Museum Ship Weekend June 3-4, 2006

Thanks to Mike Hardester.

This is one of my favorite ham events I participate in every year. I have quite a few attractive cards thanks to this Museum Ship weekend. You can get complete details at the website http://users.tellurian.com/freddie/nj2bb/ship-event.html. This event is sponsored by The Battleship New Jersey ARS. So breakout the tuner, loadup the wire and stand by for some fun next weekend during the 2006 Museum Ship weekend.

73 de Larry

New HF beacon on 1960 kHz

Thanks to Costas Krallis and the UDXF board

I am currently testing a low power experimental beacon on 1960.000kHz +/- 1Hz. It uses a transmission format similar to that of the 5MHz beacons, GB3RAL/WES and ORK, execpt that the sounder sequence is replaced by a PSK31 message.

The sequence transmitted is :
T+0s CW Callsign
T+7 - T+15s Nine power steps with the output reduced by 6dB each time
for a total of -48dB
T+16 - T+24 A repeat of the power steps.
T+25 - T+30 Full power (level measurement reference period)
T+30 - T+47 PSK31 data
T+47 - T+59 Full power

The reference time T starts at one minute past the hour and repeats every 15 minutes, so transmissions occur at 01, 16, 31 and 46 minutes past the hour.

If the 'GB3RAL' monitoring software is used for logging this signal, the transmission will be shown and recorded as if it were that from GB3WES.

The transmissions will continue overnight, and will hopefully be switched on for subsequent evening & overnight runs. Power output is 3 Watts to my 7m high Tee antenna - esimated gain -9dBd.

The beacon hardware consists of an identical DDS and PIC controller to that used on GB3VHF, although without the GPS locking; frequency is derived from a TCXO alone. A Motorola Oncore GPS module controls timing. Completely new PIC software uses the 12 bits of amplitude control possible within the AD9852 DDS chip to generate the power steps directly rather than having to use a separate programmable attenuator as was done for the 5MHz beacons. The PSK31 envelope is directly generaed at RF by looking up 250 half-sinewave amplitude values for each 31.25 baud symbol at a sampling rate of 7812.5Hz.

Full details of both the 5MHz beacon designs and the driver for GB3VHF can be found on the website below

Andy G4JNT
www.scrbg.org/g4jnt/

6 Meters is wide open west 11:00 am EDT

Six meters is wide open (E-Skip) due west from here (EM85) into North Texas and northeast Mexico (my old friend XE2OR in DL98).

That means that the 30-50 MHz band is wide open

Get it before is goes away.

Larry

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Larry

National Hurricane Ham Station Sets Test 6-3-2006

The National Hurricane Center's WX4NHC ham station will conduct its "Hurricane Season 2006 On-the-Air Station Test" Saturday, June 3, from 1300 until 2200 UTC.

WX4NHC will operate on HF, VHF and UHF. Phone frequencies will be 7.268,
14.325, 21.325 and 28.525 MHz. CW frequencies will be 14.035, 21.035 and
28.035 MHz. PSK31 will be on 14.070 MHz. Look for WX4NHC on the DX spotting
networks as well. WX4NHC also will be on the VoIP Hurricane Net
(IRLP node 9219; EchoLink WX-TALK Conference) from
1700 until 1900UTC. WX4NHC also will operate on South Florida area VHF and
UHF repeaters and on FM simplex.

When working WX4NHC, report your call sign, signal report, location, name
and a brief description of current weather conditions (eg, "sunny," "rainy,"
"windy"). Nonhams may participate by submitting their actual weather
conditions using the On-Line Hurricane Report Form.

QSL cards are available for an SASE to WX4NHC Assistant Amateur Radio
Volunteer Coordinator Julio Ripoll, WD4R, 14855 SW 67 Ln, Miami, FL
33193-2027. Do not QSL directly to the National Hurricane Center.

The annual station test provides an opportunity for WX4NHC to check out all
of its radio equipment, computers and antennas using as many modes and
frequencies as possible. (Courtesy of the ARRL newsletter Vol 25, No. 21)

Monitoring the Capitol Friday 5-26-2006

Thanks to the good folks at DXtuners.com, I was able to monitor several interesting federal frequencies in the Washington, DC area during the Capitol Hill shots fired scare yesterday (5-26). Here are the frequencies that I monitored.

Capitol Architect/Emergency Alerting System: 416.150 MHz. This page system frequency feeds the enunciator system in the various Capitol Hill offices and was very useful in getting the official word that was being passed to the Rayburn building staff.

US Capitol Police: 162.250, 162.6125, 165.5375, 169.225 and 170.175 MHz

US National Park Service: 166.725, 166.850, 166.925 and 167.075 MHz.

You can get a free membership at DXtuners.com and try out remote monitoring. Go to their website and give one of their free receivers a spin.

73 and good hunting all,

Larry

Welcome to the Btown Monitoring Post

Welcome to my Monitoring Post. This is where you will find my general monitoring notes, news, frequencies, etc that are not covered on my MT Milcom Blog. I am an all spectrum DXer so you will find a wide variety of stuff here from DC to light. I have a large 500 square foot radio room and about 2 acres for the antenna farm. I have been a monitor since Christmas 1964 and on the staff of Monitoring Times magazine since 1983.

73 all and hope you enjoy the blog.