Re: [Elecraft] Elecraft CW Net Report
On Mon 27 Feb Kevin KD5ONS wrote: > There was another layer of noise, similarly varied. There was quite a good aurora active at around 2300z, seen over this side of the Atlantic at latitudes as low as the south of England. That might have added something to the noise... -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] Any KX2 or KX3 owners have experience with the IC-7300
On Sun 09 Oct wrote: > I am almost exclusively a CW operator. I have an old IC-706MK II that > drives me crazy trying to operate CW with all the clacking relays. > > I am looking at the IC-7300 as my potential field day and RV rig. Can > anyone who has used the IC-7300 for CW tell me if it still uses relays > or diodes for sending CW? It has a relay at least for TX/RX switching. It's nothing like as horrible as the old IC-706MK II but you'll want to be wearing enclosed headphones. It also does rather a lot via touch-screen, which can be a bit of a nuisance at times. -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] Elecraft CW Net Report
On Mon 18 Apr kevin wrote: > Conditions were worse than I had expected. Weaker signals, higher > noise, with moderate QSB. Everyone on twenty meters mentioned snow, > either actively falling or in the forecast. I have ferns pushing > through corn snow with bedraggled daffodils crushed flat to the ground. > The hummingbirds are guarding their feeder. Forty meters had more noise > with no signals. The sun is not being helpful. The difference an ocean makes... We (at almost 52 degrees North in IO80) have had temperatures over 20C in the last few days. Propagation has been variable, though. I did manage a fair number of SOTA chases over the weekend, but there have been a few radio black-outs thanks to solar flares in the last few days. There was one reported at around 2330Z yesterday, which is presumably the one that wiped out the 40 metre Net. There's been another reported at 0748Z this morning... -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] Why more power-efficient at or below 3 W?
That'd help to explain why I was able to eke a last QSO out of a fading battery by winding the power down (as mentioned in an article in this February's RadCom). It was the only SOTA summit-to-summit I managed that day, too! Of course, next time, I'll try to remember to charge ALL my batteries properly before setting off up to a summit, and then also put them ALL in my pack On Tue 26 Jan Wayne Burdick wrote: > There are two windings on the PA output transformer: 1:1 and 1:4. We > select one of these based on power level, battery voltage, and in some > cases, operating mode. > > In the 1:1 setting, the PA drain impedance is 50 ohms, making it more > efficient for at power levels, reducing current drain. > > In the 1:4 setting, the PA drain impedance is 12.5 ohms; the > transformer steps it back up to 50 ohms for the low-pass filters. In > this case it's more efficient at higher power levels, at the expense > of higher current drain. -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] RTTY for SOTA?
On Tue 18 Aug Wayne Burdick wrote: > If someone would like to experiment with this on a sked, I'd be happy > to give it a go. The 2020 SOTA Challenge is running different "Flavours" for the first seven UTC days of each month this year. As luck would have it, the flavour for September 1st-7th is datamodes. I'm pretty sure RTTY counts there. :) For more details see the announcement on the SOTA reflector at https://reflector.sota.org.uk/t/sota-flavours-challenge-2020/21808 with more at https://reflector.sota.org.uk/t/flavours-challenge-discussion/21953 and discussion of the previous datamodes week at https://reflector.sota.org.uk/t/datamodes-challenge-flavour-1st-7th-february-2020/22009 -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] Groundplane antennas (was: Re: Elecraft CW Net Announcement)
On Thu 30 Jul Bill Frantz wrote: > Steve Stearns, K6OIK has a article in the latest QST about the > effect of trees on 160M vertical antennas. It reads like it is > the first in a series about the effect of trees on antenna performance. > > It also mentions Jim, K9YC who has some direct experience, > living in a coast redwood forest. I tried operating on a summit covered by a timber plantation; lots of tall fairly straight trees fairly regularly spaced. A friend operating at the same time from a short distance away near the edge of the plantation, and using an 817 and a dipole, made rather more contacts than I did... -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] Groundplane antennas (was: Re: Elecraft CW Net Announcement)
