DvdR 2023

Last Saturday, Oct. 28, I was part of the ‘NL-post’ team at the DvdR (Day of the Radio Amateur) in Zwolle, IJsselhallen. 

I was there with Thieu, NL-199, PA0M and Gerard, PA2G. It was good to speak to fellow radio enthousiastics and see lots of old and new radio stuff. It was remarkable that my homebrewed  BITX20 from 10 years ago - built in ‘Manhattan style’ - draw a lot of attention.

NL-Post stand with PA0M and PA2G

Scouting girls making worldwide radio contacts during CQWW SSB contest

Nice antenna designs

My BITX20 caught some attention

SDR receiver exploration

Great fun with SDR Receiver MSI2500 in combination with SDRuno software. I am exploring  the possibilities of this nice toy.

The SDR receiver (frequency range 30 - 1000 MHz) has 5 antenna inputs each with its own bandfilter

SDRuno software in action ( Repeater PI2NOS, 430.125 MHz selected)

Experiment with E-field antenna for low frequency signals (< 10 MHz ).

I wrote an article for the Dutch radiomagazine Electron, NL-Post, Nov. 2023, about this SDR receiver:

Sun

Yesterday evening I witnessed the sunset from my backyard garden.

I realized that it is amazing that a star at a distance of 150 million kilometers from us affects the propagation of radio signals on earth. During daytime the solar wind presses the Kennelly-Heaviside layer closer to the earth, thereby limiting how far it can reflect radio waves. The effect is also influenced by the amount of sunspot activity.

Sunset yesterday from Zuidzijde

HB9 on 160 m

For a change, last week I was active on 160 m. With my end-fed longwire antenna  - in the evening hours  - I managed to work a couple of stations. One of them was HB9EFK. This was my first with Switzerland on 160 m.

Note: Description of the balun I use in combination with 25 mtrs of longwire 

https://pa2rf.blogspot.com/2019/01/balun-for-long-wire-antenna.html

Start of the Es season

Yesterday I powered up my 4 m equipment. To my surprise I saw EA and 9H stations. No dx  QSO's yet. I did make some local 70 MHz QSO's though. Looks like the Es season is ready to start.

 

70MHz stations that heard my 15 Watt signal 9 July 2023. With some of them I had a FT8 QSO;

First with OK;

The Stele of Hatiay

Case 1

Lately I visited the National Museum of Antiquities (‘Rijksmuseum van Oudheden’) in Leiden. One of the many fascinating objects that amazed me was ‘The Stele of Hatiay’. It shows general Hatiay announcing – in name of his king - that he has established many new sacred memorials (1330-1320 BC). That’s what the text near the stele tells us.

I was intrigued by the triangular shaped device that Hatiay holds in his hand. If you have a close look at the smaller persons, some of them also hold similar devices. In my view the triangular shaped units look like microphones. With a little bit of phantasy we see here something that looks like an early version of an internet teams meeting… Maybe the microphones operate wireless since there is a small piece of (antenna) wire coming from the triangles…

Case 2

Between the Nasca lines one can discover this creature;

Doesn't the device on the head look like a satellite dish beaming up a radio signal ?

Case 3

The kneeling god with a 'falcon's head' is known as 'the soul of Buto' and is dated appr. 400 BC.  Does this look like a falcon to you? The creature has 4 tows on each foot.

How about a creature which is a result of DNA mixture between two beings ?

The soul of Buto. Source; 'goden en farao's ', Museum Boymans - van Beuningen, 1979

Case 4

Those two spacecraft were seen in Teotihuacan (near Mexico City) in the vicinity of the Pyramid of the Moon.  Can you see the flames leaving the exhaust ?

More interesting information on ancient technology:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zecharia_Sitchin

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erich_von_D%C3%A4niken

BC860XLT VHF/UHF scanner

Last weekend I re-discovered the Uniden Bearcat BC860XLT VHF/UHF scanner. I did not use it for over 10 years. It is a remarkable receiver covering the frequency range 29 – 956 MHz. It contains 100 channels to store favorite frequencies.

I was glad to find out that the device still works fine. Receiving aircraft AM voice transmissions from Rotterdam Airport and vessel voice communications from the Northsea confirm that the unit is in good shape. Nice toy !

 

Specs:

https://www.rigpix.com/bearcat/ubc860xlt.htm

Citizen Band QSL card

Just found one of my old CB QSL cards. This one is from 1978. At the time I used a 23 channel CB transceiver "North Star". Memories..channel 14,    27.125 MHz  AM .. and 4 Watt RF output into a DV27 mobile antenna.

How did your QSL card look like ?

Logaritmic Power Detector

From AliExpress I ordered this nice PCB with a logaritmic power detector circuit onboard. The electronics is designed around an AD8307 integrated circuit. The detector should operate in the range 1 - 600 MHz. DC input anywhere between 6 .. 15 Volts. 

All ingredients are there to realize a nice S-meter / RF Pwr-meter. 

HF65

JostyKit was the name of a Danish manufacturer that sold nice Do-It-Yourself kits. One of them was the HF65. In fact a free running oscillator that operated in the FM broadcast band (and below and above J, according to the specification sheet somewhere between 60 -145 MHz). A 2N2219 transistor provided appr. 1 Watt HF. The modulation was a mix of FM and AM, but on a regular FM tuner one could easily hear the HF65 and the sound quality wasn’t even bad.

Anyway around 1977 I played with this nice device and was able to broadcast some music in the neighbourhood.

I think many liscenced HAM operators nowadays started their radio experience with transmitters similar to the HF65.

T1 = 2N2219

T2 = BC172