Spent today building this IC-7200 tuning interface, followed by having to go to the store to buy replacement mini-fuses due to me accidentally blowing one. I'll need to secure everything down with hot glue before I start using it but hopefully this will make tuning the magloop a bit easier.
Something other than "doing radio": Just dropped (spend) some money to the RBN (Reverse Beacon) Network. I use this very very often to get a feedback about the propagation on different bands in CW. I like that very much! http://www.reversebeacon.net/index.php
Today I did something new. I listened to voices from outer space. I figured that I should check out what the hype was all about for the new ISS repeater and so i tuned the dual band FM rig onto the downlink frequency and has a bit of a listen. Quite a few people calling, so that was something. I probably should setup my radio to cross band and have an actual qso via it so i can tick that one off the bucket list and move onto something else.
A mate turned up with his 520S which had a receive problem and no tx, problem was the HV caps were faulty and a crook relay, After removing the old caps and installed correct ones and a new relay fixed the problem he had, he went home very happy. The rig works like a new one now, i have been fixing these old Kenwoods rigs for 40 years now and still enjoy seeing the smile on the owners face when its all going as it should.
With the weather diving from the 90's to the 30's and snowing, I finally had time to sit inside and fix an Astron PS with a shorted pass transistor. I had forgotten how inconvenient it is to use heatsink thermal paste and mica insulators. Next time when I order transistors I'll buy the thermally conductive Sil-Pads to use.
Finally fixed my high SWR problems on 2m/70cm. All it took was installing a 1ft pole extending from the main mast and sticking the 2m/70cm antenna on it. Doing so also seemed to give me an additional S unit of signal strength on DMR according to the Brandmeister website, despite already using fairly low loss coax.
I was going to do some radio stuff on the Pi and instead i fought with windows for an hour so it would let me access the sd card on my phone. Nothing like windows update to screw you over.
I was up on Blue Mtn in Linden using SOTA as an excuse to do some antenna testing and heard a fair number of contesters on .520 up there. I worked one with an HT while walking to the summit. I was hoping the contest would increase activity on 6m AM so I could test my VX-7r, but I heard nothing. Chris
Seems like 99% of the activity is on FT8 this go around. Worked a couple stations on 2m and 6m SSB but the rest have been FT8, haven’t even heard any CW. Bands were a lot better in June.