Fred K6DGW wrote: > Yes, one radial is all you really "need," and Victor 4X6GP wrote: > Two radials is slightly less efficient than three or four, With only one tuned radial you've pretty much got a dipole, just in a slightly unconventional geometrical arrangement. I've used three radials for SOTA-type activations, with the vertical element supported by a fishing pole, but only on bands from 20 metres up, and experience suggests the arrangement works best when set up in the open. It certainly doesn't work as well when set up on a wooded summit with lots of straight-trunked conifers all around... -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] Elecraft CW Net Report
On Mon 06 Jul kevinr wrote: > I did hear some ESP code on 20 meters but not well enough to convince > me it wasn't just in my head. It happens now and then. Often when I'm > working and a squeaky fan is on. One of these years, perhaps, HF conditions will pick up to the point where my KX3 might just enable me to manage a Net check-in from this side of the Atlantic. Not yet, though. I have, on one or two occasions this year, just about almost managed to hear (maybe) the occasional SOTA activator operating from a summit on the eastern side of North America, but none yet clearly enough for me to work, though other operators in Europe (with better antennas and better Morse than me) have succeeded. > On the next call I copied M0YK M0YK M0YK.ÂI stared at the paper trying > to figure it out.ÂWith code this good why hasn't he upgraded to a G > call? Heh. Given, for the most part, G* calls were issued first, and M* (and 2*) calls only came along (for amateurs, at least) when the G* space was full, I'm not sure there's ever been a path to upgrade from M to G. There are chunks of the G* space that used to be "class B licences" (without HF access), but that distinction died with the Morse Test. There have been cases where folk have taken over a call from a silent-key relative, but they're unusual. For the most part, calls are never re-isssued. Recently the regulator has relaxed (or possibly "confused") conditions a bit, and released some calls that were previously marked as "not to be isssued" into the pool, but changing your call when you're not also upgrading your licence is, at best, tedious. At best, these days, the only assumptions you can make are that Foundation licence holders will have an M?3*, M?6* or M?7* (where the ? is the regional modifier) call, Intermediate licence holders will have a 2* call, and all the rest will have Full licences of some vintage. Even then, there are some short (1- or 2-letter suffix) calls that break the pattern. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Call_signs_in_the_United_Kingdom and one or two other places try to make sense of the whole muddle, but just when it seems they've nailed it some other confusion comes along... -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] OT: Australian fires
A few days back I heard that the area burned so far during this fire season in Australia could best be measured in terms of the size of Wales or Belgium. There are a fair few radio amateurs in VK putting their radio skills to work helping with the fire-fighting efforts. Wishing them all the best of luck. On Fri 03 Jan Wayne Burdick wrote: > Our thoughts go out to our Australian customers and their families, as > well as the thousands of other Australians affected by wildfires. > > California, too, has seen record droughts and wildfires in recent > years, so we can empathize. But the number of fires in VK as well as > their wide geographical impact appears to dwarf ours. > > Wishing you better luck in the new year-- > > 73, > Wayne > N6KR -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] Signing "/QRP"
On Thu 27 Jul j...@kk9a.com wrote: > I had no idea that signing /QRP was illegal in some countries. Different jurisdictions have different ideas about identification requirements, and licence wording is sometimes open to interpretation. For example: In the UK the licence says that operators "may use" certain suffixes. The only ones included are "/M", "/P", "/MM" and "/A". You could infer from the "may use" wording that these suffixes are permitted and that therefore all other suffixes are forbidden, or you could just assume that these four are picked out in the licence but there's no explicit prohibition against anything else being used. It would probably require a court decision to detemine which of those options actually applies. I have no desire to be involved in such a court case, so I'll use no suffixes other than the ones the licence says I "may use". In the Kenya licence, the wording is "shall use", which makes it clear that no other suffixes are permitted. The only suffixes mentioned in the licence are "/P" (for use at a temporary location), "/M" (for use when mobile) and "/MM" (for use when on a vessel at sea). If no suffix is attached to a Kenya callsign then the operator must be at their main station address, so, if you hear me signing as 5Z4/M0LEP then I'm at my mother's house (and nowhere else) and if I sign as 5Z4/M0LEP/P I'm elsewhere in Kenya. Log me as 5Z4/M0LEP when I've signed as 5Z4/M0LEP/P (or vice versa) and you'll have a busted call. and incidentally, all the contacts I've made as 5Z4/M0LEP/P have been using my KX3 with simple in-the-field antennas. ;) -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] OT Learning Morse anew
