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Topics - NJQA

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62
Longwave Loggings / SAQ
« on: October 27, 2019, 1033 UTC »

I attempted to hear the transmission from SAQ (Sweden) on 17.2 kHz on the 24th but heard nothing.  I was watching the live stream on YouTube for the transmission, and I have started up enough large power plants to recognize that they were having problems.  Sure enough, they posted the following on their web site shortly afterwards:

“....No transmission on UN-DAY
We are sorry to inform that the “Old lady” was not able to start for the scheduled UN-Day transmission on October 24th, and therefore we will not be able to do any transmission. The overload protection for the main motor was tripping and we will start to investigate what is causing this.
The SAQ team at the Grimeton Radio Station....”

 
It was neat to see how much effort was necessary to operate the station. If you like things like watching someone start up an old steam engine locomotive, you will find SAQ fascinating.  I hope that whatever the problem is, it isn’t an “unobtainium” part.


63
Software / Free Pactor Monitoring Software from SCS
« on: October 17, 2019, 0918 UTC »
 From the ARRL:

http://www.arrl.org/news/view/pactor-developer-scs-announces-monitoring-software

 

“....PACTOR Developer SCS Announces Monitoring Software

10/15/2019

SCS, the company that created PACTOR, has unveiled software that offers the ability to monitor the content of PACTOR 1, 2, and 3 transmissions over the air. The free PMON software runs under the Linux operating system. A software version to monitor PACTOR 4 is scheduled to become available next year. PMON will offer “thorough observation and documentation of all presently available PACTOR 1, 2, and 3 transmissions,” SCS said.

“PMON covers all PACTOR levels with the appropriate speed levels and packet variations,” SCS said. “PMON will read in parallel PACTOR 2 and PACTOR 1. The very wide receiving range (frequency offset ±200 Hz), as well as automatic sideband recognition, ease routine operation of PMON with PACTOR 2 and PACTOR 3 considerably.”

According to SCS, only minimal hardware is required to use PMON. The equipment complement includes a Raspberry Pi 3 Model B+ (minimum) computer and a USB sound device. SCS noted in an October 11 news release that all SCS PACTOR hardware modems include a command to allow PACTOR monitoring on the fly. The German company says PMON now makes this possible without a modem and adds the ability to decode B2F/LZHUF-compressed messages — Winlink email and others.

“This exciting new software development for Raspberry Pi complements and surpasses previously released SCS software that leveraged PACTOR modems’ ability to monitor PACTOR to read Winlink for meaning,” SCS said. The company also said the new software permits modem-less monitoring of all kinds, something that would be useful for monitoring Winlink email traffic.

The Winlink Development Team called the new software a “welcome contribution to the Amateur Radio community.”

The issue of message encryption arose in recent months with respect to renewed attention to ARRL’s so-called “symbol rate” petition for rulemaking (RM-11708) and the accommodation of automatically controlled digital stations (ACDS) — many of which employ Winlink. Some commenters on ARRL’s petition expressed concerns that PACTOR message encryption was a violation of FCC Amateur Service rules.....”

 

64
ID and Translation Requests / VLF and LF
« on: October 04, 2019, 1824 UTC »
I've been listening to VLF and LF transmissions today and I am trying to identify some of the signals.  NAA. NML, and NLK seem pretty obvious.  However I am hearing digital broadcasts on the following frequencies that don't seem to appear on any of the lists.  Is anyone else seeing transmissions on these frequencies, or maybe I am just hearing local RFI?

22.75 kHz
45.5 kHz
68.25 kHz
91.0 kHz

One list mentioned that there may be a station, WH2XBA/4, Stanfield, NC, on 45.5 kHz.


65
Equipment / New AOR receiver
« on: September 09, 2019, 0955 UTC »
New AOR receiver announced for scanning the aircraft bands.  I expect that it won’t be cheap.  I wonder what market they are targeting this for?

https://www.universal-radio.com/catalog/scanners/1740.html

67
Longwave Loggings / LF propagation
« on: July 09, 2019, 0907 UTC »
The August 2019 issue of QST has an interesting article on LF propagation.  The author analyzed his experiences on NDBs over 3 years.  I haven’t looked at the article in depth yet but two of his takeaways for his Texas QTH were that the best month was October and that the sunrise enhancement provided the best reception.

68
HF Beacons / "D" 13527.7 kHz
« on: April 23, 2019, 2032 UTC »
Heard with slow "D", CW, on 13527.7 kHz, 2027 UTC on 23 April 2019.  Maybe RST 549.

RX: KiwiSDR in Midland, VA.  Antenna: 80M OCF dipole.

72
VHF/UHF Logs, including satellites and radiosondes / Oscar 100
« on: February 14, 2019, 1005 UTC »
Qatar Oscar 100 is open for experimental usage and there is a lot of activity.  This is the first geostationary ham radio satellite transponder and is not visible in North America.  Uplink is on 2 Ghz and downlink is on 10 Ghz.

You can listen to the narrowband transponder at:

https://eshail.batc.org.uk/nb/


73
22 Meter Band HiFER Beacons / unknown 13556.79 kHz
« on: February 05, 2019, 2159 UTC »
Unknown 22M beacon, weak and slow fades, 2150Z 5 FEB19, 13556.79 kHz.  Intermittent dots and dashes, mostly I, T, A, D, E, N but no clear pattern.  Reminds me of the morse sent by the window shade and coke bottle in the old "On the Beach" movie...

74
HF Beacons / “A” beacon
« on: January 28, 2019, 0827 UTC »
“A” beacon, very weak and at noise level.  2097.3 kHz at 0823Z on 28JAN2019.  About 10 seconds between the “A”s....

Rx: kiwiSDR/80M OCF dipole/Midland, VA.

75
Shortwave Broadcast / R. Thailand
« on: January 25, 2019, 1231 UTC »
R. Thailand on 9940 kHz, 25JAN2019, in Malaysian.  Sig fair (better than RNZ heard earlier on 31M today) with no QRM.  Announcement of end of broadcast in English, followed by carrier drop at 1215Z.

Carrier return at 1227Z, followed by English language broadcast at 1230Z.

Rx: KiwiSDR/80M OCF dipole/Midland, VA

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