Stop killing shortwave - A message to governments in the free world.

In every major crisis abroad in the past 5 years, internet access has been severely restricted, censored, or shutdown completely. From Chechnya through to Iran
and now Egypt.

Shortwave is difficult to effectively block, and yet governments in the free world are continually cutting shortwave broadcasts as cost-cutting methods. I would like to say
a word to those governments. If your goodwill mission, propaganda mission, or intelligence mission, includes the exchange of information with other countries,
cut your websites, cut your satellite streams, but do not cut shortwave. Granted, shortwave is expensive, but as is being seen TODAY in Egypt, and what was seen during the protests against the dictator in Iran, the internet DOES NOT WORK IN TIMES OF INTERNATIONAL CRISIS. PERIOD. AT ALL. Satellite is very easily disrupted, and can also be far more easily stopped by rogue states than shortwave broadcasts to those countries.

How is information leaving Egypt today, Jan 31st 2011??????

By HAM RADIO

The latest CW message on 7072 kHz was

"hellow is anyone there? americans?"

These people are asking for our help, and reaching out to us. While our involvement
or lack of involvement is a matter for those with the intel to deliberate on, what
is abundantly clear is that the internet as a resource for the free flow of information
simply DOES NOT WORK.

For those interested in the Egyptian struggle for democracy, the frequencies
being used and transcripts to the web, and also chat relays, can be viewed and
accessed below

http://werebuild.eu/wiki/Egypt/Ham_radio

وأود كثيرا لشعب مصر السلام. ويأمل من جميع الذين يتمتعون بحرية في هذا العالم أن هؤلاء في ظل
 ديكتاتورية يجب أن تكون حرة. لكن الأهم من ذلك كله نأمل جميعا من أجل السلام. سلم عليكم.

I wish very much the people of Egypt peace. It is the hope of all 
who are free in this world that those under dictatorships should 
be free. But most of all we all hope for peace.

Shortwave Listening Not Dead At All

Hello all SWL enthusiasts,

I have seen fads come and go. In the early 90's a Tamagotchi was all the rage, it was a computerized pet game. We had the fold up scooter phase and even Pokemon trade cards - the list goes on. But one fad took off and never faded.

Shortwave radio is a worldwide band that many people from every country in the world can access with no 'set-up fees; or 'contracts', it simply requires a shortwave receiver and many cheap to expensive models are easily avaliable. Shortwave is not just for the rich, in many regions like Africa, South America and Asia (China mostly) shortwave is used for domestic broadcasting and for many is the only means to hear local content.

It doesn't matter if you are poor or rich, even people in poverty have shortwave radios often given to communities by charities. Christian organizations are by far the more prominent charity to do this, mostly as it's linked to their shortwave programming to that area. But no matter if you are rich or poor all can access this medium. (A simple sw receiver still only costs about $15) Shortwave has a vast array of stations, English being less prominent in the last few years. Spanish and Asian languages cover the bands with various other languages in between.

An antenna can be as simple as a piece of wire stringed up in a living room, a reel-up (yo-yo) antenna or just the telescopic whip. Because of shortwave being so cheap it is by no surprise that it is such a phenomenon. Each day the bands are full, in fact so full they at night interfere with each other.

The most exciting reason we like shortwave is that reception is unpredictable and sometimes stations from afar can audible and booming in that never have before. We can listen first hand to jammers from other countries and suddenly you realize your shortwave radio is the world at your fingertips.

If you happen to have SSB suddenly even more options are available. New "sub-hobbies" occur, some are obsessed with decoding utility stations, others Amateur Stations and some Air Traffic Control.

Despite many negative news that shortwave is dead, there are thousands if not even millions globally who listen to shortwave. In Western Countries many people take it up as a hobby and as far as I've seen it has only been growing. With DRM ready to be the forefront of broadcasting in the future and with satellite being unreliable inside and touchy to set up it makes perfect sense to invest and spread the word that shortwave lives. I feel like I am preaching 'Jesus lives' and although that might be so 'Shortwave lives!' despite HD radio, DAB and DAB+ and the internet. Please tell your friends and show them what they're missing.


Robb Wise
Hobart, Australia
Re-posted with permission. Thank you for such a well-written article, Robb. Cheers mate!