I only allowed myself to buy my KX3 after I'd completed a number of CW QSOs. I stumbled through most of them, but I confidently expected the KX3 would provide me with an incentive to improve my Morse, and I'd get better at it quite quickly. It didn't quite work out that way, though. I've had my KX3 since February 2013, and I'm still mostly stumbling along at sub-12wpm. I don't think there is any such thing as "The Perfect Method". I was sold on "Koch" (with a side order of "Farnsworth"), which some folk swear is the One True Way to learn Morse, but the Koch incremental approach turned out to be a complete waste of time for me. I suspect good teaching in a face-to-face class would probably have worked a lot better, but that sort of thing is pretty much impossible to find these days. The CWOps courses seem to get quite a bit of praise, and while they're not quite face-to-face (as they rely on something like Skype) they are at least led by real people rather than machines. Their main drawback is that they seem to have a waiting list well over a year long. At the end of the day, I expect improving your Morse mostly comes down to practice, practice, practice. Having that practice guided by an experienced teacher would probably help a lot. If you can, find some local experienced Morse mentors, listen to their advice, and then practice, practice, practice... and try to get out and operate at whatever speed you can manage. On Sun 11 Jun Jim Sr Sturges wrote: > I think I learned code all wrong. Can't ever seem to get my speed up. > > Surely some of the astute among you _know_ The Perfect Method, and I hope > you will share? -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) The Alchemist's Guild is opposite the Gambler's Guild. Usually. Sometimes it's above it, or below it, or falling in bits around it. -- (Terry Pratchett, Men At Arms) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] New Super Antenna? OT ish
Not too bad on the higher HF bands, but the more loading coil you need, the worse it gets. I suppose, if you make good radials for it and lay them out on nice dry ground, then you'll probably be pushing more signal out via them than via the antenna... and, like Jack, I've had *far* better mileage, particularly on the lower HF bands, with a pocket dipole held up by a glass-fibre fishing rod... -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) Cat: Do you speak Bulgarian? Lister: Bulgarian? Me? I can hardly speak English. -- [Red Dwarf 3/1] __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] New KX3 up & running.
On Wed 04 May Don Wilhelm wrote: > For those doing SOTA and operation from places where there are no > trees or other natural supports I prefer to carry a light-weight telescopic pole and a linked dipole, and not just for the better efficiency it offers; it also weights quite a bit less, even including the telescopic pole, pegs, guy lines, etc.. If space is a bit limited then the pole can always be used to support a random wire (or whatever) and the KX3's ATU gets to do a bit of work. -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] increasing CW copy speed: practice slow -v- practice fast
I think there's a selection effect; when someone learns Morse quickly and it becomes known that they're musically inclined then folk make a correlation. However, when musically inclined folk struggle to learn Morse their musical inclination is either dis-regarded, or they hear things like "You're musically inclined; you shouldn't have any trouble learning Morse." About half the musically inclined folk I know who have tried to learn Morse have struggled to make progress. For increasing my speed I've found working with systems that increase speed as an exercise proceeds to be helpful. The W1AW "Fast Morse" exercise that starts at 35wpm and gets slower is no use to me. On Tue 08 Dec Robert Harmon wrote: > I noticed that musically inclined folks seem to learn morse quicker. > I wonder why that is ? -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] KX3 - setting sidetone pitch
On Sun 30 Aug Ken Alexander wrote: I pressed PITCH and tried rotating the VFO A and B dials but moving them does nothing except kick you out of pitch mode. Press PITCH (under CMP) so that the pitch frequency appears in the B display, and turn the KEYER/MIC/PWR button to adjust the pitch. -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] Portable Power
