Amateur Radio

Every single radio amateur has come to this hobby with an itch to scratch. Time and again I've seen amateurs around me pursue that particular purpose, only to come out the other end with a look of bewilderment writ large across their face. For some amateurs it means the end of their involvement in the hobby, for others it starts a new journey into the unknown.

One of the ways we explore our community is by travelling out of our shack into the big outdoors in whatever form that takes. Popular activities include setting up a radio in a location and talking to others, known colloquially as an "activation". We do this all over the planet. Perhaps the most recognisable of these is IOTA, or Islands On The Air, where a station is erected on an island and contacts are made. As amateurs we cannot help ourselves and seem to have an insatiable need to measure our prowess. We do this by counting how many contacts, callsigns, countries, grid-squares, or in this case, islands, we've managed to put in the log.

If an island represents a new callsign, a new country, and a new grid-square, the contact making will turn into a feeding frenzy that can last for days, especially if the station offers multiple bands and modes, making the effort all the more tempting.

We don't stop with islands. Summits, with Summits On The Air or SOTA are popular, as are Parks, POTA, and even over a weekend, the International Lighthouse and Lightship Weekend, or ILLW.

Some of these activations follow rules set out by amateurs like you and I, who thought it would be fun to track such activations and encourage others to participate. For example IOTA World publishes a four page document outlining what's required for those on the island, activators, and those trying to make contact, or chasers. This raises an important point. Rules require documentation, which leads to discussion and disagreement, and versions. I can show you two versions of the IOTA World rules, neither is dated, of course both are different, so if you're going to publish rules, make sure you add a date or version, preferably both, to the rules document.

Disagreements aside, sometimes there are multiple programs with the same name or aims. Two groups came up with the same idea and didn't know about each other, or, a group in a different country wanted to run the show in a different way and a new group was formed.

I'm mentioning this because sometimes these groups are antagonistic towards each other and have forgotten that the whole point of this is to have fun.

So, what else can we activate?

Well, there's Castles and Stately Homes, Bunkers, Beaches, Museums, Walmart Parking Lots and even Toilets On The Air, mind you, Slow Scan Television, or SSTV is discouraged as a mode.

The other day the power was off for maintenance in my street and I planned on escaping to the local library, which caused me to search for libraries across Perth. It seems there's pretty much one in every suburb and I considered the notion of activating a library or three, comes with easy access to public transport, a car park, and even toilet facilities, what's not to like? I wondered what might be a suitable exchange so it could incorporate the library itself, promoting amateur radio and libraries, two birds and all.

I made a comment on mastodon.radio and it turns out that Frank K4FMH beat me to it, several years ago. Libraries On The Air, or LiOTA. I've been hunting for a dataset of libraries in Australia to give to Frank, but it's been slim pickings, despite there being over 10,000 of them, apparently around 10% of those public.

It raises another question, is there a directory of activation types anywhere? I couldn't find one, so I started a list on my GitHub repository. Feel free to add any I missed.

Toilet jokes aside, consider that TOTA is being held during the annual Hackers On Planet Earth conference and it will introduce new people to our amateur community, which ultimately might be the best reason to have fun, get on-air and make noise.

I'm Onno VK6FLAB

Amateur radio operators love to make contacts with other amateurs, seeking any excuse to get on-air and make noise.

This is an unordered list of programs and sites which facilitate such activities. Note that some activities have cross-over, parks, peaks, summits and flora & fauna for example.

If you'd like to update the list, login to GitHub, click the pencil at the top of this document and suggest an update.

Remember, the purpose of this is to have fun!

73 de Onno VK6FLAB

Recently I came across a series of strident posts about the injustice associated with a non-amateur service using the 70cm band. Complete with links to discussions, spectrum plots, angst and even incoherent outrage, all related to the notion that whomever "allowed" this user to transmit on this band was clearly incompetent.

Except, that this is probably not the case, or the full story.

So, what's going on and why are people incensed?

This all started at least six years ago. Since then AST SpaceMobile has deployed seven low Earth orbit satellites and used the 70cm band to communicate with them. Although in the trial phase, there's plans for an additional 243 satellites, and there's at least one other company playing in the same space, Atmos Space Cargo.

The outcry from amateurs is around the commercial use of "their" 70cm amateur band. It's an emotional statement, but what is the reality?

Before I dig in, let's set some terms. Radio frequencies are globally coordinated because electromagnetism doesn't care about sovereign borders. This coordination is conducted at the United Nations by a body called the ITU, the International Telecommunications Union. Within that body, amateur radio gets a seat at the table from an organisation called the IARU, the International Amateur Radio Union.

For the purposes of the ITU, the world is divided into three, Region 1, or essentially Europe, Russia and Africa, Region 2, the Americas and Greenland, and Region 3, the rest of the world. There's more to it, for example, Antarctica is split across all three, but for the moment, that really doesn't matter.

Of interest is that the band plan, the agreements that outline which frequencies are set aside for what service, might be defined differently across each of those three regions.

To add complexity, each country can be granted exceptions. I don't know the exact mechanics of how this is achieved, but I can guarantee that there's lots of haggling and foot stomping, diplomatically of course. If you're curious how I come to that observation, just look at the absurd list of exceptions associated with each band plan allocation.

Further complexity is added by the fact that not all allocations occupy the same frequency range. For example, in Region 1, the 2m band for Amateurs exists between 144 and 146 MHz, in Region 2 and 3 it's between 144 and 148 MHz.

Within an allocation there is the concept of shared and exclusive priorities. These determine who "wins" if two stations with a different service are transmitting on the same frequency. Essentially, a secondary user may not interfere with a primary user and a tertiary user may not interfere with either a secondary or a primary user and so on. A primary user can pretty much do what they want, as long as they stay within the allocation and don't interfere with other primary users. As a result, the order in which services are listed, matters. An exclusive allocation doesn't have to be shared at all.

Between regions these service priorities might not be the same. For example, in Region 1 between 430 and 432 MHz is allocated to Amateurs and Radio Location, but in Region 2 and 3 it's between Radio Location and Amateurs. So an amateur using that frequency whilst in Region 1 would be a primary user, but in Region 2 or 3 they wouldn't.

As an added wrinkle, for example in Australia, that slice is "primarily for the purposes of defence and national security", even though Radio Location is the primary service and Amateurs the secondary one. As a bonus, amateurs in Australia have access to 420.8 to 421.2 MHz as a secondary service, even though the ITU designates this as Fixed, then Mobile, except Aeronautical Mobile, and then Radio Location. Although amateurs are a secondary service, they come after the Department of Defence who are the primary users for those frequencies in Australia. Between 420 and 430 MHz, and from 440 to 450 MHz in several countries, Australia included, the Amateur Service is explicitly designated as a secondary service even though the band plan doesn't actually show this.

If you're confused, you're in good company, since this tapestry of regulation isn't as straightforward as the "70cm band is an amateur band", in fact, I'd go so far as to say that it's not an amateur band at all, except perhaps in Region 1 between 430 and 440 MHz where Amateur is designated as the non-exclusive primary service.

Back to the blow up.

AST was at one time authorised to use 430 to 440 MHz for trial purposes by a regulator in Region 2, the FCC, the United States Federal Communications Commission. I suspect that at the time, the Blue Walker 1 nano satellite was experimental and the approval made sense.

You can argue that whomever initially allowed this made a mistake, but, reality is whatever the regulator says it is, unless someone at the ITU objects.

It appears that the FCC has since been attempting to make AST comply, instead with billions of dollars at stake, AST continues to apply for more spectrum, which they apparently originally filed with the ITU through the Papua New Guinea administration. It's unclear if the FCC has since capitulated.

There is evidence that the new commercial AST satellites are transmitting outside of their authorisation, euphemistically described as "IARU Uncoordinated".

Ask yourself, how is it possible, or even allowable, that a regulator permits use of radio spectrum outside its borders and what penalties and remedies exist?

The ground stations using these disputed frequencies are all outside the USA. One of the five ground stations is in my own city, Perth in Western Australia. I haven't noticed any discussion on this topic within my local community, even though this has been brewing for years.

It does raise a bigger question. How is the band plan enforced? I mean, the 40m band is pretty much unusable in VK6 between sunset and midnight thanks to the fishing fleet of our northern neighbours, it's been like that for as long as I've been an amateur and I expect no change during my lifetime. How is this satellite fleet operating on the 70cm band any different?

That said, I cannot help but wonder, will the originally authorised 50 kHz signal every eight seconds, not for phone calls to space, and only for 24 hours after launch or in the unlikely event of an emergency, for Telemetry, Tracking and Command, actually cause issues, or will it be an opportunity for radio amateurs to learn how to deal with interference? Speaking of interference and considering the allocated services, who is interfering with whom here and what priorities and remedies exist?

Recently I talked about promotion, and the lack thereof, across our community. This is an example of promotion, and despite the uproar this week, a very poor example at that. Searching for "AST SpaceMobile", the oldest post I could find was on the German AMSAT, or Amateur Satellite forums back in September 2022 by Peter DB2OS who has been very active on this matter. His original post was in English, but went on to discuss the issue in German. I only found it after specifically looking for the names of the organisation involved. Peter's posts supplied links to many of the documents I consulted.

Despite having links to specific pages, I found no search results for "AST SpaceMobile" on the websites for the regulators in the US, UK, Germany or Australia, and none on the ARRL, RSGB or DARC. The WIA produced two glowing news reports around the beginning of 2023 about this wonderful new mobile phone service. No mention of the 70cm band. The only active discussions appear to be the German and UK AMSAT forums, that and all the glowing investor posts.

In other words. This is the equivalent of publishing the information at your local planning department in Alpha Centauri, 50 years before the event and hoping for a good outcome.

As a potential path forward, in January 2023 the German regulator forced AST to shut off 70cm operations whilst it was within radio visibility of Germany. I don't know if that's still in effect, or how and if it's being enforced.