New 1946 Zenith TransOceanic Shortwave Radio 8G005 makes its way to the shack

The shack is now officially a storage unit, housing my collection of radio gear until I have somewhere to operate it out of. Right now, the Zenith is sitting on a desk on the variac (mine smoked, so thanks to N3KCB for loaning me one) and awaiting discovery of what will need to be attended to in order to restore her to her original working state.

I've wanted a good Trans-Oceanic for more than 20 years, and finally found one in the right physical condition, and at the right price.

As the young would say, "I'm psyched!"

New RX at the shack

The shack, if you can call a coffee table and a long wire out the window, a shack, has a new addition. A beautiful 1939 Hammarlund HQ-120X that looks almost as good today, as it did when it was made.

The Radio Shack speaker I'm using isn't a good match, but its better than nothing. Sometime in the future, I hope to have a small van wired for use as a mobile HF shack, with shelves, racks and wiring in place, that I can also use for moving musical equipment. But that is yet to come.

In the meantime, with what's left of my shack in storage, or sold off to the hawks on eBay, this is my only link to the world on HF.

Sent from my Crackberry

Feb 11th, or Yet Another Snow Day

The National Guard, DEMA, State Police and Kent County commmanders have been working throughout the night to extricate motorists from stranded vehicles, provide transport for emergency services, provide medical support to those in need, including responding to dyalysis needs and co-ordinating the movement of medical personnel throughout the state.

We have one shelter active in Milford. Reports from New Castle County indicate up to 50 disabled tractor-trailer vehicles on RT301 near Middletown. RT13 Southbound is impassable in places due to snow drifts as high, or higher than a Humvee.

The road conditions are so bad on some routes, including RT-1, that even Humvees and LMTV's have had a hard time navigating the roadways. Reports of stranded motorists were still coming in around 1000 UTC, many of whom had been stuck in their vehicles for hours, and National Guard units have been driving to those affected and taking them to the shelter. Many small vehicles as well as tractor-trailer rigs, have been abandoned and are awaiting tow from many of these routes within Kent County. Crews have been working throughout the night to try and remove some of these vehicles, but this has proved to be difficult because the tow trucks have to be coordinated with plows, or those too will become stuck.

The official word is that the roads will likely not be safe for general transportation today or tomorrow due to the amount of snow and number of routes affected. Kent County ARES has been monitoring for traffic throughought the night, and will continue to do so throughout the State of Emergency.

February 10th State of Emergency

Yet another storm, yet another mitigation and relief effort. W3HZW is staffed at the Kent County Delaware EOC, and a local-ish shelter. Unfortunately for reasons unknown the Red Cross would not open a nearer location to the state capital, (reason unclear at this time), so the nearest shelter is 20 miles +/- away.

So far as of 0144 UTC 11th Feb, the shelter is at 14+ displaced persons, and there are a myriad of others in local hotels and medical facilities, moved courtesy of the good and hard working folks of the DE National Guard in the absence of a more local shelter.

DE State of Emergency, Feb 6th-7th 2010

This weekend I was a part of the ARES/Kent County EOC/DEMA operation at a local shelter during the declared state of emergency.

I had the opportunity to work with a group of thoroughly professional workers and volunteers from the Red Cross, the EOC, DEMA, ARES, National Guard, and SPCA.

It was surprising to arrive at the shelter location to find the SPCA prepared to house displaced animals, in addition to the Red Cross efforts to house displaced persons.

The school that hosted the shelter for us did a wonderful job, and the Principal of Dover High School should be applauded for his assistance to all during this time, including making his kitchen and maintanence staff available to the relief effort throughout the entire weekend.

Special shouts go out to the National Guard for the care and compassion shown towards the elderly residents of the shelter during their journey to the facility.

