Ham Radio Activity - New Licensee in the Household M7ELC - M0YKS Mini Tower Competition

Well its been far too long since i posted here so I thought I best sort that out. What have I been doing lol. Lots of radio including livestreams, a few repairs and plenty of work. You might have seen on my YouTube channel that my eldest daughter Elsie has now become one of us and now holds her own Call sign at the sweet age of 10 years (only just as well). Her Mum M3TLL, Sister and I are all very proud of her amazing achievement. We have been working together throughout lockdown teaching Elsie and she has been an awesome student that's for sure! Well done M7ELC - Elsie.

As well as playing plenty of radio I recently achieved the QRZ DX100 using only a microphone and antenna no digital modes or internet! 

I have also had a bit of time to take down the satellite antennas and rotator for a 5 year service. This went well, I since refit the installation in a different more accessible location to the side of my QTH as well as replace a broken reflector and change the polarisation from horizontal to vertical which has made a massive improvement on all of the satellites. I am now booming into both FM and SSB Satellites and receiving excellent NOAA weather images. I am looking forward to ISS switching back across to the repeater which is due to happen in the next couple of weeks.

Satellite Rotator YAESU G-5500, 5 Element Yagi 145 MHz , 15 Element X Yagi 435-437MHz - The Latest Position a few feet lower but working much better than before. 

Radio propagation on HF has been much better and I am spending more and more time on the higher portion of HF such as 20m again and really making the most of the late night DX openings into North and South America and the Caribbean. I have had some great reports from Argentina and beyond and currently I am chasing Master Of Radio Communication - South America award. I have a way to go as I am at 54% so far.

Finally over lock down I have done lots of hours live on YouTube operating Ham Radio and amazingly the subscription numbers have doubled I am currently at around about  2.42K and climbing. So as a thank you to each and everyone for watching, following and keeping me sane through a couple of long a difficult lockdown periods I have decided to make a second mic stand. This one has been improved and will be given to a lucky competition winner which will be happening on my Sunday night Live check in (tomorrow). I will also post the competition here with an entry link. Keep an eye out from tomorrow eve late.... The comp will be open for a week or so and is free to enter. Good luck.

This is the finished off Prize -  One Mini Lattice Tower with a Mic Clip and Separate PTT switch which needs wiring to your radio mic PTT input. The Heil GM-5 is NOT included lol Its just to give you an idea of what to expect. the Mic stand will hold most studio microphones. Good Luck!

Nice QSL on 40m Using the Hustler 6BTV and Radials Cut For 40m

 

Another successful improvement to the station this winter was putting some 12 ft radials at the base of the Hustler 6BTV antenna. Since I did the performance has greatly improved with regular DX contacts into Monserrat in the Caribbean, Canada and USA. Chris GM4ZJI was the one who told me to try the 1/8th wave radials which work amazingly well. Thanks Chris!!! As you can see the signal on the QSL card from Adam KA1KA is not 5/9, the band was quite poor so that is why I am over the moon to make the QSO and QSL with the 6BTV. My fan dipole on 40m is very similar in performance, almost as good but slightly down on outgoing signal with about 5-10 db less signal reports back in. (just for info).

40 - 80 Meter Fan Dipole with 1:1 Balun Review

Greetings and hello, hope all is well. Since I built the 40-80m Fan dipole antenna I have been much more active on the 80m band, this antenna with its 1:1 balun has been receiving many excellent signal reports from both short and long skip local and DX. 