It appears that AST has been lobbying for the use of this spectrum for a long time, not just the 340 page submission made last month. For example, NASA made its first response to this satellite constellation in October 2020. It appears that the WIA responded four years later, but I have yet to see it, and this week the Bulgarian Federation of Radio Amateurs, the ARRL, and RSGB added theirs. The IARU issued a statement this week too.

The fact that we're still arguing about it over half a decade later is a good indication that how we're responding as a global community is clearly ineffectual. Perhaps that is what we should be arguing stridently about.

So, where do you stand on this? Should something be done about this, and if-so, what, and more importantly, how?

I'm Onno VK6FLAB

In the community of radio amateurs scattered around the planet we have a habit of getting together with others to have fun in whatever shape that takes. The obvious ones are HAMfests, car boot sales, raffles and other amateur adjacent pursuits, but we also do things like licence training, weekly on-air nets, contesting, portable activations, climbing mountains, or hills, setting-up in parks, or lighthouses, we set-up on a field day, just for fun, and find excuses, sorry, reasons, for any number of other activities.

Some of these are solitary affairs, but many are best enjoyed shared with multiple friends, both old and new ones. Having been a member of this community since 2010 I've come to observe an aspect of this community that is odd, to say the least.

We organise all these events, but rarely promote it beyond a single email to three people, if that. It's almost as-if the average organiser thinks that their event permeates the community by magic osmosis.

Even if there is any form of promotion, there's sometimes a date and time, but hardly ever does it show that time in UTC, even if it's a radio event, it's like we've forgotten that radio waves pass through time zones, or there is a misconception that everyone on the planet knows what your local timezone is, let alone if it's summer or winter time at the time of the event.

So, what does promoting your event look like if you actually want people to know about it?

For starters, you should consider who you want to have as a participant. A local HAMfest is unlikely to attract people from around the globe, but Friedrichshafen and Dayton are examples that contradict that notion. A VHF-only event might be intended for local amateurs, but what if it allows for satellite or digital contacts, like say via Allstar, IRLP or Echolink? Similarly, you might run a weekly on-air net, but have visitors from around the planet.

The point being, that your audience might not be exactly what you initially think. In other words, there might be people playing from further afield. Consider that when you announce what time the event starts, and finishes. Speaking of finishing, adding an expected closing time is helpful for participants where only one member of the family lives and breathes amateur radio and the rest just want to get on with their respective lives, so consideration is welcome.

Aside from telling your audience when and for how long the event goes, adding a location is not optional. You'd be surprised how many events say things like: "it's again in the usual location", or "we're at the community hall" without ever publishing an address. I can tell you, it's fun discovering that the name of the hall isn't unique.

Now, for the big one. After putting the information together about the event itself, where and how do you announce it?

For starters, on your own website, in whatever form that takes. It serves two purposes, announcing to the world what is happening, but it's also the definitive place where the right information is published. This is important because things change, get cancelled, moved, updated, whatever. Life isn't static, so you need to define a place where the official announcement lives.

At this point I'd like to mention that this is often where promotion stops. It's easy to think that in your universe everyone you know is aware of your website, but that's just not true. A single place to publish is not the end of the process, it's the start.

Then you need to use things like the local news broadcast, the national news broadcast, the international news broadcasts, contesting websites and calendars, social media, fediverse and whatever else you can get your hands on. You need to include it in your own club news, in club newsletters from other clubs, on the local amateur notice board, you need to talk about the event on-air, share it during on-air nets and if it's recurring, tell the world that it's going to happen again next year.

Nothing here is revolutionary, it's not like launching a rocket into space, this is basic common sense and you too can do this. If you need help, ask.

So, if you have an event that you want to have participants for, you need to make noise. Publishing the announcement at the local planning department in Alpha Centauri 50 years before the event is going to cause issues, as will defining the date for an annual event as: When the June solstice is on a weekday (Monday through Friday), the weekend following shall be the weekend of the event. When the June solstice falls on a Saturday or Sunday, that weekend shall be the weekend of the event, but only for the Winter field day, the Summer one requires you to count back four weekends, or forward, depending on if you're talking about the Spring or Summer event, and add one if it falls on the weekend.

In case you're wondering. No, I didn't make that up. It's real. I'll leave you to ponder how you'd add such an event to your family calendar.

I'm Onno VK6FLAB

If you have a good resource to share beyond Grounding and Bonding for the Radio Amateur by N0AX, please do!

I want to mount a simple 6m aluminum dipole from my roof chimney.

The Wio Tracker L1 Pro delivers GPS, solar charging, joystick controls, and 2.5-day battery life for just $42.90. With BaseUI and a 1.3" OLED screen, it's the first truly user-friendly Meshtastic handheld that regular people might actually want to use.

The ISS will be transmitting SSTV pictures from July 14 0945 UTC to July 20 1800 UTC on 145.800 MHz using the PD120 mode.

The start may be delayed due to the departure of Axiom 4 from the ISS.

Recently I was given some radio data captured on the 40m band. Using a piece of software called "Universal Radio Hacker", I attempted to decode it. At the time I thought that this might be Morse code, since then I've been told by someone who has been using Morse longer than I've been alive, that it isn't.

I shared the data on my VK6FLAB GitHub repository where you can download it and see what you learn, and perhaps repeat what I did, or better still, improve on it.

Over the years I've talked a little about how Software Defined Radio or SDR works, essentially it's a glorified Analogue to Digital converter, much like the sound card in your computer, which does the same, albeit at a much lower frequency. As it happens, you can represent the signal that comes into your radio antenna as a series of values. Essentially, the stronger the signal, the bigger the number, the weaker the signal, the lower the number.

Let's talk about the characteristics of this signal. It consists of two parallel signals, in opposition to each other. The first signal jumps intermittently between 7 kHz and 40 kHz, where the second jumps between -7 kHz and -40 kHz. The recording is marked 7.06 MHz, so if we think of that as the central frequency, the whole signal sits between 7.02 and 7.1 MHz. This 80 kHz wide signal is not something you'd typically be able to hear using a standard amateur radio receiver which tops out at about 3 kHz bandwidth. It's so wide that you couldn't even hear more than one of the four tones at the same time.

Randall VK6WR, who supplied the recording, spotted it on a waterfall display showing a chunk of radio spectrum, in fact, a $25 RTL-SDR dongle could receive this signal.

Aside from the fact that this is a really wide signal, well at least in traditional amateur radio terms, it was interesting in that it was heard on the 40m band. As it happens, just after I shared my initial exploration, I was told by several other amateurs that they had heard the signal. I even saw it on a WebSDR in India and attempted to record it, but failed.

As it happens, a few weeks ago, I was playing with something called "CAN Bus", or Controller Area Network, a technology that was designed in 1983 and is used all over cars for things like sensors for speed, engine temperature, oxygen level, detonation timing and anything else that's happening inside a car. You might know the end-user view of this called OBD2 or On Board Diagnostics, second generation. I was looking into it because my car has been acting up and I've been trying to track down the root cause.

Anyway, I learned that CAN Bus is implemented using something neat, "differential signalling", where two wires each carry the same, but opposite signal, so they can be combined to ensure that in an electrically noisy environment like a car, the information still gets where it needs to go.

Seeing the radio signal Randall shared, reminded me of this.

Noise immunity is a useful attribute in digital HF communication, so I can understand why it was done like this, but it also means that either signal was sufficient to start to decode the information. We can use Universal Radio Hacker to show us only half the signal using a band pass filter.

I then decided that the 40 kHz frequency was "on" and represented by a "one" and the 7 kHz frequency was "off", represented by a "zero". Of course that's entirely arbitrary, there's no reason that it cannot be the other way around, but for our purposes it doesn't matter at this time.

That said, we don't yet have enough to decode the actual signal. We need to figure out how long each switch, or bit, lasts, because two zero's side-by-side or two ones side-by-side would look like a long "off" or a long "on". Using that logic, you could also say that the shortest possible duration for a 40 kHz or a 7 kHz tone would represent a single "one" or a single "zero".

Of course, this is a simplified view of the world. For example, the data file contains more than thirteen and a half million bytes. Half of those are for the I in I/Q, the other for the Q. I'm purposefully glossing over a bunch of stuff here, specifically the notion of so-called I/Q signals, that's for another time.

In computing a single byte can represent 256 different values. It means that if the signal is represented by a single byte, a voltage from the antenna at maximum amplitude can be represented as 255 and the minimum amplitude as 0. As it happens, voltages go up and down around zero, so, now we're only using half a byte, 127 for maximum, -128 for minimum. If we use two bytes, we get significantly more resolution, -32,768 as the minimum and 32,767 as the max.

A little trial and error using another tool, "inspectrum", told me that the data was organised as two bytes per sample. Which brings the next point. How many samples per signal?

Said differently, we're measuring the antenna voltage several times per second, let's say twice per second. If a tone of 7 kHz lasts a second, then we get two samples showing 7 kHz. If it lasts half a second, we only get one. As it happens, we're measuring over 22,000 times per second and using the cursor feature on Universal Radio Hacker, we can determine that each signal lasts 2,500 samples. It's roughly a rate of 100 bits per second. The "inspectrum" tool puts it at 91.81 Baud. It's not a standard Baud rate, sitting between 75 and 110 Baud.

Using Universal Radio Hacker, I was able to decode 1,416 bits. You'll find them on my GitHub page next to the signal.

Now for the fun. What does it mean?

I started with looking for structure, by looking for zeroes. In short order I discovered several sequences of zero, then I noticed that there appeared to be a repeating pattern. After some trial and error, using the "grep" and "fold" commands on my Linux terminal, I discovered that the pattern repeats, more or less, every 255 bits. I say more or less, because there are a few bits that are not the same. I suspect that this is a decoding error which could potentially have been eliminated by using the noise immunity features associated with the differential signalling, but I don't yet know how to do that.

Here's what I think I'm looking at.

It appears to be a signal that's a unique identifier, specifically so that it can be used to synchronise two things together. In this case, I suspect that it's an over the horizon radar and the sequence is used to synchronise the transmitter and the receiver. I think that the signal strength variations are what allows reflections to be measured and I suspect that the actual transmitter and receiver are using more than two bytes to represent each sample, but I'm speculating.

