn’t pretty. It pushed the PVC to form a flange or lip around the entire diameter of the tube. I had to use a sander to remove the burr/lip.

PVC Cut into lengths

I also decided NOT to use PVC primer and cement. The parts fit together so tight that I didn’t even bother using it.

Antenna Boom Dry Fit – PVC was so tight fitting that I didn’t bother using glue

Tape Measure Sharpness

The tape measure is somewhat sharp along the long edge. It’s not razor sharp but it’s sharp. Cutting the tape measure creates a real sharp edge. You can combat this by either wrapping the exposed edge with electrical tape or cutting a chamfer (corner) or both. I’m going to use a product call “Plasti-Dip) and coat the tips of each element with it.

(Chamfering the corners and sanding down the points)

Hopefully you will be careful running around with the beam. Doing this will make things just a tad bit safer.

I’d would either dismantle or cut out the bad sections of tape. If you already have a 1″ wide (or bigger) tape measure, I’d suggest buying a new one and cut apart your old one. I’ve notice coating usually wears out within the first couple of feet. My suggestion would be to start cutting the tape up from the oppisiet end.

Soldering the Hairpin and Coax

There is also an issue when it comes to soldering the tape measure. If you have normal flux core solder, you might have a hard time soldering the wires to the tape measure to where it won’t stick. I ended up using a liquid flux that is commonly used in the plumbing/welding industry. It’s an acidic flux that works great.
After grinding away the paint/coating on the tape measure, I put just a teensy drop of flux on the exposed metal of the driven elements. After soldering the hairpin match and coax using a 100W iron, I took it over to the sink and washed off any left over residue that was still on the tape. I’ve been told and I’ve read that using this type of flux is pretty corrosive and will eat away at the metal it was applied to causing a bad connect. So please be careful. After a week of playing around with it, I have not noticed anything.

Running the cable through the boom.

You will notice that I drilled some holes extra holes. I want to run the coax through the center of the boom, have it come out to start the coil and back through. I did that so the cable couldn’t drag across or get snagged in the reflector and to provide a little more security with the coil. It’s not a big deal but I found it to be cleaner than having it zip-tied or taped to the boom.

Cable Through Boom

Prices Involved

You can build this antenna for under $20. Since I work in trade where a lot of people accidentally cut off or destroy their tape measures, I have quite the collection of tape measures.

8FT of 1/2″ Schedual 40 PVC Pipe – $3 (Home Depot)
3 PVC Cross Tees 1/2″ – $1.50 Ea ($4.50) (Home Depot)
2 PVC Caps 1/2″ – $0.40 Ea ($0.80) (Home Depot)
6 SS Hose Clamps – $1 Ea ($6.00) (Home Depot)
1 Tape Measure – $3 (Harbor Freight)

Grand Total – Approx $17

If you already have a 1″ wide or bigger tape measure in your tool box, I’d suggest on purchasing a decent tape measure and use your old one for this project. When it comes to using used tape measures, I would make my cuts starting from the other end of the tape. Most used tapes have lots of wear and tear on the first 12″.

Also don’t cheap out and get regular steel and electrical grade PVC conduit. The clamps will rust and the electrical PVC has a thinner wall and will easily flex. It may not happen right away but time will take it’s toll. I know it’s a cheap antenna but it would be more cost effective in the long run.

End Result

Well Did it work? I would say so, I don’t have an analyzer to tell you for sure. I hooked up the antenna to a SWR meter (bridge) and was seeing 1.2-1.5 on the meter. I went out in the back yard of my house and I’m sure my neighbors think that I’m training to be a JEDI fighter or something with the way I was waving the antenna around. I ended up hitting a couple of repeaters that I couldn’t normally hit with the stock antenna

Here is a video I made really quick to show it in action

Nothing exciting but it was fun.

Here is the complete setup. I gave myself enough slack on the coax incase I decided to mount the yagi on a tripod.

Here it is with the elements folded up. I would do this before a fox hunt so I can place it in the back of my truck

Here it is folded up for extended storage. I use the clamps that hold on the driven element to secure the tape measure to the boom

Here is a plot of the Yagi using the miniVNA Pro. Testing conditions involved hooking the calibrated analyzer to the end of the feed line and taking multiple readings while holding the antenna in my office. Increasing the gap lowers the center frequency.

Overall it was a really fun build. It didn’t require any type of heavy equipment or tedious work. I have a feeling that running around the woods with a tape measure will end up with crimped or broken tape measure. However it would be much better that running around with 1/4″ (6.35mm) aluminum rod. Replacing the director and reflector would be easy as cutting the tape measure. So fart so good!

