Saturday 13 March 2021 – working DX SOTA chaser stations in New Zealand and Indonesia, SSB voice mode. Equipment – Yaesu 2m HT, Yaesu FT817ND, 7m telescopic pole, homebrew 40/20m inverted V linked dipole and an experiment with the use of a 10m length of RG-174 coax. I normally carry a 10m length of RG58AU.…
Like many in the amateur radio hobby, I have an interest in listening to my local airport air traffic and en route air traffic operating between Sydney – Canberra – Melbourne centres. I am fortunate that my QTH is located in a RF line-of-sight path to Canberra International Airport (13 km east) and an air…
Saturday 16 June 2018. The weather around Canberra is cold wet and windy as a deep low, 994 hPa passes over south-east Australia. Today’s top ambient temperature is 9 degrees C while the feels-like is a chilly 2 degrees C. Tomorrow’s forecast is for a chance of snow down to 800 m ASL. My QTH…
This morning I assembled a SOTABeams 4-Way 12 volt PowerPole connector box. This little beauty will form part of my SOTA kit. The SOTABeams kit includes all parts, plastic case and a lazer-cut front panel. Assembly time is approximately 30 minutes including time to make a mug of tea. Until now I have used a…
A homebrew 2m 144.2 MHz vertical 1/2 wave Coaxial Dipole antenna project for your home QTH, SOTA, portable field operations/WICEN exercises or the emergency 2m Go-box. Elsewhere in amateur radio circles this antenna is known as a 2m Flower Pot Antenna. Credits to VK2ZOI (SK). Post updated 5 May 2019, scroll to the bottom for…
Everyone needs a new challenge for 2016. My ambitious plan for 2016 is to qualify each SOTA peak on 430 MHz (70cm) either on 432 MHz SSB or 439.00 MHz FM simplex. To qualify each summit I will need 4 unique amateur radio contacts on either frequency or a mix of unique contacts on SSB…
Get out of the Radio Shack and Live Life 