PA1JIM » Miscellaneous

Unidentified Signals

PA1JIM — Sun, 02 May 2010 11:05:27 +0000

When I was tuning around at the band the other day, I mistakenly went out of band and ran into a pretty strong signal. A weird signal. When I spin around some more I’ve noticed this signal repeats itself all over HF. First I thought its something in the neighborhood but when I asked Fred, PA3YH and Anne, PB1A to listen for the signal, they confirmed it.

I’ve made a list of all the HF frequencies were I hear this signal. Does anyone know where this signal is coming from and what it is? Are there more HAM’s who hear this?
Listen to the mp3 here: Unidentified signal JO22NF
The list of frequencies is over here: Frequencies Unidentified Signal

Genesis G3020 SDR

PA1JIM — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 13:27:19 +0000

Reminder to self: is this interesting to build?

BPSK31 first contacts

PA1JIM — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 14:33:23 +0000

Lately I’m not doing well on the antenna area. I did pull down the multiband dipole because it was really a horrible sight from the back garden. Then I put down the Antron 99A because it wasn’t giving the performance I hoped for (I couldn’t use it for 20m anyway). And the Cobwebb is still under construction which give a little delay because of the DYI-stuff I have to do around the house at the moment. So the only antenna I now use is a single wire which I draped over the roof. More of less in a square, 20 meters long.
I’ve noticed a pretty nice receiving signal in SSB but (of course) transmitting is awful. Not been able to make a single contact in SSB.
But the other day I got an idea: why not trying BPSK31?! So when I fired up the Signalink USB I started making QSO’s! A lot of European Russia (UA3PI, UA3GX, RA3FO, RN3DY, RX3DD, RU3EJ) but after trying a little harder I also contacted Croatia (9A6DJM), Ukraine (UX1MW, UX1LN) and Romania (YO3JX). This turns out to be fun! Fine tuning my macro’s a little here and there.
Seems that my wire on the roof has a liking for the east, don’t know why since it lays out in a square. But hey, it’s nice working till I’ve get my Cobwebb up and running!

Could D-Star destroy ham radio?

PA1JIM — Tue, 20 Apr 2010 15:12:33 +0000

One of my favorite hamblogs must be the one from Julian, G4ILO. Julian always writes very sharp and critical posts, fun to read! I’m so happy he now implemented RSS to his blog so I can keep track.

This afternoon I was reading his piece about D-star. I’m not very familiar with D-star. Read a little about it, seen someone at the club with a portable transceiver making QSO’s with an American Ham. Didn’t like the digital sqeeks and blibs. D-star equipment also seems to be too expensive for me. But when I read this article from Julian (supposing he did his research), I don’t think I mis out on anything…

Holiday at the Y-country

PA1JIM — Sun, 11 Apr 2010 21:13:49 +0000

Last three weeks I’ve been celebrating my holiday in Indonesia. We’ve made a roundtrip starting in Sumatra, Java and ending on Bali. Absolutely beautiful country! Funny thing happened in Ubud on Bali: my lovely girlfriend is making a photo of a nice entry to a house and suddenly I see the house belongs to a radio amateur YD9DP! That can’t be a coincident!
When arriving at home last friday I wanted to send the OM an email but unfortunately he doesn’t seem to be on qrz.com Bummer! Anyway, maybe he read this some day and drops me a mail.

I didn’t bring any rigs with me this holiday. Of course we we’re using the plane to get there and I didn’t want to bring another 10 kg on luggage with me for making a few QSO’s.

