Category: General

New Callsign

After applying for multiple different 1×2 and 2×1 vanity call signs, I finally decided to apply for one that I knew I could actually get. I had quite a few others “picked out”, but one of them stood out from the others, so I decided to file the single application for it. On April 12th, I filed for KØAGM and on May 2, 2017, it was assigned to me.

I got the domain name and bought some eyeball QSO cards before it was even granted. This posted was actually written on April 18th, but not published until everything was final.

There may be some misconceptions about vanity call signs out there, I realized. The first misconception being that you have to spend money to get one. As of September 2, 2015, there is NO COST for applying or getting a vanity call sign. There are websites that will tell you exactly when certain call signs are available (this is the one I used), and describe the process of how to apply for them. The process is actually very easy.

The first thing to do is make sure that you have an FRN. This makes things much easier to keep track of. Once you have that, just log in to the ULS on the FCC website using the “online filing” log in button. Enter your FRN and password, and submit. Over on the right side of the page, click on “Request Vanity Call Sign”. Select “No, No”… then click continue. Select “Primary station preference list”, then press continue. Put in the call sign that you want. If you have a list, put the one that you most prefer in the #1 spot, the next in the #2 spot, and so on.

From that point forward, it’s pretty self explanatory. Just digitally sign your name, exactly how it’s listed with your FRN, and submit. It takes around 19 days to know if you got the call that you requested, or not. It no longer costs anything to request a vanity call sign or to actually get one, so there is no reason for expense to get in the way.

Here is another good site to check, if you’d like to see how many others have applied for the same call. I’ll let you explore that site, yourself, since there are a lot of different things that it will help you out with.

Announcing: KEØKEC /AE

That’s right! In the past month, not only was I able to study hard enough to pass the General, I became good enough on the practice tests and studied for the Extra. This morning, I went to the Central Dakota Amateur Radio Club Hamfest in Bismarck for the “main” purpose of testing.

I was pretty confident about passing the General, since I was actually hitting 90% or higher on each practice test I took. Once they graded my General and let me know that I passed, I immediately started on the Extra Test. As I was taking the test, my youngest son was notified that he had passed his Technician test. Super proud!

Once they graded my General test, Bob (NoTC) told me that he had some “bad news” for me. Then he said that it looks like I’d be spending a lot more money, soon, and congratulated me on passing.

Now, it looks like I need to spend some more money. In the end, Bob was right.

Couple New Radios

A while back, I purchased a used 10/12 meter radio. I found a really good deal on a Ranger RCI-2985DX. It’s the low powered little brother of the 2995dx. While the big brother will do 150+ watts, the one I have will do 25+ watts. It’s definitely not a fancy, modern HF radio, but for me, it’s a step in that direction. Sure… It would be nice to have a Kenwood TS-990S, but at this point, I have no use for it. Even if I was able to afford it (I don’t have $6,800.00 laying around), the thing would just sit there, for the most part, until I upgraded my license. Right now, I can legally get on SSB between 28.3 and 28.5MHz. Hopefully at the end of February, I’ll be able to expand that out to the full 10 & 12 meter bands.

As it sits right now, though, I am still waiting until spring, before I can throw up another antenna without worrying about sliding off the roof. I’m just listening to it using a temporary antenna, right now.

Today, I also received another radio in my mailbox. I found a Realistic HTX-202 for $27, and couldn’t pass it up. It was the first kind of HT that I owned, back in 1997, when I got my first license. The guy that I bought it from even sent me an Icom HM-46L speaker/mic. I quickly realized why it was such a low price and why he sent the speaker/mic, though. The internal mic doesn’t work. It’s not a huge deal, and I may rip it open and see if I can fix or replace it, at some point.

For now, though, I decided to use it as the receiver for the Broadcastify feed that I provide. It can be directly powered by 12 volts, so there’s no transformer or step-down converter to use. I used to have a small ground loop buzz on my feed, when I was using the scanner, and there was really no way to completely get rid of it. Now, the feed sounds a whole lot cleaner than it used to. Because of that, the audio is quite a bit louder and easier to hear.

I suppose that’s it, for now. Until next time…

Going to the Bismarck Hamfest

I’m planning on going to the CDARC 2017 Hamfest in Bismarck that will be held on February 25, 2017. As of right now, my youngest son and I will be heading over there on Feb. 24th (leaving in the afternoon) and staying in a hotel, so we can get up bright and early on Saturday. Things open up at 7:00am on Saturday.

Here’s a link to the PDF that’s on their site.

