Category Archives: Ham Radio

A photo tour of the VOA radio shack, K3VOA

Last week, I visited my friend and fellow radio enthusiast, Dr. Kim Elliott, at the Voice of America headquarters in Washington DC. Kim gave me a tour of K3VOA, the ham radio club station of the Voice of America. K3VOA has a full ham shack, QSL card gallery, an SWLing station, some vintage gear and they even run a repeater site. Kim also took me on the roof to view the K3VOA antenna farm; not only is it impressive, but so, too, is the view of the Capitol Building.

Here is a gallery of the photos I took–click on the image to enlarge:

K3VOA shack

Anyone catch the irony here?

At the SWLing desk, they have one of my favorite tabletops, the Drake SW8

They even have a Hallicrafters S-27 UHF receiver

QSL cards from across the globe

K3VOA antenna farm

The Washington Monument in the distance.

View of the Capitol Building from the roof of the Voice of America on 330 Independence Ave., S.W.

Going to the Dayton Hamvention? Stop by our booth!

Heathkit is back in business

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Great news for kit builders! Legendary company Heathkit has started manufacturing kits again. Though their first line-up of products do not include radios, they are planning to cater to the amateur radio community as soon as next year.

I would like to believe that the popularity of the Maker community has given Heathkit the ability to re-enter the growing kit building market (it has certainly given Radio Shack reason to continue carrying components).

Here is an announcement from Heathkit’s website:

Thank you for your overwhelming response to our announcement that Heathkit is back into the Do-it-Yourself kits business. We received many great suggestions for kits you would like to build.

We will be releasing Garage Parking Assistant kit (GPA-100) in late September and soon after the Wireless Swimming Pool Monitor kit will be available.

Based on your input, we are looking at developing amateur radio kits. Our goal is to have kits available by the end of year.

Please keep your suggestions coming so that we can continue to bring you interesting, unique Heathkit products.

Now is the time to let Heathkit know you that you want shortwave and amateur radio kits!

You can contact Heathkit at the following address:

Heathkit
2024 Hawthorne Avenue
St. Joseph, MI. 49085
(269) 925-6000 : Phone
(800) 253-0570 : Toll-free
(269) 925-2898 : Fax
[email protected]

Listen to hurricane watch nets on your shortwave radio

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As of time of this posting, Hurricane Irene is on a path that could threaten a large swath of the east coast of the United States. If you have a shortwave radio, even a portable, that can tune in SSB (or Single-Side Band) you can listen to or participate in the Hurricane Watch Net courtesy of your radio.

How to find the Hurricane Watch Net on your portable shortwave radio

Simply tune your radio to 14,325 kHz (or 14.325 MHz). Since these signals are often weaker than AM broadcast signals, you should fully extend your antenna.

Next, turn on the SSB or BFO switch on your radio. These are labeled in various ways, but when you activate the SSB mode, the audio characteristics of your radio will change rather dramatically.

If there is activity on the frequency (i.e., the Watch Net is busy), you should hear voices. More than likely, you will need to tune the SSB to make the voices intelligible. Typically, there will be a dedicated fine tuning knob/wheel to allow you to do this.

Keep in mind that if you hear nothing but static, that may only be because there is no current traffic on the net. Patience will pay off.

Participation

Can you participate in the Hurricane Watch Net and make reports on your weather observations if you’re not a licensed amateur radio operator? Of course! In fact, the Hurricane Watch Net states:

The National Hurricane Center collects observations from people in coastal areas who have home weather stations. Send an e-mail to [email protected] and request information about this program or use their on-line submission form by clicking here.

I will attempt to record some sample audio from the Hurricane Watch Net and post it here (on this page) in the near future.

Also, please note that there are many other frequencies to monitor in the resources section below. Many frequencies are specific to a region, like North Carolina (tune to 3923Khz or 7232Khz SSB), so be sure to try several, not just the HWN.