PA1JIM

Elecraft K1 update

PA1JIM — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 09:28:36 +0000

A day after the birth of my son (12th December) a package arrived from Elecraft! Of course the first week I’ve got something else on my mind but I got anxious soon to heat up the solder iron!
First I read the manual thoroughly and unpacked all bags and packs. According to the manual you have to start with the 4-band filter board. Then build the front panel. Last (but not least) it’s time for the main RF-board. And that’s a biggy!

I don’t know exactly how many hours I spend reading, winding cores and soldering, but it was one great adventure and I really enjoyed building the K1! More then one of my amateur friends asked me why I bought an Elecraft. They are expensive and do not have much functionality (at least the K1 doesn’t). But when you open the package you’ll see the effort and accuracy Elecraft (thank you Susan and Stephanie!) put in to a great kit, you realize not everything is about functionality. It’s probably much cheaper to it put together at Foxcon in China rather to compose a whole kit with a detailed manual.

That said, I was completely surprised about the performance of the K1 after it’s completion and first test run! It’s so simple to operate and the receiving performance blows my previous QRP-rig (Yaesu FT-817) out of the water! I specifically bought the Elecraft K1 for portable operation (maybe SOTA in the future?) with my BuddyPole. And with it’s extremely low power usage (just 58 mA in receiving mode) it should do about 2 or 3 hours on 8 AA-battery’s! That’s a lot better then my previous rig which did only 20 minutes of receiving on the same battery’s (with transmitting even less).

And just one day after finishing the build a package arrived from Rose N7HKW! She made me a great case for the K1. Totally handmade, great materials, absolutely perfect finishing! I’m sure this case is more beautiful and stronger then any case I ever seen! I love it!
Of course the K1 fits perfectly and is really protected when I engage in SOTA-activity

I ordered the K1 with the battery-pack option and the display back lighting kit. The back lighting is build in but the battery pack I still have to build in. The manual said it’s a good idea to wait with that option until I have some experience in operating the radio. So I’ll pick up that later.

Some pictures of the building process, finished K1 and Rose’s great case found here: http://t.co/RhFRxqX

Elecraft K1 casing

PA1JIM — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 12:08:56 +0000

Pending the delivery of my Elecraft K1, I was browsing the Elecraft website when I found this link.
It turns out Rose is a lovely lady who makes (all by hand) beautiful Elecraft cases! Because it’s made by hand, she can sew your own call on the case. I’m a sucker for this kind of handcraft! So I ordered a case for my Elecraft K1 right away!
If you want such a beautiful case for your Elecraft, just send Rose an email!

Elecraft K1

PA1JIM — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 13:26:58 +0000

After a few months of day-dreaming and watching YouTube, last monday I visit my friend Hans, PC8E to play a little with the build kit. Hans owns the complete Elecraft line: K1, KX1, K2, K3 with pan-adaptor and some other mini-module-kits. He got me convinced: I definitely want the K1!

I just ordered a K1 with the 4-band module and the internal battery adapter (I want to be able to use it portable of course) and the backlight kit for unbuild K1′s.

I’m anxious to see how long it will takes till the kit arrives. Maybe I’ll record a YouTube-video of assembling the kit since I’ve noticed there are no build video’s of a K1 around.

Now off to Learn CW Online to practice some more. I need to be able to run a cw-conversation when it’s time to test the kit

Kit building all over again

PA1JIM — Tue, 01 Nov 2011 16:00:41 +0000

As a small boy I seemed talented for working with electronics. My parents encourage this by buying me a Philips Electronics Box. I really loved it and build all circuits there were to build. Not long after that I got my first solder iron and start building little kits I bought of my allowance.
After all these years I always owned a solder iron but used it maybe once a year or so. These last months I’m really working hard on CW-practice. I’m not there yet but there is lot’s of progress. One of the cool things of CW is it’s high efficiency due to the high S/N-ratio. Therefor CW makes it possible to work great distances on HF with only very little power.
So no need necessarily for big transceivers for CW. And then suddenly a whole new world of the radio amateur hobby opens up: QRP!

Building kits for QRP CW is versatile and a lot cheaper en less complex to build compared to QRO. And there seems so much creativity and wide range of kits! From the fancy (and expensive) Elecraft K1 to the awesome kits from NorCal QRP club.
I think I’m about ordering a kit and pick up the solder iron to start building again! The fun and satisfaction of working with your own build equipment seems incredibly attractive!
Reporting back on any building here of course.

