Remote Control using your iPad

Last week i found a great app for my iPad! This program called CommCat makes it possible to control your rig als long as your in WiFi range. On the computer that is connected to your transceiver you have to make use of Hamradio. Beside this, you'll need QSXer, a little programm the connect Commcat with Hamradio. Audio is send vice-versa using Skype. Configuring is very easy, good instructions and support are both supplied. See yourself making global connections while sitting in the garden.

After downloading and installing/register QSXer (found here), you'll als have to register two skype-accounts. One is used on de transciever side, the other on the Ipad. Both take care of transporting audio up and down, so it's possible to QSO! On the iPad, download both Commcat and Skype, configure them and off you go. Think of all the possibilities of mobility around the comfort of your home. Beside that, using this app on the Internet is also possible. Offcourse, HamRadio Deluxe is also capable of remote control, but it's not possible to use it on the iPad.

Another extra of using QSXer is the the personal MyQSX.net webpage you'll get when you'll register (free). On this page the visitor can see amongst some information about your station, the status of activity, operating frequency and your S-meter (updated every 60 seconds). It's provides the vistor als the possiblity to contact you by mail. Nice is also the MyQSX World activity Map where live global connections are shown.

The Commcat app (which is originally an iPhone app) gives you basic control of your rig. Change frequency, band and mode (also CW) on the spot. It features some macro's and has a good user-friendly design. On top of that is houses a logbook, a callbook and a build-in DX-spot list. Commcat works great and using it is lots of fun. All this, Commcat, QSXer and Hamradio Deluxe are free!

9/11 Tenth Anniversary

Today  the global radioamateur community honor all those lost on September 11, 2001, with special remembrance of the amateurs who lost their lives in this tragedy;

Steven Jacobson N2SJ
William Steckman WA2ACW
Gerard "Rod" Coppola KA2KET
Bob Cirri KA2OTD
Michael Jacobs AA1GO
Winston Grant KA2DRF
Winston A. Grant, KA2DRF

Holiday activities

While enjoying a very active holiday in Drenthe, one of the northeast provinces, I managed to spend some time to set up a configuration and take some part at the Lighthouse weekend (August 20/21). Offcourse I had my D-Star handheld and DVAP taken with me, which gave me a lot of fun in the evening hours. Especially for the lighthouse event I brought my Yaesu FT-897 with me and several homemade wire-antenna's. Unfortunatly there was a high density of trees surrounding my cabin so I didn't had the oppertunity to make use of the ZS6BKW i build some time ago. Also I didn't wanted to highjack to childrens playground in front of the cabin to set up my Buddipole.

Luckily enough I managed to place a G5RVjr, one leg on 6  meters, the other on 3. SWR was okay on all bands. Although the vast density of the woods surrounding me, I heared a lot of traffic. Altough the location conditions were not good, I managed to work some european stations that Saturday. One of them was my 'first' with the Isle of Man. That afternoon on 20 meters I worked GT8IOM, the Island Radio Club at Ramsey. They're flag is now decorating my logbook (and the flagcounter on my QRZ page) and although the short distance, I am very proud to have worked them! You'll understand I had a very enjoyable afternoon, it was certainly worth the extra 20 kilo's of bagage I had to bring along!

Cochanneling activities

Much activity in being a radioamateur is experimental. Every ham is inventing the wheel again and again, in order to gain experience and knowledge to share. I think one of the best examples momentarily in experimenting is the cochanneling / diversity project for North- and East Netherlands. This project is a cooperation of more than 40 amateurs and tries to realise an analog relay system with a huge covering. Started as an idea in 2006, realisation began last januari. Now, some 7 months later, a multi relay covering most of northeast Netherlands is live. And although in an experimental fase, first reactions are very positive! 

Cochanneling is all about transferring the best received signal from a wide range of receivers/signals through the internet  to all the transmitters. The trick is that all these repeaters use one frequency! Image this: move through the covering area, you signal is received by different receivers and the best is transmitted in the rest of the area!  Initialy started with two repeaters, nowadays twelve are operational.

I quess a project like this will learn us a lot and thats why I think you should pay these guys a visit on their website. If you want, download the software to monitor the activity. The upcoming holiday allows me to spend a lot of time in an area located in the reach of two of those repeaters, you can imagine I will listen in on that frequency (in / out 431.623 / 430.025 shift 1,6 MHz)!