Thanks for reading,
73

SB-200 Project: Update #2

This is the 3rd and update to my HeathKit SB-200 Amplifier Project.

See the orginal post here
See update #1 here

The amp has been running fine since I’ve got it going. I had a resistor pop in the parasitic suppressors and I think that the amp is running too hot in temperature for little time I use it. At this point I am placing the blame on the two muffin fans that are currently “Cooling” the tubes. I am thinking that the fans are not providing enough air to cool the tubes fast enough. When I was replacing the parasitic suppressors, I performed some modifications (see update #1) and ordered a new fan from Harbach Electronics to see if it would make a difference.

I also held out on performing a couple more modifications because I had to fabricate some parts to encase the glitch resistor so if it were to pop, most of the resistor mess would be contained. The fan was placed on back order so It gave me time mark up and cut the lexon glass to sandwich the resistor with.

The new fan came in and I just had to install it.

The fan kit does come with installation instructions which at first were a little difficult for me to understand. This was due to the fact that the new fan is a modified replacement of the original fan that came from Heathkit and I had purchased the amp with PC type fans. There is pre-assembly you have to do to the fan before installing. It involves removing a couple of screws on the fan that stick out and replacing them with shortened screws. Then you have attach aluminum spacer blocks to the fan which the block also has holes spaced out to fit in the orignal pattern of the fan from Heathkit.

Aluminum Spacers Used On Installtion

The installation is pretty simple and straightforward. The kit comes with new rubber grommets to absorb any minor vibration that the fan causes.
You can either cut the wires near the old fan and tie into them or what I did was un-solder the old wires and wire the new ones in place.

The Installation is complete and we’ll see what happens!

I initially wrote this article in early may. I wanted to do some other upgrades at the same time but the New England QSO party was really close so I decided just to do the fan. The install went easy and would like to thank those at Harbach for rushing out the part. I made sure the fan was balanced as much as possible and I was able to use the amp during the entire contest. It’s a tad bit louder than the PC Muffin type fans that were in there but you can actually feel more air being pushed with the replacement fan. Over the past months the amp has performed very well. I should find more screws to secure the hood and the sheet metal covering the tubes/rf deck as it tends to rattle during operation.

EmComm And Whackers

Let me start off by saying that I understand the need for Amateur Radio operators when it comes to emergency situations. I saw it get put to good use when a tornado ripped through the area I live in. This article is about the small fraction of people that are involved and is not meant to discriminate the entire EmComm community. These are just opinions on what I’ve witnessed throughout the years of being licensed and my personal views about it. I could be very wrong about it.

For those who are new or do not know, EmComm i.e., Emegency Communications, is a part of Amateur Radio. It has been since as far back as World War II (and possibly before). They consist of amateur radio operators who volunteer their time and resources (e.g., transceivers, antennas) to assist other operators and their community during times of disaster where normal means communication has been compromised and/or during significant weather events. A large percentage of these people also volunteer to provide communications during non-profit events like marathons and walk-a-thons. It’s been proven time and time again that these operators are an asset to their community. I am not going to deny that. It’s what got some people interested in Amateur Radio in the first place.

Most EmComm operators are involved in a related group(s). It could be governed by the group itself, by a national/regional chapter, by a municipality or even by state or federal government. These groups provide the necessary training needed so the operators can quickly establish communications and provide vital information to those who need it. The major groups are RACES (Radio Amateur Civil Emergency Services), ARES (Amateur Radio Emergency Service), MARS (Military Auxiliary Radio System). These groups work with each other, municipalities and other emergency management groups that spring into action during an event.
For weather, there is SKYWARN among others. SKYWARN is not really an Amateur Radio group per say but uses amateur radio and their operators as a tool. They provide localized weather related information to the National Weather Service and other weather outlets.

Most, if not all of the people in these groups are made of people who really care about their community and take pride in volunteering and providing much needed information. However some of these people like it a little too much to where I would put them in the “Whacker” group. Whacker is a term first coined by the volunteer firefighter community. It’s when the volunteer treats their duty as it were a full time paying job and beyond. They would buy more gear than necessary, decorate their personal vehicle with lights and sirens and start showing up to calls when they are not even scheduled to show and possibly do no work while taking a lot of the credit. That term is also used in law enforcement, medical profession and even amateur radio.

