15m is up in the UK at the moment

I know we have been approaching the doldrums on HF but over the last couple of days 15 metres has been open and I've heard lots of DX. South Africa is coming in strong and South America is good too. At the time of writing 11:45 UTC 9th August 2016 it has become lively.

There is hope for DX yet so get your ears on and listen or if operating digimodes get the computer on!

HF Doldrums

Very little HF working in the last few days. Daytime working has been limited to occasional contacts on 20 metres. Early morning I've had a few 40 metre contacts. SFI is currently 73 with a K index of 4.
This is what approaching a solar minimum is like :(

Logbook #1 completed - 36 years after it was started

In my blog entry from August 2015 g8yph.blogspot.com/2015/08/logbooks-and-logging-in-uk.html I posed the question to myself "I wonder when the logbook will be completed". Well the day has come and it was filled by the station RX1CV Sergo in Russia at 0929UTC on April 1st 2016.
This was almost 36 years after I started it as a teenager back in October 1980.

The first contact was Fred G8TLB who is now G4TJU a few minutes after I received the license through the post on October 4th 1980. I remember that first QSO as it was a nervous time taking the steps for the initial time speaking on air. I'm sure everybody has gone through that.

There are lots of gaps in my logbook, sometimes years without operating, others were exclusively logged electronically when operating on packet radio. Remember that? I'm not sure it still exists. Most of the off times were due to changes in circumstances, job commitments, family commitments, changes in lifestyle where I didn't have time for the hobby.

And here were are so many years later with a brand new blank logbook.

Hopefully it won't take as long to fill logbook #2!......

Yaesu FT-450D not broken

I thought my FT-450D rig had developed a fault but I was wrong.
Essentially I was mid QSO with an Australian station both of us operating low power JT65A (I was transmitting 5 watts). I use HRD and JT65HF HB9HQX to control the rig. All of a sudden the PC started making beeping noises (the one when you unplug a USB device) and the rig was powering off and on by itself.

I disconnected everything and the rig would not power on. When I put the CAT cable back into the D9 on the back panel it powered up. However it would not TX and kept rebooting when I tried.
Thinking that it had developed a fault I emailed Yaesu customer service in the UK. A shortwhile later Sam Ruddy, the Yaesu Service manager, replied. One of the things he suggested was try the fuses in the power lead.

"Fuses?" I thought. "Are there two?"
Sure enough there are and the one in the negative lead had become loose in its holder. I don't know how but it had. Basically the rig had been powering on through the PC ground connection. When trying to TX the high current ground was going through the PC causing the rig to become disconnected from power and rebooting it. Fortunately there was no damage to either the rig nor the PC.

So when both fuses were reseated and everything reconnected all is working again. It just goes to show - get back to basics when you fault find.

Thanks to Sam Ruddy at Yaesu UK

ZL still elusive on JT modes

Grey line propagation between UK and New Zealand is good this morning on 40 m. I can hear (detect??) a few ZL stations. However as soon as they come up they disappear again so no contacts made yet.

Happy New Year 2016

A few JT65A QSOs over the last couple of hours on 15m and 17m. Hopefully many more of the year.

HNW 73 De Terry G8YPH

Logbooks and logging in the UK

It is no longer a requirement in the UK for a station logbook to be kept. There is a clause in the current license that states "12(1) For the purposes of any interference investigation, to determine compliance with the
terms, conditions and limitations of this Licence, or for any other matter concerning the
enforcement of any relevant legislation, the Licensee shall at the request of a person
authorised by Ofcom, keep a permanent record (a “log”) of such matters concerning the
operation of the Radio Equipment, over such period, and in such form, as the authorised
person may require."

Which basically means if Ofcom tell you to keep one on the basis of an interference investigation you must do so until they decide otherwise.

As an old hand in amateur radio, having held my license since 1980, I have always kept a log and always will. I know it is now voluntary but it's really nice to look back through the logbook and see previous contacts. I'm still on my first physical paper one as I did a lot of packet radio operation and that kept it's own electronic logs that I still have. However I have purchased a new one from the RSGB and that is on the shelf when the original is filled. I wonder what date that will be!

