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Kits at Friedrischaven
"Stephen"
Guys,
Just a quick note to say that I will be selling some of the second run of beacon kits at the Friedrischaven hamfest this Friday-Sun. I will be on the SDR-Kits stand Its in the main Hall A1 stall E43. The price will be 12 Euros if you pre-order your kit and provide me with your callsign so I can program your keyer chip before I leave home on Thursday morning. The discount is so i do not have to go through the process of programming the keyers at the rally - its always hectic! If you buy on the day the price will be the regular rally price of 15 Euros. The additional 3 euros goes towards helping towards the cost of the stall. For those of you who cannot make the rally please don't panic. We have enough boards and parts to meet our current and predicted committments and for those of you who have already asked for a kit to be reserved that has been done. When i get back from my holiday, in the second week in July, I will post ordering details here.... Apologies for the delay. Hans and I decided that in order to streamline the process I would program the Keyer chips. So I installed the latest version of the WinAVR/AVR Studio Toolset on my Windows 7 laptop to start work only to discover that Hans had used an earlier version of the compiler and whilst the compilation was clean with the latest version of the compiler the code wouldnt "Beacon". It took us a couple of days to figure out that we needed to revert to the old version of the compiler rather than battle wit the source code. And to think I thought I had left all this stuff behind when i retired from my job in IT. In my day compilers had to cope with legacy code! 72/3 to you all, Steve G0XAR (and Hans G0UPL) -- It is vain to do with more that which can be done with less. |
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Re: 30 METER BEACON PHOTOS AND CAPTURES
"Newton"
Hi Hans,
You wrote: I wonder if the results might be even better if this situation could be >avoided. Perhaps a balun between the TX and the dipole?I remember you showed some pix at the FDIM where you rigged up your TX while on holday. I believe that you had fasioned a balun between your TX and the antenna. Can you describe how you made that balun? Thanks, Newt k0nwt |
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Re: 30 METER BEACON PHOTOS AND CAPTURES
"Paul Daulton"
开云体育You are correct there is some rf on the coax. Note
the power box , the small one with metal plate. this has a type M coaxial power
socket and an F connector, a 7805 IC drops the voltage to 5v. I can use any
spare wall wart transformer with correct polarity and a plug that will
fit.
?
I can touch the plate and see a slight bump in the
signal on my own receiver. I will put a choke in each leg of the? power
coax next time I take it down. Or maybe a bifilar wound choke.
?
Note also I drilled two 1/8 inch holes in the
bottom of the tx box to drain any moisture out.
?
I regularly check the grabbers on the digilander
site, so fara no DX. Our stateside forums dealing with the Lowfer beacons have
developed a very good reporting system. I have 19 states confirmed on my
185.3khz beacon. Thats all the states where active listeners reside. I encourage
all that listen to post screen captures, and where possible edit the captures in
Microsoft picture viewer by adding the text of the calls received.
?
Check out our lowfer sites at and the
lowfer mailing list on? ?
click on side bar, email lists, and scroll down to "lowfer". I have been using
the Argo and Spectran software chasing weak signals? on 137khz, 160-190khz
and 13.555 to 13.565 mhz for about 9 years now. I've made lots of friends and
had lots of enjoyment. It is a two way partnership between those who beacon and
those who listen. A great learning experience.
?
73 Paul
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Re: 30 METER BEACON PHOTOS AND CAPTURES
"hanssummers2000"
Hi Paul
I HAVE CREATED A PHOTO FILE "K5WMS" WITH PHOTOS OF MY BEACON CONSTRUCTION AND INSTALLATION.[Snip] Congratulations on the success, the screenshots, and I'm glad you're having so much fun! I hope you will look for your beacon on the worldwide grabbers too and soon see some DX reception when the conditions are right! One question I had... I see that you have mounted the PCB nicely in a box with hooks on the side, which look like they are designed so that the transmitter sits directly at the centre of the dipole... the dipole attaching to those two hooks. Then the coax brings power in at the "bottom" of the box (when it is hung on the tower). I'm no antenna expert at all, but I wondered about something... The LPF output is designed for 50 ohms output so putting it at the middle of the dipole should be Ok. However one arm of the antenna would also be connected directly to PCB ground, which is itself connected to the coax power feed cable. This means that the coax feed cable would form effectively part of the antenna "dipole", unbalancing it and probably no longer matching it to 50 ohms. I wonder if the results might be even better if this situation could be avoided. Perhaps a balun between the TX and the dipole? Or perhaps you could fit a couple of RF chokes at the two power connection inputs, to stop RF going back down the power feed cable? Feel free to ignore me if I'm talking giberish, as I say, I'm no expert on antennas (or anything else, for that matter). 73 Hans G0UPL |
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Argo tricks
"pgdaulton"
One of the tricks you can use with ARGO is multiple screens, try and set one screen centered on beacon band, another up 100hz, and another 100hz below. You can set different gains and sensitivity and see which is best, just assign a different folder for each screen. I use \desktop\30mbcn(1,2,3) then put date on next pull down. Set for capture every 15 or 30 minutes and watch band changes.