On Mon 10 Aug David Bondy G4NRT wrote: Should I be looking at LiFePO4 batteries or Sealed Lead-Acid batteries? You'll find quite a bit of discussion of batteries on the SOTA reflector, but apart from the cost, I can't see any obvious advantages of using SLABs any more. Choose an appropriate LiFePo and you'll have a battery delivering more power at a more useful voltage with rather less weight in your pack... Things get a bit more involved if you intend flying to foreign parts. Again, lots of advice on the SOTA reflector. -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] K3 KX3 Memory Editing Utility (revisited yet again)
On Sun 26 Jul Matt Zilmer wrote: Since both functions are already available, That availability is limited. Windows is covered, and there's a beta version on Mac (which seem to work OK) but nothing yet for linux. It's a pity the function isn't included in the relevant Utility programs. -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] Miniature self-supporting HF antennas
(Consolidating replies to a couple of messages here...) The object of my exercise was not to measure the exact losses in the loading coil, nor to determine why it made such a poor antenna, but to determine which antenna would work best for the appropriate bands from a SOTA summit. The antennas under consideration were the loaded vertical (adjustable for all the bands required), a link-dipole (covering bands up to 15 metres), and various mono-band elevated ground plane verticals (one for each band from 20 metres to 10, though only 12 and 10 aren't covered by the dipole). I'd taken the loaded vertical on a couple of activations. One had been a reasonable activation (14 contacts on bands between 40 metres and 12 metres) and one had been a struggle (just 4 contacts, enough for the points, in over an hour and a half of calling on HF between 60 metres and 12 metres, with me resorting to CW for the last contact), but on both I'd noticed the reports I was being given were lower than I'd have expected. My friend could only help with the lower HF bands, so I have more confidence in those tests, and I wasn't expecting the loaded vertical to shine when compared to the dipole, but the magnitude of the difference was surprisingly wide. To give myself a baseline expectation I'd first tried contacting him with my (then) main 27ft tall vertical (which had some top-loading and a feed-point ATU), both with my main rig and the KX3 I planned to use to test the portable antennas. Somewhere I had detailed notes of all the numbers, but I can't find them. However, the QSOs are also in my log, and with the main rig at 100 watts we reported 5 and 9 both ways. With the KX3 at 10 watts we reported 5 and 7 both ways. I then took the KX3 outside to test the portable antennas, using it at the same 10 watt level. The best QSO on the loaded vertical has me giving him 5 and 1, and he giving me 3 and 1. On the dipole the log says 5 and 9 both ways. Some of that will be down to radiation pattern, height above ground, and so on, but it confirmed experience from the second summit mentioned above. Clearly, if I want to make contacts on the lower HF bands then the dipole is a far better bet. For the higher bands I had to rely on RBN and any contacts who happened to answer, so the comparison's a bit harder to quantify exactly. (RBN skimmers don't report every CQ, so you have to play games changing frequencies, and waiting, in order to get enough coverage.) However, as best I could figure, the loaded vertical was well down on the un-loaded mono-band ones as well as on the link dipole. Again, height above ground level will have had some effect. The loaded vertical has its own little tripod, so isn't far off the ground. The others all rely on telescopic fishing poles, so they're at least a few feet higher off the ground. In all cases the loaded vertical was worst, in some cases by a very large margin. At best (on 10 metres, which was clearly its best band) it was only 6dB or so so down on the elevated ground-plane vertical. That could be down to elevation, radials, the loading coil, or all three. I'd rather over-optimistically hoped that the self-supporting loaded vertical (total weight 1.5kgs) would do the SOTA job nicely. The dipole, a couple of verticals for the bands the dipole doesn't cover, pegs, guys, and a short (6 metre) telescopic pole weigh 2kgs in total. For SOTA purposes the loaded vertical was not worth carrying despite its (mostly) glowing reviews on eHam. Sure, I've made a few contacts with it from SOTA summits, so it wasn't totally useless, but the alternatives I now take are far better. Next time I'm tempted to make a link-dipole I'll make sure it has additional links for 10 and 12 metres so I can save myself the weight of the elevated ground-plane verticals I usually carry for those bands. On 21 Jul 2015 Wes N7WS wrote: If so, you are not determining the effects of loading coil loss On 21 Jul 2015 Mel, K6KBE wrote: does not tell you why one works better that the other one. -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] Miniature self-supporting HF antennas