Logbook #1

2 Rigs 2 Antennas 2 Switches - Part 3

6m activity is very sporadic and as we are coming up to the Perseids maximum activity phase (August 12th 2015) then I have had chance to try out the switches in anger (so to speak). I heard a DXPedition station calling CQ on 6m from Aland Island (a rare DXCC island off the coast of Finland). I was on the dipole at the time and decided to switch over to the inverted Vee. Wow what a difference, before he was about RS52 perfectly readable. As soon as I threw both switches over to the Vee then he was coming in at RS57 occasionally peaking at RS59.

The new switching mechanism works a treat and is superb. Maybe my dipole is not that efficient!

I bet behind your computer and rigs it's a rats nest of cables like mine!

2 rigs 2 antennas 2 coaxial switches - Part 2

The Diamond CX-210A switches arrived along with some high spec 0.5m long patches leads terminated either end with PL259 plugs.

I cut a small piece of plywood on the table saw and mounted both switches side by side with the supplied screws. One of the patch leads was connected between the switches as per my circuit diagram outlined in Part 1.

The other two patch leads were used to connect to the two rigs. The antennas were then connected to the switches output as per the photo.

I placed the switch assembly board behind both rigs on the desk. In operation I just exercise a few muscles and get out of the shack chair to throw each switch! No need for it to be in finger tip reach.

The insertion loss for each switch is 0.05dB from DC to 500MHz and I have not noticed any issues with loss of sensitivity of either rig. I just worked a couple of stations in Argentina and Brazil (about 8000 miles away) on 35 watts PSK31 so neither transmission nor reception have been impacted. VHF/UHF on the FM transceiver is ok too with a distant repeater in Birmingham (about 72 miles away) still being workable on 2m.

2 rigs 2 antennas 2 coaxial switches - Part 1

I have a couple of antennas and 2 base station rigs. The FM transceiver is quad band and is attached to a tri band antenna covering 6m/2m/70cm. The HF antenna is connected to a multi band antenna covering 40m to 6m including all the WARC bands. It is supposed to be able to resonate on 80m band too but I've never had any success with this.

With this in mind the 6m portion of the VHF/UHF antenna (Diamond V-2000) is an inverted Vee that is directional - despite "visually appearing" to be part of a vertically polarized antenna system. The VHF and UHF portions of the antenna are omnidirectional vertically polarized. I have the 6m portion pointing eastwards.

At times of 6m activity it would be nice to switch between the conventional HF antenna to the W-2000 on the HF rig to see if there are any differences. It is very inconvenient to reach around the back of each of the rigs to unscrew the antenna plugs and swap them over so I came up with this idea.
Using a pair of Diamond CX-210A 2 way coaxial switches I designed the circuit shown below.

There is no interlocking so there can become an issue where rigs are connected to nothing on occasion. However the good news is that the output of one cannot be connected to the output of another! As this is going to be used just by me I see no problem. I just have to remember to throw both switches at the same time. 

The antenna switches are connected the conventional way (the HF rig feeding the common connection) of the HF switch. The FM transceiver is connected to one of the switched connections of the VHF/UHF switch. In normal operation each rig is connected to its respective antenna. When I want to use the HF rig on the V-2000 I have to throw both switches to their other positions. I would also switch the FM transceiver off as it wouldn't be connected to an antenna at all.

There doesn't appear to be anything relatively cheap on the amateur market that can do this so in the spirit of ham radio I'm doing it myself. The switches and connectors have been ordered - watch this space!

Working SOTA stations

I have one of the rigs on S20 most of the time I'm in the shack listening for local FM contacts. Occasionally I hear operators calling CQ SOTA. I try to always reply to them as they have taken the time to climb up to the top of a high point. It must be really disappointing when nobody replies back to them so I encourage everybody who hears a CQ SOTA to please reply.

I was just speaking with Tom M1EYP stood upon SP15 "The Cloud" near Bosley, Macclesfield. He wanted other operators to also try reponding to him on 6m SSB. I of course am fully equipped for most bands and was able to just pick him out of the noise. He gave me a 59 response he was only 41 to 51.
On 2m FM he was 59 end stop.

I also send eQSL cards out too so they have proof of the 2 way contact should they need it for an activation. Tom was no exception and an eQSL is on its way.