Amateur Rocketeers Reach 121,000 feet (36,880 meters)! AMAZING VIDEO!

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Carl Sagan on the META (SETI) Results

Project META's Control Room

I mentioned this in Ppodcast #138 and wanted to provide more info. Here are the relevant paragraphs from Sagan's book, "The Pale Blue Dot."

"Of course, there's a background level of radio noise from Earth-radio
and television stations, aircraft, portable telephones, nearby and more
distant spacecraft. Also, as with all radio receivers, the longer you
wait, the more likely it is that there'll be some random fluctuation in
the electronics so strong that it generates a spurious signal. So we
ignore anything that isn't much louder than the background.
Any strong narrow-band signal that remains in a single channel we take
very seriously. As it logs in the data, META automatically tells the human
operators to pay attention to certain signals. Over five years we made
some 60 trillion observations at various frequencies, while examining the
entire accessible sky. A few dozen signals survive the culling. These are
subjected to further scrutiny, and almost all of them are rejected-for
example, because an error has been found by fault-detection
microprocessors that examine the signal-detection microprocessors.
What's left-the strongest candidate signals after three surveys of the
sky-are 11 "events." They satisfy all but one of our criteria for a
genuine alien signal. But the one failed criterion is supremely important:
Verifiability. We've never been able to find any of them again. We look
back at that part of the sky three minutes later and there's nothing
there. We look again the following day: nothing. Examine it a year later,
or seven years later, and still there's nothing.
It seems unlikely that every signal we get from alien civilizations
would turn itself off a couple of minutes after we begin listening, and
never repeat. (How would they know we're paying attention?) But, just
possibly, this is the effect of twinkling. Stars twinkle because parcels
of turbulent air are moving across the line of sight between the star and
us. Sometimes these air parcels act as a lens and cause the light rays
from a given star to converge a little, making it momentarily brighter.
Similarly, astronomical radio sources may also twinkle-owing to clouds of
electrically charged (or "ionized") gas in the great near-vacuum between
the stars. We observe this routinely with pulsars.
Imagine a radio signal that's a little below the strength that we
could otherwise detect on Earth. Occasionally the signal will by chance be
temporarily focused, amplified, and brought within the detectability range
of our radio telescopes. The interesting thing is that the lifetimes of
such brightening, predicted from the physics of the interstellar gas, are
a few minutes-and the chance of reacquiring the signal is small. We should
really be pointing steadily at these coordinates in the sky, watching them
for months.
Despite the fact that none of these signals repeats, there's an
additional fact about them that, every time I think about it, sends a
chill down my spine: 8 of the 11 best candidate signals lie in or near the
plane of the Milky Way Galaxy. The five strongest are in the
constellations Cassiopeia, Monoceros, Hydra, and two in Sagittarius-in the
approximate direction of the center of the Galaxy. The Milky Way is a
flat, wheel-like collection of gas and dust and stars. Its flatness is why
we see it as a band of diffuse light across the night sky. That's where
almost all the stars in our galaxy are. If our candidate signals really
were radio interference from Earth or some undetected glitch in the
detection electronics, we shouldn't see them preferentially when we're
pointing at the Milky Way.
But maybe we had an especially unlucky and misleading run of
statistics. The probability that this correlation with the galactic plane
is due merely to chance is less than half a percent. Imagine a wall-size
map of the sky, ranging from the North Star at the top to the fainter
stars toward which the Earth's south pole points at the bottom. Snaking
across this wall map are the irregular boundaries of the Milky Way. Now
suppose that you were blindfolded and asked to throw five darts at random
at the map (with much of the southern sky, inaccessible from
Massachusetts, declared off limits). You'd have to throw the set of five
darts more than 200 times before, by accident, you got them to fall as
closely within the precincts of the Milky Way as the five strongest META
signals did. Without repeatable signals, though, there's no way we can
conclude that we've actually found extraterrestrial intelligence.
Or maybe the events we've found are caused by some new kind of
astrophysical phenomenon, something that nobody has thought of yet, by
which not civilizations, but stars or gas clouds (or something) that do
lie in the plane of the Milky Way emit strong signals in bafflingly narrow
frequency bands.
Let's permit ourselves, though, a moment of extravagant speculation.
Let's imagine that all our surviving events are in fact due to radio
beacons of other civilizations. Then we can estimate-from how little time
we've spent watching each piece of sky-how many such transmitters there
are in the entire Milky Way. The answer is something approaching a
million. If randomly strewn through space, the nearest of them would be a
few hundred light years away, too far for them to have picked up our own
TV or radar signals yet. They would not know for another few centuries
that a technical civilization has emerged on Earth. The Galaxy would be
pulsing with life and intelligence, but-unless they're busily exploring
huge numbers of obscure star systems-wholly oblivious of what has been
happening down here lately. A few centuries from now, after they do hear
from us, things might get very interesting. Fortunately, we'd have many
generations to prepare."

