Mountaintop portable - Oct 2011

We went to QF46 from 2nd to 6th Oct, operated on 23cm EME WSJT, my first 23cm EME contact with Bruce PY2BS in Brazil. This is the 5m dish down at the house. Tim VK4TIM came down from Brisbane.

Also did some AE contacts on 144.200 morning sked, working VK1, VK3 and VK4 over a couple days, using the 8el 2m yagi, FT-221 with Tono amp, giving approx 60w PEP, need to get some more drive from the FT-221 to get 300w PEP for next time. Contacts included VK1BG, VK1KW, VK3BJM, VK4OX, VK3DUT & VK3VFO on 144.200

And made contacts on 40m, 10m, plus worked Tim VK4TIM mobile2 on 52.525, as he approached from Dubbo to Orange, prior to that on the Coonabarabran rptr (146.800) whilst he mobile up past Gilgandra.
On 40m, worked club members VK2HL, VK2XE & VK3BQ/7on the 80m Loop antenna.
On 10m, worked T32C, I0KNQ plus others, 10m FM was useless, with wall-to-wall Indonesian fishing boats blocking most of that band, did hear a BY station on 29.600 a few times.

Did some work on antennas, added a few more basic antennas to the shed, e.g 2m 5/8th, 2m 1/4 wave, 70cm 1/4 wave for rptr usage. Fixed the 13.8v power distribution, for easier connection of xcvrs when working in the shed. New larger shed is planned.


More pics on the Flickr site. I still need to add the screenshots of the EME contact here.

Mountain top portable

planning to go mountain top portable across the October long weekend, Oct 2nd to Oct 6th, hope to be active on most bands from HF up to 23cm, at QF46 at 900m ASL, near Gowan, n.w. of Bathurst. Probably use vklogger.com to report our activities, in between doing some work activities.

Android for Echolink

One thing I noticed about this HTC (Android based) Aria phone, is that when used for Echolink using the headphones, that the audio from the Echolink side does not come out of the headphones, but comes from the speaker on the rear, although the warning tones, etc do come out the headphones.
I kept checking the settings of the phone and Echolink app to see if it was something I did wrong,
but no, after some Googling, I found another ham in UK reporting the same issue and same phone
on one of the Echolink forums, but of course nobody replied, so I contacted him, but nil reply from him, shame, as I hoping there was a fix.

so the downside is, I have android phone and a headset, but can't run Echolink when I am out
pedestrian mobile.

I looking to borrow an iPhone4, just to download the Echolink app and try it with its headphone.

Well, at least everything else works great on the HTC Android. Time to email Terry VK2KTJ as he is a Android fan.

6metre FM operation in Japan (JA)

here's a little snippet of information that's hard to find:

In Japan, the FM segment is 51.000 to 53.999 MHz in 20 KHz steps. There are no 6m FM repeaters. The 6metre FM calling frequency is 51.000 and most FM activity is from JA to HL. I think the JA's use 52.525 (or the equivalent channel) for data use.

Easter/Anzac holiday weekend Photos

some recent photos from the Easter/Anzac long weekend 2011:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/33440868@N06/5708536553/in/set-72157612214659210/

you will see these are labelled as Easter 2011

Easter Weekend wrap-up

EME, only did some pings of the moon with Dave as the moon was too far south, therefore nil opportunities for working norhtern hemisphere ie. Nth America and Europe where the majority of EME'rs are found. This would only leave Africa , Pacific and Sth America and very few EME'rs in those regions.

HF, poked around on 20metres, Bob VK2ABP was primarily on 20m working DX, uisng the TS-50s and TH3.

I tried making contact with rest of the club members on 40m & 80m sked freqs, as they were camping & 4WDing up at Coolah Tops National Park, no joy, one thing was they didnt get on 80m, so it was 40m only and they just weren't around at the time I called.

I also poked around on 2m SSB using FT817 and 8el 2m yagi, very quiet on 144.1

Did some tests on 80m, 40m & 20m with Tim VK4TIM, was heard by Tim on the 80m loop antenna on 80m & 40m, Time was very QRP so could only just make out his voice. For 20m we used the TH3 with 300w, but no contact made, although there was a T31 station in Kirrabati with solid, strongs signals on 20m for several hours.

Spent most of the time away working on clearing the scrub surrounding the mountain top, burning off a lot of chopped down trees in the direction of Sydney, next the trees on the n.e. direction need thinning too to give better takeoff to VK4 and VK2 north coast.

A new larger shed planned for the mountain top with bunk beds and more operating space, as opposed to the small garden shed, which will become a equipment shed for APRS digi, repeaters, etc.

Good wx the whole weekend, unlike Sydney where it rained.

Easter/Anzac holiday weekend

counting down the days until go portable DX'ing, location QF46pu (896mASL) and QF46pv, or known as Gowan which is n.w. of Bathurst NSW, across 22nd to 26th April.

Operating bands: HF, VHF, UHF, SHF
modes: FM, SSB and maybe digital modes,

Planning to make some contacts with other local MWRS club members, some of which will be also portable at Coolah Tops National Park (grid QF58) on 40m (daytime) and 80m (nightime)

check www.vklogger.com for operations.

Easter/Anzac holiday weekend

planning to go portable, QF46. HF, VHF, UHF & SHF activity on the drawing board.
see vklogger.

another great photo

another great photo with 23cm EME dish in foreground and what looks like a 70cm yagi and 2m yagi possibly for terrestrial DX. This is 10 min timelapse looking to the southern polar centre.

great photo

Amazing pics of 3m dishes (for 23cm operation) by Bob VK2ABP, with TH-3 for HF in the background.
One dish for EME and one for terrestrial DXing.
The red glow is from the campfire.