The SOTA wire is an excellent radiator and combined with a 1:1, 50 ohm balun which I bought  a Diamond BU-50 rated to 1200 watts seems really good despite its small physical size, it appears to be working very well so far with 400 watts. I am pleased to report it has not shown any problems or issues over the winter months where we have had lots of snow and ice. The homebrew 40-80M FAN DIPOLE, YES! I would definitely recommend. Also, I recommend fitting a balun to any dipole made for HF as it does help to prevent unwanted RF return and reception interference that is often picked up on the feed line. Since I fitted the balun, I have noticed a positive difference whilst using it. The dipole seems to be a very good performer all round on the 80m band and I have been hitting North and South America as well as Asiatic Russia and North Africa up on the DX portion of the band over the winter months as well as booming up and down the UK and across to EU. This winter has been really good on 80m since I built the 40-80 Fan Dipole, much better than my previous antenna set ups. I am glad I went to the effort, well worth it and it was easy and inexpensive. Have a look at the homebrew 40-80 fan dipole video if you want to see how I made it with all of the dimensions. Its on my YT channel or further down the blog posts.

I hope to hear you later maybe on the 80m band during my Sunday night live check in, on my ham radio YouTube channel from around about 22.00 utc (10pm Local). It wont be long before 20m is back in full swing each evening and the DX will be plentiful so I best get on 80m a few more times  before hand and work a few more amazing stations. Thank You for all of the Calls, keep them coming in!  73. 

2021 Ham Radio Fun!

A very late Happy new year to each and everyone,  I hope you are all keeping well and safe as we enter another year over shadowed by this dreadful virus. Once again I am working online with my students rather than being in the welding and fabrication workshop where I belong. Despite the chaos there is plenty of fun and laughter in the household and I have also been very active on the ham radio bands. My log has never looked so healthy and I have been making many QSO meeting some great guys and girls on the air. 

The last few months have flown by and I now seem to be live streaming both welding sessions and ham radio from the shack. Every Sunday evening I have been live on YouTube working lots and lots of other radio amateurs on 80 and 40m as well as up on 20m when conditions permit. Its started to become a weekly ritual and I have almost formed a virtual gathering of regular friends via the YouTube channel stream and of course on the air. It is a real pleasure to finally get to meet/make qso with so many of you guys and girls that have been following my ham radio antics. The weekly check in is becoming very popular and I would like to thank each and everyone of you for making the effort and trying to call in. 

The weekly check in usually happens after I settle down my two fast growing daughters and get them into dream land. I try to get on the air for 22.00 utc and sometimes a little bit earlier if at all possible. Each week the number of callers seems to be growing and last nights live stream was great fun with a mini pile up at one point. 

My good friend and fellow blogger/youtuber Bas PE4BAS was one of the many super contacts that I made last night and as ever was coming in superb with an arm chair copy. Many of you guys come through exceptionally well on my recently home brewed 40/80 fan dipole. Its certainly working very well for me and with the 400 watts I have been hitting the USA and Caribbean on a regular bases, its fantastic to work so many great operators from around the world and see so many regulars on the live stream chat. There are too many great guys and girls to start naming everyone but please keep it up guys as I am really enjoying the fun and banter. 

Some of my favourite contacts have been with Barry - G6JMX, Chris - GM4ZJI, Jimbo - G1JSP, Michael - W3MLJ, Brayden - KC1KUG, Marija - YU3AWA and Frankie - VP2MNI. But in all honesty you have all been top guys and girls and have really helped me to de-stress in the current lock down situation. I cant wait to catch up with all of you and some of you that have been trying but not quite made it through yet.

See you all next Sunday around about 22.00 zulu for some more fun in the shack live and direct on my ham radio YouTube channel.

Here is a sneak peak of what kind of craziness we get up too.

Once again a Big Big Thankyou to all callers/friends that have made the evening so much fun. If you haven't managed to join in yet I hope to catch up with you soon.

In the meantime keep playing ham radio or SWL or CB or what ever it is that makes you happy and helps to pass the time in lock down. Stay safe and best 73 as ever de M0YKS Simon

ARISS SSTV Award - ISS

Greetings friends and followers around the World! 73 Seasons blessings and good will and health to each and all! Merry Christmas!

I received a nice diploma on Christmas day for receiving SSTV images which commemorate 20 years of onboard amateur radio activity. It was easy enough to obtain via ARISS SSTV Award link. 

Here is an earlier one from the Sputnik series.

