Summer VHF/UHF Field Day Contest - 12th / 13th January 2019

almost end of 2018 and just realised that it only two weeks until the 2019 Summer VHF/UHF/SHF Field Day Contest.   I missed the Spring Field Day for 2018, so more effort required to ensure I go portable to operate VHF through SHF, obviously a mountain in the western side of Blue Mtns. The plan is to go Saturday morning setup for 12noon start, do 6 hrs stint will be enough. Not serious to win, it's about just getting out portable to give out some numbers to others and build up microwave skillset. I got everything for 6metres and above, but primary focus is on microwave bands.

viewed the demise of a star last night 26th Dec 2018 at 21:57 AEDST

I was out walking dogs last night, just happened to look up towards the saucepan, which was roughly +10deg off TN with elevation of around 60deg, clear skies, I see one star in a constellation, in a direction of about 8 o'clock from the saucepan, it swells up then shrinks until it disappeared, all over the period of about 5 seconds. there was no sideways movement, so not a satellite. It flared up bright white, larger than any other star in the sky, then  it disappeared.  I ripped the phone out of my pocket  to note the time. Amazing.

Internet Speedtest results - Frenchs Forest NSW - pathetic

Here is typical sample  of the Speedtest results at Frenchs Forest, NSW, AU for ADSL connection,
note, I seen much worse than this lately, and  this is after we had the NBN FTTN infrastructure installed, some 12 months or more ago,  I have not seen any difference in speed for past 4 years,  the highest  download speed I have seen is 8Mbps download some time ago, but after rolling out FTTN infrastructure and the FTTN box is sitting 500m cable distance (not direct distance) that I expected that even ADSL would  be faster, up towards the maximum theoretical speed of 12Mbps, considering 500m should be a whole lot better than the 3km of twisted pair copper back to the local exchange, but no, its still poor performing ADSL.
We had the big handover of Telstra infrastructure here in Oct/Nov (handing over of wires and poles from Telstra to NBN Co.) nothing more nothing less, although the emails and letters from Telstra gave the impression that we were getting NBN  (fast NBN) but that was hype, checking both Telstra and NBN websites, it still shows  that "fast" NBN service won't be  available here until approx April-June 2019.  As for the NBN FTTN boxes installed around here, I not even sure now are they functional or not, maybe just sitting there doing nothing. I really need some test equipment to plugin to my phone line to tell me how long the copper pair is,  is it connected  to the FTTN node at 500m, or still connected to the FF exchange at 3km ? I suspect we still connected direct to the  FF Exchange because  the ADSL is still giving piss-poor performance.  No wonder the Kiwis are laughing at us, they got 1Gbps broadband and we still messing around with 5Mbps or less. It just proves that Australia is a 3rd world country.

VKLogger.com to be discontinued

news just received that VKLogger.com to be closed down on 25th March, 2019, due to outdated software technology used to create the application, rendering the application be un-maintainable, without a major rewrite of the code.  Waiting to see if someone else willing to create and/or run a similar type propagation reporting system for Oceanic region. A real shame as VKLogger been running or 14years. Thanks goes to Adam VK4GHZ for creating it and running it all these years.

DX Report 19th December 2018

another opening to ZL yesterday from VK2, on 2metres  and FM broadcast band across Tasman Sea.
ZL2WHO beacons heard into Sydney and Newcastle areas. Interestingly, Hepburn didnt predict much tropo for the day.
For the day before (18th December) good opening  on 2metres between VK4 and VK5 a few contacts.

DX Report 14th December 2018

there been some openings to ZL on 2metres in past couple days, FM broadcast stations from Norfolk Island and ZL received in vk2.

Also open again this afternoon is 6m and 10m, hearing vk3 chatting to vk2's on 52.525 MHz  FM
and some people repetitively keying up 29.620 MHz repeater (VK5RSC) nice strong signal 20/9 for the duration I was driving home and calling on it.

DX report 8th December 2018

driving yesterday, had the quad band FM (TH-9800) scanning it stopped on 29.640 MHz repeater, hear a couple fellows chatting, it was a a VK2 and a VK3 via the VK3RHF 10m rptr,  so first 10m E's opening I have had this summer, nice signals up and down a bit, but peaking at 60/9 that was around 12noon.
Later at night I went out and had  it scanning again, this time  stops on 146.750 Mhz rptrs, a couple fellows chatting, at first I thought it might have been Tamworth repeater, but as qso progressed they were talking about hearing ZL's on 2metres and then realised they were on the Bega 2m rptr, on the far south coast of NSW, this was whilst I driving to Forestville and the signal peaking at time around 20/9 so definitely some coastal ducting.