If you have an alternative explanation, I'm all ears.

I'm Onno VK6FLAB

xaioen waren 498 Ortsverbaende aktiv. Das DARC Referat Conteste gratulierte den Siegern und dankte allen Teilnehmern fuer ihre Aktivitaet.

Das DARC-Remoteprojekt ist gestartet Auf der HAM RADIO wurde das DARC-Remotestationsprojekt feierlich gestartet. Es war Ende des Jahres 2023, als der DARC-Vorstand dazu aufrief, sich mit einem Standort fuer eine Remotestation fuer das bis dato aufzubauende Stationsnetzwerk zu bewerben. 18 Gruppen hatten sich daraufhin gemeldet, schlussendlich wurden 15 ausgesucht. Auf der Messe fiel nun der Startschuss, sodass alle DARC-Mitglieder das neue Serviceangebot des DARC e.V. nutzen koennen. Es muss eine Clientsoftware heruntergeladen werden, der Funkbetrieb erfolgt daraufhin ueber das Internet - ohne eigene Antenne. Eine entsprechende stabile Internetverbindung natuerlich vorausgesetzt. Finanziell wurde das Netzwerk durch die DARC-Mitgliedschaft Pro ermoeglicht. Rein rechtlich fiel der Startschuss allerdings schon ein Jahr vorher mit dem Inkrafttreten der novellierten Amateurfunkverordnung (AFuV), die nun Remotebetrieb ermoeglicht. Die Software wurde von Roland Wolf, DL1EHP, programmiert, der auf der Aktionsbuehne nach dem kollektiven Startschuss der Stationsbetreiber die Software in Aktion erklaerte und ein Demo-QSO vorfuehrte. Ernst Steinhauser, DL3GBE, betreute das Projekt seitens des Vorstandes und zeigte noch eine Karte, wie sich die Stationen ueber Deutschland verteilen. Leider ist der Norden Deutschlands noch nicht "abgedeckt", hier waeren noch vielleicht drei weitere Standorte willkommen, so DL3GBE. Wie kann man nun die Remotestationen nutzen? Dazu klickt man auf die entsprechende Kachel unter MyDARC [1]. In der Clientsoftware ist zu beachten, dass immer ein Nutzer Operator ist, also VFO verstellen und senden kann. Alle anderen Nutzer sind SWLs. Ein ausfuehrliches Erklaervideo hat Michael, DL2YMR, auf seinem YouTube-Kanal veroeffentlicht [2]. Das Nachrichtenportal Heise hat dem Remoteprojekt ebenfalls einen Beitrag gewidmet, leider befindet sich der Artikel hinter einer Bezahlschranke [3].

13-Jaehriger stellt neue Bestmarke in Hochgeschwindigkeits-Telegrafie auf 1160 Zeichen pro Minute: Der 13-jaehrige Rumaene Alexandru Ianis Scutaru, YO8YNS, hat am Samstagvormittag auf der HAM RADIO-Aktionsbuehne die Zuschauer ins Staunen versetzt. Als mehrfacher Weltmeister in der Hochgeschwindigkeits-Telegrafie unternahm er live einen Rekordversuch in RufzXP. Trotz seines jungen Alters ist Ianis Alexandru Scutaru schon ein alter Hase in der High-Speed-Telegrafie: Bereits bei der Schnelltelegrafie-Weltmeisterschaft in Tunesien im vergangenen Jahr hatte YO8YNS mit einer Punktzahl von 311.192 Punkten und einer Hoechstgeschwindigkeit von 1126 Zeichen pro Minute einen neuen Weltrekord aufgestellt, den er nun weiter verbessern konnte.

Neue Kooperationen auf der HAM RADIO geschlossen Der armenische Amateurfunkverband FRRA laesst ab sofort seine auslaendischen QSL-Karten ueber das Buero versenden. Auf der HAM RADIO wurde ein entsprechender Vertrag unterzeichnet. Die aus Armenien zu versendenden QSL-Karten werden, nach Laendern vorsortiert, an die DARC-Geschaeftsstelle in Baunatal versendet, wo sie den Auslandskarten der deutschen Funkamateure beigefuegt werden. Arman Babloyan, EK6NK, Praesident der Federation of Radiosport of the Republic of Armenia (FRRA), zeigte sich bei der Vertragsunterzeichnung auf offener Buehne sehr zufrieden mit der Vereinbarung. Kooperationsvertraege fuer den QSL-Servi ce gibt es bereits mit den Amateurfunkverbaenden von oesterreich, Schweiz, Daenemark, Israel, Schweden und Nordmazedonien. Zwei Vereine mit demselben Ziel - unter diesem Motto sind der Verein Notfunk Deutschland e.V. und der DARC e.V. eine weitreichend e Kooperation eingegangen. Auf der HAM RADIO wurde besiegelt, was ein Jahr zuvor am selben Ort als Idee entstand. "Wir wollen unsere Kompetenz buendeln, um das so wichtige Thema Notfunk erfolgreicher angehen zu koennen", beschreibt Oliver Schlag, DARC-Referent fuer Not- und Katastrophenfunk, die Motivation beider Vereine. Ruediger Stingel, Vorsitzender von Notfunk Deutschland, ergaenzt: "Nothilfe jedweder Art sollte kein Thema sein, bei dem es um Konkurrenz geht." Neben dem Austausch von Wissen und Kontakten stehen die Ausbildung der Vereinsmitglieder und die Fortbildung im Vordergrund der Zusammenarbeit. Auch eine Kraeftebuendelung bei gemeinsamen uebungen sowie die Werbung fuer das wichtige Thema Notfunk umfasst die Kooperation.

Aktuelle Conteste 5. bis 6. Juli: CQ WW VHF Contest, DARC VHF/UHF/Mikrowellenwettbewerb, Marconi Memorial HF Contest und Original QRP Contest 8. Juli: DARC RTTY-Kurzcontest 13. bis 14. Juli: IARU HF World Championship Die Ausschreibungen finden Sie auf der Webseite des Contest-Referates [dx] sowie mittels der Contest-Termintabelle in der CQ DL 7/25 auf S. 68.

Der Funkwetterbericht vom 2. Juli, erstellt von Hartmut Buettig, DL1VDL Zunaechst der Rueckblick vom 23. Juni bis 2. Juli: Obwohl 10 Sonnenfleckenregionen etwa gleich verteilt auf beiden Hemisphaeren der Sonne sichtbar sind, war die Sonnenaktivitaet gering und nur von C-Flares gepraegt. Der solare Fluxindex stieg leicht von 120 auf 128 Einheiten. Das geomagnetische Feld war bis zum Abend des 25. Juni ruhig, dann bis zum 27. Juni mittags stark gestoert und danach wieder ruhig. Die Geschwindigkeit des Sonnenwindes erreichte am 26. Juni 888 Kilometer pro Sekunde [4]. OK1HH schrieb im ARRL-Funkwetterbericht, dass die gestiegene Konzentration von freien Elektronen in der Ionosphaere leider ein bekanntes Phaenomen in diesem Jahr ist, das die Kurzwellenausbr eitung negativ beeintraechtigt [5]. Die hohe ionosphaerische Daempfung spuerten wir taeglich. Die besten DX-Bedingungen fanden wir morgens und abends auf 20 m. Tagsueber wurden wir mit Short-Skip-Bedingungen durch die sporadische E-Schicht belohnt. Die fuer 3000 km Sprungentfernung geltende MuF2 betrug nachts etwa 14,5 MHz. Sie lag zum lokalen Sonnenaufgang bei 13 MHz, stieg mittags auf etwa 18 MHz und kulminierte zum Sonnenuntergang bei 19 MHz. Zwei Stunden spaeter betrug sie noch 17 MHz. Der Referenztag fuer die Station Juliusruh war der 29. Juni [6].

Vorhersage bis 9. Juli: Am 5. und 12. Juli erwarten wir die Wiederkehr der aktiv gewesenen Regionen 4114 und 4117. Damit steigt unsere Hoffnung nach etwas besseren Ausbreitungsbedingungen. Die Aktivitaet des Erdmagnetfeldes bleibt wegen koronaler Effekte und Sonnenwind unbestimmt bis aktiv. Positiver Faktor im Funkwettergeschehen bleibt die sporadische E-Schicht, die sowohl die oberen Kurzwellenba ender als auch das 6-m-Band positiv beeinflusst. Waehrend die globale Erwaermung indirekt Auswirkungen auf die Ionosphaere haben kann, das wird gegenwaertig erforscht, ist eine direkte Korrelation zwischen Erwaermung und Ionosphaerendaempfung derzeit nicht eindeutig belegt [7].

Es folgen nun die Orientierungszeiten fuer Gray-Line DX, jeweils in UTC:

Sonnenaufgang: Auckland/Neuseeland 19:34; Melbourne/Ostaustralien 21:36; Perth/Westaustralien 23:17; Singapur/Republik Singapur 23:02; Anchorage/Alaska 12:24; Johannesburg/Suedafrika 04:55; Tokio/Japan 19:28; Honolulu/Hawaii 15:52; San Francisco/Ka lifornien 12:51; Port Stanley/Falklandinseln 12:05; Berlin/Deutschland 02:47.

Sonnenuntergang: New York/USA-Ostkueste 00:30; San Francisco/Kalifornien 03:36; Sao Paulo/Brasilien 20:31; Port Stanley/Falklandin seln 19:56; Honolulu/Hawaii 05:17; Anchorage/Alaska 07:35; Johannesburg/Suedafrika 15:27; Melbourne/Ostaustralien 07:11; Auckland/Neuseeland 05:14; Berlin/Deutschland 19:32.

Das waren die Meldungen des DARC-Deutschland-Rundspruchs. Die Redaktion hatte Stefan Huepper, DH5FFL, vom Amateurfunkmag azin CQ DL. Meldungen fuer den Rundspruch - mit bundesweiter Relevanz - schicken Sie bitte per Post oder Fax an die Redaktion CQ DL sowie per E-Mail ausschliesslich an redaktion@darc.de. Diesen Rundspruch gibt es auch als PDF- und MP3-Datei auf der DARC-Webseite, in Packet Radio unter der Rubrik DARC sowie per E-Mail-Abonnement. ueber die DARC-Webseite [mail] koennen Sie sich dazu jederzeit an- und abmelden. Bitte bewahren Sie hierfuer Ihr Passwort stets griffbereit auf!