Its great fun receiving images from ISS and can easily be decoded using MMSTV free software on your pc. There are a few apps for phones and tablets that work well also. Check out my latest video as I decode ISS SSTV images if you want to see how easy it is.

 Also if you like that you might want to decode weather satellite images which is a very similar method apart from you need a slightly more complicated decoder which again is free and is called WXtoImg

Above is a recent image from NOAA 18 below is a video showing how I successfully decoded the weather image.

Keep yourself amused this Christmas as we all stay safe, have a go at decoding its lots of fun... Merry Christmas, 73, see you soon! Be healthy! 
 

73... Season Greetings To All

What a year we have been having with little sign of any significant change as of yet. Some of the  Positives of this year for myself  Have to of been Ham radio. I have  met many new amateurs and SWLs since lock down began on the air and online, I formed a Facebook group and doubled my YouTube subscription. Also I carried out maintenance on all of my antennas and made a new one along the way. 

Ham radio has been a great choice of passtime this year and I would like to thank all of you guys and girls, new friends and old friends for all comments and encouraging feedback that helps keep me going. HAVE A MERRY CHRISTMAS everyone ❤.

This week was my last working week at college, I'm finally on holiday for two weeks and hope to get on the bands. Earlier and through the week I have been active and I was also able to make a few videos of some of my qso and radio fun. Catch up on my YouTube channel. This week I worked some mobile and base HF, Satellite and ISS. I even decoded a couple of NOAA weather Satellites. I received an award for working 5 YOTA Stations which was cool 😎 

Hope to catch up with some of you soon on air or online. In the meantime stay safe and healthy and have a restful but enjoyable Christmas 🎄 from M0YKS and family. 

New Antenna Switch

I noticed a swr variation when I switched between my dipole and vertical hf antennas. The swr reading on my Hustler 6btv was 1:6 and I noticed that when I switched back to it sometimes it was up to 2:0. I played around with the switching mechanism and sure enough it was back to 1:6. The next step was a quick inspection of the internal contacts and switch housing. I noticed that the central spindle was worn and this was allowing the switching pole to lean slightly towards the dipole pick up point. The slight movement rectified the closeness but the switch was well worn through years of operation. So I treated my station to a new better quality replacement as seen below. 

my old switch has served me well but the new high power Avair switch has better isolation and is much nicer to operate. 

I hooked it up and to my pleasure saw the SWR fall to 1:4 which is even better. Let's hope this nice neat upgrade has a good long lifespan as it seems pretty cool on day one of operation. 73 stay healthy! 

Home brew 40-80 Balanced Fan Dipole

Hi All! Hope you are keeping safe... We are in the same position as most regarding lock down and other than going to work I have been stuck indoors a lot lately. So, off outside into the garden it was and antenna building time once again was here. 

I decided to replace the prototype 40/80 fan dipole that has been in use since the end of spring. It has been working really well even though I made it from some random used wire, I bought three reels of SotaBeam military spec heavy duty wire which come in 50 meter reels. The wire is stainless coated multi strand 50 ohm and is in a low impact green colour. It is very good for antenna elements or radials and solders up nicely. 

I also decided I wanted to try out this new build double dipole with a suitable 1:1 balun that would help prevent unwanted coaxial line transmission and also help reduce unwanted reception noise on the feed line from random electrical sources nearby. The balun also helps to isolate the returning RF at the feed point and balances the dipole elements to 50ohm, as well as helping to produce a more effective radiation pattern on the transmit signal generated.

I looked into making my own, but in my possession had a gift voucher to spend on Amazon. So I opted for a commercially built balun capable of handling my 400 watts. I ended up with the Diamond BU-50A which is a really neat piece of kit.

I made a step by step video on how to make your own 40/80 fan/balanced double Dipole, If you want to have a go watch the video below. 

