T32C

As of last night I had 3 QSOs in the log with T32C. Over my lunch break today I put 15m CW in the log.  I can hear them working 15m SSB but they are calling for Europe right now.

I have been pretty impressed with their DX expedition so far. Good signals, good operators, good job running the pile-up, and very efficient.

73 de NG0R

T32C - Working a little DX

I decided to turn on the rig in the shack for a minutes between chores. Since I have not spent any time on 10m I have been feeling a little guilty in this sun spot cycle. I decided to check the DX spots and saw a call sign that I did not recognize... T32C.



I was not really sure where T32C was located so I had to visit QRZ.com and then http://www.t32c.com/

I turns out that this is Kiritimati Island; (Christmas Island)

They were working split on 10m SSB. I turned the beam and dialed in the split (up 5) and worked them on the second try.  That was kind of fun. I probably should turn the rig on and hit the PTT a bit more often.  :-)

73 de NG0R

I heard a whisper

Click on the picture to view a larger version

I have been watching to see what paths are typically viable with 5 watts on 30 meters. I decided to leave the radio on over night and let my computer do some work. In the last 6 hours my station heard France, Brazil, Australia, and Japan. All of those stations we running 5 watts or less of power.

The path to Australia is open every day. Initially I thought that I might added by gray-line propagation (normally the radio had been turned on around the same time as sunrise) but clearly that is not the case right now because this screen capture is at 5:45am central time which is quite a bit prior to sunrise.

Clearly WSPR and 5 watts is enough RF & power resolving power to make it across the pond every day.

73 de NG0R

What does a person do with a book?

Back 10 years ago when the internet was still fairly new to a lot of people we used to go to the bookstore and pay $50 per book to learn how to develop things for the internet. --Now the internet has largely replaced the bookstores.

I am cleaning out my old (home) office as I work on moving into my new (home) office. I had several boxes of books that are completely out-dated and can be completely replaced by a few finely tuned Google queries.

I have a lot of books and magazines that are headed to the recycling bin. :-(

Fall color tour day three

Today's trip was from Two Harbors to the Twin Lakes area near Cloquet then across the Skyline Drive in Duluth then to Silverbay then across the back roads to Finland and then back to Two Harbors.

The weather was nice and made for a nice drive but the color was disappointing initially. I ended up finding a lot of color on a couple of peaks between Sonju Lake and the Cramer Tunnel mid afternoon.

Fall color tour day two

I spent today driving from Two Harbors, MN up to Grand Portage. It was a nice day to visit the water falls. After that I drove to Grand Marais and then went north west up the Gunflint Trail. Today was about 350 miles in the truck which surprised me.

Fall color tour

Here are a few photos from day one uploaded from my iPad via my Droidx hotspot from the middle of no where. No retouching other than resizing them for the web.

Maybe 5 watts is enough

Now that I have my radio and computer listening for & posting WSPR spots almost everyday while I am busy at work I am noticing that 5 watts seems to be enough power to make it across the pacific almost every morning. I am noticing that Australia to the central US looks like a pretty reliable path every morning recently at QRP levels.

The map shows the 30m path around 8:20am central time.

73 de NG0R

A whisper in the morning

I turned on the radio before work this am and found a surprise....




I am hearing a WSPR signal from Australia this morning. That is pretty neat given that he is running 200mW of power.

73 de NG0R

PS....  A few more stations from down under.

Whispering

While I am working on some projects and runnings some errands I am leaving the radio & computer running in the shack listening for WSPR and posting spots.


The map below shows who I have heard over the past 90 minutes or so on 30m.


Now that new office/shack is coming back together so I am going to try to make more of an effort leave the rig & computer on listening to  WSPR while I am working on other things.

At some point in the future I would like to build small rig with a small microprocessor like a PIC or AVR as a self contained WSPR appliance.

PS... here is another map from later in the day.


73 de NG0R