HF emergency frequencies for Haiti disaster recovery and mitigation

Reposted from the CQ / WorldRadio Online Newsroom:Some ham radio activity from Haiti is beginning to be heard,following yesterday's devastating earthquake.Father John Henault, HH6JH, in Port-au-Prince, made contact lateWednesday morning with the Intercontinental Assistance and TrafficNet (IATN) on 14.300 MHz, the IARU Global Centre of Activityfrequency for emergency communications. Based on relays monitored atW2VU, Father John reported that he and those with him were safe, buthad no power and no phone service. He was operating on battery powerand hoping to get a generator running later in the day. He asked thestation copying him, William Sturridge, KI4MMZ, in Flagler Beach,Florida, to telephone relatives with information that he was OK.The following frequencies are in use for earthquake-related trafficand should be kept clear unless you are able to provide requested assistance:14300 (IATN), 14265 (SATERN); 7045 (IARU Region II) and 3720 (IARURegion II) kHz. Additional frequencies may be activated on differentbands at different times of day, so be sure to listen carefullybefore transmitting to make sure you are not interfering withemergency traffic
Sent from my Crackberry

Update from the shack

Well, its been a cold, cold winter, plenty of ice and snow. I have been off-air due to divorce, and am looking to get back on-air as soon as the issue of property is settled. To those whom I owe QSL's, please be assured that they will be mailed out as soon as possible.

First solid-state build

Yesterday saw my first ever solid-state build, courtesy of N3KCB's breadboard, components and guidance. It's a conceptual leap for me to overcome the fact that an integrated circuit can perform more than one function at the same time, such as being both an amplifier and oscillator all-in-one, but the simple circuit worked well.

In minutes, I'd built a direct conversion RX for 7040, changed it to a 40m RX, and then an 80m RX by merely using the correct bandpass and a signal gen as VFO. While the concepts are certainly not foreign, using a breadboard and an IC certainly are.

After 20+ years in tubes, it feels good to no longer be a stranger to solid-state, even if it does represent the "dark side" of electronics. IC's don't light when you power them up, after all ;)

KB2GSD, aka Walter Cronkite, Silent Key 23:30 UTC July 17th

It was with some shock that I saw on TV late last night, that Walter Cronkite, KB2GSD, had passed at the age of 97. About 3 years ago, when Mr Cronkite was apparently 94, I met him at Schaeffer's Canal House in Chesapeake City, MD, where he docked in the Wyntje (his sailing yacht) to dine. Mr Cronkite, not only being a great ambassador for Amateur Radio, and the world's favorite reporter, was an avid sailor, and wrote books on sailing the upper Chesapeake Bay. In December that year, Mr Cronkite apparently had her hauled and painted, ready for the 2007 season, so I have no doubt that he was out on the water again.

Here is Walter's ham radio piece, that he did in late 2003.



KB2GSD 73 OM

Vintage Military Surplus Radios

Recently, I have been playing with green sub-miniature tube radios from the early 50's through the Vietnam era. Right now, I am converting a URC-4 bailout radio for 2 and 6, and have finished bringing a PRC-10 back to life and almost on frequency (couple of KC's off on the dial).

The PRC-10 is now running on a 6v battery with an inverter supply that was built by a ham in Italy for me (no sense re-inventing the wheel) and works great, the URC-4 will take a little work to make a usable battery pack or switching supply for it, but both projects have been fun.

I have an extra URC-4 which I'll be hamfesting this weekend, and will probably offload the PRC-10 - as the one I really want is a PRC-8.

For those of you wondering what the URC-4 is, here's a snippet from an old magazine from the early 60's

Time for the big one

Yes, that's right, it's time for Field Day, when amateurs around the country, gather in fields or other sparsely inhabited areas, and play radio as if all other lines of communication have ceased to exist.

The magic of radio, reaching out wirelessly, with your own power source, and without the need for fiber optic or copper cables connecting point A to point Z by way of a hub in between, should not be ignored.

To the naysayers, and there are more than just a few, who say that Ham Radio is dying, let me say that if it is the case, then it's your fault. If you put as much energy in being an advocate of the hobby, as you do in calling it's demise, we would have a record number of radio hams.

Let's all remember as we approach this weekend, that we are getting together not only to enjoy each others company, for the contest between stations, or the food, but to also show local government, community leaders, and in many cases, scout troops, the benefits and the fun our wonderful hobby has to offer in the digital age.

Timonium Hamfest Review

Today was the first hamfest of the season that I have attended. I made the trip with another local ham and setup a tailgating spot to offload some extraneous gear that's been laying around the shack here.