Vielen Dank fuers Zuhoeren und AWDH bis zur naechsten Woche!

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• EmComm DATA Exercise Channel - EmComm DATA Exercise Channel *
• EmComm DATA Exercise Channel - EmComm DATA Exercise Channel *

QST = Here is a broadcast message to all Ham Radio Operators

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• In on emergency situation [DB0ZAV] WinLink VARA RMS operates on the QRG 10.489.640.000 KHz
• DL0NOT EmCom Net Broadcast also in Mode KG-STV & HSMODEM Mode HSMODEM: 4410 QPSK BW: 2500 Hz (QO-100 Standard)
• To see the Solar powered EmComm Station Setup Visit:

http://dl1zav.de/ http://dl1zav.de/ http://dl1zav.de/

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BROADCAST SOURCE: https://www.darc.de/home/

Editorial 06/03/2025

AMSAT-EA

HADES-ICM becomes SO-125

The HADES-ICM satellite of the Spanish AMSAT-EA, a 1.5U PocketQube, is now a member of the OSCAR fleet. Upon request, the satellite was designated SO-125. It carries an SDR-based FM and digital repeater payload for amateur radio.

HADES-ICM was launched on March 14, 2025, aboard a Falcon 9 rocket as part of SpaceX's Transporter 13 mission from Vandenberg Space Force Base, California. The satellite entered service on March 31. The FM repeater is expected to be activated in June initially on weekends, with plans for a later transition to full-time operation.

HADES-ICM also hosts an experimental payload from the Smart IR/Graphene Engineering Innovation Centre (GEIC) at the University of Manchester. Data from this experiment will be publicly broadcast via telemetry packets.

The satellite carries an FM and digital repeater payload built on an enhanced SDR-based platform, capable of transmitting up to 0.25 W when battery conditions permit. This makes it accessible to stations with handheld antennas such as the Arrow antenna. The coordinated uplink frequency is 145.875 MHz, and the downlink frequency is 436.666 MHz. The repeater operates with an open squelch and does not require a subtone. The satellite has been cataloged with the NORAD number 63492.

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BROADCAST SOURCE: https://www.darc.de/home/

Editorial staff 01/29/2025 March 6

Lecture "Amateur radio meets space travel"

Lecture DK5LA

Radio amateurs continue to be involved in research and development: A few years ago, the Chinese launched satellites to the moon in order to be able to conduct research in space. Since radio traffic data is only possible with a clear line of sight between the stations involved, the Chinese team could only send or receive data when the moon is in their sky. A station here in Europe was therefore required. Reinhard, DK5LA, near Flensburg was able to take on the task in the 2 m band and send data to the satellite.

He also managed to establish the first connection via a satellite in lunar orbit. This was a new milestone in radio history. He will give his lecture "Amateur radio meets space travel" on March 6th in the planetarium in Glcksburg. Information a"out the event and registration can be found at https://www.planetarium-gluecksburg.de/vorstellungen/details/amateurfunk-trifft-raumfahrt/2025-03-0 6-19-00.html. Ulrich Fenner, DL2EP, reports on it.

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BROADCAST SOURCE: https://www.darc.de/home/

"Hacker" makes abandoned BEESAT-1 functional again

In 2009, BEESAT-1 was launched into low Earth orbit as the first 1U CubeSat from the Technical University of Berlin. In 2013, operation s were largely discontinued, apart from occasional checks every few years to determine whether the satellite was still responding to commands. Now a "hacker" has repaired the satellite, which is now usable again for radio amateurs.

In 2024, PistonMiner, the hacker's pseudonym, repaired a number of software problems on BeeSat-1, restored the telemetry function and downloaded images from the camera for the first time. His work was presented at the 38th Chaos Communication Congress from December 27th to 30th, 2024 in Hamburg.

Restoring BEESAT-1's operational readiness was particularly attractive because, according to current estimates, it will remain in space for at least another 20 years due to its higher orbit of over 700 km. In addition, the satellite is equipped with a number of sensors and actuators that were not fully used during the main mission and could be used in an extended mission.

The lecture "Hacking yourself a satellite - recovering BEESAT-1" can be found at the following link: https://media.ccc.de/v/38c3-hackin g-yourself-a-satellite-recovering-beesat-1

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BROADCAST SOURCE: QO-100 Multimedia Beacon 10489993.50 kHz

N:2:Umfrage:20240923

Umfrage / Survey

English version follows below

Du hast diese Nachricht von der Multimedia-Bake ber QO-100 empfangen. Innerhalb der AMSAT-DL diskutieren wir ueber den Fortbestand der Multimedia-Bake. Wie nutzt du die empfangenen Informationen, welche weiteren Informationen sollten noch abgestrahtlt werden oder was empfindest du als Ueberfluessig? Evtl. hast du auch andere Ideen zur Multimedia-Bake. Schreibe uns bitte deine Gedanken an mmbake@amsat-dl.org 73 de AMSAT-DL

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Survey

N:2: Survey:20240923

You have received this message from the multimedia beacon via QO-100. Within the AMSAT-DL we are discussing the continued existence of the multimedia beacon. How do you use the information received, what other information should be transmitted or what do you think is superfluous? You may also have other ideas about the multimedia beacon. Please send us your thoughts to mmbake@amsat-dl.org 73 de AMSAT-DL

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BROADCAST SOURCE: https://www.darc.de/home/

Editorial December 12, 2024 AMSAT

Launch of HADES-R and HADES-ICM planned for the first quarter of 2025

After HADES-D (SO-121), AMSAT-EA will provide radio amateurs with two new satellites, HADES-R and HADES-ICM, at the beginning of 2025. These are intended to replace SO-121, which burned up in the Earth's atmosphere at the beginning of November, in orbit. Both satellites in the PocketQube 1.5P format (5 5 7.5 cm) will be launched by SpaceX as part of the Transporter-12 and Transporter-13 missions.

The AMSAT-EA satellites are developed and built with technical support from private companies and universities. The transmission power will vary depending on the battery level between 40 mW and theoretically 250 mW when fully charged.

The uplink is in the VHF band and the downlink is in the UHF band, they also transmit telemetry with their status as well as voice and CW messages.

The AMSAT News Service Weekly Bulletin from AMSAT-NA provides further information:

https://www.amsat.org/ans-343-amsat-news-service-weekly-bulletins/

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BROADCAST SOURCE: https://www.darc.de/home/

Editorial 03.12.2024

Satellites

Japan launches the first "wooden satellite" with amateur radio payload

Japanese researchers have launched the world's first wooden satellite, LignoSat, into space, taking a step toward exploring the suitability of wood for lunar and Martian construction. Developed in collaboration between Kyoto University and Sumitomo Forestry, the satellite was launched on board a SpaceX mission to the International Space Station on November 4, 2024. From there, LignoSat is scheduled to be deployed into an orbit at an altitude of about 400 kilometers.

LignoSat, a 1U CubeSat, carries an amateur radio payload. A downlink on 435.820 MHz has been coordinated for CW, 4k8 GMSK AX25 telemetry, and FM. For more information, visit https://space.innovationkyoto.org/amateur-radio-operators/

The satellite, whose name is derived from the Latin word for "wood," is a compact, palm-sized structure. LignoSat is designed to demonstrate the potential of wood as a sustainable and durable material for space exploration. Takao Doi, a former astronaut and current researcher at Kyoto University, explained that the use of wood could pave the way for building habitats that enable human life and work in space.

One of LignoSat's main tasks during its six-month orbit will be to measure wood's resilience to extreme space temperatures, which fluctuate between -100 and 100 C every 45 minutes as the satellite moves from sunlight to darkness. The sensors on board the satellite will also monitor how well the wood mitigates the effects of space radiation on semiconductors.

The team behind LignoSat is optimistic that their experiment could inspire a wider application of wood in space exploration. Doi even hinted at the potential for future partnerships: "If we can prove that our first wooden satellite works, we want to offer it to Elon Musk's SpaceX."

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BROADCAST SOURCE: https://www.darc.de/home/

Editorial 11/06/2024 AMSAT

AO-7 celebrates 50th anniversary

It is often reported that the oldest satellites still functioning in space are the Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 spacecraft. These probes were launched in 1977, but are they really the oldest functioning spacecraft in space? If we also take into account the satellites in Earth orbit, the oldest functioning satellite that continues to be available to radio amateurs around the world is AMSAT-OSCAR 7 (AO-7), launched on November 15, 1974.

In its first phase of operation, AO-7 had a lifespan of 6.5 years. In late 1980, AO-7's NiCd batteries began to show signs of increased resistance. This was a sure sign to the AMSAT command stations that the end was in sight. The cells had originally been tuned by NASA for their capacity. In fact, they failed in June 1981, when a three-week period began in which the satellite spent 20 minutes in the Earth's shadow.

AO-7 remained inactive for almost 21 years. However, in the summer of 2002, AO-7 came back to life. Probably due to radiation, the status of a NiCd battery changed so that the solar cells could once again supply power to the control and communication units.

Pat Gowain, G3IOR, was the first to discover the CW telemetry of the satellite, which was thought to be silent, on June 21, 2002 and informed Perry Klein, W3PK, the first AMSAT president and designer of the VHF/HF transponder. As a result, many satellite enthusiast s began to observe the signals from AO-7, and the second life of the "Sleeping Beauty" satellite began.

AMSAT has provided a detailed article on AO-7 on its website: https://www.amsat.org/amsat-ao-7-a-fifty-year-anniversary/. The AMSAT News Service reports on this

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Editorial 09.10.2024

Milestone

IARU processes the 1000th request for an amateur satellite frequency

IARU

The International Amateur Radio Union (IARU) recently processed the 1000th request for coordination for an amateur satellite frequency. The IARU Satellite Frequency Coordination Panel has faced new challenges in recent years with the increasing popularity and growth of cube satellites.

