We had several days of high winds last week. My fan dipole suffered greatly from the wind! One leg came unbolted from the center connection and fell to the ground. In addition, one of the guy ropes holding the far end of the dipole became unattached as the turnbuckle gave way. When repairing the dipole, I decided to put in a 1:1 balun to choke off ay RF energy that might come back down the outside of the feedline. Now the SWR is huge! Most of my power is not getting out the antenna!
Meanwhile, we’ve had another seven inches of snow. It’ll be a while before I can get out to the antenna to try and figure out what’s wrong. Dang!
For quite some time I had seen a very high noise floor across most of the HF bands and it seemed to be getting worse. Very often the noise floor would be S9 or S9+ on 80 meters, 40 meters, and 20 meters. Making SSB contacts was very difficult because I simply couldn’t hear the other stations. FT8 was working fairly well, but it was clear from the decoding window that there were a lot of stations being replied to that my equipment wasn’t hearing.
Then we had a significant power outage due to a wildfire. My FT-897D has battery power, the batteries were fully charged, so I turned on the radio … and the noise was gone! The noise floor was down to about S3 or S4 across all the bands. The noise was definitely QRM … man-made interference.
My AM/FM/Short Wave Radio
Google search indicated that an AM radio with a reasonable antenna could be used to track down a noise source. I had an AM/FM/Short Wave little radio somewhere. I found it, put in some batteries, tuned to 540 kHz where an AM radio station was supposed to be, and heard the same noise which was covering up the radio station.
Thinking that the noise was coming from somewhere in the neighborhood, I went outside and found the noise decreasing as I went away from the house! The noise source was somewhere inside the house. Next stop was the basement and the circuit breaker panel. I turned the breakers off and on one by one. When I turned the breaker off for the “West Bedrooms”, the noise went away. It came back as soon as the breaker was turned on.
The house has two upstairs bedrooms on the west end that we don’t use as bedrooms. One has been converted into a study / piano room where Nina has her desk, computer, and stuff as well as the piano. The other room has my desks, computers, ham radio equipment, and all that related stuff. The noise was coming from one of these two rooms.
It wasn’t coming from Nina’s study. In my room the noise was much louder and as I ran the radio around the room the culprits were immediately clear!
Power Strip with USB Charging Ports
I had two power strips with USB ports in the room. As soon as I switched them off, the noise mostly went away. I knew there was another of these power strips in the master bedroom. Turning that one off eliminated the rest of the noise.
Anker Six-port USB Supply
These were expensive power strips! They are now replaced with normal cheap strips with no USB ports. I picked up an Anker six-port USB power supply which produces no noise. It’s now taking the place of the USB ports on those expensive power strips … which power strips are now at Deseret Industries. Hopefully they’ll be used in houses that don’t listen to AM or Short Wave radio!
Every year on the first Saturday in June since about 2009 Pocatello, Idaho has hosted a grueling mountain trail race. Runners had the option of running a 100 kilometer or a couple of shorter lengths. This year the race was expanded and lengthened to a 100 mile, a 50 mile, and a 21 mile race. Further, the 100 mile race would kick off at noon on Friday June 1st and the racers would run through the night Friday night and into the afternoon or evening on Saturday, June 2nd.
Roland Working the Radio
Nina and I were invited to provide communications support at the City Creek aid station located about 63 miles into the race for the 100 mile runners. The 50 mile runners would start at 5am on Saturday morning and 13 miles later go through the City Creek aid station.
The aid station was schedule to open at 11:30 pm on Friday night and remain open until 10:30 am on Saturday morning. In addition, any 100 mile runners had to arrive at City Creek not later than 10 am on Saturday morning in order to continue for the rest of the race.
Nina and I arrived at the aid station location about 8 pm on Friday evening as I wanted to set up while we still had a bit of daylight. We’d then kill time until the real opening time. The aid station volunteers were there as we arrived with the same intention: getting set up while there was still some daylight.
