I have just acquired a second hand Yaesu FT817ND for portable operation, microwave radio driving and camping holidays and I also plan to start to participate in SOTA activations. More posts to come as I explore this nifty little radio and the Z-match ATU i acquired in the bundle, as well as some useful SOTA…
When I lived in sydney, i was a member of the Manly Warringah Radio Society (VK2MB), this is a very active ham club on Sydney’s northern Beach’s, they have weekly meetings at the clubs shack/rooms in Terrey Hills. The club has recently obtained a stack of portable / quick erect flagpole antenna poles, and have…
It’s not all about radio’s here at VK3BQ!. We recently went on a Family holiday to the flinders rangers. (and while I did have radios with me, it was more about a relaxing holiday in a part of Australia I have not visited before). It was a wonderful relaxing trip to a beautiful part of…
Peter, VK5KX has modified my IC-9100 INI file to work with the new Icom IC-7100. He has modified the radio address (hex) only, and the same operation and limitations as my original IC-9100 version of the file. I don’t have a IC-7100, thus have not tested this file, but their is no reason it should…
A cheap and cheerful way to mount wire antennas and verticals when portable is a cheap Squid Pole. These fibreglass poles are available in many sizes and styles from fishing stores all over the country. One example antenna using the squid pole as a base is this simple multi band vertical from VK7JJ. I plan to…
A very nifty range of FREE ham related apps is available on both android and iOS devices to help locate repeaters, Sota summits and to cat control some yaesu radios on the andriod version with a special adaptor. The software is produced by ZBM2 Software – Nicolas Pike M1HOG and a quick look at the website will…
DUBUS magazine is an international amateur radio magazine intended for the serious VHF and up operator. Published in Germany, it is fully bilingual (English/German). There are four issues a year, each of over 100 A5 pages which are devoted to a mix of state-of-the-art technical articles and DX operating news. Ive always been interested in the…
To ensure my two sons, Nathan who is 5 and Toby who is 3 get a balanced (brainwashed as Christine would say) education, I recently got them a basic electronics kit to help teach them some simple electronics principles. The kit I ended up is a Snap Circuits 300, the kit uses plastic tiles, each…
I enjoy getting out into the Australian outback, but i like to keep connected to the going’s on of the world via AM broadcast band radio when I’m travelling, listing to the morning news helps keep me connected. I recently upgraded my camper trailer AM Broadcast band radio to a very capable Sangean PR-D7 am/fm…
Software Defined Radios are all the rage these days, and with a cheap USB digital tv tuner card with the RTL2838 chipset, its very easy. My dongle cost $10.99 and took a week to arrive from Hong Kong via this eBay seller. You can find these dongles cheaper, I choose this seller as a friend…