Step by step how to make a 80/40m Fan Dipole with 1:1 Diamond BU-50A Balun

The result is great! I have 1:1 - 1:5 across the full 80m band without any need for an ATU and the same  1:1 - 1:5 also on 40m after a slight adjustment. I had made the antenna slightly longer and had to cut the legs equally to achieve the best match. The reception clarity has improved on both bands and the noise has lowered in strength. My out going signal as ever, is good to go and I will be DX hunting over the winter months! Thanks for passing by catch you soon. 73 Stay safe!

Autumn - Winter HF DX - What to expect

 

As we move into the last couple of months of 2020 which has been defiantly a year to remember for obvious reasons, we can look forward to getting back down to the lower HF bands such as 80m.

I really enjoyed the winter DX last year and made plenty of good qso across to USA, Canada, Caribbean and South America whilst operating on the 80m band.

This year I have the 40m/80m home brew Fan Dipole which has already proven to be an awesome asset to my HF station. For those of you that have been coming back to my call on the regular YouTube live streams you have already sampled its performance h.i. Thanks for the super qso's guys, I look forward to catching you all again over the weekend this coming Saturday evening about 10.30pm local (21.30 utc).

So, the homebrew Fan Dipole worked out well for me. I must admit I am quite impressed with it, I have some brand new SOTA beam wire reels in my possession which at some point will be used to build a brand new replacement which will be cut to the same length and installed to the same fixing points and configuration. At present the Fan Dipole is up at 30ft with each leg fixed in a straight line face North to South with a total length of 131 ft. The SWR on both bands 40 and 80m is 1:1 - 1:4.

This week I made a 80m DX qso across the pond and worked Big Gun remote Op Ray W2RE on the DX portion of the band. I was 5/7 at rays end and it was quite early in the evening over at my QTH and daylight in the USA. I have also worked into Canada recently and heard other North American signals coming in well recently. I am expecting plenty of decent signals from now on as we draw closer into the winter months down on the 80m band which I will use the Dipole and amplifier to make some good DX. I will also enjoy hearing the old timers make DX in the early mornings as i eat breakfast and drown myself in coffee. This is almost a religion for me during the 80m DX season and I hear the same 80M DX chasers year in and year out. I enjoy hearing them on their switchable four square arrays and obviously when they are far away and exotic I love trying to work them. Its a good time to get on 80m if you haven't done it before and listen to how some of the seasoned DX operators work others, they also will be interesting DX nets on an evening run by experienced radio amateurs out of Europe and North America. Most of these radio amateurs will come back to your call if you follow the DX code of conduct which is basically be patent, polite and listen for your opportunity to call. Sometimes you wont hear the stations that they will be hearing so you have to sit on the side and listen for a while first. Its great fun and like I said already well worth trying out if your new and haven't yet.

 Other bands such as 40m are generally good for DX all day and night during the next coming season and again the 40/80m fan dipole seems to be a kick ass antenna for me so far. I also have the 6 band vertical - Hustler 6BTV and recently refit a new tube section to the bottom 10m element/section. This vertical has served me well and definitely works well with a few radials. I like it a lot and it sometimes has the edge over the dipole on the 40m band. As for 80m its a great receiver but is narrow banded on transmit meaning the use of ATU is necessary.

20m is up and down but has been providing some good DX openings here and there so I will be always listening around the band for activity. The same goes for 17m through to 10m, catch it when its there and always worth a quick check. With a bit of luck the FM repeaters from the USA will be coming through up on 29MHz if we get any propagation. Its another great thing that happens from time to time during the winter months.

That's about it for now, hope your all keeping well and staying safe as possible. I am working back at College fulltime and really enjoying the company of my learners. We are working as safely as possible and at the same time trying to get on with life which is a lot more interesting than when I had to stay home back in full lock down. Our region is classed as ''high risk'' and a few staff and students have been affected but thankfully all have made full recoveries with nothing two terrible whilst being ill. We have masks on and welding headshields with extraction and the cleanest hands you have ever seen on a welder so with a bit of thought, consideration and common sense we should hopefully continue on through the other side eventually. 