Our book: "SolderSmoke -- Global Adventures in Wireless Electronics"http://soldersmoke.com/book.htmOur coffee mugs, T-Shirts, bumper stickers: http://www.cafepress.com/SolderSmokeOur Book Store: http://astore.amazon.com/contracross-20

Meet the Author (of SolderSmoke) Event TODAY

For those in the Washington D.C. area: Today from 2-4 pm I'll be at "One More Page Books" in Arlington, Virginia at a "meet the author" event. The store will have on sale ten copies of "SolderSmoke -- Global Adventures in Wireless Electronics." Please pass the word to local hams who might be interested. Thanks.

One More Page Books
2200 N. Westmoreland Street #101
Arlington, VA 22213
703-300-9746

Our book: "SolderSmoke -- Global Adventures in Wireless Electronics"http://soldersmoke.com/book.htmOur coffee mugs, T-Shirts, bumper stickers: http://www.cafepress.com/SolderSmokeOur Book Store: http://astore.amazon.com/contracross-20

Happy 50th Birthday to the Parkes Radio Telescope

http://www.cio.com.au/article/402613/australia_celebrates_50_years_dish_/?fp=16#closeme

This is my favorite antenna. And it is the subject of the BEST movie ever made about an antenna.

Our book: "SolderSmoke -- Global Adventures in Wireless Electronics"http://soldersmoke.com/book.htmOur coffee mugs, T-Shirts, bumper stickers: http://www.cafepress.com/SolderSmokeOur Book Store: http://astore.amazon.com/contracross-20

Party Like its 1957! (with the Sputniks on 21.060 MHz)

Steve "Snort Rosin" Smith sent me this very creative reminder that the Sputnik Replica On-The-Air event is scheduled to continue for the same length of time that the original transmitter was on the air. That means we have until October 26 to work or to listen to these magnificent replica rigs. (Hey, maybe I'll get my HW-7 into the action!) See you on 21.060 MHz Comrades! 73 and DSW!

Our book: "SolderSmoke -- Global Adventures in Wireless Electronics"http://soldersmoke.com/book.htmOur coffee mugs, T-Shirts, bumper stickers: http://www.cafepress.com/SolderSmokeOur Book Store: http://astore.amazon.com/contracross-20

"Spine Tingling" Sputnik Recordings From 1957

Doug, W8NFT, sent me this booklet and copies of the recordings that came with it. Below you will find links to the booklet itself and the two mp3 files. Note that the signals were captured using an HRO receiver. Side A is a "re-creation" of the launch ("spine tingling in its realism!!!!") Side B is an actual recording of the sat's iconic beeping.

http://soldersmoke.com/Sputnik Booklet.PDF

http://soldersmoke.com/Sputnik Side A.mp3

http://soldersmoke.com/Sputnik Side B.mp3

Our book: "SolderSmoke -- Global Adventures in Wireless Electronics"http://soldersmoke.com/book.htmOur coffee mugs, T-Shirts, bumper stickers: http://www.cafepress.com/SolderSmokeOur Book Store: http://astore.amazon.com/contracross-20

ON6WJ's Sputnik Rig

I think Jos's rig is magnificent. He is getting the high voltage for the tubes from a cheap (3 Euros!) 12 Volt to 120 Volt DC/DC inverter that he picked up via e-bay. (I think you can see the inverter board to the left of the headphone jack.) He runs it from a 12 volt gel cell. The little battery is for the filaments. He gets about 700 mw out, and had a very solid 15 minute QSO with Jim, W1PID yesterday. FB Jos!

More Sputnik news (with some audio from the original) tomorrow.

DSW to all!

Our book: "SolderSmoke -- Global Adventures in Wireless Electronics"http://soldersmoke.com/book.htmOur coffee mugs, T-Shirts, bumper stickers: http://www.cafepress.com/SolderSmokeOur Book Store: http://astore.amazon.com/contracross-20

Listening for Sputniks, Watching a Satellite

I felt like a junior high school kid yesterday, rushing into the shack, firing up the old rigs, anxious to tune in some special stations. It was Sputnik Anniversary Day! 15 meters was still in pretty good shape at 2315 UTC. On the trusty Drake 2-B I could hear W1AW's code practice session a bit above the Sputnik frequency of 21.060 MHz. All of a sudden WA5TCZ was booming in, calling CQ Sputnik! OM Darron later e-mailed and let me know that he wasn't running a replica rig -- like me, he was looking for them.

This morning, inspired by all this space activity, I pulled out my newly cleaned and collimated telescope and took a tour of the skies of Northern Virginia. Jupiter is very bright in the East (I could see the Galilean moons in my finder scope!) Mars is in the West, but is too far away for any detail to be seen in my 'scope -- it is just a little red disk. I had to go out into the street to position the 'scope for the great nebula in Orion. At 1023UTC the International Space Station flew over -- I watched it disappear into the sunrise. A good morning indeed.

I have a suggestion: Can the Sputnik event be extended through the weekend to give more people the chance to tune in these magnificent rigs?

Our book: "SolderSmoke -- Global Adventures in Wireless Electronics"http://soldersmoke.com/book.htmOur coffee mugs, T-Shirts, bumper stickers: http://www.cafepress.com/SolderSmokeOur Book Store: http://astore.amazon.com/contracross-20

Sputnik!!! SolderSmoke 138!!!