Exploring SDR

The nicest thing (at least I think it is) about our hobby are the many different aspects. If you seen enough of one, you can put this activity on hold and switch to another. A few months ago a conversation on 40 meters raised my interest in SDR (Software Defined Radio). Instead of using a rig with internal firmware, SDR is a more physical separation between hard- and software. You buy and build a kit, download some software and of you go! You can also buy ready-build kits. It was the general mentioning in the conversations that talked about very clean signals and the visibility of them on a computerscreen that awoke my interest. Second was the building of the kit. I'm not very experienced in selfbuilding and soldering, perhaps this was the oppertunity to make a good start!

While gathering information about this subject on the internet, I came accros the site of the Harzburg II kit. While focussing in on this 3-30 MHz 'Fernempfangsradio', many others pages showed up. One of them showed the ease of constructing this kit, so my confidence of building this was set. I ordered the kit, and start reading everything in order to prepare myself. The kit arrived in a couple of days, and when there was some spare time left I took the soldering iron in one hand and the construction manual in the other. It was with with great ease that a beginner like me was able to finalize this part of the project and as you'll understand it gave me lots of fun. After checking (and doublechecking) the board and its components, the moment of reward came in sight.

There are different programs to use, some of them are free to download on the Internet. First priority was checking if the board was functional, software topics will follow in a later stage. For a start I decided to make use of SDR-RADIO.com by HB9DRV, the same amateur who gave us Hamradio Deluxe. After hooking up the board on my little netbook by RS232/USB and an audio cable, I connected my multiband wire-antenna on the BNC connector. The kit also needs 13,8 volts. If everything is in order and a red led on the board is glowing, starting the software is the next step. Like all ham programs which talks to hardware, this program also needs some configuration. After telling the program which comport to use and which soundcard, the magic begins!


You'll understand the moment of joy and satisfaction when the board came alive and on the screen a beautifull diorama of a frequency spectrum showed up! On 20 meters, my favourite band, I saw several signals that were inviting me to click in order to focus in on them. Choosing one results in receiving that signal, and then there are lots of functions to fine-tune and filter them. Some signals are indeed very clean, although I'm not experienced enough to make a compare with my Yeasu FT-950. Also the propagations wern't very good, so I have to use it more often to make a good evaluation. I also want to make use of other SDR programs, for instance HDSDR (formerly known as WinRad). There is also a modification that expands receiving 160 meters on the agenda.

Very handy App!

The last couple of days were filled with searching and testing app's on both the Ipad and Blackberry. Some of them looks great and are worth a second view, otherone's are deleted right away. As a professional webmanager (one of my activities amongst several others) I thought it was a good idea to be as versatile as possible. For that reason I flashed my office smartphone from Windows Mobile 6.5. to Android 2.3.4. Again I am positively amazed! And again I started the search for nice app's and wow, what an offering. Litteraly thousand of apps are in reach. Some are the same as on the Ipad or Blackberry, others are intended for Android only.

One of the nice things I bumped into, is the one called ElectroDroid. This multilanguage app is FREE downloadable from the well-known Android Market or via this link. It's provide you with information of  resistor and inductor color codes, an Ohm's Law calculator, pin-out schedules, a voltage divider, tables of standard resistors and capacitors and a lot of usefull other ham related stuff. Offcourse there are many other apps that offers the same, but this is a collection of the most used. It has a nice look and feel, on a small screen of your smartphone it's very good readable. As a student for full license, this app certainly is going to help me to understand and explain the basic of electronics in a great way. So, if you have an Android, open Market and download this little jewel!

Back in business!

It's been a while, sorry for that. Due to family matters, I didn't feel like being busy with the hobby. Now the storm is over and almost everythings back to normal, there's some time and good mood left for hamradio issue's.

The last couple of weeks I bought myself some new gadgets. First of all I got myself a new cellphone, mainly because my old one (a Samsung Omnia II i800) didn't receive some of my calls. After hearing several time's "I tried to call you, but you weren't there" I went to the local grown-men toyshop and got hold on a Blackberry. After a couple of weeks I allready start to appreciate it, this neat little thing. Main purpose, being in reach, is a succes.

Second part of the gadget fulfillment is an Apple Ipad 2. Wow, what a neat kind of gadget this is! If youre, like me since 1984 a Microsoft user, this is something totally different. Offcourse, you can't compare apples with other kinds of fruit, but this is great. On the side that is. I'm a big fan of using the computer in all aspects of our hobby and I don't see this Ipad as an 'instead of'. First of all, the lack of interfaces is restricting you and it's impossible to connect to a rig (yet).  I wonder if there are amateur allready busy to solve this? I allready got me some ham related apps and when I have some experience with them, I'm sure you're going tot read about it. Same goes for the Blackberry offcourse!