Timonium is a very well run affair, and the organizers do a wonderful job at keeping things going. It's usually a very well attended hamfest, and this year seems to be also.

However, things are not what they used to be. When I go to a hamfest now, I expect the usual overpriced retailers, at least one made-in-China doodad booth, and MFJ or an MFJ distributor. This year, the junk-to-ham-gear ratio was the worst I have seen anywhere. Broken computer parts, ripped speakers, etc, littered the tailgate area, with only one or two exceptions. The bargains have also seemingly gone, with the little radio gear actually there, being sold at close to eBay prices. $750 for a modified R390A with "extra" front panel details (putting it nicely)....and many more wonders like it ("But they go for $1800 on eBay!"). I wouldn't argue for a fully restored, factory fresh R-390A. A working, unmolested R-390A can be had for $400 to $500 easily on eBay. There are 2 that completed this weekend for $400 and $500 respectively. Both working, both without the "extra" features. This is just one example of insanity this year. Here's a hint - if you drill holes in the front panel of a collectible, add knobs and switches where there weren't any, you have made your radio practically worthless unless someone wants to buy it for the "features" you added.

Ham radio isn't dying, contrary to the people that regularly cry wolf in QST, CQ, QRZ, etc, but hamfests are. Hamfests are dying because it's all about people who aren't connected to our hobby, trying to make money from junk that should go into the dumpster, and hams trying to charge for "time and labor" on rigs they're trying to sell. Whatever happened to doing it for the love of the hobby? To sell unused items from your shack for a reasonable price so that someone else can actually make use of it?

My first hamfest was in 1987. There were kits, people would walk up to you and talk with you when you were looking at something and tell you how good, or how bad it really was. People would offer advice, and be happy to tell you if they were selling something and someone else was selling the same thing cheaper. It was more about a day out, meeting people and helping other hams, than it was an exercise in how much money you can make in one day.

Last year I noticed that the best deals and gear I saw, were at the smaller hamfests, like Kimberton PA, and BRATS hamfest, for example. There were real radios from $2000 new KenYaeIcom bench queens to $80 workhorse, daily use boat anchors.

I think tailgaters and vendors should be asked what they will be selling at a hamfest, and the real junkers turned away. Half the time the stuff gets left on the ground as they drive away so someone else has to clean it up anyway. Just a thought....not like anyone listens to me anyway, hi hi

Re-using old computer hardware for mobile ham use

Hams, as you know, are renowned for making "old things" work for radio use. It occurred to me that there is a vast pool of old computer hardware, especially laptops, that are suitable for use for logging, digital modes, etc.

With this in mind, I thought I'd build a cheap system, for under $50, for satellite tracking, APRS, PSK31, RTTY, etc. $50 was a nice round figure, that if you lost it in the field, if it was damaged, or even stolen, it wouldn't hurt your bottom line, unlike a $600-900 modern laptop. Using a P233 MMX (MMX is a "must have" because of it's multimedia performance - ie, sound processing) IBM laptop, I started testing with Windows 95. This worked great, even with 32 MB of RAM, with Orbitron, Pizza, MMTY, Digipan and SeaTTY, although the odd "blue screen" error reared its head. $10 later, and 128 MB of additional RAM, I decided to try XP, which worked with multiple programs open, but was at times unbearably slow, especially running Agw Packet engine in combination with anything.

Not being satisfied, and still wanting to accomplish my goal, I found Digipup, a Linux distribution designed around Puppy Linux. (Don't worry, all the hard to find links for current versions will be at the end of this post)

The Digipup distribution has been around for quite some time, and Puppy has moved on and had many enahancements since it was built, so I decided to use the current distribution, Puppy 4.1.3, and incorporate "fldigi" digital mode software, "fl_logbook" logging software, "flarq" software based arq modem, and PREDICT for satellite work.