Today is Sputnik Anniversary Day! Michael, AA1TJ, and his intrepid international band of solder melters will be putting their homebrew Soviet-parts rigs on 15 meters! I will be listening with my HQ-100. This is all discussed on SolderSmoke 138, which I have just uploaded:

http://soldersmoke.com/soldersmoke138.mp3

October 4, 2011
A Meteor and Jupiter: Cosmic Birthday Present!
Sagan's Pale Blue Dot -- Lots of interesting radio info
On the cover of "Hot Iron"!!!!
The HW-7 Philosophy and Way of Life
Sputnik Anniversary
Getting my 2B back on 17
Preparing for a return of sunspots and 17 meters
Raiding Radio Shack (for 2N2222s!)
The Autumn SPRAT
MAILBAG

Our book: "SolderSmoke -- Global Adventures in Wireless Electronics"http://soldersmoke.com/book.htmOur coffee mugs, T-Shirts, bumper stickers: http://www.cafepress.com/SolderSmokeOur Book Store: http://astore.amazon.com/contracross-20

More Homebrew Tubes -- This Time from Poland

That's a homebrew triode built in an apartment workshop by the intrepid Polish radio wizard Aleksander Zawada. The last line in the blog post really got to me:

"All is needed now is to solder a socket to the base of the triode, and use it to make (for example) a regenerative radio receiver!"

Check it out: http://lekernel.net/blog/2011/09/prywatna-wytwornia-lamp-where-diy-meets-vacuum-electron-devices/

Our book: "SolderSmoke -- Global Adventures in Wireless Electronics"http://soldersmoke.com/book.htmOur coffee mugs, T-Shirts, bumper stickers: http://www.cafepress.com/SolderSmokeOur Book Store: http://astore.amazon.com/contracross-20

Mystic Steampunk Icelandic Radio Symbology

Mike, KC7IT, alerted me to this one. Check out the decoration on the top of this box. The artist explains:

"The electrolytically etched brass plate on top of the box depicts symbols used in science, engineering, and alchemy. An Icelandic Vegvísir is featured prominently surrounded by the components of a modern magnetron microwave transmitting tube. The background features the schematic diagram for a vintage Heathkit oscilloscope. The Vegvísir is often thought of as a mystical symbol but it is in fact a very practical mnemonic device for mastering navigational rules of thumb."

Billy has been interested in the whole "steampunk" thing (he will be a steampunk guy on Halloween) so this one caught my eye. It also made me think that we need to jazz up those Altoid tins! (Speaking of boxes, while I had the 2-B on the bench yesterday, I took its old metal case out to the garage and gave it several coats of black paint. It looks wonderful.)

Our book: "SolderSmoke -- Global Adventures in Wireless Electronics"http://soldersmoke.com/book.htmOur coffee mugs, T-Shirts, bumper stickers: http://www.cafepress.com/SolderSmokeOur Book Store: http://astore.amazon.com/contracross-20

A Good Day in the Shack -- 2B Fixed, SPRAT Arrives

The temperature has dropped to around 10 C today. Fall is in the air. So it was appropriate for me to do some work on an old tube radio. (Several of our correspondents have reported similar seasonal urges to melt solder and to heat filaments.) This week my trusty Drake 2-B was giving me trouble on 17 meters. It was working on all other bands, but not on 17. Today I put it on the bench, pulled out the schematic and started troubleshooting. I quickly determined that the problem was, in fact, with the 22 MHz crystal. The 2-B has a 24.5 MHz rock for tuning the lower portion of the ten meter band. When I put that crystal in the "E" socket (where the 22 MHz crystal normally sits), the local oscillator worked just fine. Putting the 22 MHz rock back in the E socket resulted in no oscillation. And when I tried to the 22 MHz crystal in the 10 Meter socket normally used by the 24.5 MHz rock... nothing. What causes a perfectly good crystal to go bad like this?

Consulting the 2-B manual, I saw that I could also tune the 17 meter band by using (in socket D) a 14.21 MHz crystal from my junk box (it had been used in my 20 meter NE-602 DSB. transceiver). It works great. I'm listening to DK9KW calling CQ on 17 right now. Makes me want to fix up my homebrew 17 meter transmitter. (I need a final for it, and am thinking of using Farhan's JBOT circuit). I may even buy some telescoping fishing poles and rebuild my Azorean rotate-able dipole (I have the mast and the wooden center support for the fishing poles). This magnificent antenna is shown above, spreading its wings above Sao Miguel island in the Azores (our home from 2000--2003).

Icing on the cake: I went out to the mailbox, and, instead of the usual pile of bills, there was a SPRAT 148 and the G-QRP Club's Members Handbook.

Our book: "SolderSmoke -- Global Adventures in Wireless Electronics"http://soldersmoke.com/book.htmOur coffee mugs, T-Shirts, bumper stickers: http://www.cafepress.com/SolderSmokeOur Book Store: http://astore.amazon.com/contracross-20