That is exactly what I did, with the help of a friend a reasonable distance away with a reasonable S-meter, repeated antenna swapping, and a little help from skimmers on the RBN for control. I'm pretty sure the difference is real. I'd rather carry a lightweight telescopic pole with the means to guy it, and use an inverted-V dipole than trust that loaded vertical to get me contacts. On Tue 21 Jul Wes (N7WS) wrote: In other words, take measurements of antenna one, remove it and replace it with antenna two and note the change. Any other comparison is uncontrolled and suspect. -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] Miniature self-supporting HF antennas
So far, I've found nothing that comes close, and there's nothing more frustrating than getting to the top and then finding the antenna you have is doing a poor job. I now regard anything which relies on loading coils with deep suspicion. That coil's usually doing a fine job of converting RF to heat. One such antenna I tested against an inverted-V dipole turned out to be over 20dB down on the dipole for 40 metres. On Sun 19 Jul Wayne Burdick wrote: But the search for the ideal miniature HF antenna continues: something both very compact *and* highly efficient. Ideally it would break down to a length of 8 or less, do an excellent job on 20 meters and up, and earn a passing grade on 30 and/or 40 meters. -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] Miniature self-supporting HF antennas
Yes, I too prefer to get wire in the sky, and an inverted-V dipole works pretty well. I have one with link breaks in it so that it can quickly be changed for different bands (using 2mm or 3mm radio-control power connectors for the breaks because they're very small, light, and make a good connection), and a couple of fibreglass telescopic flag-poles. One collapses to about 18 inches so fits in a back-pack easily enough, and extends to 18 feet. The other (which only goes on shorter walks) is about 28 foot long when extended, and about 3 foot 6 inches when collapsed. That set-up, however, doesn't fit Wayne's breaks down to 8 inches ideal. On Mon 20 Jul Vic Rosenthal wrote: I prefer a dipole that can be configured as a sloper, V, etc. I have a 33' collapsible fiberglass pole that has been useful where there aren't enough trees. It's not really suitable for backpacking, but smaller and lighter ones are available. -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) Simony's eyes gleamed with the gleam of a man who had seen the future and found it covered with armour plating. -- (Terry Pratchett, Small Gods) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] Miniature self-supporting HF antennas
The one I got bitten by was the one reviewed here: http://www.eham.net/reviews/detail/1378 It isn't too bad for the top end of HF when most of the adjusting coil is not involved, but performance drops off dramatically once more than about a third of the adjustable coil is exposed. If you've got 100 watts (or more) to drive it with then I guess you might get somewhere with it, but with the KX3 it might as well have been a dummy load on 40 metres, never mind with the add-on coils for the lower end of HF. On Mon 20 Jul David Gilbert wrote: In general, properly built coils aren't nearly as bad as you say they are. It is possible to build coils with a Q of several hundred, and if you do the math you'll see that the resulting loss is essentially trivial. It all depends on the rest of the antenna, and yes, a very short antenna with a crummy coil in the wrong place is going to suck. But some of the best antennas on the market right now use coil loading very effectively. -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] Memory Manager for Linux?
Thanks. It seems to work well enough with my KX3 for me to fix up a few things. On Wed 15 Jul Rick M0LEP wrote: Thanks for the pointer. I'll give it a try. On Wed 15 Jul Walter K6WRU wrote: Forgot about that one. It is still in beta, but worth trying. http://dl2rum.de/rumsoft/Elecraft.html -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) The trouble with doing something right the first time is that nobody appreciates how difficult it was. -- Walt West __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] Memory Manager for Linux?
