Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Dan Robinson, who shares the following photos from the Berryville Hamfest.
Dan notes that the resolution is not great in these photos, but I believe we can still see enough detail to know that this hamfest had many vintage treasures:
Thank you once again for sharing these, Dan!
Welcome to the SWLing Post’s Radio Waves, a collection of links to interesting stories making waves in the world of radio. Enjoy!
Although Irish pirate radio is our main interest, today we explore the lively pirate scene in the Brooklyn area of New York City. The Brooklyn Pirate Radio Sound Map is a fascinating project established by radio producer and audio archivist David Goren and provides interactive maps and historical and contemporary recordings of the many unlicensed stations in Brooklyn.
This is a longer version of an interview by John Walsh with David Goren first featured in Wireless, a series about radio, audio and media on Flirt FM in Galway. It covers the history of pirate radio in Brooklyn and New York generally, attempts to crack down on the unlicensed stations, the role of low-powered FM, the background to the Brooklyn Pirate Radio Sound Map itself and plans for the future. Many thanks to David for taking the time to explain this fantastic project for us. [Read the full article and listen to the interview on the Irish Pirate Radio Audio Archive…]
From AM-only portables to multi-function machines
With the advent of the 9V battery-powered transistor radio in the 1950s, the “Emergency Radio” was born.
Unlike vacuum tube receivers with heavy batteries or unpowered crystal radios, these handheld AM portables were small and simple enough to keep in a drawer. They could then be retrieved whenever man-made or natural disasters knocked out the power, providing listeners with lifeline connections to news, weather and relief information. Continue reading
By Jock Elliott, KB2GOM
Okay, I realize this is ham related, but I thought it was fun, and I hope you do too.
On a quiet Saturday morning in May, the “Big Gun” Motorola 1250 (which is used for running the Commuter Assistance Net) is quietly scanning through half a dozen frequencies.
The scanning stops on the 147.330 repeater, and a computer voice announces: “Echolink activated.”
Huh, that’s unusual, I think.
According to echolink.org, here’s the scoop on EchoLink:
EchoLink® software allows licensed Amateur Radio stations to communicate with one another over the Internet, using streaming-audio technology. The program allows worldwide connections to be made between stations, or from computer to station, greatly enhancing Amateur Radio’s communications capabilities. There are more than 350,000 validated users worldwide — in 159 of the world’s 193 nations — with about 6,000 online at any given time.
A few seconds later, a male voice with a distinct British accent drops a call on the repeater: “GB2022ER.”
What?!! A Great Britain call sign with multiple numbers in the middle? What’s going on?
I reply: KB2GOM.
Mark, the British ham, tells me he is running a special events station with a special call sign to celebrate the Queen’s Jubilee. He tells me I am the very first contact for the special events station. I tell him that he is my very first Echolink contact.
We chat for a bit, exchange good wishes and sign off.
A bit later, I look him up on QRZ and send Mark an email. Since I am his first contact for the special events station, is there a QSL card available? He replies that he will see what he can do.
A few weeks later, an envelope arrives with this coaster inside:
For a moment, I felt like James Bond:
Also inside were these postcards:
In all, it made me smile.
Bottom line – moral of the story, if you will – you never know what’s going to happen on the radio.
By Brian D. Smith, W9IND
The Checkered Flag is in sight – for hams and SWLs who’ve completed two-thirds of the chase for the annual W9IMS certificate. And for those who haven’t, there’s still a special QSL card awaiting all who snare the final contact during the coming week.
As its initials imply, W9IMS stages special events in honor of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway’s three major races. The third and final operation of 2022 – commemorating the NASCAR 200 at the Brickyard – will activate between the hours of midnight Indy time (0400 UTC) Monday, July 25, and midnight Sunday, July 31 (0400 UTC Tuesday, August 1).
Earning the 2022 Checkered Flag Award depends on working or tuning in each of the three special events. Since the first two races (the IndyCar Grand Prix and the Indianapolis 500) ran in May, it’s obviously too late to claim the clean sweep.
However, W9IMS also issues collectible QSL cards for the three individual races, so there’s still time to get a piece of the action.
Where to start? Well, W9IMS favors 20 and 40 meters, sometimes adding 80 meters later in the week (not to mention 2 meters on Race Day for locals and fans in the stands at the Speedway). Preferred frequencies are 14.245 and 7.245 SSB, plus or minus QRM.
