PSK-31 Contacts

-
The past couple of nights have seen quiet conditions on 20m so I've concentrated on working a couple of satellites as well as listening around on the LF bands. I had some fun last night on PSK-31 working stations up and down Europe. Using my home brew 130ft Dipole, FT-767 interfaced to my PC and Nomic rigblaster I worked quite a few stations on 80m running qrp (30w).

Stations were coming in well on 80 meters around 3.582 lsb and I worked stations from Norway, Sweden, Germany and the UK including SM6AMU and a fellow Twitterer M0TZO - Paul. For a full transcript of the contact with Paul you can read it here on MØTZO's Blog. Twitter is proving to be a lot of fun and I'm managing to bag a few Twittering followers into my log.

Thanks to all my followers so far, hope to get many more. If you're not on Twitter you can join up here feel free to add me to find out when and where I am active on the bands.

Comments

Unknown said…
I think it's a fantastic idea to listen LF Bands ham radio from 80 KM's
9:32 am
MØYKS Simon said…
Hey Brent nice link to the Ham equipment site. 73 Tnx
9:55 am
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

New DX Contact 0n 12 Meters

-
Image
Today I managed a nice QSO with Tom ZD7X who is located at St. Helena which is quite a distance away from my location. I managed to work Tom ZD7X with a 5/9 report operating my FT-767GX with my home brew 20m delta loop assisted with the MFJ-969 to tune the antenna with 50 watts on 12 meters. 12M is rarely open and I have only had a few QSOs on this band so I guess the new Cycle has begun at last! Good DX de 2E0HTS 73
Read more

Full Size Delta Loop for 20M

-
Image
I came across a simple delta loop design courtesy of dxzone found on the net some time ago and have been planning to give it a go for a while. This weekend I had a couple of hours spare, so I decided to give it a go using some 2mm multi strand wire cable, a dipole centre and a mixture of 75 ohm and 50 ohm coaxial cable. The delta loop is supposed to be resonant on 20 meters but I found it to be a little high so at present I am tuning the Loop with my mfj-969 which copes extremely well. The resonant frequency is 13.2 MHz at the moment so the next chance I get, I shall shorten the overall length making sure that each of the three sides are still equal in length, and hopefully adjusting the antenna for maximum performance ATU free for 14.2 MHz. I believe the miscalculation in the resonant length is probably down to the fact that my wire is covered in the plastic sleeving from the manufacturer which always effects the swr as I have noticed in past experiments with dipoles you always get sl
Read more

Homebrew 40/80 Trap Dipole Design

-
Image
This Antenna design was one that I used about 4 years ago, it worked exceptionally well on 80m and 40m. The size of the antenna makes a Half wave length on 80 meters, and with the traps a half wave on 40m with a SWR (standing wave ratio) of 1:1-1.5 across both bands. It worked well also on 20m with the use of an A.T.U (antenna tuning unit). I made my version of this antenna using 3mm multi strand copper cable which I left covered by the PVC insulation. The traps can either be home brewed using some 40mm diameter plastic drain pipe and winding wire around the pipe approximately 10 turns, then connected in line after the 10 metre lengths. Or the alternative is to purchase some commercially made 7.1 MHz traps, and fit them in line the same way. The antenna can be fed with 50 ohm coax with a home brew balan or again a commercially purchased balan. The wire lengths of the dipole are 2x 10 metres and 2x 6.7 metres as shown on the diagram above. This antenna can be mounted quite low to the gr
Read more