I too have had no luck getting the KX3 Memory Editor to run on either MacOSX or Linux (with a variety of emulators). I live in hope that the KX3 Utility (which runs just fine for me on MacOSX) will have the memory management functions added to it. On Wed 15 Jul Dick KA1OZ wrote: Don has it right regarding the Utility. I've been running it on various versions of Linux since I built my K3 (#859). The memory editor is interesting to me. I tried installing it under WINE, but all I got was a desktop icon. The program won't execute. It wants native Windoze, which I will not run. -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] Memory Manager for Linux?
Thanks for the pointer. I'll give it a try. On Wed 15 Jul Walter K6WRU wrote: Forgot about that one. It is still in beta, but worth trying. http://dl2rum.de/rumsoft/Elecraft.html On Jul 15, 2015, at 9:35 AM, David GM4JJJ wrote: Have you seen or tried this memory manager for the K3/KX3 for Macintosh? http://www.machamradio.com/blog/2015/3/3-k3-memory-manager -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] OT: Last post on time subject
On Thu 27 Nov Martin Sole (HS0ZED) wrote: Maybe the US is not as up to date as the rest of the world. :-) Here in the UK I've seen one network carrier adrift by several minutes on occasions, and it even missed a daylight savings change for a few days once. ;) Generally, networks aren't bad, but when operating away from base I figure the clock in my handheld GPSr is likely to be more accurate, and it'll tell me my QTH locator too. :) The clock in my KX3 is mainly for timing the battery charging. -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] KX3 na K3 Memory Editor help needed
On Sat 15 Nov Dick Dievendorff wrote: The program is a Windows executable, but several users have reported success with Windows emulators on Mac (Parallels, etc.). Some of them work some of the time, if you're lucky. I've found ones that deal with anything more than screen, mouse and keyboard tend to go belly-up with emulators. It's a great pity the memory editing isn't incorporated into the main utility programs for K3 and KX3, as they do work on Mac (and, I think, at least some flavours of Linux too). -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) Message ends...Engage coffee making mode. __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] BNCs
On Mon 13 Oct Jim Brown wrote: the o.d. of the male tip. Although I have not studied the mechanical Standard for 75 ohm BNCs, I would VERY surprised if the dimensions of a proper 75 ohm connector would prevent it from mating with a proper 50 ohm connector. Have you studied such a spec? I'm quite active in international Standards work (with the AES) and that sort of incompatibility is something we make certain to avoid! It's certainly possible, given a 75 Ohm male connector and a 50 Ohn female connector, to end up without good electrical contact on the central conductor, especially if you're dealing with cheap plugs and sockets. Been there, suffered the consequences. -- 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] Turning off list mail
On Wed 23 Jul Joseph Robertson wrote: *Can someone direct me to how to turn off list mail? * 1) Go to http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft 2) Look down near the end of the page for a field with a button saying Unsubscribe or edit options and enter the email address your list email goes to, then click the button. 3) That'll take you to a page where it asks for your password (and gives youthe option of a reminder). Enter your password and click Log in. 4) Assuming you got the password correct then you'll be taken to a page with a whole bunch of options. A little way down there's a section headed Your Elecraft Subscription Options. The very first one is Mail Delivery, and you can enable or disable it there. 5) Click Submit My Changes at the end of the page, and then Log out. and you're done. -- ... 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) A tagline: Go not unto Usenet for advice, for the denizens will say both yes, and no, and maybe, and I don't know, and f*** off, and -- [Unknown net.wit] __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] Which way to steer a new ham K2-KX3
On Mon 16 Jun KC6CNN wrote: What would you guys suggest? I know at least one person who's got a K2 kit still in its box even though he bought it years ago. I'd guess you don't want that happening. How about getting them hooked on (or at least figuring out whether they get anything from) building their own rigs by having them to build something that's almost disposable (say a RockMite or something equally small and inexpensive) first? When that works you can raise the bar a bit... -- ... 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] QRQ CW