Given the lower cost of launching these small satellites, the focus is on carefully managing the radio frequency spectrum and ensuring minimal interference with terrestrial services. "As Earth's orbit becomes increasingly crowded, the IARU's work in the area of ??frequency coordination will also be critical for future missions," explains the IARU. The Amateur Radio Newsline reports this with reference to the AMSAT News Service.

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Editorial staff 07.10.2024

AMSAT

MESAT1 receives OSCAR number MO-122

On behalf of the University of Maine, AMSAT has assigned the CubeSat MESAT1 the OSCAR number MESAT1-OSCAR 122, or MO-122 for short. MESAT1 was launched on July 4 at 04:04 UTC on a Firefly Alpha launch vehicle from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. The satellite, developed by the University of Maine, carries an Earth imaging experiment and a linear LTM-1 transponder provided by AMSAT.

The satellite has been put into operation and the transponder is currently active (frequencies and information: https://www.mainesat/ .org/mesat1/ ). The AMSAT News Service reports this with reference to Drew Glasbrenner, KO4MA, responsible for assigning OSCAR numbers.

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AMSAT-EA plans HADES-R and HADES-ICM for 2025

The Spanish AMSAT has announced the upcoming launch of two new satellites, HADES-R and HADES-ICM. They are expected to be available to radio amateurs at the beginning of 2025. These satellites are intended to replace the current HADES-D (SO-121) satellite in orbit. Unlike HADES-D, which transmits with a transmission power of 40 mW, the new satellites will have a variable transmission power that can theoretically be up to 250 mW when the batteries are fully charged. The HADES-R and HADES-ICM satellites, in the format of a 1.5 pocket qube, will be launched by SpaceX with the Transporter-12 and Transporter-13 missions. The launches will use D-Orbit's ION Orbital Transfer Vehicle, or OTV, with mission management provided by Alba Orbital, a Scottish company specialising in satellite launch solutions. As with previous AMSAT-EA projects, these satellites were developed with support from private companies and universities.

Both satellites will support a wide range of communications functions, including FM voice, FSK, FT4 and FT8 modes. They will also be equipped for AX.25/APRS communications at 300 and 1200 bps. The satellites will uplink in the VHF band, while the downlink will operate in the UHF band. In addition, the satellites will transmit telemetry data, including status updates, voice messages and CW messages. All communications will be handled via an SDR-based FM and FSK repeater, which is available at all times and activated by squelch without the need for subtones, for example. In addition to their primary communications functions, both satellites will carry a scientific experiment from the Smart IR/Graphene Engineering Innovation Centre, or GEIC, at the University of Manchester. HADES-ICM is sponsored by Florida-based IcMercury (Interstellar Communication Holdings) and will carry several messages embedded in the FSK telemetry. While the frequency range of the HADES-R satellite has already been coordinated by the IARU, approval for HADES-ICM is still pending. The AMSAT News Service reports this with reference to Flix Pez, EA4GQS, President/Mission Manager.

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AMSAT-DL editorial team September 13, 2024

ERMINAZ mission postponed to 2025

As AMSAT-Deutschland e.V. reports on its website, on August 19, 2024, just a few weeks before the planned launch date of the ERMINAZ payload, an incident occurred during a test of the RFA One rocket from Rocket Factory Augsburg (RFA) that led to the complete loss of the first rocket stage. As a result, the ERMINAZ mission has to be postponed until next year, but the exact launch date is still open.

The UNNE-1, MARIA-G, SIDLOC-PQ-1, SIDLOC-PQ-1, QUBIK-5, and ERMINAZ-1U and ERMINAZ-1V satellites are part of the Erminaz mission, a joint effort between AMSAT-DL, AMSAT-EA, and the Libre Space Foundation, with each organization flying its own satellites and using the PicoBus deployer developed by Libre Space in the ERMINAZ mission.

ERMINAZ-1U and ERMINAZ-1V are AMSAT-DL's two PocketQubes. They are intended to carry out a series of telecommunications experiments in the amateur radio field, using various modulation, coding, and framing schemes. In addition to a CW beacon, SSDV is also planned for digital image transmission, the images of which are stored on a micro SD card and transmitted cyclically. The aim here is to gain long-term experience under space conditions with SD cards. In addition to telemetry in the CCSDS standard, a CCSDS digipeater is also implemented, so radio amateurs can also communicate directly via the two ERMINAZ PocketQubes, although it is not AX.25 compatible. A sensor board is also on board to measure beta, gamma and X-ray radiation in orbit.

Another goal of ERMINAZ-1U and -1V is to introduce and involve students from Bochum University of Applied Sciences in the space projects of AMSAT-DL, in cooperation with the Bochum Observatory.

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Editorial 09/02/2024 AMSAT

Seven Cubesats launched from the ISS

On August 29, seven Cubesats were deployed from the Kibo module of the International Space Station ISS. According to the IARU Satellite Frequency Coordination, six of these satellites transmit on amateur radio frequencies. Three of them carry APRS digipeaters that operate on 145.825 MHz.

Below is more information about these six CubeSats:

CosmoGirl-Sat

(APRS, call sign JS1YOI)

A 1U Cubesat built by the Cosmo Girls Amateur Radio Club, a group of Japanese women founded under the motto "Getting closer to the universe". The satellite has, among other things, a high-resolution camera for imaging the Earth.

SaganSat0

(APRS)

A 1U Cubesat built by students from various high schools in the Japanese prefecture of Saga. The satellite is equipped with an infrared camera and a gamma-ray detector.

SAKURA (APRS) A 1U CubeSat built by the Chiba Institute of Technology, a university in Narashino, Japan. The satellite carries instruments for sunspot and solar flare observations, as well as for measuring environmental damage on Earth.

Binar-2, Binar-3 & Binar-4 Three CubeSats built by Curtin University in Australia for testing radiation shielding materials and modeling reentry data from LEO.

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Editorial 07/18/2024 Satellites

NASA discovers spectral formations in LEO orbit

NASA scientists have discovered unusual formations in Earth's ionosphere. The ionosphere extends from 80 to 1000 km above the Earth and forms the boundary between our planet's atmosphere and space. Although it is home to most of the satellites orbiting the Earth, it is vulnerable to electromagnetic storms emanating from the sun.

Under certain conditions, the layer can become electrically charged. As the GOLD (Global-scale Observations of the Limb and Disk) observation satellite found, plasma bands extending across the ionosphere can lead to unusual X and C formations. It is a startling "alphabet soup," as NASA called the findings in a press release. This could shed light on how space weather can affect our planet's upper atmosphere and "disrupt radio and GPS signals."

Charged particles formed dense bands or "ridges" around Earth's magnetic equator, while elsewhere areas of low density caused by the setting sun took shape, NASA said. Scientists believe major disturbances such as solar storms or massive volcanic eruptions cause multiple ridges to join together to form an X-shape, as previous GOLD observations have shown.

But now scientists have discovered the same shapes without such a cause, during a quiet period of solar activity. "It's an unexpected feature during geomagnetically quiet conditions," Fazlul Laskar, a research associate at the University of Colorado and lead author of a paper on the discovery earlier this year, explained in a NASA statement.

In addition to an "X," some formations in the ionosphere also take on the shape of a "C," which new observations show can occur in close proximity to each other. "The fact that we have bubbles so close together with very different shapes tells us that the dynamics of the atmosphere are more complex than we expected," said NASA scientist and ionosphere expert Jeffrey Klenzing.

The full article can be found at https://science.nasa.gov/science-research/heliophysics/alphabet-soup-nasas-gold-finds-surprising-c-x -shapes-in-atmosphere/.

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Amateur radio satellite

Tom Kamp, DF5JL April 1, 2024

AMSAT-DL publishes geostationary satellite proposal

In response to the IARU and ESA's request for feedback from the amateur radio community regarding a geostationary satellite, AMSAT-DL has published a comprehensive proposal for a geostationary microwave amateur radio payload [1]. The 31-page document proposes a satellite position at 43 West that would include Central, Southern and Eastern European countries, parts of Scandinavia, Africa as well as large parts of the North American continent, Central and South America.

Other considerations include hosted and unhosted payloads, a micro-GEO platform, and future European launch systems as a method of transport to orbit. The proposal goes into great detail about possible frequency bands, transponders, link budgets and even draft frequency plans.

[1] https://amsat-dl.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/AMSAT-DL_Proposal-Geo-Payload_final.pdf

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Editorial February 20, 2024 Software AirScout Web

"AirScout Web" presented

At the recent GHz conference over the weekend, Frank Schmhling, DL2ALF, presented the new web version of the AirScout software: web.airscout.eu. AirScout itself has been around for several years (www.airscout.eu) and is an essential software tool for predicting aircraft scatter, i.e. signal reflections in the VHF range on aircraft. While AirScout was primarily written as Windows software and can be installed on a PC, the new web version is platform-independent and runs in a web browser.

AirScout Web also works on smartphones and tablet computers. If you want to use the new system, you first create an account. The user interface is similar in many parts to the installation variant. But there are also functions that differ depending on the system. A few features are currently not implemented, such as CAT control, wtKST coupling or alarm function. The presentation from the GHz conference AirScout goes Web can be downloaded from the DLGTH website: http://dl0gth.dl2alf.de/index.php/docu. If you would like to delve deeper into how AirScout works in general, you should also watch the lecture AirScout Deep Dive for Advanced Users on the same page.

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Editorial February 2, 2024 Satellites and space

SLIM mission: An amateur radio beacon on the moon

As part of the SLIM mission of the Japanese space agency JAXA, there is currently an amateur radio transmitter on the moon. Shortly before the probe landed, the LEV-1 and LEV-2 payloads were deployed. The collected data from LEV-2 is received by LEV-1 and transmitted as a beacon on 437.41 MHz at 1 W. LEV-1 operates under the call sign JS1YMG [1]. However, the mission struggles with technical problems, but is still considered a success by JAXA [2].

