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- Written by: Maintenance Guy
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There was another net running on our usual frequency of 145.350MHz on Sunday morning, so I took it upon myself to put a quick call out to MSARS members to QSY to 145.375MHz, which was clear. There I caught up with Phil M5BTB, and we had an interesting chat for 50 minutes or so. Sadly nobody else joined, despite a few excursions back to 350 to redirect any lost souls.
I'd just like to say to everyone, that if you don't hear a net running on 350, have a tune around the band - we'll likely be on an adjacent frequency! Not so easy to spot if you don't have a waterfall available for 2m, but just try twiddling the VFO knob, like we used to do in the olden days 🙃
Anyway, a bit of fun, though not the half-a-dozen or more members I was hoping for. Please try and join us again next week if you can.
Berni M0XYF
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Sorry, I don't have one, officially.
I believe the 'plan' was for the CHCA to call me once the line had been re-activated to go and make whatever changes were required. I didn't hear anything.
Here is some of what I worked out for myself.
Yes, the ISP switch went ahead OK, and the new router appears to be the standard Vodafone WiFi unit.
I checked the Flex and the eWeLink app late last night, and all is working fine. The KiwiSDR won't work until I make the internal router changes, which I may be able to get done on Friday evening. The hall WiFi is up and running, which is good news.
Until the Kiwi is sorted, I'll run an alternate WebSDR from the west tower of my Sussex mansion as an option for you all.
Update to the update
Friday night saw the KiwiSDR back-end updated, new firmware flashed, a new short coax link-cable installed, the hall network reconfigured and the website homepage banner reset to the Kiwi URL. Phil installed a new and improved Flex antenna relay, so this will now work again from the app. A big batch of QSL cards were signed from Town Day last year, a spot of high-level Flex training was completed (nice to meet a few new faces at the club - and very glad to have some fresh input and opinions on-board at MSARS) and there was even time for a cup of tea. I haven't sent or received a paper QSL card since the bad old days of the '80s, when nobody gave the state of the environment a second thought.
Wonderful to see a photo of Chris M7VJE's brand spanking new granddaughter Mary. How cute! Congratulations.
Loads of people in attendance tonight - if you weren't one of them, then you missed out on a lively night. Get yourself along there next time.
Berni M0XYF
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Quick thanks to Phil G4UDU for dropping off some 18650 batteries this afternoon. I was just looking at used ones on eBay for my experiments, as the ones I ordered from China are slated to arrive at the end of March! I was so surprised to see you on the doorstep, I think I forgot to thank you, so you get your own post on the website :)
Cheers Phil. That is very good of you, and super fast delivery haha. Much faster than those scoundrels at DPD.
Berni M0XYF
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Cyprus Hall Community Association have today switched broadband providers, and the new network will take some re-configuration. I have offered my services to help set up their existing WiFi infrastructure with the new router etc, as well as applying the required changes to re-establish MSARS shack connectivity. The KiwiSDR will not be available until this work has been completed. The FlexRadio may or may not have connectivity issues, as I believe it uses a proxy server and it has an Ethernet cable to the LAN - i.e. it doesn't require any specific port forwarding. The eWeLink App should be OK once the ISP has activated the new service.
I will post again when I have any further news.
Berni M0XYF
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- Written by: Chris G4ZCS
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As many of you might know, I have been having health problems for a few years. This had put a stop to my DXing as concentration was a bit compromised by the treatments I have been having. As I have had a 'holiday' from hospital treatment recently I got the urge to get back to DXing.
For the New Year I set myself a couple of targets, the main one was to work 100 DXCCs during January.
Well, I got off to a good start by fixing my broken delta loop antenna, twice!
With that and the amp' properly set up I started, only to find Rob 'KPD/M had beaten me off from the start. For the next four weeks I was chasing him up the charts always trailing by 6 to 12 (it’s probably his early morning starts that did it) I settled to work any station I could hear on any band, and to give a few points in the contests I came upon. Using my 'Electronic wrist' I used CW as well as SSB, but none of these new-fangled data-modes, (I’ll try those in the future).
Early on I managed to work some interesting stations including Greenland, Australia, Indonesia, and several in southern Africa. As this year the WRTC is being held in Italy, there was a month-long activity by about 50 stations worldwide with awards (wallpaper) being awarded for working as many stations on as many bands and modes as possible. There were some 110,000 stations involved in the chase and my final place was 2001, just outside the top 1%. It was just for a bit of fun but frustrating trying to break through the pileups to China, Japan and some of the South American stations.
So, by the end of the month I had failed miserably with 'only' 91 worked - still behind Rob with his 102.
Still, I still hope to have another 11 months to work my targets. The next big one is Bouvet island in the South Atlantic, luckily the propagation predictions suggest afternoon and early evening as the most likely times for a contact.
Reports like this one used to be a regular feature of the old paper newsletters. If you are interested, I might be able to do regular updates for as long as possible. Just let the webmaster know.
73 Chris.
[Yes please Chris! - M0XYF]