Also note Spectran, Spectrumlab, and ARGO can run simultaniously on the same sound card. Be an experimenter! Paul k5wms |
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30 METER BEACON PHOTOS AND CAPTURES
"pgdaulton"
I HAVE CREATED A PHOTO FILE "K5WMS" WITH PHOTOS OF MY BEACON CONSTRUCTION AND INSTALLATION.
ALSO INCLUDED ARE CAPTURES FROM KL1X/5 IN BARTLESVILLE,OK AND W4HBK FROM PENSACOLA FL. I AM IN CENTRAL ARKANSAS GRID SQUARE EM34WU. I ALSO HAVE BEEN COPIED BY MIKE WE0H IN ST FRANCIS MN BUT HAVE LOST THE CAPTURE. I EDITED THE CAPTURES AND ADDED THE TEXT. THANKS HANS AND STEVE FOR A FUN PROJECT. THREE DOWN AND 47 TO GO FOR WAS! PAUL DAULTON K5WMS |
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Tutorial on programming AT Tiny chips
"Stephen"
Good morning one and all,
For those of you who are interested in learning how to program the AT Tiny chip (we use the AT Tiny 13 in the beacon kit) there is an excellent tutorial at :- It uses the AT Tiny 45 but the example programs will run in the Tiny 13. The code for the beacon is available on Hans's website. 72/3 de Steve...G0XAR |
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WE0H Grabber new address...
Mike-WE0H
As I figured would happen with a freebie website, they deleted my account tonight. No surprise there. So go to:
and lets see how long that Grabber survives. This is my pay per month site but it had issues with ftp service before, so who knows if it will keep working or fail. -- Mike WE0H EN35hj |
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Re: NP0 Caps
Mike-WE0H
I use that Lyle K0LR style thermistor crystal heater in my freq counter. It has maintained better than 1hz stability for over a year now.
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Show quoted text
Mike WE0H Charlie , W5COV wrote: ... |
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Re: NP0 Caps
Matt Palmer
NP0 caps become much more important when going cold... not such an issue for ham electronics which will likely never see temps below 0C
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Matt W8ESE sent from my VIC-20 On Thu, Jun 17, 2010 at 12:33 PM, hanssummers2000 <hans.summers@...> wrote:
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Re: NP0 Caps
"Charlie , W5COV"
开云体育I have to agree with Hans . NP0 caps are fine in some
applications , but not all . I just changed a pair of them out in a filter and
replaced them with some high quality "glass" capacitors , which work much better
in this application.
?
I am on the waiting list for a beacon , but while waiting
and having worked with QRSS60 for many years , know the crystal and oscillator
are the areas of real concern .
?
I built my 10.140 MHz.?oscillator on a very small
board?separate from the transmitter . I soldered a thermistor to the
crystal to maintain a constant temperature . The entire board is then
encapsulated in a small container and filled with thermal conductive epoxy .Only
the leads for hookup to the transmitter come out of the package .
?
I haven't yet had time to run many tests with it . I'll
post my results once I can run it for a few days under different temperature
conditions .
?
Charlie , W5COV
?
?
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Re: NP0 Caps
"Paul Daulton"
开云体育my experience is not all npo caps are created
equal. I suspect many are mismarked as happens with nuts and bolts. Mono caps or
cog as they are sometimes called exhibit better stability.
?
My beacon is mounted at the center of my dipole,
temp here has been from 100 degrees F daytime to 75 or so at night. My beacon
will shift about 25 to 30 hz. this fall I may have to take it down and reset it.
I have a 7805 regulator down in the shack, power is fed to beacon through rg59
coax and? f? connectors. I could replace the 7805 with an LM 317 and
limit the voltage to 6v and trim the freq by adjusting the voltage. also the led
may shift somewhat due to temp change, I have found this the case when using
varactors to tune vfo's. Those in cooler climates may want to put a heat source
in the case if the beacon is to be remote mounted. a small incadesent lamp or
led or resisor? and lots of insulation on? the beacon. would
help.
?
Drift is a minor problem.
?