SLIM (Smart Lander for Investigating Moon) was launched on September 6, 2023 together with the XRISM X-ray telescope. The mission goal of the 700 kg probe is to land safely and precisely on the moon. Navigation is based on camera images and the landing site should be hit with an accuracy of 100 m. On January 19th at 12:20 a.m. Japanese time, SLIM touched down - albeit incorrectly, which caused problems with the power supply due to the compromised solar cells. SLIM was therefore switched off several times to save electricity [3]. SLIM carries several payloads, including LEV-1 and LEV-2/Sora-Q. Lunar Excursion Vehicle 1 (LEV-1) is a jumping lunar rover. He should take measurements immediately after landing. LEV-2, meanwhile, is designed as a spherical, two-wheeled lunar rover with a diameter of 8 cm. Sora-Q has two cameras and should take images for about two hours after landing. Daniel Estevez, EA4GP, presents the method and extraction results for the demodulation of the Morse code from the signal transmitted by 'LEV-1' and the extraction of the code string (call sign and HK data in hexadecimal form), it says [4]. Unfortunately, due to the low energy budget, the transmitter has only been active for a short time [5]. In contrast to EME operation (Earth-Moon-Earth), which is based on signal reflections on the lunar surface and has a path loss of 240...290 dB depending on the frequency, this is an active transmitter on the lunar surface itself. However, it is also Antenna effort is required here to receive the signals, which are only 1000 mW strong. SLIM is currently retired. The command team waits for sufficient sunlight to fall on the solar cells. This is expected to happen on February 15th. It remains to be seen whether SLIM will report back because the probe is not designed for the cold nights on the moon.

Left [1] https://twitter.com/LEV1_Rover_SLIM/status/1752313361780572550 [2] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smart_Lander_for_Investigating_Moon [3] https://www.heise.de/news/Nach-dem-Sonnenuntergang-Japans-Mondlander-SLIM-zum-zweiten-Mal-ohne-Strom-9615619.html [4] https://www.linkedin.com/posts/on7wp_finally-a-beacon-on-the-moon-activity-7158513522648174592-ZOuE [5] https://www.jaxa.jp/press/2024/01/20240125-2_j.html

BROADCAST SOURCE: https://www.darc.de/home/

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BROADCAST SOURCE: https://amsat-dl.org/en/qo-100-multimedia-beacon-with-new-content/

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QO-100 Multimedia Beacon with new content

QO-100s Multimedia HighSpeed Beacon has received another update and now includes 10 tabs for the various AMSAT bulletins. Other functions, such as the DXCluster and the CW spotter have also been revised. Also new are the QO-100 DX Club News, which are constantly updated.

As Florian DF2ET reports, the headers of the tabs are displayed in bold as soon as the respective bulletin content has been received. In addition, the last bulletin received will be scrolled to in each case. This allows the user tnt tin at any time by selecting the appropria te tab.

For this purpose the file qo100info.html was published in a new version 0.95 and updated automatically.

More info: Links

QO-100 High Speed Multi Media Beacon
https://amsat-dl.org/en/qo-100-high-speed-multi-media-beacon/

HSmodem Manual from DJ0ABR and DD1US as a single PDF file
http://www.dd1us.de/Downloads/Manual%20HSModem%20rev%202.03.pdf

QO-100 Multimedia Beacon Wiki: german / english
https://wiki.amsat-dl.org/doku.php?id=en%3Ahsmodem%3Astreaming_beacon

HSmodem Download for Windows, Linux and Raspberry PI
https://dj0abr.de/german/technik/sat/modem/images.htm

HSmodem Open Source Code on GitHub
https://github.com/amsat-dl/QO-100-Modem

EA4GPZ: Decoding the QO-100 multimedia beacon with GNU Radio
Discussion in AMSAT-DL Forum ( german / english )
https://destevez.net/2022/05/decoding-the-qo-100-multimedia-beacon-with-gnu-radio/

QO-100 High Speed Multi Media Beacon

The new AMSAT-DL Highspeed Multimedia Modem developed by Kurt DJ0ABR for the QO-100 NB transponder allows a transmission speed of up to 7200 bit/s in 8 APSK or 4800 bit/s in QPSK despite the maximum allowed bandwidth of 2.7 kHz.

It is thus significantly more efficient than conventional methods on the QO-100 transponder and it can be used to transmit any data and voice in full duplex. The software is open source and available free of charge.

Since the end of May 2022, the MM beacon from the QO-100 ground station (DK0SB) in Bochum is active. Settings:

Center frequency: 10,489,995 MHz
Zero beat, ssB: 10,489,993.3 MHz
Modulation: 8 APSK
Symbol rate: 7200 bit/s
HF bandwidth: 2700 Hz

Contents

different types of multimedia content are already available or planned.

Narrow Band Transponder Activity
Wide Band Transponder Activity
DX Cluster Messages
CW Skimmer
AMSAT Bulletins
APRS (planned)

Links

HSmodem Manual from DJ0ABR and DD1US as a single PDF file
http://www.dd1us.de/Downloads/Manual%20HSModem%20rev%202.03.pdf
http://www.dd1us.de/Downloads/Manual%20HSModem%20rev%202.03.pdf

QO-100 Multimedia Beacon Wiki: german / english
https://wiki.amsat-dl.org/doku.php?id=de%3Ahsmodem%3Astreaming_beacon
https://wiki.amsat-dl.org/doku.php?id=en%3Ahsmodem%3Astreaming_beacon

HSmodem Download for Windows, Linux and Raspberry PI
https://dj0abr.de/german/technik/sat/modem/images.htm
https://dj0abr.de/german/technik/sat/modem/images.htm

HSmodem Open Source Code on GitHub
https://github.com/amsat-dl/QO-100-Modem
https://github.com/amsat-dl/QO-100-Modem

EA4GPZ: Decoding the QO-100 multimedia beacon with GNU Radio
https://destevez.net/2022/05/decoding-the-qo-100-multimedia-beacon-with-gnu-radio/
https://destevez.net/2022/05/decoding-the-qo-100-multimedia-beacon-with-gnu-radio/

Discussion in AMSAT-DL Forum ( german / english )
https://forum.amsat-dl.org/index.php?thread/3767-hs-modem/
https://forum.amsat-dl.org/index.php?thread/3609-highspeed-multimedia-modem-for-qo-100/

BROADCAST SOURCE: https://amsat-dl.org/en/qo-100-multimedia-beacon-with-new-content

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NETWORK INFORMATION

• QRA DL0NOT EmComm C19 Net Broadcast

International QO-100 Emergency Frequency

SOURCE, https://amsat-dl.org/international-qo-100-emergency-frequency/

Zur Koordinierung potenzieller Notfallkommunikation waehrend der aktuellen oder einer anderen Krise wird mit sofortiger Wirkung die folgende Frequenz als internationale Notfallfrequenz auf dem QO-100 NB-Transponder zugewiesen.

In order to coordinate potential emergency communications during the actual or any other crisis, the following frequency shall be assigned as international emergency frequency on QO-100 NB Transponder with immediate effect. QO-100 International Emergency Frequency

Downlink: 10489.860 MHz
Upleink: 2400.360 MHz
SSB channel: max. 2.7kHz bandwidth

All users on QO-100 are encouraged to monitor this frequency, but keep it clear for emergency traffic!

Alle Benutzer von QO-100 sind aufgefordert, diese Frequenz zu ueberwachen, aber halten Sie sie fuer den Notfallverkehr frei!

VISIT, https://amsat-dl.org/international-qo-100-emergency-frequency/

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™RYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRY RYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRYRY * EmComm DATA Exercise Channel - EmComm DATA Exercise Channel * * EmComm DATA Exercise Channel - EmComm DATA Exercise Channel *

To see the SetUp ViuP¤-->> http://dl1zav.de/ http://dl1zav.de/

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EMCOMM GROUP PSE QSL VIA UHF TETRA TMO RPTR DB0MOT 438.275 Kl.Feldberg/Taunus

End of BROADCAST , 73, God bless U All es stay healthy

DL0NOT Katastrophen NotFunk Distrikt Hessen COVID 19 NET

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Tevel2-3 is active for 72 hours - source email from David Greenberg via Amsat-BB

TLE

TEVEL2-3 1 63218U 25052J 25187.92807724 .00008866 00000-0 40508-3 0 9994 2 63218 97.4278 81.4748 0001696 259.5200 100.5844 15.20803146 17400

Freq: Downlink 436.400 MHz Uplink: 145.970 Mode: FM Tone: none

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.radio/post/8219573

Discover how radio frequency (RF) works—from electrons to WiFi. Learn how changing currents create electromagnetic waves, how crystals like TCXO and VCO power modern communication, and how your devices turn digital bits into wireless signals traveling at the speed of light.

Recently I was helping a friend erect their newly refurbished multi-band antenna and during the process we discussed the notion of tuning an antenna that's high in the air. They made a curious response, in that they'd tuned the antenna on the ground before we started.

I asked how this would work, since as I understand the process, this changes things once it gets in the air. They assured me that while the actual SWR might change, the frequencies at which it was resonant would not.

This was news to me because I've been putting off erecting my own multi-band 6BTV antenna mainly because I didn't really want to face having to erect it, tune it, lower it, modify the elements, erect it, tune it, etc., all whilst standing on the steel roof of my patio. Would this phenomenon be true for my antenna?

It occurred to me that I could test this idea, not only for my antenna, but for other antennas as well. In my minds-eye, I saw a video displaying the pertinent attributes of an antenna, SWR, gain, radiation pattern, and whatever else I could think of, animated with the modifications of things like height and ground radials.

If this sounds familiar in some way, it's because I've been here before. This time the outcome was slightly different, since I found a tool that can optimise antennas using a genetic algorithm. What I mean by that is an automated process where you can test variations of a thing, in this case antennas. Rather than design each antenna and test it, you essentially generate antenna designs and tweak them to determine the best one. Then you use that to generate the next series of designs. Rinse and repeat until you have what you're looking for. There's a whole field of computer science dedicated to this and unsurprisingly the rabbit hole goes deep.

