I wrote a post in august 2017 lamenting the power output woes of my IC9100 radio, problems with the Blade fuses getting VERY warm and causing voltage drop. I thought I had solved he issue with cleaning the fuse contacts and replacing the fuses with new ones to ensure the contacts were good. Time moved…
Over the past couple of months, I had noticed some strange power output issues with my IC9100. I don’t use the radio a great deal, but at times, i would see the output power indicator drop over time, or fail to reach peak power, most noticeable on 70 cm FM, but also on HF. I…
The trouble with operating from a car is, modern cars with electronic systems can be RF noisy! The diesel D4D engine in my Prado 150 series is no exception. With many sources of noise on the HF bands. From throttle noise to electronic injector noise, and base car background noise. Operating on some parts of…
When Chrisitne got her new truck (4wd) I was keen to install some HF radio gear into it, i realised a codan 9350 auto tune antenna would be a nice addition, I had previously used a terlin tapped whip, and while this was a good performer, it was a pain to change bands when mobile!…
I have cable internet connected at home, I’m using the Optus hybrid fibre/coax network (HFC), recently I had some performance issues, the old modem had started to go a bit flakey and Optus came and swapped my faulty modem/router. Thats when the noise on HF started, s9 hash constatntly, mostly on 7MHz, but all over…
At the November coffee shop meeting for the EMDRC radio club, Marshall, VK3MRG and myself presented on sota, and how to activate sota easily in metro Melbourne The night was aimed at people interested in being an activator but unsure where to start, where the summits were and how simple an activation can be. Marshall…
Yesterday afternoon, I visited peter VK3YE and a group of like minded hams at a arp afternoon at a park near the beach in Chelsea south of Melbourne. My kids came along with the promise of a cool playground/park for them to explore, and it was a very cool park with a lighthouse and pirate…
I haven’t ever really played serious DX HF, Ive used it to chat around Australia while exploring the country and for the occasional chat overseas while driving, but thats not a serious effort. In recent weeks (and with the CQ WWDX Contest) it spurred some interest in me, that my small bit of random wire…
Having day release (thanks wifey) to attend the Ballarat hamfest saw me spend some time activating two more local mountains. Both Mt Warrenheip VK3/VC-019 and Mt Bunninyong VK3/VC-018 are ~10km form Ballarat and are the remains of old volcanoes. This was my second summit for the day, having worked Mt Bunninyong earlier in the afternoon. After my previous hill…
I managed to grab a couple of hours yesterday afternoon for a drive to Mt Dandenong VC-025 and then a simple activation. My first summit activation. (Thanks wifey) I met Andy VK1NAM who had just packed up and was about to head home, Andy has been in Melbourne for the last week and has activated many…