On Wed 30 Apr DGB wrote: That's what the WARC bands are for, plenty of room there! ;-) Yeah, right... /sarcasm ;) I don't do contests, so I tend to take big contest weekends as weekends for doing something else; the contest bands will be jammed with contesters, and the WARC bands that are open will be jammed with contest-avioding folk, so why bother with the radio? After all, the contests will be over, and there'll be space on the bands, by Monday. As a Morse beginner (primarily motivated by Summits On The Air), anything from about 15wpm up is QRQ by my standards, and I won't bother trying to answer anyone going much over 25wpm, even if they are on a never-before-activated 10-point summit... and if I'm on a summit and have to resort to CW (and my Morse is not the best, so I usually only use it when SSB isn't getting me anywhere) then I'll most definitely ask for QRS. -- ... 73, Rick, M0LEP (KX3 #3281) __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
Re: [Elecraft] Percentage of KX3 owners who bought a KXPA100
On Fri 14 Feb Wayne Burdick wrote: Last bug was squashed yesterday :) I heard a song about that: http://steve.savitzky.net/Songs/bugs/ ;) ;) and more on-topic; I do plan to get a KXPA100 at some point, but other things are slightly higher on my radio-spend priority list: *) Getting a mast up in the garden *) Getting a beam on the mast in the garden *) Getting a rotator to turn the beam on the mast in the garden which saga might be twisted to fit Rattlin' Bog, but I don't think I'll bother, yet; it needs to be a far longer saga first. ;) -- ... 73, Rick, M0LEP __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
Re: [Elecraft] The Joy of QRP
On Thu 26 Sep Rick Johnson wrote: QRP puts the onus on the receiving station. No problem transmitting 5W. If you want to make contacts with a QRP station you need to pay a lot more attention to your antenna. You will likely make things a bit easier for the other end of the QSO if you push that 5 watts into a good antenna than if you push it into something that's more dummy load... Of course, your QRP station is also a receiving station, and a good antenna matters there, too. As we're fond of saying to our licence training course pupils; You can't work them if you can't hear them. I also use my KX3 as a home rig for SOTA chasing (and other things). Sure, it'll run to 12 watts on the home PSU, so not quite QRP, but you still need to make those watts count... -- ... 73, Rick, M0LEP __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
Re: [Elecraft] The Joy of QRP
On Thu 26 Sep Ron D'Eau Claire wrote: Y'know, most of the DX I work is on dead bands, usually 20 meters Yeah, QRP often has the best chance when the bands are dead. Once the big guns get the idea that a band is open QRP can get quite difficult. I was out on a SOTA summit yesterday with my KX3 trying to get another 12 metres challenge multiplier, and I could hear quite a bit of activity on the band, but wasn't able to make myself heard either when I called CQ or when I answered others' calls. -- ... 73, Rick, M0LEP __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
Re: [Elecraft] The Joy of QRP
On Thu 26 Sep Stephen Roberts wrote: at least you had a nice day in the great outdoors. which is at least half the point of activities like SOTA. It'd be nice if the summits nearest to me were more interesting, but I'd have to move house to make that the case. My latest adventure was a QSO with a station in Japan on 20m yesterday QRP sometimes throws in surprises like that. I don't think my antenna is up to it. Experimenting with antennas is a big part of the challenge. The KX3's ATU makes that a bit easier. One thing that's pretty much guaranteed is that the antennas you've cut and tuned to near perfection in your back garden will find some interesting way to behave when stuck up on a rocky summit, or wherever, and the ATU helps keep them in line... My main QTH antennas could do with a re-think, though. I dream of having something steerable with a bit of directionality... ;) the pleasure and challenge of low power QSO's makes up for the occasional inability to make a contact. Heh. First time I took a radio to Kenya, back in mid 2011 when the sunspots were all but absent, all I had was an FT817. Making contacts from there with 5 watts was quite hard work; I think I averaged fewer than two QSOs per day overall... -- ... 73, Rick, M0LEP __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
Re: [Elecraft] KX3 display question
On Wed 11 Sep Reginald J Mackey SR wrote: I would like to see comp and alc when I transmit. I have read the book. In voice and data modes (but not in CW mode) tapping KEYER/MIC toggles the meter between SWR/RF and CMP/ALC modes. -- ... 73, Rick, M0LEP __ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