But rather than spin the dial, try scanning the following tips for finding W9IMS on the air:
Welcome to the SWLing Post’s Radio Waves, a collection of links to interesting stories making waves in the world of radio. Enjoy!
Since September 2020, ABC Radio has been quietly trialing DRM technology in Victoria
The public-service Australian Broadcasting Corp. and its transmission contractor BAI Communications Transmission Network hosted a public demonstration of Digital Radio Mondiale broadcasts on June 29, 2022. ABC highlighted the use of DRM on both AM and FM in Wagaratta, Victoria.
According to the DRM Consortium, the demonstration was the culmination of almost two years of COVID-impacted work to assess the performance of DRM services in Australia’s VHF and medium-wave bands.
Previously, the Australian Amateur Radio Experimenters Group reported that AREG member Steve Adler (VK5SFA) had been monitoring “a very un-publicized Digital Radio Mondiale (DRM) trial” on 747 kHz from Wangaratta in August 2021.
The Australian Communications and Media Authority provided ABC with a license variation to conduct the DRM 30 trials from September 1, 2020, to August 31, 2022.
At the public demonstration, senior representatives from the public, commercial and community radio sectors, along with regulators and other interested parties, were able to hear and see the capabilities of DRM broadcasting on AM from Dockers Plains and on FM from Mount Baranduda. They were also able to review the transmission equipment at Wagaratta.[Continue reading…]
Also check out the DRM Consortium’s article on this same topic.
The James Webb Space Telescope probably needs no introduction, since it is perhaps the most important and well-known mission of the last years. It was launched on Christmas day from Kourou, French Guiana, into a direct transfer orbit to the Sun-Earth L2 Lagrange point. JWST uses S-band at 2270.5 MHz to transmit telemetry. The science data will be transmitted in K-band at 25.9 GHz, with a rate of up to 28 Mbps.
After launch, the first groundstation to pick the S-band signal from JWST was the 10 m antenna from the Italian Space Agency in Malindi, Kenya. This groundstation commanded the telemetry rate to increase from 1 kbps to 4 kbps. After this, the spacecraft’s footprint continued moving to the east, and it was tracked for a few hours by the DSN in Canberra. One of the things that Canberra did was to increase the telemetry rate to 40 kbps, which apparently is the maximum to be used in the mission.
As JWST moved away from Earth, its footprint started moving west. After Canberra, the spacecraft was tracked by Madrid. Edgar Kaiser DF2MZ, Iban Cardona EB3FRN and other amateur observers in Europe received the S-band telemetry signal. When Iban started receiving the signal, it was again using 4 kbps, but some time after, Madrid switched it to 40 kbps.
At 00:50 UTC on December 26, the spacecraft made its first correction burn, which lasted an impressive 65 minutes. Edgar caught this manoeuvre in the Doppler track.
Later on, between 7:30 and 11:30 UTC, I have been receiving the signal with one of the 6.1 metre dishes at Allen Telescope Array. The telemetry rate was 40 kbps and the spacecraft was presumably in lock with Goldstone, though it didn’t appear in DSN now. I will publish the recording in Zenodo as usual, but since the files are rather large I will probably reduce the sample rate, so publishing the files will take some time.
In the rest of this post I give a description of the telemetry of JWST and do a first look at the telemetry data. [Continue reading…]
The average person’s perception of a ham radio operator, assuming they even know what that means, is more than likely some graybeard huddled over the knobs of a war-surplus transmitter in the wee small hours of the morning. It’s a mental image that, admittedly, isn’t entirely off the mark in some cases. But it’s also a gross over-simplification, and a generalization that isn’t doing the hobby any favors when it comes to bringing in new blood.
In reality, a modern ham’s toolkit includes a wide array of technologies that are about as far away from your grandfather’s kit-built rig as could be — and there’s exciting new protocols and tools on the horizon. To ensure a bright future for amateur radio, these technologies need to be nurtured the word needs to be spread about what they can do. Along the way, we’ll also need to push back against stereotypes that can hinder younger operators from signing on.
On the forefront of these efforts is Amateur Radio Digital Communications (ARDC), a private foundation dedicated to supporting amateur radio and digital communication by providing grants to scholarships, educational programs, and promising open source technical projects. For this week’s Hack Chat, ARDC Executive Director Rosy Schechter (KJ7RYV) and Staff Lead John Hays (K7VE) dropped by to talk about the future of radio and digital communications. [Continue reading…]
Radio World reports the Electromagnetic Interference generated by Electric Vehicles is causing some EV automakers to drop AM (medium wave) radio
The article says:
Some EV automakers are dropping AM altogether due to audio quality concerns, but that’s just one piece of the puzzle as radio continues to fight for space on the dash.