Look forward to catching up with some of you on the bands and of course YouTube! Thanks for passing by my old time blogg. Have a great weekend!

de Simon M0YKS

Lots of ISS and Satellite activities as HF is quiet

 Hi everyone I hope all is well? It's been a couple of weeks since I last posted so thought I'd drop by and update you of some of the activities I have been getting on with.

First I will start with the card I received this morning confirming a great qso with ON3ONX who was worked via SSB Satellite XW-2A. 

Over the past fortnight I spent a number of evenings trying my hardest to get into the new ISS repeater, I have probably tried around about 50 passes which I would say out that I made a qso 5 times giving me a 10% success rate. At first I thought I had an issue at my end but soon realised that the majority of stations in the UK and N.W Europe that were getting in each time (the same stations) are in fact running higher power than myself. This of course is quite unnecessary as well as out of order lol. I guess some people are so desperate to make it their own personal repeater hi hi that 300w is acceptable. I cranked it up to 50w and still struggled and at one point went the whole hog of 85w to try prove a point - still did not get in lol. 

2M0SQL- Peter who has a great satellite station dropped me a message informing me that the squelch level onboard ISS has been turned up high. This would explain why the up-link signals are struggling to open the repeater up and when they do work, cut out a lot.  Thanks for the info Peter. 

The other earth orbiting satellites such as AO-91, SO-50, XW-2A and RS-44 have been absolutely solid at my end. I have really been enjoying myself working lots of amateur stations on these satellites and I did manage a DX contact via RS-44 into Canada where I worked VE1VOX - Dana. That was cool!

My 145MHz Yagi has been vandalised by our feathery friends and I have lost half of my reflector when a big Owl decided to adjust their perch. I haven't noticed any detrimental changes to performance other than it looks and is annoying lol,  maintenance and repair/replacement is planned for the end of the month when I get the half term holiday. 

Everything else apart from HF propagation seems to be going well, I am flat out at work teaching the latest generation of welder fabricators which is great despite wearing a face mask all day for protection against the dreaded C19. 

I also did a bit more work on the tower I started a while back and finally brought it home to complete the bits and pieces at home in my spare time (if I get some lol). The plan is to fit a tilt over bracket and tube clamp to allow a telescope type height adjustment.

So that is about it for now, Oh i almost forgot.... I have been banging out lots and lots of videos on my Ham radio YouTube channel so if you haven't seen them all yet lol why not take a look! My channel is growing in popularity lately and I want to thank everyone for their support with this. I know some of you have been there from the beginning and I value your loyalty a lot! Thanks guys and girls. 

Hope to catch some of you soon! have a lovely weekend all 73 de M0YKS Simon

Amateur Satellite Bands

 Its been just over a month since I purchased the COM 232B antenna rotator interface. 

The neat little box sits nicely on my G-5500 control unit and is hooked up to my Windows 10 PC running Orbitron and WiSP DDE tracking software.

The auto tracking of the antenna has made making a contact into the satellites much easier allowing me to focus on the reception and uplink signal out from my FT-847. I am looking at the next step which is configuration of the cat control for auto frequency doppler correction but at first glance its a bit of a faff and is not something I have the time to commit to setting it up properly at the moment. However, I spent a couple of hours last night trying to get it functioning on Orbitron but had no success so far. I more than likely will have to try something else if I want the auto frequency control, possibly GPredict. 

I made a new video of my satellite operation which features CW, SSB and FM communication. Best 73 from the family and myself and we will catch you soon. 

BTW back at work full time. Stay safe everyone!

FlightAware Aircraft Tracking on 1090 Mhz - Improving the range

 The FlightAware setup that I received from my good friend Pat W1DUK recently has been performing really well with the "Cantenna" 1/4 wave vertical antenna for 1090MHz. The set up comprises of a raspberry Pi with a FlightAware SD card and a FlightAware SDR USB Dongle, into a 1090 Mhz Antenna.