International Beacon project

As you probably already have guessed, as a radioamateur I'm very interested in propagations. One of the usefull tools to check if the circumstances are in good shape for a DX, is the International Beacon Project. This worldwide system of HF beacons transmits on 5 bands, 24/7 on a known timing sequence. Every beacon transmit 3 minutes starting it's CW ID in 22wpm, followed by 1 second 100 Watts, 1 second 10 Watts, 1 second 1 Watt, ending with 1 second 100mW. 

For more info about The International Beacon Project, the time schedule and a lot of tools that help you make use of the beacons, take a look at the website of the Northern California DX Foundation.

For a dynamic worldmap showing the actual upcoming transmitions on the several frequencies, take a look at the bottom of the Homepage.

DVAP finaly arrived!

Yes! It arrived. Finally. I ordered a DVAP dongle on February 27th and after almost 3 long months the parcel containing this little red wonder arrived by UPS. Because this dongle is so popular,the manufacturer could not keep up with delivering. When the DVAP which was becoming mine roled of the factoryline, the guy who distrubute the stuff put the wrong adress on the package and transported it to Canada. Anyway, with a long detour it finally reached my supplier Parmacom, who almost instantly directed it to me. You'll understand my eagerness to unpack it and give it a try.

In the package a smaller carton folded box appeared which houses everything. The box contains the red dongle (offcourse), a USB to mini-USB cable and a manual. Installing is easy, simply plug one end of the cable in the dongle and the other half in your computer. The dongle is equipped with its own litle antenna, which is replacable with any other SMA handheld antenna. It is said that the packed antenna is not a very good one (-3dB gain), but this problem is very simple to overcome by placing another one with a positive gain. Like this it should be no problem to cover the entire neighbourhood giving 10mW.

The dongle contains the driver, so installing is done automaticly. The DVAP website shows a link to the software which you simply download and is nothing more than 1 (one) exefile. Afer starting the program, you have to fill in your call (which you have to register for the second time with an extra C on the 8th place), choose a frequency in the 2m band and of you go. Of course there are some configurations to do on your transmitter, in my case a Icom IC-92AD porto. The website had some good examples wich I placed in the porto's memory. After hitting the powerbutton and hooking up the DVAP on reflector 17A, I immediately received a signal and on the program al kind of info showed up. Connected and working!

Big advantage is not only being QRV on any place where there isn't a repeater or a hotspot. As long as there is a connection with the Internet (Hurray for KPN hotspots!) 10mW is enought to talk wit any other D-star fan on the world! The weatherforecast for the coming weekend is perfect for outhouse testing the DVAP and its reach, the results will follow in a later blog.

WSPR - first steps

Triggered by an article in one of the ham magazine's, WSPR (pronounced as WhiSPeR) took my attention. This digital mode isn't used to communicate, but developed for doing propagation research. With as little power possible you send and a recieve signals containing your call, grid location and used power in dbM (in my case PD0JDF JO22OI 37). A few moments later you can check the results on an website.

Again the Internet gives you the start by offering much info about the topic. The program used is downloadable here. After installing, setting up your rig and a bit of finetuning in receiving the incoming signals, your on. WSPR is cycling through transmitting 1 or 2 minutes and receiving the next 5 or 6. The received signals appears in the waterfall.  When gathered and undecoded, the results are uploaded onto a database and on the WSPR website you can see the results on a global level. Its very important to have your computerclock at the exact right time, for this purpose are different programs, this one works fine also under Windows 7.

I turned my rig to 14.096500 MHz (20m is my favorite band) and pulled power back to 5 Watts. This is the minimum on my set. After setting the clock, installing the software and hooking things up, nothing happened! After a doublecheck, I realised I just had to be patient. The program was waiting to start at an exact point in time. After a couple of minutes things were going to happen. The program was receiving signals on the 20m band and at the end of the cycle it started to transmit for a minute. This was followed by a period of standby and the cycle started again and again.

After a couple of houres cycling through sending and receiving signals I visited the main WSPR website at http://wsprnet.org/ and pointed direct to the map section filling in my call. What then happened, exceeded my expactations! The map showed als the station who had spotted my signal and uploaded it to the WSPR database! Spots from Canada till Australia with only 5 Watts!