The tool is called "xnec2c-gao" and it's written by Maurizio DC1MDP. The name of the tool hints at its nature, working in combination with "xnec2c", written by Neoklis 5B4AZ and maintained by Eric KJ7LNW, you'll find links to both tools on the xnec2c.org website.

How the two tools work together is a beautiful dance. The antenna modelling tool, xnec2c, can read an antenna definition file and detect if it changes, at which point it can redo the simulation, which it can output to another file. The genetic algorithm optimisation tool, xnec2c-gao, can detect the changed output and update the antenna definition file, and the process repeats. Which brings me to a pro-tip, for this to work, you need to configure xnec2c to do two things, detect the changed definition file, and write the output to CSV, both of these options can be found in the "Optimization Settings" menu, just so you don't spend an hour banging your head against the desk.

Between the two tools, the antenna definition evolves and you end up with a design optimised for your purpose. The default does this for SWR and gain. Mind you, I tested a multi-band dipole which managed to find some interesting designs, but didn't pick them because a low SWR combined with a high gain, for reason't I don't yet understand, wasn't considered better than a high SWR with a high gain, so there's some work to be done. As a software developer I have a sneaking suspicion that it's adding the two, rather than picking the highest gain combined with the lowest SWR, but I haven't confirmed that. As I said, deep rabbit hole.

While we're not yet at the video display stage, for the first time I can get a sense that this might come to pass. There's plenty of work to be done. For example, the antenna display on xnec2c during the process seems broken, there's no way to output gnuplot files during the process, and capturing the various charts in real-time will require work, but all that seems if not easy, at least possible.

Meanwhile, I'm attempting to locate an antenna definition file, preferably in .NEC format for my 6BTV antenna, so I can use this combination of tools to discover if tuning it on the ground will work and while I'm at it, discover if the installation I'm working on will give me something worthwhile.

I realise that this is well beyond "try it and see", but my body isn't up to climbing up and down ladders 17 times in a day and I think that getting a feel for what might occur is a good way to learn.

When was the last time you climbed on a roof and what did you do to avoid it?

I'm Onno VK6FLAB

Learn how to add a BME280 sensor to your DIY ESP32 Meshtastic Node for real-time temperature, humidity, and air pressure monitoring. This guide covers hardware setup, wiring, and Meshtastic app settings—perfect for enhancing your LoRa mesh network with environmental data.

Just over a year ago, the ARRL, the American Radio Relay League, the peak body for amateur radio in the United States and one of the oldest of such organisations, experienced an incident.

During the weeks following, the ARRL was tight-lipped about the extent of the incident and most amateurs only really noticed that services were off-line or slow to respond. After months of delay and disinformation, the ARRL finally revealed that it was the subject of a ransomware attack and that it had paid a million dollar ransom. It went on to blame the authorities for its silence.

Mind you, it didn't tell me personally, it made public statements on its website. Similarly when I specifically contacted the ARRL to discover what information of mine it held, and what the status of that information was, the ARRL responded that I should refer to its public statements. It continued to state that my information was not compromised, since it only lived in LoTW, the Logbook of The World, the system it uses to coordinate the verification of amateur radio contacts, which are used to distribute awards like the DXCC and Worked All whatever.

Imagine my surprise when I received an email this week, sent from "memberlist@arrl.org" to my non-amateur radio email address. I confirmed with several amateurs that they too received this email. Informative, to a point, but likely well beyond anything intended by its author, it stated that LoTW was being updated with associated down time, incidentally, inexplicably, coinciding with the 2025 ARRL Field day, and it "will be fully migrated to the cloud". It went on to solicit donations. It made no reference whatsoever to the ransomware attack.

There's a lot hidden in that email.

Although the attack last year was linked to the outage associated with LoTW, the ARRL has continued to claim that the LoTW data was not impacted by the ransomware attack, but the email reveals that the system is being migrated to the cloud, in other words, right now, it's not in the cloud. Which begs the question, where is the server infrastructure for LoTW today, and more importantly, where was it a year ago when its systems were compromised?

From a public post by Dave AA6YQ, dated the 2nd of February 2021, in response to a message about a January LoTW committee meeting, we know that the LoTW server "now employs the current version of an SAP database engine". A month before that, Dave wrote another informative email that indicated that 105 thousand callsigns submitted logs to LoTW in the last 1,826 days or the five years between 2016 and 2021. There were logs from 21 thousand callsigns in the week prior to that January post. In all, according to Dave, there were 153,246 callsigns who submitted contacts to LoTW.

The LoTW committee meeting minutes are no longer available from the ARRL website, but I have a copy. The document states that there were 1.2 billion contacts entered into LoTW, big number right? The next line tells us that this resulted in 262 million QSO records. I wonder what happened to the other billion records? This activity was generated by 139 thousand users using 200 thousand certificates. For context, every VK callsign automatically comes with an AX callsign, but LoTW requires that you separately register each with its own certificate.

As someone who has been playing with databases since the 1980's I can tell you that LoTW is a tiny database. For comparison, the WSPR database is an order of magnitude larger, not to mention, more active. I have no insight into the business rules within the LoTW database, but the fact that updates are being processed in batches and that it regularly has delays indicates a level of complexity that I cannot account for.

As an aside, the LoTW committee document lists 10 members. Dave is not one of those listed. It makes me wonder who else has access to this database. Note that I have no reason to believe that Dave's information is questionable, nor that he has access that he shouldn't, he was after all a member of the LoTW committee from 2013 until 2017 when the ARRL removed all development resources from the LoTW. I'm asking who else has access and why? While we're here, who has been doing maintenance and updates on this system over the past seven years?

Moving on. The database for LoTW contains information from amateurs all over the planet, including those in Europe where the GDPR, the General Data Protection Regulation, enacted in 2016, is extremely strict on the security and disclosure of personal data with very heavy penalties for breaches. The GDPR requires notifications be sent within 72 hours of a breach, and that an organisation must designate a data protection officer. I wonder who has that role at the ARRL and I wonder if they told anyone? Did any European amateurs receive personal notification from the ARRL about their data, I know I didn't.

My first activation of LoTW was in 2013, now twelve years ago. I received certificate expiry messages in 2016 and 2019. Since then there have been no such messages. That's unsurprising, since I stopped using LoTW once I discovered just how broken it was. Don't get me started on portable and QRP variants of my callsign. My care factor is low as to when I last actually used it, since attempting to dig up that information would take considerable effort, but I can guarantee that it was before 28 October 2019, when the last certificate expired.

You might come to this point and ask yourself why am I digging into this at all?

Let me ask you some questions in addition to those I've already mentioned.

SAP, the database system which apparently runs LoTW, had 254 CVEs, or Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures listed, in 2020 alone. It continues to have exploits. When was SAP updated and is it up to date today?

Is it credible that LoTW wasn't compromised during the ransomware attack? Does the ARRL know this for sure, or did it just not detect the compromise?

We know that LoTW was down during the incident and according to the UptimeRobot service showed outages on the 14th of May 2024 but we still don't know exactly when this attack started.

As you might know, the ARRL is also the headquarters for the IARU International Secretariat, the administration body for the global representation of our hobby. It presumably shares infrastructure with the ARRL, but at no point in the past year have we been advised of the impact of this breach to the IARU.

What information is stored in LoTW and why has the ARRL continued to ignore requests for disclosing the specific information it holds on the users of that system? I know for sure that it knows my callsigns and my email address. I also know for sure that it required identity documents to prove my identity and right to use those callsigns. I have been told in writing that LoTW never deletes anything, so what does it store and can I delete all my records and if-so, how?

Why did I receive an update about the upgrade for LoTW when I'm clearly not an active user of the system?

The memberlist@arrl.org is used for all manner of services, including the propagation updates, and the three other ARRL bulletins. In other words, this address is used for a myriad of messaging. Is this information stored in a database and if so, where is this database? Was it compromised? What information is stored in that database? Are my details in that database, are yours?

While discussing this LoTW update email with other amateurs, I was informed by one amateur that even after they stopped being a member of the ARRL, as a direct result of the ransomware attack and the discontinuation of the delivery of QST magazine they paid for, the ARRL continued to send regular email updates as-if they were still a current member. Where is that data stored and how are the ARRL not considered a source of SPAM?

While we're exploring the blurred lines between being a member of the ARRL and not, why did it send the update about the incident via email to its members on 21 August 2024 and update the website a day later, and why did it not send that same email to me and every other amateur directly? Why does the ARRL continue to ignore its obligations in relation to the personal information it clearly and demonstrably holds?

The GDPR has been a fact of life since 2016. It's not optional if you store data for European citizens, but the ARRL doesn't even mention it on their privacy policy page. Did European users receive specific notification about the breach, now a year ago, which clearly the ARRL had both the capacity and obligation to? Has the GDPR been invoked by European amateurs? Should it?

You could attempt to explain all this as incompetence or mismanagement. That's a response, but it doesn't pass the sniff test. For example, implementing SAP is a non-trivial process. I have over 40 years professional experience in the ICT field and I'm not sure I would stick up my hand to have a go at doing this. Mind you, if I did, there's no way I'd choose SAP, I'd find an open source solution, but that's just me, not to mention that SAP license costs are significant, this in an organisation asking users for donations.

The thing is, we're talking about a system that's now at least 22 years old, running in an organisation that's been around for over a century, an organisation that deals in regulation and legalese at the very foundation of its existence.

In other words, there's a massive amount of legal and technical skill and history available within the organisation, but we're still seeing this level of at best questionable, at worst illegal behaviour.

I'm not a member of the ARRL and nothing I've seen to date makes me want to give them any of my money. If you are, perhaps you should be asking some questions. If you're a citizen of Europe, perhaps you should start asking some questions about your data. If you pay money to your own peak body, then you should ask it to find out what happend at the IARU International Secretariat during the attack.