If anybody in the area would also like to go, and needs a ride, get in touch with me. I have a comfortable, full sized van and a lot of room for more people. I’m also a very careful driver. I would not expect any money for gas (since I’ll be using the gas whether you go, or not). You’d have to get your own hotel room (and food), though. If you get in touch, I’ll let you know where we’ll be staying on Friday night. There’s also a few other hotels in the same general area, so you could shop around, a bit, if you wanted, and I would (of course) do the drop off and pick up.

My main reason for going is to take a stab at the General test. My son will be trying for his Tech ticket, also. I’m not sure if either of us will be “ready” by then, but we’ll give it a shot, anyway. The secondary reason is just for the experience. This will actually be the first hamfest that I’ll be attending.

Two Meter Contacts

The holiday season has now come and gone, and I haven’t posed an update since the day before Halloween. I have talked to a few different people that are not from the area, since then. There were a couple people that were “passing through” or in the area for other things. Doug, from Texas was driving down the interstate and keyed up on the repeater. We talked for a short time, and left it at that.  Robert, from Bismarck was also passing through, and we talked for a bit. He and I realized that he was one of the VEs that was there when I passed my test, last summer.

Besides talking to the “normal” locals (using that term loosely, hihi), I have recently had QSOs with a couple other people from the area. A few days ago, Randall, from Bismarck, was actually getting into the local repeater from about 70 or 80 miles away. We talked for a while, before saying 73s. For such a long distance to the repeater, I heard him loud and clear. He told me he was using a vertical (not sure on the wattage) to hit it. I would have expected that he would be using a yagi to cover that distance, but I was wrong.

Another recent contact that I’ve had (a few of them, actually) is a newly licensed amateur in the area. Austin is very young, compared to some of the others around here, and that’s actually pretty exciting to me! From the things that we’ve talked about, he seems really interested in radio. That’s something that you don’t find a lot of, these days. I’m not going to blame the lack of interest of most other “younger” people on electronics, because in all actuality a lot of those electronics were made possible by radio amateurs. It’s nice when the ones that have an interest in how it works get into it, and really begin to realize the new things that are out there, and that there’s a lot of new stuff on the way. Some of the amazing new radio technology that is right around the corner will become the future of radio, and 99% of the population doesn’t realize where it’s going.

Twenty years from now, the average hamshack will be able to do things that seem unthinkable, now.

Eyeball QSO

While I was at work, tonight, made a completely random “eyeball QSO” with an amateur radio operator that I had never met, before. I work in a hotel, which gives me the opportunity to meet a “lot” of new people on a daily basis. I happened to be helping out at the front desk, tonight, when I saw a truck pull up under the front canopy. On the other side of the truck, I noticed what looked to me like a screwdriver antenna (when you’re a ham, antennas catch your eye). The base of the antenna was obscured by the bed of the truck, so I couldn’t see the whole thing.

As the man walked in the front doors, I asked him if that was a screwdriver antenna on the back of his truck, before I even looked at him. As I was finishing the question, I turned my eyes to him, and realized that he was wearing an ARRL shirt. Of course, we shook hands, and exchanged call signs, and he told me that it was actually a hamstick. He also told me that his wife was a ham, and told me her call sign (though I didn’t get to meet her).

I had my HT in the back room, and threw out my call on 146.52 and the local repeater a couple times, after that, but never heard from him on the radio. I’m sure he was in town for the rodeo finals, and I just assume that he wasn’t actually monitoring the radio because of that.

It was still pretty cool how virtually perfect strangers are able to connect because of a common interest. Even though I never actually talked to him on the radio, should I put it in the log book?

A Bad Name For Ham Radio

The title might suggest an anti-amateur radio stance, but that’s far from what I mean. There are certain places on the ham bands that seem to be the exact opposite of what the hobby is all about, though. One of these is 3840.00kHz, lower sideband. While there are some good conversations and ragchew, once in a while, there is also a lot of crap.

Here’s a sample from October 8, 2016 (NSFW):

A lot of the things that I hear on this frequency (luckily, it seems to be mostly limited to this frequency) are reminiscent of the way some people on CB radio used to be, back in the 1970’s and early 80’s. On 3840 kHz, it seems like nobody obeys the rules of amateur radio. Almost nobody identifies themselves… especially any “troublemakers”.

Definitely gives a bad name to ham radio, and everybody that plays by the rules. This is not how most amateur radio operators act, though.

Here’s another sample from the same night (again NSFW):

Do you have any other examples of people giving ham radio a bad name?

A New Mobile Hamshack

Last week, I found a new vehicle and like anybody that get’s a new vehicle, I’m really excited about the possibilities ahead. I had been “in the market” for a used conversion van for a couple months. I used to own a 1984 Ford conversion, and for some reason (probably gas mileage… it had a 351 Windsor), I traded it off about 15 years ago. I loved that old Ford, and all of the space that it had inside.

