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NJQRP MEETING SUMMARY

Saturday, March 27, 2010

NJQRP meeting notes (via N2MPM, minor editing by N2GJ)


Attendees:


W2AEW Alan
W2BVH Lenny
WA8BXN Mike
AD2DA Denis
KB2EGI Kip
N2GJ Gerry
KA1HGP Robert
W2JLK Jim
N2MPM Brian
KB3OXW Jack
KC2TXZ Arek
K2ULR Ray
KC2VGL Joe


Meeting notes:


N2GJ reminds everyone that there will be no NJQRP meeting in April due to the NJ State ARRL convention being held in conjunction with the Trenton Computer Festival in Ewing, NJ, the weekend of April 24-25, 2010 in Ewing, NJ at The College of New Jersey (TCNJ). There will be a hamcram boot camp on Saturday for those who would like to go over the information on the Technician class lesson, and there will be a Volunteer Examination (VE) session on Sunday at 2 PM for those wishing to take FCC license exams.


Additional information on the NJ ARRL State convention was discussed.


N2GJ brought his SoftRock-40 SDR. He also described some features of the Flex Radio Systems 1500 he has on order. It now sports 3 antenna jacks - 1 regular plus 2 software-configurable antennas. He also brought a "Wings of Life" go kit/backpack purchased from geeks.com for $34.95. He showed how a small fanny pack can be used to carry small accessories for QRP field operations.


KA1HGP Expressed an interest in "all things." He would like to operate on all bands and modes especially portable operation on the trail. He's interested in mountain topping, antenna building,and SDR.


KB2EGI is the Mercer County ARES Emergency Coordinator. He says he just came to see what happens at one of our club meetings, especially to see what folks are building.


KB3OXW is an avid homebrewer, he brought a beautiful crystal set he built that he says is tunable, and brings in 18-20 stations. It sports a 3 gang/section cap and 3 coils (high Q) antenna mag coupled. He's a member of the NJ Antique Radio Club. Discussion of hollow-state devices. He has a large quantity of solder flux available to anyone who wants it.


K2ULR brought his Rock Mite which he says works great with his mag loop antenna. He also brought 2 m Standard radio.


WB2BVH reported on his January ARRL VHF/UHF contest results on 6M. He brought and distributed a supply of very nicely produced NJ ARRL convention postcards. He's building an amplifier using a 13 GHz device that he will "snowflake" to 10 GHz for his 10 GHz station. EME discussion, mention of K2UYH. His HF station is down -- his remote tuner in the yard experienced a control box power supply failure.


KC2VGL is working on commercial trackers for work and this has kept him very busy. He says he needs some help to id some radios he brought.


N2GJ asked for a show of hands about potential TCF/NJ convention and Dayton Hamvention attendance.


KC2TXZ Continued discussion of his project (HF transceiver) that uses DDS. He's looking for band pass filter ideas and 10 watt final amplifier.


WA8BXN Brought his "Retro 75" AM transceiver. His show and tell discussed its performance. He has made a number of modifications to it. He added a crystal controlled VFO. He "borrowed" a crystal in the circuit to use for an oscillator, added a spot switch to aid in tuning (listening for the birdie). The other night he had a QSO with a nearby station running 100 watts and decided he may need an attenuator on the front end. He has plans to add an antenna tuner, another mixer for tx/rx control. Has has only had the kit for a week! Calibration is done with microprocessor - very cleverly done.


W2AEW discussion of 40M station done in the 1970's in High school. He works for Tektronix as an RF engineer. Built QRP tuner.


W2JLK Sold his 8 ft satellite dish via the email list (posted by N2GJ). Interest in QRP. He designed and built a "station in a box" all included. He showed off his homebuilt rig. It has many, many features. These include tuner bridge with an LED to indicate reflected power. It has a micro controlled keyer. He started with a 40 CW now it's a 3 band (80, 40, 20) radio. Discussion of "manual" band switching. freq. display read 40 regular, 80 and 20 show offsets. He can plug in Small Wonder Labs boards. It also has a built in audio system. He opened the box and showed off internals and discussed with everyone. He is interested in very low power QRPp. He mentioned friends WW2I, micro micro rf. WSPR and DSP. Sub noise level communications like WJST. "weak in the noise" discussion. Discussion of correlators and super low wattage measurements.


Discussions: ZigBee low power control.


AD2DA Discussion of the Cherryville Hamfest . Discussion of April QST on breathing new life into battery packs for HTs. His new project is called power "tweet a watt." bee comm. He also had a few of those $2 scientific calculators left for sale.


W2AEW Discussion of the SolderSmoke podcasts. Started on echolink between 2 hams who then recorded the discussions. Homebrew, WSPR, low power beacons. They have a book for sale on lulu.com


N2MPM Discussion of the Arduino microcontroller. He brought his Arduino board and described some of the activity currently going on around development projects using it.


73,

N2MPM and N2GJ


See you all at the next meeting! (See the NJQRP Event Calendar for the full set of meeting dates.)

Last updated: June 14, 2010