In amateur radio, it’s the person who owns and uses one or more of the following

Uniform – Similar to a uniform worn by Law enforcement or Military.
Duty Belt – Once again, worn by Law Enformcent or Military
Multiple radios w/ speaker mics worn on said duty belt
Badges – I’m talking TIN baby
High Visibility Clothing – Extra points for saying “Emegency Communications” on it
Police gear – Things like holsters (for their radios), big flashlights (With optional traffic cone) and tactical vests
Amber lights – Like the ones you see on Police Crusiers. Extra points if they are permanently attached to their vehicle
Decals – Either a sticker or a magnet that shows you that they mean business.
Law enforcement type vehicle – This is the ultimate form of Whackerdom. A typical example would be either a Ford Crown Victoria or Chevy Impala (depends on what brand of vehicle is most used in the area) that its setup to look exactly like a police cruiser. That would include multiple antennas placed in similar locations, Push/brush guard, steel rims with “Center caps” and amber lights throughout the vehicle. Some will go as far is actually buying an ex-police cruiser.

This can range from the most expensive high tech gear that even municipalities can’t afford; all the way down to old surplus gear that is on the verge of being broken, rotted, worn and non-functioning. Yes, there are even well-to-do whackers that are caught up in it.

When these whackers are attending public events like a Marathon, they tend to focus more on their “style” and their attempts to be “authoritative” more than actually helping out in a situation. You’ll see them ~~walking~~ standing or driving around in their gear trying to look like they are actually making a difference and are important. They also LOVE the sound of their own voice. They love the sound of their voice so much to the point where they are reporting in every minute detail that has little to do with or no effect to the reason why they are there in the first place. If it was something important that actually happened, instead of just giving the facts, they would give out way too much useless information and find ways to prolong the communication so it gives the appearance to spectators and others who are listening that they are serious business.

You will also see this stuff in weather related events as well. They will be out in their “Official Storm Chasing” vehicles reporting on things that either have no relation or no effect to the weather event taking place. And if there was actually something to report, it would be greatly exaggerated. 1/4″ or less size hail (if any) would be reported as golf ball to softball size hail. A gust of wind would be reported as 60 Mph force winds. A tree branch snapping off a tree in someones back yard would be reported as an entire tree fallen into the street. For SKYWARN, it’s encouraged to stay inside a safe location during an event and there is a toll-free number that can be called to send reports. But that’s not fun… Is it?
You also have armchair weather whackers that are just as bad, if not worse as those that are outside. They sit there and stare at online radar maps, listen to the police scanner and actually report on the things that appear they’ve seen with their own eyes.

All these people do is get in the way of things. Tying up the airwaves with nothing but useless information just so they can flex their jaw muscles and puff their chests to show how important they think they are. I just hope that they’re not on the air when an actual life threatening situation occurs. Just imagine what would happen if someone is in cardiac arrest and the only mean of communication is ham radio. But they can’t get through because some whacker is going into great detail about a twig coming off the tree in their backyard.

Sometimes it’s just one or two people in a group that casts a shadow over the entire group. There are groups where everyone in it is a whacker. There are even some whacker groups that get so involved with the town, city or county that they convince them that they need to invest money, equipment and even property to their cause. Some of these town/city councils have no clue. They are just trying to look out for the well-being of their residents. In some places the decision makers are whackers themselves. Some of them don’t even know that they fit the definition of a whacker.

How come these people exist? How come they haven’t been kicked out, excommunicated or shunned from their group? It’s really simple… It’s all volunteers. These organizations need bodies to survive and stay operating. They will take anyone they can get and will put up with their “whackerness” up to a point. Some of the whackers do really care about what they have signed up for and possibly listened and paid attention to their training and followed the guidelines and reporting criteria. Even though their “whackerness” shows, they really care about their purpose. But then you have the whackers who didn’t listen and didn’t pay attention to their training just to get an excuse to go out and inflate their own egos. You’ll never get rid of these people and they will always be here. Back in the day when cell phones we not even existent and not everyone had a landline in their house, Radios were depended upon and taken more seriously. With todays technology, Ham Radio is looked at as a last resort.

Is it preventable? Yes and no. People view whackers in all different types of ways. Some may think they are dedicated to what they do and others may think that the person is just nuts or somewhere in between. Since they are mainly volunteer positions, it’s difficult to “Fire” them unless they have done something really wrong. If organizations started getting rid of all their major whackers, it would be seen by the entire community that it’s a unfriendly organization. It will discourage the closet whackers from joining. They also might not be whackers when they first joined up. They either get sucked into it by another established whacker or become one once they get a little taste of it. They might even have no clue that they’ve become a whacker. They love to congregate with other whackers and feed off each others egos and whackerness. They also become really defensive and sometimes irrational when they are labeled as a whacker or the term whacker is mentioned. You’re basically attacking their livelihood by poking at their whacker ways. They are too proud to admit to it and will give you reasons trying to justify their whackerness. It can range from the truth of “Hey, I just like dressing up this way” to some stretched out lie like “When I am not at this walk-a-thon, I work for the (INSERT CITY, COUNTY, STATE OR FEDERAL AGENCY HERE) doing some important stuff” to justify their actions.