Paul k5wms
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Re: NP0 Caps
"hanssummers2000"
Hi Steve et al
Greetings from sunny England,Speak for your own part of England! Here in London, the sun has disappeared behind some thick clouds. Those of you who have built the beacon kits will have noticed that we do not use NP0 caps. In fact I cannot remember the last time I used them. Yet these beacons are very, very stable in output frequency as are my other projects. Which makes me wonder if modern caps are much less temperature sensitive than they were in times of yore and question why people still use them.Personally I think NPO caps might be useful sometimes, but generally are over-rated. There are a lot of other temperature-sensitive parts involved in an oscillator, including of course, the crystal itself. In past QRSS work, I have used the DB6NT crystal heater, see . I found that it completely removed any observable drift, even though I didn't trouble with NPO capacitors. So I believe that, in the case of crystal oscillators for QRSS, the main freuqency-drift-determining component is the crystal itself. The DB6NT crystal heater is very nice. It typically goes on an HC49 crystal, whereas the crystal in the QRSS Beacon kit is a 1/4 height crystal. So I'm not sure how well it would work, or maybe need adaption. Beware too, that it will cost you somewhat more than the QRSS beacon kit cost you! 73 Hans G0UPL |
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NP0 Caps
"Stephen"
Greetings from sunny England,
Those of you who have built the beacon kits will have noticed that we do not use NP0 caps. In fact I cannot remember the last time I used them. Yet these beacons are very, very stable in output frequency as are my other projects. Which makes me wonder if modern caps are much less temperature sensitive than they were in times of yore and question why people still use them. What do you guys think? Regards, Steve G0XAR |
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online lowfer grabber
"Paul Daulton"
开云体育Another qrss site that may be of interest is
Ralph's, W5JGV, online grabbers. Part 15 rules in the US permit unlicensed
operation on 160 to 190 khz with 1 watt input to a 50 ft antenna.
?
See ?
?
This grabber is centered on the "watering hole" at
185.3 khz.
?
Daytime my beacon, WMS is often visible via ground
wave( we are about 225 miles apart). At night stations up to several hundred
miles apart are seen. Operation is qrss 30.
?
Best time of course is during winter months but
there is propagation year round. Summer thunderstorms anywhere in the
propagation area desense the ARGO but we have lots of quiet days.
?
Ralph also has a grabber on 137 khz, while not a
ham band here in the us , special permission by FCC for experimental licenses
has been granted to several US hams.
?
For more info on beacon activity go to ? or yahoogroups/part15.
?
Thanks for the bandwidth.
Paul k5wms |
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Re: beacon receiver
Mike-WE0H
Hi Hans,
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Add me to your list for the receiver kit. Tell me when and how you would like payment and I will get it to you fast. Many thanks, Mike WE0H hanssummers2000 wrote: Certainly the frequency of the 5068.8 rocks can be pulled easily. |
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Re: beacon receiver
"Paul Daulton"
开云体育Clayton thanks for the link to Genesis. Nice
offerings of kits, parts, and xtals. Mono caps ?npo? at very
attractive price!
?
73 Paul k5wms
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Re: beacon receiver
"hanssummers2000"
Hi Mike, Paul et al
I don't know, using 5068.8kc rocks would end up with a 2.4kc center freqCertainly the frequency of the 5068.8 rocks can be pulled easily. One thing to bear in mind: This receiver is a very basic design utilising two SA602's. The strong signal performance, IP3 and Dynamic range, AM broadcast breakthrough etc will all be quite poor. Steve G0XAR and I are currently working on a QRSS receiver kit to complement the QRSS beacon kit. The kit price will probably be somewhere in the range $15-$30, I can't be more precise yet. This will not be a simple, basic receiver! My design goals for this receiver are as follows: + Very high performance, single band receiver + Single signal reception (not Double-Sideband) + Crystal local oscillator, or option for DDS input + Easy to build: no complicated adjustments, no test equipment needed + Low cost, in the range $15-$30 + Output direct to sound card input, will work with Argo etc By "high performance", I mean that this receiver has a strong front end with an IP3 of around +30dBm, which will outperform the vast majority of commercial ham equipment, let alone homebuilt. I hope to have this ready in a few weeks. So if you can wait, it might be worth waiting for ;-) 72/3 Hans G0UPL |
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Re: beacon receiver
"Paul Daulton"
开云体育?
Sorry in my excitement I forgot to include
this.
?
I have the Norcal dds ,? which I contemplated
using in a multiband Bitx. Not much has been written about 30 m with the bitx
since it is mainly a phone rig but it could be adapted for 30m rec. I have 20m
bitx and 80 meter bitx and an IF board with 9.0mhz xtals I was going to use in
the multi band, probably should try that first.
?
Thanks for the interest Hans,
73 Paul
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