The first runner, a 100 miler, came into the aid station at 12:20 am on Saturday morning. Throughout the remainder of the morning, 100 mile runners trickled into the station, got some refreshment, tanked up on electrolites, and continued on their run. The first 50 milers came in about 7:15 am and all of them were in and out of the aid station by 9:30 am. At that time there were still fourteen 100-miler runners on the course who had not yet arrived at the City Creek aid station.
The 10am cutoff time came with five runners still unaccounted for. At 11:15 am three of them came into the aid station. They had gotten off the trail earlier and spent more than an hour trying to figure out where the trail was when they stumbled upon the course sweepers who escorted them to the City Creek aid station. The course was laid out in segments and two volunteers acted as “sweeps” to go behind the last person on the trail in that segment so that when they arrived at the next aid station, we could be assured that no one was on the course behind the sweepers.
We arranged for the three runners to be transported to the finish line and then went about figuring out what happened to the two other racers. One we eventually determined had dropped out of the race earlier at a point close to a road but hadn’t told anyone until they were driven by a family member to the finish line to turn in their ID chip (an RFID chip used the by the timing system which kept the official race times). By late Saturday afternoon when Nina and I left, there was no additional information on the other unaccounted-for runner.
So What Did We Do all Night and Saturday Morning?
First, radio communications to the net control station located at the finish line was our priority resonsibility. We reported when we opened, any significant events (such as the first male and first female runners in the 100-mile and 50-mile races), information from the runners about course conditions, and information about any runner who decided to drop out of the race at City Creek. If needed we would summon medical assistance or call 911 if needed. If the aid station itself needed anything, we could call net control to send it up.
In addition, we answered questions from other aid stations about specific runners, usually whether or not they had gone through the aid station and when. Often these were answering questions from friends or family of a specific runner. These questions would come via net control.
Secondly, we tracked all scheduled runners into and out of the aid station. When a runner arrived, the arrival time was noted. When he (or she) departed, the departure time was noted. Recording the 100-milers was pretty straight forward. After 63 miles, these racers were pretty well spread out giving lots of time between each runner. The 50-milers, however were only 13 miles into their run and they would arrive in groups. It took two or three of us to note all of the incoming or outgoing runners and get their information logged.
With an accurate tracking log, we were able to know which runners were still to come and by the cut off time know whether or not all runners were accounted for. We didn’t want to have any lost racers out there in the mountains somewhere without us knowing and able to launch a search.
How Did the Communications Work?
There were a dozen aid stations spaced along the course. Line-of-sight communications across the entire course was not possible at all. The course was divided up into four sections with a cross-band repeater serving each section. The radio operators in the section used a specific VHF simplex frequency which was picked up by the cross-band repeater and repeated out on a UHF simplex frequency. The cross-band repeaters were up high on hilltops and they all had line-of-sight communications with each other. The cross-band repeaters were linked on the UHF side and served the aid stations in their section on the VHF simplex frequency. All of that funneled into net control.
In case of issues, there was also a regular amateur radio 2meter repeater on Scout Mountain (the race’s namesake mountain) that most of the aid stations could hit (some of them with a LOT of steam on their signal). There was a period of time early on Friday evening when an issue with one of the cross-band repeaters necessitated using the Scout Mountain repeater. That issue was resolved and normal communications were restored.
How Cold Did it Get?
We knew the forecast … a low of 37 degrees Friday evening. There was a period when I’m sure it was around -50 degrees!! We were somewhat prepared, but will double down on cold weather preparation for next year. According to the weather service, temperatures at the Pocatello Airport got down to 42 degrees. Up in the mountains the temps were up to 10 degrees cooler. It definitely got cold … but the runners seemed to love it.
Would We Do It Again?
Well, this was my 5th year working one of the aid stations, Nina’s 3rd year. We seem to be addicted…. If invited, we’ll be back next year, health and circumstances permitting.
Meanwhile, there are several other events in our area in Utah needing communications support. We’ll do some of those, and report them here!
