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Days 276 to 282 – The RSGB Convention and getting a US amateur radio licence
Here’s what should be one of the last ‘regular’ updates that consists of just a list as it brings me up to date. I’m not saying there won’t be lists in the future when I work a lot of stations such as...
View ArticleDays 287, 288 and 289 – A bit of (almost) everything
There’s a bit of everything in this update. Variety is the spice of life! I only had two QSOs on day #287 though, I first worked KD4FNI, Glenn on 15m and then I heard EA3JW, Jim calling CQ DX on 40m....
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Days 290, 291 and 292 – A QSL card in the post
I had three QSOs on day #290, I worked MX0BCQ, Kevin and 2E0OTL, Gary on 40m SSB and then had a JT65 QSO on 20m with IW1PUR, Roberto. Even less on day #291 despite the current good conditions – I spoke...
View ArticleDays 293, 294 and 295 – First SSB contact to VK
Conditions have been great over the last couple of weeks. I’ve not been going out of my way to have long strings of QSOs though, just tuning around and picking people off as I feel like it. On day...
View ArticleDays 296, 297 and 298 – I finally worked T32C
Day #296 was the day of the aerial work although before we started tearing my aerials down, I had a quick ‘banker’ QSO just in case things didn’t go well. I worked JG1WNO, Hiro on 10m JT65 early in...
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Days 311, 312 and 313 – I have an amplifier
I started off day #311 on 20m when I spoke to IN3LQB, Paul before I moved to 10m and worked A61AS, Salem and TA1BX, Burhan. I then moved to 12m to talk to JT1BV, Naran. This was followed by three...
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Days 364 and 365 – Some QRSS and a bit of everything to wrap up QSO365
It feels a little odd to be writing this final regular update for QSO365. It really doesn’t seem like a year ago that it all started and I’m a little relieved to be posting this update, knowing that...
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Working Amateur Radio satellites – A blast from my past
I’ve tried many facets of amateur radio including working through ‘repeaters in the sky’, or as they’re more commonly known, satellites. I recently dug out an envelope of old QSL cards and in amongst...
View ArticleI’m not dead!
I know I’ve not updated this blog for some months but don’t panic, I’m not actually dead! Although I’ve not done much operating this year, I have still been playing radio. I’ve been melting a lot of...
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Revisiting D-STAR and the GB7TE repeater
Back in March 2011 I wrote about three different modes of communications, EchoLink, D-STAR and QSONet. In that piece, I discounted all of them and although I said that D-STAR was the one which most...
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A guide to setting up an APRS receive only iGate using a Raspberry Pi and an...
I originally bought a Raspberry Pi back in October 2012 but as I didn’t have a specific purpose in mind for it, I quickly sold it again. A few months ago I decided to play around with a Pi again and...
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Setting up an APRS RX only iGate using a Raspberry Pi, RTL-SDR dongle and a...
After my previous post, it was suggested that an easier way to set up a receive only APRS iGate would be to provide a pre-built image which only needs slight tweaking to go live. That seemed like a...
View ArticleMB7UIV is back
A little history In January 2000 I started running the first licensed APRS Internet gateway in the UK originally with the callsign GB7UIV. Within a week of experiments starting on the 26th January...
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How to replace the noisy fan in an Icom ID-5100 with a much quieter one
I’m a happy owner of two Icom ID-5100 radios, one is mounted in the car and I use the other one in the shack on low power for working the local repeaters. It doesn’t get much use but I’m monitoring...
View ArticleAre you transmitting illegally on 70cms?
An interesting subject came up on our 70cms voice repeater earlier today following an incident on a local DMR box yesterday and it got me thinking. There are a lot of 70cms repeaters in the UK with...
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DMR – My thoughts about Digital Mobile Radio
I’ve written a couple of times in the past about various digital voice modes and if I’m honest, I’ve been quite scathing of them. I make no secret of the fact that I’m very happy to use repeaters for...
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Updated guide to setting up an APRS RX only iGate using a Raspberry Pi,...
** image has been updated as of 21/04/2018 to resolve the problems some people had booting their Pi ** This post is an updated version of the original article I wrote in February 2017. It’s using...
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Installing a radio into my car
About a year ago I changed my car and it’s taken a while to get around to fitting the radio into it. I’ve missed having a wireless in the car and recently resorted to keeping a handheld in the glove...
View ArticleDigital audio noise on receive when using WIRES-X
Back in February, I bought myself a Yaesu FTM-100DE with the intent to use it connected to a PC for WIRES-X. In the meantime, I’ve been using it to talk to friends via a YSFReflector and I wrote about...
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How to enable cross band repeater on an Icom ID-5100E
I own two Icom ID-5100E radios, I initially bought one for home so I could access the local D-STAR repeater GB7TE and I was so impressed with it that I bought another one for the car to replace my...
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