Peter DK7IH's Amazing Rigs and Blog

It has been a few years since we last mentioned Peter DK7IH.  He has continued to melt solder and to document his work on an excellent blog: https://radiotransmitter.wordpress.com/

I was especially interested in the rig pictured above.  NOTE:  NO GLOWING NUMERALS.  That rig has an analog VFO.  The blog article provides some great pointers on how to achieve thermal stability.  Also, be sure to check out his "Old School" rig.  

I've put Peter's blog in the blog listing on the right side of the SolderSmoke blog.   

Book Review: "Man of High Fidelity: Edwin Howard Armstrong" (Free Download)

Dave W2DAB sent me this wonderful book.  He picked up a copy at a recent Columbia University lecture on E. Howard Armstrong.  Written by the notable science writer Lawrence Lessing, the book was first published in 1956.  The paperback copy that Dave sent me came out in 1969; while 50 years old, my copy is in remarkably good shape. 

I really liked the book.  The author captures the technical achievements of  Armstrong, while also describing vividly the world in which Armstrong lived.  Being from the area, I especially liked Lessing's description of New York City and the Hudson Valley in the early years of the 20th century. This was the world of my grandparents; Lessing's book helped me understand it better. 

For the radio amateur, I think the most gripping part of the book is the way Lessing describes  the excitement of early radio.  Armstrong was a true enthusiast for the new technology, and he was -- even as a teenager -- at the cutting edge.  He was constantly striving to improve the technology, especially the receivers.  Like us, he often became obsessed with his radio work, often forgoing sleep and missing family meals as he toiled away in his workshop. Lessing tells us of Armstrong's astonishment and joy, when, upon inventing the regenerative receiver, he was suddenly able to clearly receive signals from distant stations that previously had been barely discernible.  Realize that when he was doing that, he was the only person on the planet who was doing it.  He was the inventor. He was the first. 

Lessing gives us a lot of great information about Armstrong's work as an officer in the U.S. Army Signal Corps in Paris during World War I.  We learn more about how his desire to be able to detect noise from the electrical systems of enemy airplanes led him to the invention of our beloved superhet receivers.   But my favorite Armstrong in WWI story involves his visit to the radio shack of the ship that was carrying him to the war.   In the radio shack he found a conventional station.  But he asked the operator if he happened to have one of the then new audion tubes.  On the spot, Armstrong took the tube and rigged up a regenerative receiver.  He and the ship's radioman then delighted in hearing stations that had never before been audible.   Amazing.     

I was less interested in the sad tale of Armstrong's legal patent battles, so I kind of skimmed through that.  I'm also not much of an FM guy, so I'll save those portions of the book for a later date.  

I think this is an important book about a significant part of radio history.  It is well written.  It gets almost all of the technical details right (but sorry Mr. Lessing,  radio waves are not composed of electrons).  The book deserves a place on the shelf of all radio history libraries.   If you can't get a print copy, an online version can be downloaded here: 

 https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.189098

Thanks again to Dave W2DAB.   

"Want one!" F6DMQ's Remote Rig

I talked to Yves F6DMQ last night on 20 meters.  I was on my all-analog BITX20.   Yves was up in Toulouse, operating his station near Cannes via this EXTREMELY COOL remote rig.   He connects to the home station via 4G.   Check out the rest of his station here: 

https://www.qrz.com/db/F6DMQ

The Echophone EC-1 -- Chicks Dig it! In the Middle East! With a Hookah!

We've covered the success of this fellow before:  
https://soldersmoke.blogspot.com/2017/09/hallicrafters-and-romantic-life-of.html

But never before with a hookah! 

"The Bit Player" A New Movie on Claude Shannon

The Bit Player Trailer from IEEE Information Theory Society on Vimeo.

Thanks to Bob KD4EBM for alerting us to this.  As Bob put it, Shannon definitely had The Knack.  Check out the trailer (above)  for this new movie.   It looks like the IEEE is still working on the release plan for the film.  Does anyone have info on this? 

More info on the film here: https://thebitplayer.com/

Four years ago we reported on a video about Shannon: https://soldersmoke.blogspot.com/2015/09/claude-shannon-had-knack-video.html 

Thanks Bob! 

SSB on the QCX? Sounds pretty good here (Video)

In SolderSmoke #211 we reported on recent efforts to generate SSB from the QCX CW phasing rig -- we said that we'd heard that the effort wasn't very successful.  But today we got an e-mail from Jim W4JED pointing us to YouTube video from Guido PE1NNZ.  

I must say the signal sounds pretty good to me, and it looks good in the waterfall.  Listen for yourselves via the video above.  His is the signal on the left. 

Guido has a great write up, along with software here: 

https://github.com/threeme3/QCX-SSB 

I hope this all works out -- it would be great to get on phone with Hans Summers' amazing phasing rig. Here is a picture that hints at the potential: 

Go Guido! 

SDR vs. HDR - Is the Superhet Dead?

Pete N6QW had this very interesting video about Software Defined Radio on his blog.  Thanks to G3WGV for putting this presentation together. 

It is very interesting, but -- for me -- it is also troubling.   I think something important is being missed in this discussion. You have to listen carefully, but if you do the thing being missed becomes apparent. 

Like many others, G3WGV asserts that very soon, 100 percent of commercial radios will be SDR.  Traditional superhet radios will be a thing of the past. 