Why do you have a stick up your butt about these kinds of people?

Due to possible major interactions with the public, It will lead to a negative impact on the Amateur Radio community as a whole. When people that I know outside of amateur radio find out that I am a ham radio operator, one of three things come up. What are you, a nerd? Isn’t that for old people? Are you one of those guys running around with a vest and a Radio pretending to be a cop? I can always argue and say that I’m a proud nerd, that a lot of young people are getting back into it and that it’s only a tiny percentage of operators that actually run around pretending to be a cop. It’s also really embarrassing to me as an operator to hear and see people having no clue that what they are doing and are just making things worse. I am sure deep down they are just trying to help but I don’t think we need a 5 min report about a tree falling in your backyard and then to hear it again 3 more times because net control doesn’t seem interested in your report. Obvious exaggerated reports coming in also really annoy me. The whole point of emergency communications is to get on the air, give the facts and get off the air so others can help. Not to sit there, holding up the frequency because you need to tell others in your area that it’s raining in great detail.

Other than to rant a little bit, the whole point of this article is to show others that these people exist and they do not make up the majority of EmComm community or the Amateur Radio community. Hopefully a full blown whacker reads this and changes their way. Hopefully the airwaves will get less polluted with crap. Hopefully the police gear disappears. I doubt that will happen but you may never know!

New changes in the Shack as well as on this Site.

Things have been kind of slow since Field Day. I Don’t have the drive to pickup the microphone (or practice on the key). It doesn’t stop me from doing stuff in the background. I was looking at my station and was disgusted by how it was setup. I had equipment on top of equipment and a rat’s nest of wires behind my desk.

I recently saw an Antenna Tuner” come up for sale on eBay that matched what I needed which consisted of having a variable inductor and that it can handle at least 1000 watts. It was also within the price range that I could afford so I took a chance.

It was the Heathkit SA-2060A tuner. After reading review after review, I put this on my list of potential tuners. The only complaints I hear about this particular tuner is that the hardware becomes loose after use. Since they are kits when they were first sold, The build quality depends on the operator who built it. When I received the tuner, I opened it up and made sure everything was tight and soldered correctly. It appears that it’s in great shape and I did no work to it other than some light sanding using a fine scotch-brite pad.

The reason I decided to get a tuner is because of my antenna(s). At the time I really have only one HF antenna which is my home-brew G5RV wire dipole antenna. Once you started getting away from 20 meters, the mis-matched antenna places a strain on my tubes that are located in the amplifier. The “tuner” should help that out.

However I had no room for it. I didn’t want to stack the amplifier or anything else on it so I decided that I need to do something about my desk to keep everyone happy. I ended up fabricating a shelf that spans across the entire desk which would allow for me to put more stuff on my desk.

I’m liking it better than the previous setup. The most important piece is right in the middle and a tiny bit easier to get to.

I had a chance to work some DX with the new layout. Here it is in action with LA4UOA (Tor in Norway)

Now I just have to clean the rest of the office.

Site Updates

I am debating on placing advertising on this site. I am not a fan of advertisements and wanted to keep this site AD free but running this site isn’t free. It’s not much compared to other websites but any income I can get that would offset the costs would help greatly. I also might place ads on my YouTube videos. Not looking to make AMAZING profits but hopefully enough to cover the hosting.

ARRL HQ – Again and Again

That’s right! I went to ARRL HQ again. With it being in reasonable distance from my QTH, how can I NOT resist on going there often. I try to go at least once a year. I also try to see and or do something different everytime I go. Last year when I went down, the Lab where they test a lot of the things you read in QST was being remodeled so I made it a point to go back when it was operational again.

Here is ARRL HQ which is located directly behind the Hiram Percy Maxim W1AW building. They have scheduled tours provided by a great bunch of Volunteers whom take pride in their work. I had the same person as last time which was Dan Arnold (W1CNI) who gave the tour. Since I was the only one there, I only expressed interest in the lab and wanted to visit the VEC so I can take care of some VE stuff. I figured to kill two birds with one stone. If you didn’t read about the last time I went to ARRL HQ, Read about it here

Here is just a part of the ARRL Lab. At lot about the product reviews you read have most likely been tested here.

Here is where a lot of tests take place. The walls, floor and ceiling are lined with metal and RF absorbing material. You also see a lot of equipment that I wish I had (A HP Network Analyzer would look really good on my bench). In the photo is Ed Hare (W1RFI) who does a lot of work in the lab and is very passionate concerning RFI (Hence the call). Very nice person to talk with and I’m glad he does what he does and he’s an asset for the League.

