Monday, July 30, 2012

OK5MM pass to say hello...




Vit (OK5MM) and his wife pass from my house today to see us. We have a nice ham conversation and ofcourse we stay for while at my shack. He runs at previous weekend the IOTA Contest from his hotel and as he said manage to make 1300 QSOs.

Welldone Vit....!! 73s


Thursday, July 26, 2012

Another 139 QSLs gone....

Due to bad conditions on 6m is good chance for QSLing working with my QSL manager SV5QND (YL Toula) So another 139 QSLs gone today most of them for Europe
Some people still sendining QSL cards without any SAE and fee for returning. That is no fair for someone who have to handle some 100s QSL every month....

Friday, July 20, 2012

PA3FXO on KM36VC...



Yesterday Cees PA3FXO visit us on south Rhodes.  Cees spend the holidays with his family at Faliraki Rhodes and as promished his passing to say hello. He is an interesting person with a wide spectrum of knowledge and a real Amateur Radio man. We have a nice talk for about 2 hours under shadow with about 36 Celcius around....hi hi
Unfortunately no any propagation on 6m to work from my station but the eyeball qso with him was beatiful....

Thanks for visit us Cees and we look forward to see you soon on island.

Tuesday, July 17, 2012

My 2m transverter....


Searching the Ebay I show this auction:

Up for sale the 144 to 28 mhz No-Tune transverter board. It had been invented and built by one of our Ukrainean HAMs. The transverter has been tested and it works very good. And I can assure you it does. With this transverter you can operate on the 144-146 mhz band useing any type of HF radio at 28 to 30 mhz. You should apply only 100 mWt (0.1 Watts) to it on 10m band to get 10-12 W output power on 2m band. There is no antenna relay required. This auction is included the completely built and tested transverter board and the schematic diagram of the transverter. I made a translation from Russian to English and printed the text there on the back side of the sheet. There is No-Tune transverter. You should only place the board onto the radiator get necessary connection and it's ready to operate. This transverter so small that you can even place it inside your HF radio! Below the basic information about this transverter: The power voltage is 12 V. The Input RF power on 28mhz is about 100mWt (0.1 Watts). Output power on 144 mhz is 10-12 W LO freq is 116 mhz and the crystal it already installed on the board. TX Output transistor is RD15HVF1 RX Input transistor is BF998 PTT to ground. The size of the board is 7cm x 3.5cm The lot does not include the heatsink , power and RF connectors, wires or cables. To get the transverter worked you have to do some soldering works with a cables , wires and connectors. Probably some instruments would be required. I ship Worldwide from the Ukraine by Airmail with insurance and provide a tracking number that can be easily tracked through the Internet here. Usually shipping takes up to two weeks but it can be more or less delivery time depending on how quickly the package goes through Customs Thanks for watching my auction.
 
Knowing that Spyros SV8CS is looking for something like this for his remote station I call and inform him about the transverter....  Few minutes later Spyros make an order for the last two items. I thought that "is to cheap to be good" but the price (50 $) was too low for a second think. 
After 10 days the transverters arrives and last night (due to bad propagation on 6 and 4m) I decide to put it in a box.
My good friend George SV5KJO find and unusual but finally very ergonomic box from an old B/W CCD camera. I put out the junk and I have a nice box and guess what ...with PWR plug and a BNC for the IF input!!!
A spare hole filled with an RCA plug that is necessary for PPT and a new hole for the antenna PL connector. Before the metal work I make the wire work carefully as you can see on pictures ....
I disconect my ME4T 4m transverter from my FT-2000 and just put the plugs to the new 2m transverter. A short breath and fired up the Yaesu. I tuned directly to SV5VHF/b frequency at 144.850 (well is on 144.847 excactly...) and the keying from beacon comes clear and loud to my headphones with S-4. Unpluging the antenna from transverter and out it to FT-817 a see S-5....  Thats good news...
Tune to local repeater on FM the signal comes +40.   Also good news. The RX part is fine. No birdies no unusual sounds and signals.  And all functions and filters of FT-2000 is available....!!!
I make my tests on transmit also. Starting with CW the crispy clear sound of my keying comes out on my IC-7000 receiver and the frequency is also stable. No drifts so far. 
QSYing to local repeater again and optimizing the FM Mic Gain on FT-2000 menu I meet again on random George SV5KJO going to work.... The first thing that noticed is the " FB Audio" He comment also the clear signal. I explain to him that his box is filled with the small transverter .... "I nedd one of this too"....   


I think this small transverter is a diamond.  The price is too low and I don't know why the guy who make them decide to stop his pruduct.

Again thanks to my good friend Spyros SV8CS and George SV5KJO for their help ...

Wednesday, July 11, 2012

Sporadic is back again.....!!!!

Conditions the last 3-4 days was very bad.... Also my shack was a mesh. My PC burned and thanks god I manage to save my disks. It takes me 3 days to put everything again into my computer and when I equalize the situation I decide to call CQ again on 6m.  Good opening and signals on my S-meter.
Later I decide to move on 4m and the coditions was cool too.... 

 
Big suprise the QSO on 4m with my good friend Leo SV2DCD. 
 Watch the video:


and here from Leo's shack....


But the best comes at the end...!!! Listening on 2m on 15:40 I hear the first station on 144.300  ...IZ4AIK !!!

About 30 QSOs mostly with I, and some with 9A and S5.



...and the map

Click on map for larger picture.

Monday, July 9, 2012

SV5KKR on AEGEAN VHF Contest 2012...

This year I decide to stay out of competition on any band at AEGEAN VHF Contest and for first time my son Manos try on 6m band after his upgrade from SW (category 2) to SV (Category 1) prefix due the low for Radiomateurs change.
Yet another time we use our alternative QTH for AEGEAN Contest at KM36vc. At Saturday propagation goes just fine and he manage to make 180 QSOs. Sunday was a propagation disaster. No propagation at all and only 10 stations. A small opening to SP, OM for all day !!! Total 190 QSOs for Manos and hopes for a good rank...


Late the night on Sunday a good friend send me a link from YouTube about Manos:


Monday, July 2, 2012

July 1st Sporadic E opening on 2m...


Incredible opening on 2m. On 1st part I miss lot of fun (a good friend come to see me) But at the afternoon was coool... I spend lot of time (about 2 hours) at 4m and the rest time  at 6m band.

More info about the opening and reports to:


pictures are curtesy of http://www.mmmonvhf.de