OK, but I will make a parallel assertion:  Looking ahead, I think 100 percent of TRULY homebrewed rigs will be HDR.  

Of course, this really just comes down to how you define "homebrew."  I'm a traditionalist here.  I think of homebrewing as actually building -- from discrete components -- all the stages that send or receive radio signals.  By my definition, I don't think you can really "homebrew" an SDR radio.  Taking an ADC chip and connecting it to a computer running SDR software is not -- by my definition -- homebrew.  Even if you wrote the software yourself, writing code is not the same as wiring up all the stages that go into a superhet-style transceiver.    

There were a few lines in G3WGV's talk that seemed to confirm this difference:  The SDR radio is defined as a "server." Commercial manufacturers like SDR because they can use the same components that go into cell phones (exactly -- and people will soon have the same relationship with these "radios" that we have with their cell phones). 

I kind of grimaced when G3WGV described the two sets of users of SDR technology: the "early adopters" who are "technology enthusiasts",  and the "pragmatists" who don't care what's in the box -- they just want to talk on it.  I think "pragmatist" is a nice way of saying "appliance operator." Even the "early adopters" are pretty far from the world of traditional homebrew.  And for me that gets to the point that is being missed in all this -- this shift away from hardware is also a shift away from homebrew.   

But hey, this is a hobby.  To each is own!  Have it your way.  For myself, I plan to continue with the hardcore, radical fundamentalist, hardware-defined, discrete component, fully analog homebrew radio.  This morning I am attempting to stabilize a cap and coil VFO.  And I'm liking it.  As the world shifts to SDR, I look forward to the appearance on e-Bay of massive quantities of old forsaken HDR rigs.  We will buy them for pennies on the dollar and use the parts for new HDR Superhet rigs.  

Viva  E. Howard Armstrong!   Viva!   

Need Some Trans-Atlantic Support -- "The Impoverished Radio Experimenter"

A friend in the UK writes: 

I'm looking for volumes 2 and 4 of the "The Impoverished Radio Experimenter" pamphlets. I've searched in the UK for them - they are available but at silly money (nigh on £25.00 each). No sign of any pdf downloads, either. pdf downloads (preferred!) or purchasing at £10 and under would do me fine, if you know any sources?

Any ideas?    Thanks,  Bill 

SolderSmoke Podcast #211 -- Malicious Code! Spaace! Vintage Sideband! MAILBAG

27 April 2019

SolderSmoke Podcast #211 is available

http://soldersmoke.com/soldersmoke211.mp3

Pete NOT quitting podcast!  Malicious code case RESOLVED! 

Ambiguity and the Digi-Analog Divide

Edwin Howard Armstrong biography 

SPAACE! 
   Apollo 11 50th Anniversary
   Oscar 100 in Geostationary Orbit.  Why can't we have one too? 
   Farhan puts AISAT in orbit.  FB!  
   Space is difficult
   SSTV from the Space Station

Pete's bench report. 

Vintage Sidebanders
    Recording of Midwest Vintage SSB "tune up session" 
    Vintage rigs that sound bad
    Distorted views on "distortion" 

Bill fixing old Bose Wave Radio

NOT GOING TO DAYTON.  AGAIN!  But SolderSmoke rep will be there

75 meter secrets of success (timing is everything!) 

MAILBAG

Steve N8NM sends me FB National Dial
Steve N8NM aspires to complexity -- enough of this simple stuff!
Dave W2DAB goes to Columbia U session on Armstrong, sends FB book. 
Jim W4JED -- reports of QCX sideband a bit exaggerated.  Where is Allison? 
Rob Powell wins beret challenge.  VK2TPM and VK2BLQ also win. CONGRATS!
Colin G3VMU sends nice 1930s radio picture
Alan WA9IRS sends diagram of digi radio signal flow.  CLEAR AS MUD! 
Chris KD4PBJ Grandmother worked at Hammarlund. 
Steve NU0P sends info on Art Collins and the Apollo moonshots. 

BITX on the Beach in East Java (Indonesia)

Nobel Prize winner Joe Taylor, K1JT, Talks to a Radio Club

Really great to see this session with Nobel Prize winner Joe Taylor, K1JT.
I liked his comments on his use of his retirement office at Princeton, University. 
I also liked his slide on how far below the noise level you can go with various modes. 
And then there was his reminder to 1) RTFM and 2) be sure to check the EME delay box so that your software will get the timing right when working earth-moon-earth. 

"Pulsars keep good time." 

A Beautiful Variable Capacitor (from Pete)

Is this a thing of beauty, or what?   Pete sent this to me back when I was having trouble finding a "smooth running" variable cap for my HRO dial receiver.  It has a standard Jackson Brother's reduction drive attached to the shaft, followed by a really cool gear arrangement.  Note the spring loaded teeth on the big gear -- that is to keep the gears tight when turning in both directions.  

As was the case with the HRO dial that Armand sent me, the beauty of this part will cause me to build something with it, really just for the purpose of putting it to use. We've been talking about double or triple conversion superhets with 100 or 50 kHz final IFs.  At those frequencies you can get good selectivity with LC filters.  As with the Drake 2-B.    Steve N8NM is sending me a dial that will go well with this part.  That will add to the already abundant mojo/juju.  I feel a VFO in the works.    Thanks to Pete for being so supportive of my luddite analogism.