NT1K w/ W1RFI in the RF room At ARRL HQ (Photo courtesy of the ARRL/Dan Arnold (W1CNI))

This is why I came down. It’s the W1AW building. It’s where all the toys are at.
Looks small but it’s packed full of fun. In the background you’ll see one of the many towers on the property. At one point this was a lonely building on a hill and now it has neighborhoods all around it and with HQ in the back. I Guess nobody can complain about the towers since they were there before their house was.

MORE TOWERS!!! Oh man I wish I had just one tower…. Okay, maybe two. A lot of these are fixed beams that are used for the ARRL Bulletins and some of them are on rotors to be pointed where needed.

Here is studio one. You have a Yeasu FTdx9000D in the foreground and you have the Icom IC-7700 in the background. I wanted to use the 7700 because of the PR-781 microphone that was attached to it. I was interested in how they hooked it up. Since I am Biased towards the Yeasu, I got to say that I really like the 7700 If by some miracle I have that kind of money the throw at a rig, I would consider getting the IC-7700 over its Yaesu counterpart. I like the nice clear screen, The VFO knob with nice and smooth, All the important adjustment that are needed are up front, None of that menu driven stuff and the audio sounded great coming out of it.

(Photo courtesy of the ARRL/Dan Arnold (W1CNI))

Here I am at the control of the IC-7700. Muahahahahah!! I started off on 20M SSB calling CQ, the band wasn’t open so I made a lot of US contacts. I then went on 15M finding that it also was just as dead. Not sure if I was allowed to but I played with the Rotor and had the 4 El beam pointing South East (135 Degrees) and got a lot of people calling with the occasional pileup. It was great hearing some people say, “I always wanted to make contact with W1AW. This is my first time!” I’ve also heard a couple of people tell me their W1AW stories. It’s also fun when Saudi Stations are calling me (Well… W1AW) when I’m the one fighting in pileups to contact them.

Overall has a really fun day trip. Wish I could have stayed a lot longer but was worth it. Maybe I can squeeze in another trip. If you happen to be in the Hartford CT area or you know you’re going to be. Give the ARRL a call to make sure they will be ready when you get there. Getting to use the W1AW call is fun because most times there is a pileup

73!

RTL-SDR = CHEAP FUN

I am sure some of you have been hearing the letters RTL-SDR come up more often. At the time all I knew was what the SDR part meant (Software Defined Radio) and didn’t really care about the subject. After hearing more and more I decided to see what all the buzz was about.

The company Realtek (sounds familiar?) designed an IC chip called the RTL2832/RTL2832U (USB 2.0) that was originally used by electronics manufacturers that made DVB-T (Digital Video Broadcast – Terrestrial) receivers. These devices will display Digital TV signals from nearby TV stations (Remember the whole Digital TV upgrade that made older TV’s useless unless it has a converter) as well as digital FM radio onto your computer/laptop. The actual RTL chip demodulates the signal, cleans it up and processes the signal using a built in ADC (Analog to Digital Converter). All the software does is display the information that is coming out of the RTL and it will also control the frequency and filtering of the signal through a tuning chip on the board. It’s way more technical than that but I’m just giving you the basics.

Someone found out that RTL chip with the tuner could allow you do sample/listen to signals from 64Mhz up to 1678Mhz (Varies depending on the tuner) which is quite impressive. These chips could also decode many different modulations and you can view/sample megahertz at a time. All of this for around $20 USD and some software. With some other tricks you can decode APCO25 (P25) or other digtal and digital type signals with this dongle.

What does all this mean to me?
In short terms you have a Software Defined Receiver (SDR) that you can listen and actually SEE any signals from around 64Mhz to around 1678Mhz at around 2Mhz at a time.

For example you can listen/watch a good portion of the 2M (Let’s say from 146.000-148.000Mhz) band and see all the conversations going on in that 2Mhz span. Depending on the software you’re using, you can filter just what you want to hear while seeing what else is happening . If you’re listening to a repeater, you can view the station on the input as well as hear and see the same station on the output frequency on 2M. If you tried to get the same features in a police scanner, you could be spending at hundreds of dollars.

Is this too good to be true? What’s the catch? Is this a Scam?
It does seem to be too good to be true but it’s actually true. For around $20 USD, you can have a VHF/UHF SDR receiver. I have a feeling the price will go up as retailers are seeing a huge increase in sales of these “Cheap” devices. There are some catches however. It doesn’t have the best filtering so signals could get cross and mixed in. You’ll sometimes hear “Birdies” and there are times where the frequency displayed is not correct to the frequency you’re listening too (So far I’ve seen if off around 6khz). Another issue is with the dongle itself, depending on the manufacture the cases don’t have really any shielding and the antenna connection and the supplied antenna is basically crap. At the time of writing this, there are a couple companies seeing the demand for these RTLSDR’s and are making units with the correct case and antenna connection. But for the issues it has and for the price they are being sold at the moment, it’s well worth having. It’s almost comparable to purchasing a FunCube dongle for around $190 that is similar even though I think the FunCube is better and helps support AMSAT.