Today I was up early and with a freshly fabricated bracket I managed to clip the Cantenna up high in the sky on the top of the mast. The reception footprint has now become up to 200 miles and possibly further with a greatly improved omni-directional pattern. I am in the first couple of hours of testing and have seen the number of aircraft increasing from an average of 10 to 20 + aircraft at once being tracked. A great success so far!

A screen capture taken with my first go using the "Cantenna" 1/4 wave vertical mounted in the top window inside the house

A screen capture of much improved activity and reception range taken with the "Cantenna" 1/4 wave vertical mounted outside on the mast top.

The receive footprint screen capture taken with the "Cantenna" 1/4 wave vertical mounted in the top window inside the house - Range map.

A much improved footprint on this screen capture taken with the "Cantenna" 1/4 wave vertical mounted outside on the mast top -Range Map

Hope you found this interesting! Its great fun to do and relatively low cost! Once again Thank You Pat W1DUK and the guys and girls at Ham Radio Outlet for this awesome gift! I have really enjoyed trying it out and providing the feedback and will continue to play! 73 All.

Catching Up With Ham Radio Activity - M0YKS

 

Well guys I have had a busy few months playing radio and staying safe at the same time! I am back at work now and decided to post a few of the videos that I recently created! I hope everyone is safe and healthy and if you haven't seen these yet enjoy!

Operating a Yaesu FT-847 on the Satellite bands using VHF and SSB.

A quick DX catch up with Kurt in Trinidad. Beautiful signal as always!

Upgrade made to the Diamond F-23 high gain 2M band mono band vertical antenna

On my way back from Burnley in Lancashire over the hill tops!

                                                             IOTA 2020 Warm Up

                                                A quick pass from a couple of FM Satellites

M0YKS mobile ham radio FT-857 DX Machine

Out and about in the DX Machine with the family. We visited some great local countryside and played radio in between. Total distance travelled was 80 miles round trip.

                                            Ham Radio Communication  - RS0ISS - M0YKS

Using a PC running windows 10, Orbitron 3.71 & MMSSTV 1.13A with a Yaesu FT-847 Transceiver, connected to a G-5500 controller/rotator which operates two antenna's. The antenna used today was a 5 element Yagi beam. The reception frequency was 145.800 Mhz FM Wide band.

Signal transmitted from onboard the International Space Station ISS - RS0ISS. 

Reception by M0YKS Bradford UK IO93CU.

COM - 232B -
A new addition to my shack to control my satellite rotator automatically via my PC.

My good friend Pat W1DUK sent me a fantastic mysterious package. Check out the video to see what it is.  THANK YOU PAT W1DUK.

Demo of the new mysterious package received from Pat W1DUK and the guys from Ham Radio Outlet. Thank you Pat!

Working into Eu and the UK using amateur radio satellites.

Satellites were AO-91 and AO-92 which are strong signals operating on FM. 

EQUIPMENT- YAESU FT-847 TX/RX, YAESU G-5500 ROTATOR, COM 232B INTERFACE, 437 OSCAR X BEAM, 145 5EL YAGI, ans OBITRON.

Playing radio/p in between the family fun at the Cabin 1000 ft ASL

And finally hours and hours of  live streaming from the shack

Catch me streaming live from the shack on My Youtube Channel  Each and every Sunday at 21-00 UTC. 

Signal Report From South Korea - HL2-0112B

This morning I was pleased to receive an email form Kwon -HL2-0112B from South Korea. Kwon had received my signal whilst I worked OZ/DB4ST  up on the 20m band. I will be writing out a QSL card for Kwon shortly, thanks for the report Kwon! 73 to South Korea hope to make it to your SWL station again soon Thank You!

Nice DX Opening Into Montserrat and USA - Late Night DXer

Messing around in the shack late night DXing paid off again,  I caught a couple of nice QSO just now into Montserrat and the USA. First I worked Micheal W3MLJ operating on a remote station he was 5/9.

After that I worked Frankie VP2MNI who as usual was booming in with a solid S9 from Plymouth Montserrat. Both stations were worked on the 20m band. Thanks for the QSO guys!