JT65 QSL CardsA couple of weeks ago the forecast was for several days of reasonably good weather for antennas. That is, lower winds, no rain or light rain showers, and lots of sunshine. I pulled out my Buddipole antenna and configured it for 40 meters at the low end of the band. After listening to some CW, I decided to set up JT65 and let it run for a while.
JT65 is a weak signal system. QSO’s are possible but take quite a bit of time to complete and even then, only a little bit of information can be transmitted. If the software is set up to send reports to pskreporter and to the Reverse Beacon Network (highly recommended to enable both options), every station that my software decodes will be reported along with the signal strength of the received signal. This is very helpful to others who are transmitting in the jT65 mode and want to know where their signal is being received and the relative signal strength of the received signal.
I let JT65 run for several hours while I was doing other things in the “shack”. I had a few minutes, so I responded to several CQ’s and managed to have two JT65 conversations. The first was with a ham in New Zealand and a while later I was able to make contact with a ham from Japan. I fired off a QSL card to each of them and included two one-dollar bills in the hopes they would send back a QSL card. Both did! The cards are in the picture above.
The weather here in Hawaii is not kind to things hanging out in the breeze. Consequently, leaving the Buddipole up for any period of time is asking for problems. In that period of time, one of the clamps on the tripod grew some serious crud that needed to be cleaned off and re-oiled. Now I’m hoping for another few days when the antenna can go up and I can try some more JT65. For more information on this app, please see JT65-HF.COM as well as the Wikipedia page on the mode / protocol.
The Robert E. Heytow Memorial Radio Club publishes a “general interest amateur radio eZine” called the “K9YA Telegraph“. I ran across it a little over two years ago, subscribed, and have enjoyed every issue since then, as well as have read several previous issues from the archive.
This is a subscription electronic magazine. The subscription is free. The current issue had some very interesting follow-on information about the National Air Race in 1929 and amateur radio involvement along with links to documentaries on the air race. The magazine comes as a downloadable PDF and usually is eight pages long.
The magazine has been serializing a story about amateur radio operators called “Rose”. Part fifteen was included in the latest issue. It is a well-written, quite engaging story and I usually read the next installment as soon as the magazine is downloadable.
Rexwood 1000 ReceiverThe Rexwood 1000 QRP receiver was a straight-forward build. Two testing stages were part of the build. I had the first two stages completed several weeks ago, but needed the Tuna Power System (TPS) to provide power. I put the receiver aside and completed the TPS (see QRP Power Supply Completed and Tested).
I finished the rest of the receiver this afternoon. It is putting out sound. I need to put up some kind of an antenna to see if I can hear anything in the narrow range the receiver can tune: 7.030 and 7.0475 mHz +- a few kHz.
I’ve hooked the TPS up to the receiver and both seem to be working as advertised. Next I’ll start on the Pixie transceiver so perhaps it can provide a signal that the receiver can pick up to verify that it’s actually receiving something.
Another of the ham radio operators here in the area is Paul Crookston, KB7ZIH. He’s been directly involved in getting the new BYU-Hawaii repeater up and operational. Tonight he worked with a group of boy scouts on their radio merit badge. He took his radio over and had the boys talk with several others of us who were standing by. A couple of the boys expressed some interest and hopefully there’ll be a way for them to act on that interest. The Boy Scouts of America operates an excellent website, K2BSA.net, and has been activating a number of locations using the K2BSA portable call sign. In October the scouts will be holding their Jamboree On The Air event. We’ll need to figure out how to get some of the local troops involved in JOTA.
So, now that the J-Pole is up and operational, my Yaesu FT-8900 easily gets into the BYU-H repeater. In fact, both of my HT’s easily get into the repeater at 5 watts output into a better-than-a-rubber-duck antenna. Monitoring the repeater this evening shows some activity on the machine. However, there’s a LOT of QRM here. I’m going to ask him to put a tone on the output side of the repeater which should go a long way towards squelching the QRM.