Over the past few years, my wife and I have been taking vacations to various places, for the purpose of “getting away from it all”. We would drive our crossover (Acura MDX) and sleep in a tent at various campgrounds. We had also become pretty good at boodocking in the back of the SUV in rest areas along the way. We love the mountains and forests of western Montana and northwest Wyoming. There’s a lot of other places that we plan to visit (and re-visit) in the future.

img_20161014_182005Anyway… last week, I bought a 1992 Ford Econoline conversion van. We had to drive about 300 miles to pick it up, then drive both vehicles back home. The van runs great, although it could use a tune-up. For a full-sized van, it gets amazing gas mileage, too (still working those numbers out). There are some mechanical things that I have planned, like a new exhaust (or, at least muffler), and some new tires before next summer’s trip. I also need to work on some of the van’s electrical “quirks”. Virtually everything in the van is “powered”… locks, windows, seats, interior lights, the bed/couch in the back… everything. Some of the coach electric is a little “weird”, though, so I’m going to run through all of the grounding points before I start eliminating some of the circuits, altogether. Bad grounds can cause some really strange things to happen in vehicles. Eliminating some of the circuits would be good, though, since I want to run things my way.

Before I bought the van, I had a couple mobile radios in my Dodge Dakota. Before I got the van, I thought about how much more room I would have to work with when it came to installing radios. I really liked the idea of a larger cab and more space for the electronics (not to mention the extra interior room in the back… that’ll be another post, down the road). What I really didn’t think about was the height of the van, and how that would effect the way I installed antennas. This past week, I’ve been thinking about different ways I could mount antennas, but none of the alternatives seems to be as optimal as mounting them with an NMO mount on the roof. I was just worried about the height, if I did that.

Tonight, I stepped outside, at work, and was thinking about it, again. That’s when I looked over to the corner of the parking lot and saw a Herzog rail testing truck. I realized how much higher the truck was, compared to the van, and realized that I actually have nothing to worry about. The Herzog truck, itself (with air conditioners) is 12′ 6″ high. On top of that, there were a couple antennas. My van is about 7′ tall, so even if I add an antenna that’s 5′ tall, it still wouldn’t be as high as that Herzog truck. It really just made me realize that I don’t need to think about any other way to mount antennas, as long as I am aware of the overall height of the vehicle with the antennas up there. A 5/8 wave 2 meter antenna or a full size K40 for 11 meters would work just fine.

Down the road, once I upgrade my ham license, I may want to add a screwdriver antenna, but I’ll cross that bridge when I get there. I already have ideas about that, though, so it shouldn’t be a big deal. From some of the things I hear on 3840.00 kHz, though, I won’t be pushing myself to upgrade, too fast. It’s like the “CB” frequency of ham radio… but then again, so is the 147.435 repeater in SoCal, at times. With as quiet as it is on our local 2 meter repeater, I sometimes tune in to listen to the “Los Angeles Renegade Repeater”, but then I realize how nice the peace and quiet is. I can only take so much of that.

Anyway… I’ll have more to come on the progress of the van. I plan on doing so much more that just add radios. I actually plan on converting it into a vacation and weekend camping van. Right now, it’s pretty much a stock Waldoch conversion. In the future, it should have most of the conveniences of home. My wife and I plan on living in it for about three weeks out of the year, during our vacations, so I plan on making it as comfortable as possible. Among others, I’ve been following Seth’s blog (check out this post and others) and his YouTube channel. From everything I’ve seen, I actually like the way he’s done his van build more than any others out there. I’m sure that I’d change a few things (due to the radios), but his setup really makes use of the space available. My only different consideration would be the windows that are in my van.

Already Wanting To Upgrade

I guess it’s already time for me to start studying, again. I knew that I wanted to upgrade my ticket, but I’ve recently got into something that’s making me want it, even more.

SDR (Software Defined Radio) is really an amazing thing that I have recently discovered. In the past, when I was really into the radio hobby, I had often wished for something that would allow me to receive a large section (and even multiple sections) of radio spectrum simultaneously. I might have even heard about something that did this, in the past, but it wasn’t very popular, then. Lately, there are more and more affordable ways for radio hobbyists to be able to listen to more than they were ever able to, in the past.

SDR is a receive-only platform that is used in conjunction with a computer. Through a matter of connecting various hardware and converters to a computer, then connecting antennas, you can listen to a very wide range of frequencies. Software that is used with SDRs also allows you to visualize the complete radio spectrum, so you can “see” what you want to listen to.

While I was looking at buying a new shortwave radio, I thought that I would just buy the things that I need for an SDR. Then, I discovered that I really didn’t need to invest all that money in the hardware and antennas, right now. “Jackpot” is what I thought!

Now, go check it out, yourself!