Here are some of the tools club members have found useful when building/fixing amateur radio projects.
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Read More »Useful tools for the Amateur Radio hobbyist
I have been looking for a thermal imaging camera for over a year, the main use case was for PCB fault finding but a secondary use would be for checking heat loss around the house. My requirements are a high resolution sensor (for reasonable accuracy of SMD components), macro lens availability, direct connectivity with PC/Mac/iPhone/Android and small enough to poke through holes and see inside… Read More »Doogee V20 Pro Rugged Smartphone
After some initial hesitation, due to negative feedback from some of the club members, I have decided to build a small HF QRP transceiver called the (tr)uSDX. I won’t go into the history of where the design came from (there are plenty of posts on the internet already) but the official kit, as endorsed by DL2MAN, can be purchased on AliExpress here (affilliated link).
Walking around an antique shop in Crewkerne, I came across an old valve radio – a Portadyne Unversal – from 1953. Peering in through the back cover I could see that a couple of the valves were free-range within the case, one of which was wedged up at top, next to the speaker. After negotiating a more sensible price for the radio (and saving it… Read More »TRF Radios – The Portadyne Universal
Hardown Hill (G/SC-011) is another local hill, with fantastic views over to Golden Cap and across the sea. However, that was not what greeted me… but more of that later. There is ample space for parking just outside Ryall… and I do mean “just outside”. Where I parked, I could see the village sign about 25m in front of me! You can reach this spot… Read More »SOTA activation: Hardown Hill
Lewesdon Hill is a small lump just to the north of Bridport, Dorset. Rising up to 286m, it’s not exactly like scaling the highest peaks, but I was still breathing quite hard when I arrived on the summit… that last bit is quite steep enough! If you want to find your own way to the top, I can do nothing else than recommend G0POT’s activation… Read More »Activating Lewesdon Hill
With the realisation that time was running out to take all my leave from work, I figured I could afford a half-day to attempt an activation of a new hill for me. That opportunity came good when I had a meeting in our Taunton office in the morning… with the hill in question, Will’s Neck, just a few miles to the north of the town.… Read More »Operating On Will’s Neck (G/SC-002)
The diode ring double balanced mixer is a simple device which can be used in receivers and transmitters. In this article, we’ll be testing a homebuilt mixer for a 20m transmitter. The mixer consists of four Schottky diodes – I used BAT28 diodes – and two coils wound on toroids. The coils need to be trifilar wound and I used 10 turns of 22AWG on… Read More »Diode Ring Double Balanced Mixer
Whilst NanoVNAs are superb for testing and viewing the frequency response of a filter, you can do the same thing with an old analogue oscilloscope and function generator.
Learning Morse Using the Morserino A Morserino (or similar alternatives including the Club’s Morserino Lite) can help you to learn morse code, using the Koch method. This article is a quick primer on how to use this useful function. After powering the unit up, you’ll need to select the Koch Trainer from the top menu. Learning morse using this is a 3-part sequence. Choosing Your… Read More »Learning Morse with a Morserino
Occasionally there will be hiccoughs on the server which require some remediation – it’s only software after all. Here are a few steps you can try before raising a ticket by emailing mllite@onlineradioclub.org: What’s happening in the above? When you connect to the server, it updates a database stating that you are connected, have established a session (by sending a hi) and which channel you… Read More »What to do when there is no response from the CW Reflector
The Morserino Lite has a revised menu structure, compared to the official Morserino project. Go To SleepCW Generator – Random – CW Abbrevs – English Words – Call Signs – Mixed – File PlayerEcho Trainer – Random – CW Abbrevs – English Words – Call Signs – Mixed – File PlayerKoch Trainer – Select Lesson – Learn New Character – CW Generator (menu as above)… Read More »Morserino Lite menu structure
The reflector channels can be QSY’ed to by sending :QSY<channel #> Channel # Description 0 Calling 1 DX Cluster spot announcements 10 RSGB News feed 11 BBC News RSS feed
We have tried to use standard Q codes wherever possible to aid in learning CW. All server interaction starts with a colon except for the initial logon, so, when you want to ask the server to do something you start the instruction with a colon and all server responses start with a colon. That way the server knows your message is to it and you… Read More »How do I converse with the server?
