Even better for 2025 Happy New Year! New desktop publishing software opens up even more possibilities for the SARC Communicator, the digital periodical of Surrey Amateur Radio Communications. This issue is now available for viewing or download. Another new feature is a smaller version, best suited for mobile devices, available here. The advantage of the larger version being higher resolution graphics and photos. The best new feature, in my opinion, is the ability to provide you with a compete Table of Contents [below]. This should enable better accessibility from search engines. You will find some great articles in this issue, along with our regular columnists. Now read in over 165 countries, we bring you 120+ pages of Amateur Radio content from the Southwest corner of Canada and elsewhere. With less fluff and ads than other Amateur Radio publications, you will find Amateur Radio related articles, projects, profiles, news, tips and how-to's for all levels of the hobby. Download the January - February Communicator in LARGE or SMALL format, or read it on-line like a magazine Previous Communicator issues: Search HERE for past Communicator issues and a full searchable index is HERE. As always, thank you to our contributors, and your feedback is always welcome. 73, John VE7TI 'The Communicator' Editor The Table of Contents for the January-February 2025 Communicator issue: The Rest of the Story: Charles Wheatstone 4 News You Can’t Lose: Field Day results are in 12 Page13—News You Can Lose 13 Radio Ramblings: Reflections 15 Does the Ghost of Salvador Dali Haunt ChatGPT? 26 Tech: A transceiver on your Android phone 27 Xiegu G90 Review 28 Another Tape Measure Antenna 31 POTA is Calling - Will you answer? 32 A Different Kind of Foxhunt 34 USA Radio Orienteering Championship 35 Mastering iCOM HF: A deep dive into filtering capabilities 37 Schooling ChatGPT on Antenna Misconceptions 42 LIDS: The Less Involved Data Society 43 Experimental Maritime Mobile on 630m 44 From the ATV Journal 48 B.C. QSO Party 50 A Light Dipole 52 An Easy Field Strength Meter 53 AMSAT - OSCAR 7 55 Dutch Amateur Radio Operators Detect Signals From Voyager 1 56 Update on the Local High Altitude Balloon Project 57 They Don’t Make ‘em Like They Used To… 58 LingoSat ISS Deployment 59 Canadian Amateur Radio Hall of Fame Appointments 2024 60 The Santa Barbara 1925 Earthquake 62 Ham Radio Outside the Box: Antenna height matters 65 What Did Beethoven Do For Ham Radio? 68 VE9KK - The World of CW: I am at peace with the RFI gods 69 K0NR - 2 Meters: Handie-Talkie or Walkie-Talkie? 71 Which Modes Have You Operated? 73 KB6NU’s Ham Radio: Hurricane Helene 74 Pico-based SDR runs stand-alone 75 Foundations of Amateur Radio: The venerable QSL bureau 76 No-ham Recipe: Oatmeal brown bread 79 Back to Basics: Codes & encryption 80 Profiles of SARC Members: Jeanne Wilson VA7QD 88 CQ WW DX Contest [CW] 92 ARRL 10m Contest 94 RAC Winter Contest 96 SARC News… 97 SEPAR Report 103 Ham Leftovers... 107 QRT: Blog vs PDF? 108
John (VE7TI) featured prominently above, presented me with an electronics project kit back in the early to mid 70's. Aside from various oscillator projects (electronic bird simulators etc.) my favorite was the crystal radio. Over the years I have made many, weather for my own kids or others. I can attribute John with igniting that spark that would see me earn my Basic Amateur License in the late 80's. Today I enjoy for the most part SSB on 80, 40 and 10. So you have John to blame for that hi hi. By coincidence I also new Adam (VA7OJ) and visited his shack several times. His electronics lab was very impressive! Adam was gracious enough to afford me the time to teach me how to use some of that equipment. Over the years I did manage to put the smoke back in the box thanks to his Elmership. The ham community far and wide misses you Adam. Thanks to you both and Congratulations for the well deserved appointment to the Hall of Fame. Tony, VE7TT
Very nice newsletter. You must spend a LOT of time working on that! Very impressive!! What Publishing Software are you using?
Thanks for the comments. I used MS Publisher for many years but it is being discontinued by Microsoft and is getting buggy for a large publication. I now use Affinity Publisher which has a steep learning curve, but is fabulous. - John VE7TI
