K1JT Spots My DSB QRPp WSPR Signal

2009-05-03 16:42	N2CQR		-29					K1JT		7035	4371
2009-05-03 16:38	N2CQR		-24					K1JT		7035	4371

I got into WSPR because I wanted the gratification that comes from seeing a map readout indicating that my QRP signal has crossed various oceans. Well, yesterday I crossed the pond for a second time, but this time the receiving station heard the signal more than once, so the rx station callsign appeared on the display (if the signal is heard only once, you get the line showing the path, but NOT the rx station call). And what a fine callsign it was: K1JT, Joe Taylor, Nobel Prize winner and the inventor of WSPR.

In the last SolderSmoke I got Joe's name wrong (I called him John). It must have been too early in the morning here. Anyway, I was gently corrected by Wes, W7ZOI, and I promissed to make ammends. Sorry Joe! (Thanks Wes).

The Dover Construction Club

Last night there was a meeting of the Dover Construction Club (discussed by Nigel, M0NDE, in Solder Smoke #194). For the first time, the members agreed to be photographed.

Above, in the foreground, Merv checks the main board of his softrock, Ian explains to Paul how a mod to an old FT101ZD will work, and Nigel is seen using the microscope and observe to Merv he has not soldered all the IC legs down on a SMD board. He says he knows. grin!!

Ian Keyser, G3ROO, host of Dover Construction Club. At his bench in a separate part of the workshop where he has test equipment to diagnose the inevitable faults. Here he is working on the RAMU featured in a past edition of Sprat.

In a corner of the garden a brick arch leads to the workshop door, behind the brown door hides the secret world of the amateur radio constructor. Obviously, this is something of a clandestine operation.

Tony, sitting at the other end of Ian's test area, taking down some CW.

In this workshop club members have bandsaw, milling machine, lathe, and pillar drill.

Wow! That's the kind of club that we'd all like to be part of -- Nigel's comments on SS 104 generated a lot of envious e-mail . Thanks a lot guys!

WSPRing Across the Mighty Atlantic

You have to look carefully, but in the picture above you can see a little green line stretching from Rome to Maine. That's my 20 milliwatt WSPR signal crossing the Atlantic. W1CDO's receiver picked me up at 0452 UTC yesterday.

Date	Call		SNR				W	by	loc	km	mi
2009-04-29 4:52	N2CQR		-22				0.020	W1CDO	FN43ou	6541	4064

The day/night terminator was in the mid-Atlantic at that time, so I think I had a bit of a tailwind from the gray line! But still, not bad for 20 mw in Maunder Minimum II. K1JT's software and W1CDO's receive system did the heavy lifting. Antenna here is just an end-fed wire among the buildings of central Rome.

Goats Go QRP to the Field!

Another great video from Steve and the goats.

The Flea at MIT

Nick LaPointe sent along this nice virtual tour of the famous flea market (it includes four videos):
http://eepromeagle.dyndns.org/Pick/gallery/v/mitswapfest090419/

Nick also points us to the very interesting web site of Stephanie Maksylewich (VA3UXB): http://planetstephanie.net/

Thanks Nick!

SolderSmoke 106 Podcast

http://www.soldersmoke.com

In SolderSmoke 106:

Sicily, Mt. Etna, The Godfather
DSB success on WSPR
Am I the lowest power WSPR station in the world?
Diode Ring Mixers
SolderSmoke: The Book
SolderSmoke: The Cologne?
And now, a word from our sponsor: Genesis Radio
MAILBAG

Our first sponsor: GenesisRadio

SolderSmoke is very pleased to have GenesisRadio of Australia as our first sponsor. Check out their site: http://www.genesisradio.com.au/G40/index.html

My very ugly DSB QRPP WSPR Rig

As described in SolderSmoke 106. My beacon box is the vertical aluminum box. The junk box AF Amp lies on the shelf. Like they used to say, "It's ugly, but it gets you there."

Eldon's awesome 9V QRSS rig

Amazing! That's the whole rig, keyer chip included! And those red wires you see coming off the end -- that's the loop antenna. Here is Eldon's description of this rig:

For now, even thou it worked, I have abandoned the Water Tank QRSS Encoder, for a more traditional ID Keyer (K-ID2), and I have been busy rebuilding my 9 Volt Battery QRSS transmitter.

For my first approach, I wanted to use the Manhattan style of construction using mostly SMDs. The Oscillator was very successful even thou there were NO actual Manhattan Islands use, the components are just tacked-soldered together - I guess it would have to be called the "Ugly SMD Style".

Photos of Rev-0 are available on my web site;
http://qrss.ebcon.com/WA0UtWH/Gallery/Qx/

Setting the frequency was tough, as the some initial installed component's had to be replaced to get it to oscillate and adjustable within the 100Hz QRSS band. The "Ugly SMD Style" of construction is possible, but circuit changes are difficult. I decided to etch a HB circuit board to provide for a more physically stable "component selection breadboard", where SMDs part values could be easily tried, by just pressing them down in place (which BTW works very well). I then decided to expand the etched board to include space for the K-ID2 Keyer - with the goal of direct QRSS modulation with very few additional components.

This all worked so well, that I constructed another for a final form. Note: the second transistor in the photos is a 78L05 voltage regulator, which is used to help with long term oscillator stabilization, and used to reduce the power requirement and provide battery longevity.

The final QRSS Beacon uses a SMD 2N3904 for the oscillator and is now transmitting 1.5mW into a 18 inch loop antenna, currently only my grabber shows the results. But - My plan is to build this Beacon into the center insulator of a 30m Dipole and then start looking for QRSS Grabber DX. The battery should last several days at this very low power.

My goal is: to achieve long distance, with a very physically-small transmitter, small part count, and with extremely low power.

It will take me several days to construct and install the dipole antenna, until then you can see this Beacon sending "WA0UWH" on the Seattle Grabber:

http://qrss.ebcon.com/WA0UtWH/grabber/

73's - Eldon - WA0UWH

On to the Canary Islands

Got up this morning, walked into the shack and saw on my computer screen a thin green line from Rome to the Canary Islands. I knew that my little WSPR station had reached out to new territory, and had established a new distance record (for me). Life is good!
As I've been doing, I decided to see who was at the other end of that line. It was Luis, EA8AY (pictured above). Luis's station picked up my 18 milliwatt signal at 2106 UTC on April 24. The distance was 1871 miles (3011 kilometers). I was 23 db below the noise.
Luis has a very nice web page: http://www.ea8ay.com/index.html (Warning: This site will likely cause feelings of extreme jealousy: Luis is living in a fantastic location, with a beautiful family AND he is the owner of an Argonaut 509!)
On his site, Luis has a nice video that will give you a sense of what WSPR is like:


wspr with 100 mw from luis on Vimeo.