The whole thing fits on a CD and takes up 100MB. There is an unique feature of Puppy, that allows you to use a regular CD-R to boot, containing the whole operating system and software, and Puppy will WRITE YOUR FILES TO THE DISK when you save changes. Yes, a CD-R (as long as you have a drive capable of "burning" CD's)

I opted to install it to the hard drive, which is easy, and it found and configured my sound and Wi-Fi, although the sound did not work - which was not good, as this was the primary purpose of the exercise. However, after hours and hours of troubleshooting why the soundcard wouldn't work after each reboot, I found the fix in the machine's BIOS. To prove that it would work on other systems, I burned a distribution CD and booted several different computers, and the sound/network worked on all. All you have to do is disable "Plug and Play" in your BIOS to be sure that your sound works properly.

You can either go to puppylinux.com and download just the software you want from W1HKJ's Fldigi site OR you can download the entire package - operating system AND ham software all-in-one from HERE which is 110 MB in size. For APRS, X-APRS for X-windows works great, and can be obtained pretty much anywhere you hit on Google.


Also, a great new video on APRS can be found Hambrief.TV

QRO and Lids

Ok, after trying to work DX on 80 recently, I've noticed a few things that I don't like.


One of them is that when a weaker station replies to a DX call, instead of other amateurs leaving the operator, they just go QRO and key over him. He who has the biggest amplifier might usually win...but the hobby loses.

For example, there was an obvious QRP station at 5 and 3. Perfectly readable stateside. Another amateur started to call over him - someone who obviously heard him. The low power station didn't stand a chance to be heard. Then another station added to the now forming pile up, and transmitted with even higher power.

The two QRO stations, one identified as using 1KW, the other 500W, both heard the little guy, and still went over him anyway. I came in with 100W at the end and got the call. Why? Because I let the high powered stations fight it out and talk over each other so that they were unintelligible, managed to get the last part of my call heard by the DX station, who acknowledged me, and I was able to tell him about the original station that tried to work him and he went to him right after my contact.

There ARE some gentlemen left out there. Not everyone's a lid like the two jackasses. Moral of the story, don't be a jackass.

XYLs

It's nice to have a supportive XYL. Even though it was a weekend, XYL let me go to Winter Field Day with her blessing, and catch the action at W3HZW's Field Day site, where, again, the club put on a really good show, and will likely be among the top again.

Congratulations to the operators at the site, including N3KRX, N3NUR, K3GRT, and, of course, their respective supporting XYLs who put up with us and our bizarre hobby.

Curious as to it's origins, I looked up XYL, and found XYL wear for all the XYLs out there:

XYL Clothing

It's amazing what's out there on the internet.

WAS Update

With only a handful of states needed for WAS on 75, and the 3905 Century Club award, I have shifted my attention to 160. On 160, I have 21 states to go right now.

If you're from

AK, AR, AZ, CO, CT, HI, ID, IN, KS, KY, MA, MT, NJ, NV, OK, OR, PA, RI, SD, UT or WA, and hear me on top band, please give me a shout. I QSL 100%. No SASE's needed.

For those of you that I owe QSL's to, I am having them printed from W4MPY as I type, and will sit down at the end of the month and mail them out. Many thanks.

New addition to the shack

There is a new addition to the W3DBJ shack. There is now an E.H. Scott RCH receiver from WWII that were used on-board ships or submarines at sea, due to being designed with anti-detection technologies. It is possible to detect oscillator "leakage" in radios and TV's - and the Nazis built equipment to detect these minute voltages. The radio is barely detectable at 1 ft away, and would have been impossible to "see" with their equipment. It's black and sitting now in a black radio rack, and still pretty impossible to see, unless it's turned on and I can see the dials red glow.

Hopefully I will have it in place (bolted in) by the 15th for the Antique CX contest, along with my Gonset exciter, will give me a great multiplier!

Worked All States on 75m

Well, I haven't yet, but I'm now trying. 5 states down, 45 to go.
In QSO with another OM this evening, I realized that I've seldom, if ever, heard someone making a CQ on 75. 80, yes, all day long....but not 75....which would make WAS for 75 meters an interesting project.

I'm sure there will be those that say "75 meters isn't a real ham band" well, technically, you're right. From frequency in megacycles = 300/lambda, then lambda = 300/3.900 which gives you 76.9 meters as the wavelength. 75m would start where the COMMERCIAL 75 meter band is on old shortwave sets, and encroach on the 80 meter ham allocation. But that's just a technicality - part of the 75 meter band is within the ham 80 meter allocation.