“As carmakers increase electric vehicle offerings throughout their lineups, the availability of AM radio to consumers is declining,” said Pooja Nair, communications systems engineer with Xperi Corp., in a Radio World guest commentary. “This is because the effects of electromagnetic interference are more pronounced in EVs than in vehicles with internal-combustion engines.”
In other words, electromagnetic frequencies generated by EV motors occupy the same wavelength as AM radio signals. The competing signals clash, effectively cancelling each other out. As EV motors grow more powerful, AM static tends to increase.
Read the full story at
https://www.radioworld.com/news-and-business/headlines/why-are-some-automakers-ditching-am-radio
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Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Mike (VE3MKX), who writes:
The following pictures are from a Hamfest which was held yearly at the Milton Fairgrounds in Milton Ontario, Canada. (Located 20 minutes west of Toronto).
The Burlington Amateur Radio Club organizes the event and confirms that they had 108 vendor spaces sold and over 475 general admin passed through the gates.
A great day of meeting friends, lots of deals and smiling faces!
Thank you so much for sharing this, Mike! I haven’t been to a hamfest yet this year, so it’s great to catch a glimpse of what looks like a very successful one!
Readers: This is a large gallery of 132 photos courtesy of Kevin (VA3RCA) and Mike (VE3MKX). If you would like to view the entire image gallery click on the link to see more. Continue reading
The Yaesu FT-710 AESS
Welcome to the SWLing Post’s Radio Waves, a collection of links to interesting stories making waves in the world of radio. Enjoy!
Many thanks to Eric Jon Magnuson for summarizing these news items for Radio Waves!
Yaesu is introducing a new 100 watt SDR transceiver to their product line: the Yaesu FT-170.
The Yaesu FT-710 will cover 160-6 meters with 100 watts output. There are two other Japanese market versions: the FT-710M and FT-710S which are 50 and 10 watt respectively.
This general coverage rig will feature “AESS”–Yaesu’s ‘Acoustic Enhanced Speaker System’ which “creates the high-fidelity audio output.” Yaesu notes that the FT-710 utilizes, “the advanced digital RF technology introduced in the FTDX101 and FTDX10 series.”
Click here to check out the published features and specifications of the new FT-710.
KYIV, Ukraine — During the early morning hours of Feb. 24, as Russian missiles struck targets across Ukraine in the opening hours of the full-scale war, the Ukrainian military’s Army FM radio station went underground.
The team of seven army officers and about 10 civilian personnel abandoned their studio on the top floor of a downtown Kyiv building and relocated into a nearby basement. Inside the dank and dark underground space, they connected a mixing board and a couple of laptops to a mobile radio system, which the station’s reporters had previously used to report from the Donbas trenches.
“I just grabbed my Kalashnikov and went to work,” said Oleksandr Yurchenko, 32, a Ukrainian army second lieutenant assigned to Army FM.
While a Russian invasion force advanced to the outskirts of Kyiv in the war’s perilous first few days, the Army FM team stayed at their posts and worked in six-hour shifts to keep their programs running 24/7. They constructed makeshift beds from shipping pallets and stocked the basement studio with food and water. Body armor vests and Kalashnikovs occupied all available shelves and empty corners.
From this jury-rigged basement studio, Army FM continued to transmit information and entertainment programs to listeners across Ukraine — including into territories Russian forces invaded and occupied. [Continue reading…]
On Hackaday Chris Lott WD4OLP writes about DL1DN’s aluminum foil 20cm antenna for 28 MHz (10m) operation
David DL1DN, is an Amateur Radio enthusiast with a penchant for low-power (QRP) portable operations. Recently he was out and about, and found that 10 m propagation was wide open. Not discouraged by having forgotten his antenna, he kludges up a makeshift one using a 20 cm length of aluminum foil.
Read the Hackaday story and watch the video at
https://hackaday.com/2022/07/02/aluminum-foil-20-cm-antenna-for-10-m-operation/
Dave Zantow writes:
ATS-25 with Binns 4.1 firmware Review Now Posted. […] There were 7 different versions in the beta stage. New audio file added as well (Sync when it does not work so well, which is NOT all the time). Might be one more update before release (not sure right now).
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