A couple of weeks ago I increased the height of my wire antenna. This was done to lift the antenne between the houses and to increase the upbeam angle. Zooming in on the map to a closer look on Europe, I noticed that the nearby countries were better reachable than before. On 20 meters I didn't had a lot of transmissions with German stations. The map is showing they are now 'in reach' instead of hopped over.

WSPR - I'm sure i'll going to have a lot of fun using it. 

Building a ZS6BKW

Inspired by the fun of constructing a G5RVjr antenna (see 'Enough for  G5RVjr'), I tried my capablilities in selfmaking an other antenna with good experiences of fellow amateurs, the ZS6BKW antenna. Again, all info was in reach on the Internet, what would we do without it? This antenna is based on the G5RV antenna and designed by Dr. Brian Austin, ZS6BKW.

 
Because my leftovers were implemented in the G5RVjr, I had to order some parts. After receiving the parcel  with the Lizte and open line (called kippenladder - chickenladder in Dutch), a rainy afternoon was the moment to put thing together to something called a antenna.

After constructing the parts, I hooked the antenna up the atticwindow and the other side downwards to the garden shed. A quick stroll on the bands showed reasonable results so this antenna is on the list to take with me on my holiday.

Birthday present

One of the things I got as a birthday present (and one which I am very happy with) is the HyEndFed Multiband antenna develloped and made by Rob, PA3EKE and Ron, PA3RK.

After hearing some great stories about this wire-antenna on the local repeater, I was very interested and visited their website. My antenna situation is simply said not very good, my selfmade wire dipole antenna is situated in between houses wich results in overseas connection only when there are openings.

After getting this antenna, I couldt wait to place this antenna next to the existing one and connect it to my rig, a Yaesu FT-950. Altough I don't own expensive meters and other gauges, I immediately experienced a remarkable difference. Less noise, more signals! While tuning in on DX signals on different bands, switching between this HyEndFed and my own antenne shows a increasment of 2-3 S points!

Although the 20 meter band is my favorite, I am glad this antenna is a multiband. For this reason, the antenna is equpped with a little coil. On 10, 20 and 40 meters SWR is very good and tuning is not necessary. Even on 80 meters, it works perfect with a litle tuning. All parts are very neatly assembled.

Is my selfmade a quality lacking antenne, or is the HyendFed a very good one. I think I am alllowed to believe the HyEndFed is a very good one. Altough my old and reliable selfmade antenna gave me enough DX-satisfaction, its has to make place!

If youre looking for a great antenna with good results I can recommend this one, give these guys a visit on their website.

New netbook!

Democratic as we are, our 11-year old daughter has a vote in this year's holiday destination. After serveral years of spending time in many different countries, this year we're planning a vacation in Holland! We booked a stay in a bungalowpark with lots of horseriding oppertunities. This gives her lots of rides and me tons of spare time, guess what I am planning to take with me...

In the months before, I want to make a couple of wire antenna's to experiment (follow this blog) on HF, and take the oppertunity to be more present on D-Star. For this reason I ordered a DVAP-dongle at Parmacom. Offcourse for using this dongle I need a computer. Reason enough to buy myself a tiny little netbook. Not a fancy bling-bling state-of-the-art top-of-the-bill model, just a compact 10 inch model (with preferably a little bit of speed) will do.

After reading a few reviews and some googling on the net, I choose a Packard Bell Dot S-E 725. This is a reasonnably priced Dual-Core Intel Atom N550 equipped 10-inch netbook with 1GB memory and a 250 Gb HDD. Good specs, more than enough for the coming holiday. And because our bungalow is having a WiFi connection D-Star fun is ensured.

After completing the pre-installed Windows 7, I installed the apps that I see as standard and neccesary. Standard is also Teamspeak, wich gives me the possibility to listen to my neighbourhood amateurfriends on PI2FLD, my hometown repeater. For managing my Yaesu FT-897, HamRadio Deluxe is also installed.

Can't wait to get my DVAP dongle.....

Enough for a G5RVjr

While cleaning up te shack, I came up with lots of non used leftovers from different projects and experiments. A quick view on the Internet inspired me to build a G5RV junior dipole wire-antenna. Very easy to construct, even for an unexperienced newbie on selfmaking things like me.

With the help of  information from the internet on this antenna, I build one in a couple of hours. One of the websites I would like to mention is the one of PA0FRI, wich gave me lots of basic knowlegde and the  necesarry selfconfidence. If some spare time is left the coming weeks, I will place this antenna in my backyard to test it. Otherwise it has to wait untill the holiday.