I'm Onno VK6FLAB

Actually my first radio ever, how'd I do?

cross-posted from: https://piefed.social/post/963962

Foundations of Amateur Radio

The other day Randall, VK6WR, encouraged me to get on-air. He described it like this:

"There is a mystery signal on 40m that you can try your new Universal Radio Hacker skills on. It appears to be a FSK signal separated by 7kHz with the two signals at 7.0615 and 7.0685 MHz. Each of them on their own sounds a bit like a Morse signal, but my CW decoder decodes junk. But if you can see it on a spectrum scope, it is clearly FSK because either one of them is on at any time."

He went on to say: "You'll need an SDR to receive the signal given the separation, but could be a fun investigation!"

Having just discovered "Universal Radio Hacker", a tool that can help you decode radio signals, that sounded like something I'd love to have a go at. Unfortunately, after the demise of my main workstation last year, my current set-up doesn't allow me to do such recordings, but Randall, ever the gentleman, provided a recording of the signal.

He writes: "This was captured with gqrx demodulating the signal as SSB audio with the VFO tuned to 7.060, so both "signals" are there, one very low freq and one very high freq."

If you're curious, I've uploaded the file as it was shared with me to my VK6FLAB GitHub repository under "signals".

Over the next two days I spent my time attempting to decode this signal. I opened up Universal Radio Hacker and spent delightful hours getting precisely .. nowhere. Some of that is absolutely my unfamiliarity with the tool, but this is a great exercise in learning on the fly, where truth be told, I tend to live most of my life.

It wasn't until several hours later that I decided I should at least listen to the audio. To my ear it sounded like 25 WPM Morse Code, but being still in the learning phases, while my brain was triggering on the sequences, decoding wasn't happening. Of course I could cheat and forward the audio to one of my fellow amateurs, but the actual message wasn't really the point of the exercise, at least not at this stage.

Instead I fired up "multimon-ng" which has an in-built Morse decoder. I spent some hours doing more Yak Shaving than I was expecting, but even then, I still didn't get more than gobbledegook out of the process. I used "Audacity" to shift one of the signals by one wavelength and mixed them together. This allowed me to reduce the noise significantly, but still none of my tools did anything useful. In case you're wondering why, if you have a tone and noise and shift one signal by the wavelength of the tone, then mix them, the tone adds to itself, but the noise, random in nature, is just as likely to add as it is to subtract, so in effect, you're increased the signal to noise ratio.

After multimon-ng failed, I tried an online Morse decoder, which gave me all manner of text, but none of it made sense to me. Of course it's possible that this is someone rag chewing in a different language, but I couldn't make any sense of the thing.

I did come up with some issues that prompted me to create the signal repository. I realised that I didn't have any known "good" signals. Previously I'd tried decoding a sample FT4 signal, but that went nowhere, mainly because the signal was noisy.

So, what I'm going to do over the next couple of weeks is create some clean, as-in, computer generated, known signals, and add them to the repository. The aim is to have a known good starting point to learn from. In software development this technique is often used to limit the number of unconstrained variables. In our case, if I generate a known good Morse Code signal, then I can learn how to use Universal Radio Hacker to decode it, so when I come across an unknown signal, I can use the techniques I learnt to attempt to decode it.

Feel free to make pull requests with known good signals yourself. RTTY, PSK31, WSPR, FT8, etc. Feel free to include non-amateur modes.

One thing, I'm not looking for off-air recordings of signals, yet, that can come later, right now I need signals that are pure, as-in, as I said, computer generated. Of course at some point, perhaps sooner rather than later, I'll discover that generated signals are no easier to decode than off-air recordings, but that's for another day.

Meanwhile, you too can play. Download one or more sample files and decode them. Let me know what you learn.

I'm Onno VK6FLAB

The other day I was discussing with a fellow amateur the increased frustration my mobile phone provider was inflicting. We hit on the idea of figuring out if other providers would fit the bill and how we could determine if their coverage would suit our needs. Aside from using an old mobile phone, I suggested that using a $25 RTL-SDR dongle would provide a way to record mobile phone cell site beacons from the various mobile networks to map what signal levels we might find.

To that end, I discovered a tool called LTE-Cell-Scanner by Xianjun BH1RXH. Forked from the original project by James Peroulas, it allows you to use simple hardware to scan for LTE Cells used by mobile phone networks. James points out on his site that this tool can also be used to calibrate an RTL-SDR receiver's oscillator, since an LTE downlink centre frequency is stable to within 50 Parts Per Billion, that's 10 times more stable than my Yaesu FT-857d using a TCXO.

If this doesn't mean much, think of it as a local frequency reference standard that you can use in your shack with minimal effort and cost.

The story gets better.

I started building LTE-Cell-Scanner from source and in doing so discovered a directory on my computer named "uhrr". I didn't remember what it was for, so I looked online. The first search result, when I looked for "uhrr radio" was a repository by Oliver F4HTB, more on that in a bit.

The second search result was something called "Universal Radio Hacker". I clicked on the link and discovered a mind boggling tool. There are times in your life when something flips, this was one of those times. It happened when I discovered "csdr" by Andras HA7ILM and again when I discovered "GNU Radio".

Diving into "Universal Radio Hacker", by Dr. Johannes Pohl and Dr. Andreas Noack I was introduced to the art of decoding and generating digital radio signals. In 2018 it was presented for the first time during the USENIX Workshop on Offensive Technologies, or WOOT, as a tool to discover, decode and identify exploits of proprietary IoT devices scattered all over the planet. As an aside, USENIX, Users Of Unix, since 1975.

Back to radio. Universal Radio Hacker allows you to dissect recorded radio signals using all manner of interactive processes. When you go looking for it, and you should, I recommend that you start by watching some videos. You'll find an introductory play list on my YouTube channel. By the time you've seen those, you'll likely share my excitement.

To encourage you further, the Universal Radio Hacker is open source, written in Python, and runs on Linux, MacOS and Windows. So far there have been 94 releases of the software, so it's seen significant development in the years since it was released into the wild.

When installing it I was surprised to discover that its acronym was "uhr", not "uhrr". This was a relief since I still didn't remember what "uhrr" was all about and I couldn't imagine having forgotten Universal Radio Hacker. It turns out that the last time I looked at "uhrr" was apparently in 2021 when I shared my experience in an article titled "The remote edge..."; "uhrr" or "Universal Ham Radio Remote" is a tool that allows you to use a web browser to access a radio remotely.

My little journey into unexpected diversions, distractions and discovery has led me into a path where several puzzle pieces have come together. For example, Universal Radio Hacker and GNU Radio can talk to each other, they're both written in Python, they're both open source, have a history of development and have a community of users. The LTE-Cell-Scanner, also open source, will allow me to calibrate most if not all of my radio gear and I'm once again inspired to keep digging into yet another aspect of this wonderful hobby. I'm sure that there are more than a thousand different hobbies under this roof.

Go forth, explore, discover, be amazed, and stay curious!

I'm Onno VK6FLAB

The physicist and mathematician who demonstrated that electric and magnetic fields travel through space as waves moving at the speed of light. He proposed that light is an undulation in the same medium that is the cause of electric and magnetic phenomena. The unification of light and electrical phenomena led to his prediction of the existence of radio waves.

We wouldn't be here without his curiosity.

Hey folks! Relatively new ham here, I’ve been enjoying listening to the local repeaters while doing other stuff on my laptop. Last night I turned on my radio before my laptop, and as it booted up what was a relatively clear transmission became nothing but static. I’m a little surprised the effect could be so dramatic on 2m given none of the major components would be operating around that frequency range, but I suppose there could be some minor chips on the board running around there? Is this a common experience?

The other day a fellow amateur asked me to help them with lowering their radio mast so they could do some maintenance on the antennas attached to it. This is not the first time I've been a participant in such an activity, but it was the first time I felt explicitly safe.

Don't get me wrong, on previous occasions nothing bad happened, but there was always an undertone of "what-if" and an associated anxiety. This time was different. Before we did anything, we sat down, had a cup of coffee, talked and discussed what was going to happen. After coffee we looked at specifics and discussed the process in detail. Then we prepared. Clipping cable ties, winding up loose ends, disconnecting coax, and securing a pulley to a tree. We ran a winch line, discussed distances, looked at potential snags and coax lengths and angles, considered what would happen if something unexpected might happen and discussed various safety considerations, like never walking below the mast whilst it was in its most stressed position, half-way lowered and out of reach.

Then we slowly went about doing what we talked about.

All that sounds pretty reasonable, and it should. It was the first time I'd ever discussed in detail what the plan was, what could happen if something broke, if something got caught and any number of contingencies. We even discussed handling steel winch lines, something which I was unfamiliar with.

Of course it's entirely possible that something bad could happen, something neither of us had considered, but we put ourselves in a position where we both felt safe after mitigating known risks and allowing leeway for unknown risks.

Another word for this type of preparation is "Professionalism". It's a fraught word. You might recall me telling a story where I contacted the regulator to discuss wideband interference caused by a train-line, specifically blocking out a range of AM broadcast frequencies, including the emergency broadcast station. I revealed during that conversation that I was an amateur and had some experience with radio. The person I was speaking to shared that they were a "Professional", using a capital "P" to condescend that my amateur credentials were nothing in comparison to theirs. The conversation ended, the wideband interference is still there, years later.

It's not the only time I've come across this weird relationship with this word "Professionalism". At one time I worked at a community broadcaster where I was one of the producers and presenters. If you're unfamiliar, it's essentially a special interest broadcaster, in this case radio, run by mostly volunteers. We were having a meeting to discuss plans and during that I raised the notion of "Professionalism" in relation to conduct, things like turning up on time for your shift, documenting labels correctly on tapes, keeping logs, broadcasting advertisements at the allocated time, etc. Unfortunately some in the group equated "Professionalism" with "Commercialism" and expressed their discontent with the notion vocally. I stopped volunteering there shortly after.

This to say that I can understand that "Professionalism" has different meanings for different people. In a community like Amateur Radio it might mean that it's considered a taboo word, but I'd like to encourage you to think of it as a way of getting things done .. safely .. and to the betterment of the community.

So, next time you have a working bee, an antenna party, a contest, or a ham-fest, think about how you conduct yourself, how you might improve the experience for yourself and for those around you.

I call that "Professionalism".

I'm Onno VK6FLAB