Labels: QSO

- posted by Leigh @ 07:21 z 0 comments

Labels: QSO

- posted by Leigh @ 07:14 z 0 comments

Labels: QSO

- posted by Leigh @ 07:13 z 0 comments

Labels: QSO

- posted by Leigh @ 07:05 z 0 comments

Labels: QSO

- posted by Leigh @ 00:04 z 0 comments

I built the NESCAF Switched-Capacitor filter from New England QRP. I put it in a case from QRPKits, and it just barely fits. I broke the DPDT switch trying to bend a tab (don't do that), so I will have to replace it. I also made the holes for the two pots a bit close together, so it looks a little beady eyed. Two more holes to go.

It still picks up KGO when I hook it up to my K2 and the 550' loop. I've noticed LM386's seem to do that around here. Maybe it'll be better when I get it in the case.

Labels: kits

- posted by Leigh @ 04:59 z 0 comments

Labels: QRV

- posted by Leigh @ 00:54 z 0 comments

One of my ham friends from childhood, Bob Lee, died yesterday. Bob moved to town when I was a little kid, and brought with him tons of engineering books, equipment, and stories from his days at Aerojet General in Sacramento, California. For about ten years, every Saturday morning, my father and I would visit Bob. He was always ready to teach me something, or listen to my latest ill-informed theory, either at his house or by telephone.

Bob was an inveterate tinkerer, first with radio and later with small computers and finally software. Bob had the first micrprocessor I ever used, a Fairchild F8, and he had it hooked to a Model 33 TeleType. I remember studying the machine instruction card, trying to think of what to do with it. I think we finally added two bytes together, and were sure it wasn't working, becuase it was done before the carriage had returned and the paper had fed a line.

Bob had retired from Aerojet after brain surgery left in paralegic, and eventually the ensuing infirmities caught up with him. I miss those Saturday morning visits.

- posted by Leigh @ 20:58 z 0 comments

Labels: QSO

- posted by Leigh @ 23:07 z 0 comments

ARRL Reports:

End of an Era: FCC to Drop Morse Testing for All Amateur License Classes
... In an historic move, the FCC has acted to drop the Morse code requirement for all Amateur Radio license classes. The Commission today adopted, but hasn't yet released, the long-awaited Report and Order (R&O) in WT Docket 05-235, the "Morse code" proceeding...the FCC only issued a public notice at or about the close of business today and not the actual Report & Order, so some details -- including the effective dates of the two orders -- remain uncertain. Currently, Amateur Radio applicants for General and higher class licenses have to pass a 5 WPM Morse code test to operate on HF. Today's R&O will eliminate that requirement all around.

The US joins Canada and other countries in eliminating the morse code testing requirement, after being authorized to do so on July 5, 2003, when the World Radio Telecommunications Conference 2003 in Geneva adopted changes to the ITU Radio Regulations.

- posted by Leigh @ 07:34 z 1 comments

Labels: kits

- posted by Leigh @ 07:27 z 0 comments

I operated in the 160M Contest with my K2 at 5W and 550ft loop.

Labels: QSO

- posted by Leigh @ 05:40 z 0 comments

I played Spacewar on the PDP-1 at the Computer History Museum. Steven Russell was there, I got to ask him some questions. They also had some PDP-1 music, but had lost the original music program so wrote a new one to play the old music.

Minskytron on the PDP-1. It seems to be a three-body simulation that eventually goes chaotic, perhaps because of limited precision in the simulation.

PDP-1 screensaver.

Becky and a PDP-10.

- posted by Leigh @ 03:40 z 0 comments