Introducing The NanoVNA The NanoVNA is an incredibly versatile test and measurement tool, at a very attractive price point. There’s a place for one of these tools in every ham shack, but when you purchase one, they often don’t come with any instructions. The NanoVNA is not a particularly intuitive piece of test gear, especially when you first come across it. This series of articles… Read More »Using The NanoVNA
Working ‘DX’ In this article, we’ll take a look at how we can utilise the satellite footprint to maximise our chances of working some ‘DX’ stations on FM satellites (although the same will hold true for the linear sats too). Linear satellites tend to have a larger footprint than FM ones. The greater the footprint (that area of the globe where stations can access the… Read More »Beginners Guide To Satellites (Part Five)
Working The Satellites Over the last three articles, we’ve taken a look at the types of satellites, how to track them and what frequencies to use, and finally the minimum equipment required. In this part, we’ll get to accessing an FM satellite and working some stations. If you’ve not already listened to a couple of passes before transmitting, can I recommend that you do so?… Read More »Beginners Guide To Satellites (Part Four)
Equipment One of the surprises about working the satellites is just how accessible they can be. If you have visions of top-end radios, masthead pre-amps, rotators that can control azimuth and elevation, and quad Yagi arrays, then forget all that. That gear would be lovely (and is possibly required for moonbounce – or EME – working) but is not needed to get started. Radio You… Read More »Beginners Guide To Satellites (Part Three)
Satellite Tracking In Part One of this series, we introduced some of the basics regarding the types of satellite. If you’ve made it to this part, I’m going to assume that you’re interested enough to start working them! Unless you are only going to access the QO-100 geostationary satellite, you’ll need to know what time they will be available to you, and where in the… Read More »Beginners Guide To Satellites (Part Two)
Overview After 35 years away from the hobby, I returned to find that the world of amateur radio had changed significantly. I knew I wanted to make the most of the VHF/UHF bands and was surprised to find that what had once been very active, was now quiet and under-utilised. That is except for contest evenings! Still, I was disappointed but looked forward to working… Read More »Beginners Guide To Satellites (Part One)
We have recently updated the club activity dashboard and now host it in a publicly available location. The page shows club member’s activity by mode in both list form and with spots on a map.
Now we are, mostly, out of lockdown and are back to our regular business the daily net on reflector XLX994B has been replaced to ad-hoc calls with regular monitoring of the reflector by club members. Please continue to use the reflector and all its modules to keep in touch as and when possible.
Attending were: Jon 2E0OPT, Jeff AB6MB, Grae G0WCZ, Michael G4XIX, Fred G1HCM, Andy M0VVA, Mark 2W0YMS We talked through a range of topics in a laughter filled, informative evening. Thanks everybody. Here are some of the topics covered: P25 radios and hotspots — and the way the Openspot 3 can do cross-mode FT8 and PSK31 success solar flux over 100 for the first time in… Read More »Club Meeting 26 November 2020
Two reflector announcements: We’ve moved our daily net to 1000Z on XLX994B SmartGroup TORC2, Brandmeister TG994 and YSF37815 and Echolink 592933. We’re introducing a daily global activity hour on the reflector at 1700Z. This is a time to work easily across ITU region 1 and 2. Join us on XLX994B SmartGroup TORC2, Brandmeister TG994 and YSF37815 or Echolink 592933 Please come along … some days… Read More »Daily Net now 1000z and Global activity Hour at 1700Z
Thanks everybody, a fun meeting this week. This was a general chat meeting with no speaker. We talked about our projects and ideas again. Along for a chat:Jon M7KMW, Fred G1HCM, Michael G4XIX, Andy M0VVA, Jeff AB6MB, Grae G0WCZ We talked about: Congrats to Jon M7KMW for passing his Intermediate exam Lockdown Morse on Youtube Starting CW evenings again — first one to be Tues… Read More »Regular Club meeting – 8 Oct 2020
A fun meeting tonight. Thanks everybody. This was a general chat meeting with no speaker. We talked about our projects and ideas. Attending:Jon M7KMW, Fred G1HCM, Michael G4XIX, Matt M0JNX, Grae G0WCZ and apologies from Andy M0VVA We talked about: Studying for intermediate exam — and re-taking a mock full exam Good value wire for wire antennas (e.g. standard 2.5mm/7strand has lasted 5 years) Raspberry… Read More »Regular Club meeting – 1 Oct 2020
Given we’re mostly out of lockdown (for now), we’ve changed out nets around. We’re now having a weekday (Mon – Fri) net at 1200Z on XLX994B SmartGroup TORC2, Brandmeister TG994 and YSF37815. Feel free to drop in and say hello.
As part of our club service to show club members where other members have been active on the bands, we have now added digital mode statistics to the club Grafana dashboard and PushSafer alerts. This is taking a feed from PSKReporter every 5 minutes (a restriction imposed by PSKReporter) and stores the information in a time-series database for graphical/tabular view. One of the great things about the dashboards is that it maintains history, so we can scroll back in time to see activity since records where created or look at the “big picture” over an annual basis. Another huge benefit is having one place to see activity across multiple sources!
Read More »Digital modes added to club member’s dashboardOn 30th July 2020, Billy McGill from McGill Microwave Systems will be giving a talk to the club and friends on how Times Microwave Systems LMR products can help you in your amateur radio setup.
Read More »McGill Microwave Systems to give talk on using LMR products for amateur radio