If ARRL has literature referring to 75 meters, then thats good enough for me!

Whatever next??

While searching for tubes, I came across a site with a link for "Vacuum Tube Necklace".
Of course, my curiosity got the better of me, and I followed the link to Etsy, the arts and crafts version of eBay. I was expecting to see a gold or silver colored metal tube shaped thing of some sort, not this:

AN ACTUAL TUBE WITH GOLD CHAINS AROUND IT AND A SKULL DANGLING BENEATH!

Not exactly my style....but definitely kind of cool

Free monthly replacement for WorldRadio readers

While not quite the same quality, and also not in black and white print, there is a magazine in the same tradition, that has been created by the French of all people, with articles from amateurs the world over.

Subscription is free, and can be done through email at HAM-MAG.COM
. The magazine is to be published monthly by way of email, and is a jolly good read.

Heathkit and Manuals

A company called DataPro, has purchased the RIGHT to print and sell Heathkit legacy manuals. What does this mean for the community? Sadly, it doesn't bode well for us Hams, or the owners of DataPro either.

Don Patterson, the owner of DataPro, has been sending letters to anyone hosting manuals, such as the Boatanchor Manual Archive, BAMA, asking that they take them down, since he is now the owner of Heathkit's intellectual property. However, this is not the case, as Heathkit have not transferred one single solitary copyright to DataPro or Don. The Library of Congress and Copyright Office still show Heathkit as holding the rights for all the publications that have a valid copyright (those published since 1964).

It's important to note that DataPro haven't sent "Cease and Desist" letters, or obtained any Cease and Desist Order against any party, they are simply claiming in a letter that they now own the copyrights.

Two things: Would Heathkit, or anyone else, sell the copyright to their entire catalog for $5,000? And, if DataPro had any legal grounds, why did they not follow through legally, and send a formal Cease and Desist to BAMA?

Don't believe the hype, readers. Don owns nothing but a license to copy on behalf of Heathkit. Nothing more, nothing less. If he thought he was getting the copyrights, he bought a pig in a poke and got nothing but an empty sack.

WorldRadio Magazine To Go Web Only

After close to 60 years of publishing WorldRadio, a black and white newspaper style Ham radio magazine, Armond Noble, has decided to retire. Mr Noble has served the amateur community admirably, and I'm sure that I speak for many of us when I say that we wish him the best in his retirement.

I consider myself fortunate to have been able to receive WorldRadio in my mailbox each month, and will miss it dearly. It was the only publication for the community, that focused on the community - it was about the things we all talk about on the air, and in our clubs, and wasn't a "specialty" magazine like CQ, that serves DX'er, but one that had something for all.

CQ magazine have bought WorldRadio, and are going to publish it online only. It's a sad decision, I would rather them either keep WR as it is, as a separate publication, or even add its content into CQ so that CQ has a broader appeal.

I hope that CQ magazine really think about this one, as it would mean that they would be able to take on QST, or as I call it, QRT because it's become a dumbed down publication to say the least over the past few years. What was once the "gold standard" for DIY and would-be homebrew amateurs, is now a self-promoting, give us your money by buying a $1000 brick, publication.

CQ, please reconsider your stance, and either incorporate WorldRadio into CQ, in which case you will gain not only my subscription, but many other WR subscribers who will cancel, or leave WorldRadio it as it is.

Almost Christmas

Well, it's almost Christmas. Just one more holiday to go, Thanksgiving.

The stores are already playing Christmas music, so I have started my annual Christmas music radio station. Each year, I buy all the music licenses and sell ads that rotate in the music selections, with the proceeds going to charity, minus actual costs.

This year, my radio club is looking to buy a trailer for use as an emergency command center, so this year, the Kent County Amateur Radio Club in DE will be the beneficiary.

All that we ask is that once in a while, you listen to the radio to keep the number of listeners up, to keep it an attractive proposition for the 4 ads we want to sell between now and the official start of the holiday.

If you have nothing better to do, tune in once in a while to WhiteChristmasRadio - if you don't have a player, click the LoudCity link on the page to open a browser window with built-in player.

One last thing.....

Merry Christmas! Ho Ho Ho