Skip to content

Ham Radio

CMCC Test Rig, used in ARRL Labs?!

Hey all! Check out this video from the ARRL, showing a little in-house Common Mode Current Choke building competition they posted a couple months ago: They have people of various experience levels, from not-a-ham(-yet) to veteran Amateur Extra, build different designs of common mode current chokes. Then (starting at about 5:45 into the video) they hook up their chokes to… Read More »CMCC Test Rig, used in ARRL Labs?!

Power handling of BCI Filter for VHF/UHF

I just launched the Halibut Electronics Broadcast Interference (BCI) Filter for VHF/UHF. It’s designed to prevent strong AM broadcast signals from blowing out the front-end of wide band receivers that have little or no pre-selection, such as inexpensive SDRs. There are many BCI filters availble, but all the ones I could find were designed for HF, and performed very poorly… Read More »Power handling of BCI Filter for VHF/UHF

OHIS/HHI Test Recordings

Insert obligatory “It’s been too long since I’ve posted!” apology, and “I’ll be sure to post more often” empty promise here. Now that that’s out of the way… If you just want to listen to the HHI recordings, skip to “Without further ado…” at the bottom of this post. What happened to SOAR? I just realized I haven’t posted here… Read More »OHIS/HHI Test Recordings

First SOAR to SOAR QSO!

I worked Patrick, WD9EWK on his SOAR, using my SOAR, through the ISS! It was a bit sketchy, lots of stations calling and not responding, but we both heard each other and got our grid squares! We’re calling it a QSO! This is the first SOAR to SOAR contact. Hopefully to be followed by many more to come. I also… Read More »First SOAR to SOAR QSO!

My First Satellite QSO!

I realize this is probably not what you want to read from the person who designing hardware specifically for the purpose of operating satellites, but I just made my first two Satellite QSOs during the 23:40UTC ISS pass over the South West US today! My first ever satellite QSO, with WA6ARA DM15: You can hear me get a little flustered… Read More »My First Satellite QSO!

Which NanoVNA Should I Get?

Since I started selling the Common Mode Current Choke Test Rig I’ve had several people ask me this question, and it’s a good one. tl,dr: I recommend the “NanoVNA V2 Plus4” from NanoRFE https://nanorfe.com/nanovna-v2.html If you don’t care about my reasons and just want to throw money at something you’re not likely to regret, get the original from the people… Read More »Which NanoVNA Should I Get?

WE HAVE QUESO– err, i mean QSO!

(I blame Alun for the cheesy Queso joke.) The first successful satellite QSOs made with SOAR prototype hardware happened this morning on the ~17:30 UTC pass of AO-91 over South Western US. Patrick Stoddard WD9EWK worked W7JSD in southern Arizona, N6UTC in Long Beach, California, and XE2BHL in Tijuana. I haven’t implemented pass audio recording in SOAR yet (it will… Read More »WE HAVE QUESO– err, i mean QSO!