******** The Official amateur radio thread ********

Slowly,taking in everything.
Good luck. I certainly had the most fun doing my intermediate, mainly because it was pre-covid and I was down at the club learning to solder (less badly!).
'Full' was a bit of grind for me, as I'm no mathematician, but I got through it.

Do you have a club near you?
 
Was hoping to have a play in the EU PSK contest today but conditions have been utterly awful.

Despite SSN and SFI being nice and high, a Kp index of 5.7 for a big chunk of the day didn't help.

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But I've documented my new shack clock on my blog so that's a positive.

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Been listening to reflector 38C on d-star today as that's the one used by people heading to and from Dayton and it's been quite interesting. I see Kenwood have announced their new handbag, the TH-D75. I've been seriously looking at a new handheld recently and although it's going to be stupidly expensive, I may well consider one of those later this year. I'm not a huge fan of the digital voice modes but d-star is the one I dislike the least. I've got a DMR handy and I only ever use it for normal FM analogue.

Also planning to start my aerial build in the next couple of weeks. I've got everything I need now.
 
Worked the guys on Rockall (EU-189) on 15m CW about an hour ago, a real 579 here. They're only there for a couple of days. Cam is intending on staying for sixty days but the wireless chaps are just there briefly.

 
Gimme the bad news concisely please, not in Ofcom verbosity :)
There are some dumb ideas in there like allowing people to change their callsigns when they feel like it and for anyone to be able to run a repeater with no NoV or co-ordination.

On the other hand, Novices get 20W, Intermediates get 100W, Full licences get 1000W (all these on primary bands).

Going back to only allowing people to hold one callsign, so when they progress through, the old one is revoked (how it used to be).

Making regional identifiers optional, allowing 2x callsign holders to switch to M8 or M9 if they want.

Read the document, Chris. It's a consultation so well worth a look, it's not all in legalese.

Responding is going to take me a while. Might need more paper :D
 
OK Feek, thanks for taking the time, `er indoors (the mythical wife) is having one of her "soirees" in the garden so I am under instruction to make it look pretty..... The forecast suggests rain tomorrow, so I can see me getting some grief for not having God's ear re the weather.

As people can change gender and even become a different species I suppose changing call signs isn't too bad, Probably something OFCOM see as a fairly straightforward button pushing money maker.

I'll get into it on Sunday, when peace hopefully reigns again :)
 
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Pete's removed it but I waded through the .pdf and I agree with what may become vanity call signs <cough, can't say too much there, can I?> and hundreds of repeaters.

Meanwhile:

http://www.chriswilson.tv/DATV-HD-CHESS.ts

This was recorded live here from the satellite as someone in Italy transmitted it. Updates and fine tuning of ffmpeg and stuff now gets this sort of quality

VLC will decode and run .ts files
 
This was recorded live here from the satellite as someone in Italy transmitted it. Updates and fine tuning of ffmpeg and stuff now gets this sort of quality
Superb video. I've actually got Voyage Voyage on 12" single that I bought back in 1989 ;)

Pete's removed it but I waded through the .pdf and I agree with what may become vanity call signs <cough, can't say too much there, can I?> and hundreds of repeaters.
I've updated the link.

Make sure you fill in the consultation document with your comments, Chris. The more that do, the more chance there is of getting the slightly bonkers proposals rejected.
 
Superb video. I've actually got Voyage Voyage on 12" single that I bought back in 1989 ;)


I've updated the link.

Make sure you fill in the consultation document with your comments, Chris. The more that do, the more chance there is of getting the slightly bonkers proposals rejected.

So that's what the song's called? I have heard it before and like it, but had no idea what it was.

I'll be sure to take the time to comment on the proposals. Can I get banned by OFCOM if I get a bit naughty? ;)
 
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Mast as been lowered, Hexbeam removed and I've started building the new mast top.

I've got the initial stub, the tilt plate, the SteppIR boom and then an extension pole with a new ADS-B aerial mounted on the top, that's 48 ft above the ground.

RiEr5a2.jpeg


Everything's all wired up, new coax on the aerial, controller cable etc, all with the new chokes and cables all tidied up nicely in the shack.

I've got one more step to do on the element housings but the aerial I've got is a slightly different version to the latest manual so I've been assembling it in a bit of a mixed fashion. Hoping to get the final brackets on this week with it all being completed next weekend.
 
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