Ok ok ok… You’ve sold me. How do I get one these $20 dongles?
This should be the only battle you have to do. Securing the Proper Dongle at the correct price. There are many manufactures of dongles that do almost the same things. You want to find a dongle with the correct RTL chip and the correct tuner chip. The Cat’s meow of Chipsets are the RTL2832U and the Elonics E4000 (AKA E4K) tuner chip. Why? I have no clue. Some dongles have this configuration and some use other Tuners like the Fitipower FC0013 and FC0012 that work also. Some of the differences are the Bandsplit of what frequencies the tuner chip can tune.

At the time of writing this, If you can get your hands on a EzCap EzTv668 (or EzTv666) with the RTL2832U and E4000 tuner then you are golden. However the company that designed and manufactured the E4000 is no longer in business and the company is now being liquidated. This means at this point in time the E4K is no longer being produced. Most companies are switching over to the FITIPOWER FC0013. So you want to make sure that you are getting a unit with the E4K. There are some ebay sellers that are claiming to ship dongles with the E4K but they are really the FC0013.
If you happen to get stuck with one, don’t worry. It will still work.

JUST TELL ME WHICH ONE!!! Grrrrr.

That’s the thing… I can’t! Things are changing so much that its possible for something to be different next week. Have no fear! The good people over at /r/rtlsdr over at Reddit.Com (http://www.reddit.com/r/RTLSDR) have a very nice up-to-date list of dongles as well as places to purchase these dongles. Just take note that you’re still gambling when purchasing a Dongle. A lot of these are drop shipped from China and you’ll never know what you’ll get until it lands on your doorstep.

Here is a Ebay “EzCap EzTV668” screen shot of one I actually purchased on Ebay.

(Click to enlarge)

I purchased this from a seller on Ebay as well as one from Deal Extreme (DealExtreme.Com). The reason I purchased it from Ebay is the one I ordered from DealExtreme was taking way too long and when I contacted their customer service, I was told they were out of stock and could take almost another month for it to come in.

If you notice the Ebay Auction says RTL2832U and E4000 tuner… Well… This is what I got!

It’s a EzTv645 and it has the Fitipower FC0013. This dongle is NOTHING like the advertised dongle on Ebay.
I could have complained and returned it but as you can tell, I hacked it up already. I just wanted to warn you that you might not get what is advertised on Ebay.

I added a Pigtail with a PL-259 which voided any warranty (if any) it had. I wasn’t going to waste time with trying to return someone that was sold over ebay and shipped from china.
When soldering on the coax to the board. I messed up and used a powerful (too powerful) soldering iron without any grounding or ESD protection.

Here is a Video of the dongle with the FC0013 in action

You’ll see some of the signals being mixed and some other horrible stuff.
I am not sure if this is how it is normally is or damage done from my soldering job.
Also for some reason the video lost sync with the audio.

The dongle still works but it’s in the hands of my co-worker who would really have fun with this.

The very next day after screwing up the Ebay EzTV645 purchase, My order from DealExtreme showed up

After reading posts on Reddit of people saying their recent DealExtreme orders have the FC0013 tuner got me a little bit worried. I opened the dongle and is happy to see this

This is what you’re looking for. It’s the advertised 668 with the Elonics E4000 Chip (Little square chip to the right of the Antenna Jack) and the RTL2832U (Under the IR Sensor).

I dared not to touch this one with a soldering iron. For now I went to Radio Shack and got a couple connectors (PAL to BNC). I would suggest going on ebay and getting the correct adapters or if you have a really good soldering station, solder in a SMA pigtail and/or connector.

Here is a video of the new dongle

It looks and sounds much better than the one I purchased from Ebay. But I can’t tell you for sure since I hacked up the Ebay one before I can make a comparison between the two.

The hardware finally came in… What now?

