I've just found TXFactor

No not the Simon Cowell revenue generating TV programme of a similar name but a TV channel on YouTube dedicated to Amateur Radio.

It is very well produced if a little long (the episode I watched was 64 minutes) but if you have a remote interest in Amateur Radio you may find this interesting.

http://www.txfilms.co.uk/txfactor/

I certainly found Episode 13 interesting with articles about Radio Caroline and general radio propagation. Jim Bacon G3YLA is a superb communicator and demystifies propagation, Sporadic E, radio predictions on the video. RadCom had a tiny mention of TXFactor in January 2017 edition thanks go to the RSGB. There are 13 episodes so far and I hope there are many more.
https://youtu.be/vfaNtwsEk1A

It is sponsored by Martin Lynch (MLS) and there are a small amount of advertisements to watch. Well done to the people behind TXFactor.

New gardeners

We have a new team and they are fantastic. They know what they are doing and I mentioned about the grounding cable. They will take care around it.
Result.

Gardening contractor experience

I used to have a terrific gardener who came in once a week and did some garden maintenance with his crew. Unfortunately he became ill earlier this year and can't currently work. In his place he sent around a pair of idiots (not his usual crew) who took on his "round" and said they were giving him a portion of the payment.
I took them on thinking that Danny would come back later in the season (2016) but unfortunately he is still not well. In the meantime I have been watching the idiots whose idea of garden maintenance is mowing lawns and strimming (UK Strimmer is USA Line Trimmer, String Trimmer or Weed Eater) perfectly good plants out of existence while leaving weeds intact.
They use a leaf blower to blow leaves about a bit resulting in them being trapped behind planters, in flower beds and under our cars. This is also known as "sweeping dust under the rug".

They are completely hopeless and I am actively looking for new contractors - don't make any suggestions BTW as I'm in England. The last straw came when I found they had strimmed all our perennial sweet peas off the face of the earth. These have come up every year since we bought the house (16 years ago) and are beautiful in the springtime. Worst of all they strimmed my grounding cable connection the HF antenna to its copper grounding stake - as well as woodworking I am a ham radio operator and this cable is important.



I'm keeping them on for the fall leaves, banned their strimmer and once all the leaves are all down they are sacked.

THEY HAVE GOT TO GO!

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 :(

JT65 Salutations

I have been using JT modes for a number of years now and have got a typical logged QSO down to about 4 minutes. This is great for quickly changing conditions especially on 6 metres. I find the reply RRR to be superfluous and I therefore don't use it.

A typical QSO would go like this

1. CQ G8YPH IO83 (CQ call)
2. G8YPH G8RLR IO83 (QSO received by my station clock starts)
3. G8RLR G8YPH -01 (QSO initial report sent clock minute 1)
4. G8YPH G8RLR R-01 (QSO other station report sent minute 2)
5. G8RLR G8YPH RR73 (QSO report acknowledged and 73 sent minute 3)
6. G8YPH G8RLR 73 (QSO other station 73 sent minute 4)

So the logbook shows up 4 minutes elapsed time even though the initial CQ doesn't count in the logged QSO. So in theory you should be able to work 12 stations an hour (1 minute for the CQ and4 minutes for the logged QSO).

FT-450D Digimodes revisited

I'd had a few questions on how I connect the computer to the FT-450D when using digimodes (or even just controlling it with a program like Ham Radio Deluxe) and decided to do a block diagram of how I achieve this.
This diagram is a full picture of the station layout so you can see how everything hooks together. Feel free to use it for the basis for your own datamodes operation.
In case you are wondering why I have 2 ATUs, one is in the shack for tuning the Diamond 2000 when it is switched into circuit and the other is outside at the feed point of the 9:1 UNUN end fed antenna.

Physically I have two USB hubs in circuit. One of them has USB sockets arranged side by side and the other in a vertical column pattern. The USB deices that plug into them can't go into one hub as they foul each other. Either they are too wide or too thick to have them all in one hub. So having two enables full flexibility and physical room. The diagram only shows one hub for clarity.