Rohde&Schwarz HL-451 Log-per on a Icom IC-7700

PA1JIM — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 08:07:33 +0000

You would think it’s a great wedding to hookup a Icom IC-7700 to a Rohde&Schwarz HL451 Log-periodic. Let me tell you, it is! Last weekend we were building up the command center for the yearly Dutch balloon fox hunting and it happens to be there was a Icom IC-7700 lingering around. We decided to find out how the Rohde&Schwarz HL451 Log periodic would sound, so we hooked it up. I was listening to a USA-station in Michigan who sounds like we’re on telephone. Listen for yourself:

BuddiPole test run

PA1JIM — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 08:02:33 +0000

My birthday present of this year was getting a bit dusty. So after a days work this afternoon I decide to put it in the air for a test run. A few days ago I bought some nice mast pieces of 1m20 each. So I attached the BuddiPole to one of the mast pieces and build 6 of the pieces (the BuddiPole itself around 16 meters up in the air). It was kind of scary standing on the roof, holding the growing mast with two hands in the (little) wind. But it worked! I attached the temporary mast to my other 2m/70cm mast with some tie-wraps. There was virtually no wind, so not much could go wrong.

Back in the shack I did immediately notice the low noise level and strong signals. Of course it’s high altitude is also responsible for that (less QRM) but the SWR is flat on all of the 15 meter band! Thus it’s design and construction is quite nice. In less then an hour I worked 5 new DXCC-entities (countries) on 15 meter: Bahrain, China, Armenia, Azerbaijan and Cuba!
I think we can safely say the BuddiPole is working nice! Next time I’m putting it up in open field.

WSPR on 80m

PA1JIM — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 08:00:37 +0000

Last night I leave WSPR on for the whole night to see what happen. According to propagation rules, the best opportunities on 80m should be around the greyline. In the evening that means in western Europe I should get signals out of the east and in the morning I should get signals out of the west. A little disappointed I was this morning when the only thing I saw is stations from Europe. Could it be my antenna? Bad propagation on 80m? Not enough WSPR-station on the air? I guess my S9 noise level on 80m don’t help much.

Balloon fox hunting on Sunday, 11th september 2011

PA1JIM — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 07:59:24 +0000

The annual balloon fox hunt will take place on Sunday, September 11th. A probe built by radio amateurs will be launched underneath a weather balloon at KNMI in De Bilt (Dutch weather institute). After the launch a always spectacular hunt by other radio amateurs and enthusiasts will follow. The goal is to find the probe first and you’ll be the winner!
Over the years, the balloon fox hunting has become a multimedia event for and by people interested in the radio hobby. There are numerous activities going during the hunt for guidance for the hunters, but also for a huge group of non-participating interested parties.
Throughout the day various coaching stations are active on 80m, 2m and 70cm. At 2 meters there is the special event repeater PI3VRZ on the air at about 350m height from the Gerbrandy tower in IJsselstein. Also, the hunting footage can be monitored through Amateur Television and the Internet. This year we even try to live broadcast the start, landing and awards ceremony.
The organization welcomes the great number of participants over the years (still growing)! Joining the hunt is very easy, with only a 2 meter antenna receiver and a simple directional antenna, you are assured of an afternoon of fun, a must for the whole family! Often the simplest equippes who are the most successful …

Put Sunday, September 11th on your calendar! For any further information such as frequency and times visit www.ballonvossenjacht.nl.

BuddiPole arrived

PA1JIM — Thu, 18 Aug 2011 11:06:32 +0000

A great birthday present this year: a BuddiPole! Always wanted a simple but flexible portable antenna for the outdoor activities. Until now I used a glass fiber fishing rod with 2 pieces of wire so I could work on 20m. But that is not a small package which you can drop in your rucksack easily.

The BuddiPole is a cool piece of hardware which you can build almost anything you (portable antenna-wise) would want. It’s usable for 40 to 2m. It’s possible to build a much smaller vertical BuddiStick with the components of a BuddiPole. An ideal solution for apartments or hotel stays where it almost impossible to setup a big (even portable) antenna.

On little side note: when you’re in the ordering process, consider what kind of base you going to add. You can choose the tripod or (in the BuddiStick-modus) the table clamb. Because when you don’t order a base(like I did) you have nothing to put the dipole on.

Now I really need to fix my Yaesu FT-817 so I can test my portable setup on a quiet place somewhere out there.

Mac OSX Lion first impression

PA1JIM — Thu, 21 Jul 2011 21:38:49 +0000

Yesterday I was waiting eagerly (like the rest of the world) for the new Mac OSX 10.7 Operating System to pop-up in the Mac App Store. I did seen some nice video’s on Apple site of the WWDC 2011 where Steve Jobs (among others) showed some new features of Lion. Around 14:30 local time Lion finally popped up in the MAS and I hit the download button.
As little as half an hour later I’m running the new OSX. First impression? Nice! Very nice!

Apple wrote another very nice piece of software for the “Back to the Mac”-program. It brings the Mac and the iOS-devices a little closer. Now I don’t have to navigate to the Applications folder to start a application, just hit the Launchpad and hit the app. Just like on my iPhone.
The new way of full screen displaying apps is extremely cool. Also the new “About this Mac”-screen is nice. More easy overview. Mission Control, finally a good overview that works. And in my opinion the most cool new feature: multi-gestures. Swipe your way through the OS. I definitley need a Magic Trackpad now!

According to Apple’s reports Lion downloads are going true the roof.

Would love to spend some more time getting to know this OS!