You now have to obtain software to display the information from the dongle. At this point while writing the article, the best choice for RTLSDR software is SDR# (SDR Sharp). There are others out there depending on the operating system you are running. I’ve chosen SDR# because it’s really easy to setup and use (compared to some of the others) and it works on some other SDR hardware I have. Plus IMO it’s best choice for beginners like myself. If you do end up using SDR#, make sure to download the DEVELOPMENT (DEV) Version as well has ZADIG which will replace the driver that was automatically installed (or attemped) when you plugged in the dongle with the one that is needed to run in SDR#

I would follow these instructions as it’s worked for me

That’s It!! It should be working. Tune around and have fun. If you’re using the antenna that came with the dongle, good luck! You will not pick up much with the stock antenna. I ended up cutting the plug off the antenna and soldering it to some RG-58 as to not mess up the board. You can also find adapters online and possibly at Radio Shack. The plug looks like an RCA but it’s really a “Belling Lee” (IEC 169-2) connector or PAL connector.

Here are some RTLSDR websites that were helped me out and are resources for this article.

Http://www.reddit.com/r/RTLSDR – Huge community with tons of information on the dongles that are being sold
http://sdr.osmocom.org/trac/wiki/rtl-sdr – RTLSDR website with more technical information than I’ll ever know.
http://www.rtlsdr.com/ – Just catalogs RTLSDR feeds from websites and video sites.
http://www.sdrsharp.com – Website for SDR#. My personal choice for SDR software
Possibly where the RTLSDR idea came from

Just want to say thanks to all those on Reddit.Com (/R/RTLSDR and /R/amateurradio) and those on ##RTLSDR and other IRC channels on freenode/geekshed for helping me out.

New Gear: Heil PR-781 Microphone

I almost have my station setup to where I’m satisfied. Everything is controlled within arms reach to where I can operate the computer and radios at the same time and with ease. During 2011 NEQP, It got un-comfortable operating a couple of hours in while lurched over my Yaseu MD-100 desktop microphone. I think it led to less operation and just a lack of motivation. For the 2012 NEQP I wanted to be more comfortable. I purchased a Heil Pro Headset ($140 + Cable) and modified a Radio Shack tape recorder foot switch to work with my FT-950. This years contest turned out to be a lot different in 2012. I doubled and almost tripled last years score. It was due to being comfortable and dedicated to staying on the air.
I love the Heil Pro Set but I don’t like the way it sounds. The one I purchased uses the HC-4 Element. From what I’ve read on the Heil website that the HC-4 was designed for mainly contesting or DX. It cuts off the low frequency and focuses on the HIGH parts of your voice. Meaning the rumbling lows in your voice (if you have any) will be mostly removed.

Here is a youtube video of how I sound on the Heil Pro Set using a SDR Receiver

You will notice there is little to no bass on my audio. It has a narrow bandwidth which is great for contesting. It Could help you break a pileup because your “Cutting” in with the sharp audio. In my personal opinion (I am not a audio expert by any means), it’s a great microphone but it’s not for everyday use or ragchewing. Maybe the Pro Set Elite has a much wider response and would be worth the extra $$$ for it to be used as a everyday microphone.
Now I am back to being hunched over the Yaesu MD-100A8X ($150). I am getting more uncomfortable the more I’ve been talking on the air. It ended up where I was propping up my head with me arm while talking. The constant pressure from my arm caused some issues with my Jaw. I ended up grabbing the mic stand by the stem and using it that way which was awkward. YAESU claims the microphone could be separated from its base but I am not sure what they mean by that. Could the microphone be used without the base? It does have a TX button on it and it has a 8-pin port on the back of the microphone itself. The cable that comes out of the base to connect the microphone is very short (6 or so inches?) and would not really allow you to “Seperate” the micrphone unless you somehow make a cable that connects from the back of the actual microphone to the transceiver. I wasn’t sure of the pinout of the actual microphone and I wasn’t going to open it up to find out.

Here is a video of what I sound like using the MD-100

After being uncomfortable and finding out that a lot of my Jaw pain was insult of applying pressure to it often (I also do it at work), I decided enough is enough and wanted a new microphone. Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE the MD-100 and after tuning the FT-950 Parametric EQ to my liking, I’d often get reports on how “GUD” my audio was. I actually took pride on getting positive comments and people asking what microphone I was using.

So now that I need a new microphone, I figured I can upgrade at the same time. The only true requirement is to be able to mount the microphone on a boom. I was also thinking to use the microphone if I ever get into Podcasting. This led to a major road block. There are hundreds of different microphones out there. There are some that should not be used in Amateur Radio but there are many that could. I wasn’t sure what to get so whenever I heard a really nice signal on the air, I would look up the call to see if I can get what kind of microphone was being used. It helped a little bit but there is still a wide range of microphones that are out there. From the very expensive condenser microphones down to microphones that are used with computers. I also had a budget of $150-$200 for a microphone and really didn’t want to go over it.

I ended up going with Heil PR-781.

The reason I wanted to get the 781 is because it’s designed with Ham Radio in mind. I know I can get a microphone that could do almost all the same things for cheaper but I’ve purchased Heil Sound products before and had nothing but good things come from them. And if something does happen, their support/customer service is outstanding. Try getting support for your drop shipped microphone and you will know why.