Signalink USB

PA1JIM — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 09:01:08 +0000

Ever since my friend Fred, PA3YH has got his Signalink, I’m thinking about getting one too. I never participate in any digital modus simply because I have never been able to get the setup right. This Signalink is pretty much a plug and play device and it looks nice too. But hey, it’s a whopping 150 euro’s (with cable and delivery costs). So I’d not feel the urge that much to be in digital modus

But the other day as I was over at Fred’s place and was toying around with Ham Radio Deluxe and his Icom-Signalink integration, it pushed me over the edge. I need to get this! But still there was the money thing. So I put out a Google Alert on Signalink USB. This morning it went off. On Marktplaats (the local eBay) someone offered a Signalink USB. A reasonable price, only it had the wrong cable (Yeasu FT-817). Since my Yeasu still is broken, I need a Kenwood cable for my TS-850. But nevermind, I bought the Signalink. Fred called me to congratulate me with my new toy. He offered me to buy me a Kenwood cable and trade it for my Yeasu cable. That is a nice deal! You see, that’s what friends are for

First run with the new Signalink where pretty disappointing. I’ve got a lot of RFI in the shack, mainly because the shack is practically near the end fed wire antenna. The Signalink only makes it worse. I really need to make a good earth to be able to feed away all the nasty stuff. I think that is gonna be the next bg thing. Or will it be the Cobwebb?

Anyway, the Signalink performed very well as voicekeyer interface between the transceiver and N1MM-logger. I’ve used it constant to give CQ’s. Only need to get rid of the RFI in the shack so I can use it at home too.

PACC 2010 experience

PA1JIM — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 14:00:41 +0000

Whow, PACC 2010 was a awesome experience! 12:00 UTC I went off for as much as qso’s as possible in 24 hours at the club. My strategy was to work the high bands early and slowly go down towards 80 and 160. I went into the night with 233 qso’s and stuck on 80 meters. Then the really hard time was there. Along the night I only made 50 qso’s on 80 and 160 meter.
It was a pretty cool experience to witness the 20 meter band opening up in the morning. First I could work all Dutch stations and a half hour later I worked the whole world again.

The HF beam (10, 15 and 20) was working great. Only on 15 I had a little feedback when I pointed it towards east. The 80m and 40m open dipole wires also worked great! I’m convinced that we have to have more mono band dipoles with bandfilters, so we will be able to work contests with more people with the club call.

Score for this PACC: 435 qso’s, 50.025 claimed points.
Very exciting about my first pileup, my first pileup hijack, first 24 hour nonstop contest and so on. I think I’m officially Rookie off

Happy New Year!

PA1JIM — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 14:36:20 +0000

To all readers of this website: all the best for 2010 for you and your family. I hope I’ll be able to keep you interested with new articles on this blog in the next year and years to come. Of course I hope to hear you on the airwaves someday

DARES

PA1JIM — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 12:36:27 +0000

A few weeks ago I decided to join DARES (Dutch Amateur Radio Emergency Services). I always liked the idea of doing something very useful with our hobby. Last 14th of november was my first meeting with the crew. After driving around for a while to find the address I met the guys from DARES.

I must say, I’m impressed how well they are organized! All the new member did get a pager so the board can reach us anytime. Also we’ve got two portables (2m and 70cm) which we can use for peer communication when we are practicing or in case of a real emergency.

This meeting was about getting to know each other and getting the right mindset. I’m looking forward to the next exercise!

Morse training while traveling

PA1JIM — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 10:07:31 +0000

A while ago (somewere end 2008) I started practicing morsecode. Every day I practiced for about half an hour and ones a week I joined my fellow HAM’s on the air and practice with a teacher. For many weeks that kind of worked. But then the teacher had a major lightning strike in his antenna and many of his stuff was blown to pieces. From then on I told myself I would practice every night except the weekends.
Of course that wasn’t the case. In the meantime I picked up a very nice morse training program pointed out by G4ILO.
Some nights I was able to put myself behind the computer for a minute or 10/15 and train a little. But it was not enough to catch the drift. Last weekend I’ve got a new idea for a good training moment!
Every day I have to travel 1,5 hours to work and back. Because I have to travel in rush hours and in the busiest area in the Netherlands, I travel by train. That gives me 3 hours per day to kill some time. Mostly I spend it reading, listening podcastst or just sleeping. But it would be the perfect moment to practice morse code!
So I called a friend who owns a unused netbook and asked him if I could use it for a few months. No problem, he answered. I picked it up last night and this morning I’ve practice morse code for about 45 minutes! Maybe this evening when I travel home, more training minutes will be added. I hope this will lead to a much faster progress.