I wanted to go all out and get EVERYTHING for the microphone. That includes the microphone ($175), shockmount ($100), cable ($40), and boom arm ($120) which would end up costing $415. That costs more than what I paid for my Amplifier. There is no way that I am going to spend that much money when I am already spending a lot on something that I already have. I ended up buying just the microphone and cable which with the sales HRO is having at the time, I ended up paying less than $200. The reason I paid for the cable instead of making my own is that I don’t have XLR connectors, 8-Pin connectors or any cable to wire one up with. I also read that the FT-950 needed a balanced input and there a issue with the FT-950 can get RF into the cable so I bit the bullet and got the cable.

The only issue I have is to where I am going to mount the microphone since I didn’t purchase a mount/boom. I went up to the attic and sure enough I found some desk lamps that had booms. I thought the lamp head was similar in weight to the microphone so I thought I can get rid of the Lamp, keep the boom and fit it to the microphone holder. It ended up to almost a perfect match. I wouldn’t be able to swivel the microphone left and right but I didn’t mind. Once I mounted the microphone, I found out that the mic is a lot heaver than the lamp and was pulling down the springs and not staying where I placed it. The solution that problem was rubber bands. I placed a bunch of rubber bands along the spring and balanced the microphone perfectly. Also got rid of any spring noises.

Another great thing about the FT-950 is that it has a decent parametric EQ built right in. I can adjust how I sound from the radio instead of buying a mixer board. I used the settings suggested by Heil Sound but tweaked them so my lows would stick out and give my voice a bassy feel to it.

Here are my FT-950 Settings

Menu #62 – TX BPF (Maxium Signal Width) = 1-29 (100-2900hz wide) or 2-28

Menu #91 – Frequency = 200hz
Menu #92 – Notch or Boost = -4 (db) (Heil Suggests -15 which eliminates a lot of bass, Good for DX)
Menu #93 – Bandwidth = 6 (Heild Suggests 5)

Menu #94 – Frequency = 700hz (Heil’s site says 400hz which the radio can’t do. 700hz is the minimum)
Menu #95 – Notch or Boost = -0 (db)
Menu #96 – Bandwidth = 5

Menu #97 – Frequency = 2400hz
Menu #98 – Notch or Boost = +8 (db)
Menu #99 – Bandwidth = 5

Menu items 91, 92 and 93 are for your low range. This will give or take away all the lows or bass in the signal. Items 94, 95 and 96 are for your mids and 97, 98, 99 are for your highs and will make your voice more coherent (unless you have marbles in your mouth) . Well… That’s what I think it does for me.

These settings are the ones that I use for Ragchewing (seem to be doing more and more). It wouldn’t be much for contesting or chasing DX. At this point I will change the Settings to narrow up the signal and get rid of some or most of the bassy lows that are in my audio.

Here is a Youtube video on how I sound

After watching the video a couple of times, I think it’s great for 75M Ragchewing but not so good chasing DX. I will have to find a happy medium and remember the settings.

Just for reference, I also made a video of what the MH-31 hand microphone that comes with FT-950 sounds like.

It’s been a week since I’ve been using the microphone and I really like my purchase. Already got some good audio reports. Now I want to get the podcasting side of it going.

Thanks for reading

Field Day Fever

Even though Field Day (FD) is weeks away, the planning of it gets me excited knowing that it’s near. Field day is the basically the main reason why I got my license. During my CB days, someone brought me to a field day hosted by the MTARA (Mount Tom Amateur Radio Assn.) on top of Mount Tom around 1995. I recall being on 14mhz using a Kenwood TS-440 and was making contacts all around the country. Compared to CB I was amazed about the contacts I was making considering I would never hear the stations, let alone make contact with them on CB. Field day was the kick in the ass to get my license and pretty much put CB behind me.

For those who don’t know what Field Day is, I would check out this website that would explain it in more detail then I could. It’s a emergency preparedness exercise where operators try to contact with as many other operators as possible. Even though you don’t have to, it’s encouraged that you bring your gear and communicate from a field, hence “Field” Day. A lot of local Amatuer Radio Clubs put on events related to FD to have fun and also promote Amateur Radio to the general public at the same time.

Last year I participated in Field Day with the Hampden County Amateur Radio Association running the digital station.

NT1K FD 2011 — NT1K Doing Digi (Photo By: Frandy Johnson, N1FJ)

This year I will be running SSB on 40M (7mhz) with the HCRA again at Dufresne Park in Granby MA. If you are in the area. You should stop by and check it out. Go Here for more information