December 2019
Well MERRY CHRISTMAS
YES, it’s HERE AGAIN!
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After the Monday Night NET here recently I was listening to “America Link” on 449.625 and noticed a similar signal popping up 25Khz down on the spectrum screen on my FT-991A. Tuned down and saw this:
Hmmm, I thought must be another FUSION repeater also tuned into America Link. SO, I turned down and sure enough, saw that the NØPUF repeater was there. So, I looked up the call on QRZ.com, and sent an email to the address listed there and got a response from Dan NØPUF listing Tom KD4DT as the contact for more information. I soon then heard from Tom with this email note:
“This is Tom, KD4DT, glad you have found us. The 449.600 is a repeater that is located on Warren mountain SW of town.. About six weeks ago I replaced our GE Master2 repeater with a DR-1X. Just this week I got the Node set up here at my house using an FTM-100 with the SCU-40 cable. No HRI-200 yet. Had planned on reaching out to you once I got everything up and running but you beat me to it. Would love to talk to you about being part of the Sky Hub Network”.
That being said Tom and I of course communicated and now the 449.600 FUSION Wires-X repeater is now connected to the SkyHubLink system while just like 449.625 is steerable to other Wires-X rooms defaulting back to SkyHubLink. This is very exciting since we were really lacking coverage in the SW corridor of the Metro area with the other repeaters being shadowed tremendously along what we refer to as the “hogback”. The “hogback” is a very sharp ridge that runs N/S along the C-470 highway on the W and SW side of the Metro Area. The repeater is a Yaesu DR-1 with 50 watts output atop Warren Mountain on the southwest side of town. See http://denverradioleague.org/ for the details on the system.
COVERAGE
The Warren Mountain 449.600/146.88 site
Pictures courtesy Tom KD4DT
Try the repeater out and especially if you are in the coverage area south and southwest of town. It covers really well in the shadows of 448.350 & 449.450.
Tom KD4KDT at the Lookout Mountain SkyHubLink site
Monitoring ADSB tracking airplanes in the hamshack is fun and interesting to see the amount of traffic out of KDIA (Denver International). Using the RTL-SDR USB dongle and a homebrew 1090 MHz co-linear antenna nets great receive coverage, and, on the Saturday, I took these pictures there was SO MUCH air traffic! DIA is one of the busiest airports in the country, and today was no exception!
You can see the aircraft lining up in traffic patterns for takeoff and landings. Plus, you see little curvy tracks of small general aviation aircraft flying around the city. You can do this too with a $20 RTL-SDR USB dongle and easy to make 1090 MHz antenna. Pretty amazing what you can see with these easy and inexpensive receiving systems.
Here is a picture of the antenna temp mounted next to my NWS receive antenna. The coaxial co-linear antenna is housed in PVC piping. It is built in this fashion:
I get great reception as you can see in the map above with this antenna, look at this site for a lot of great idea’s on how to build one.
It had been my intention for quite some time to change out the mount on my work truck (Tacoma) from a mag mount to a permanent on the roof mount to improve the reception and transmission characteristics plus to be more stable for the big Diamond SG7900 Supergainer antenna. This antenna has been a great performer but doesn’t do well without being anchored very securely. It either takes a good static mount or a huge magnet mount. It really doesn’t do well though at highway speeds without a Tri-magnet setup like WØSKY has. I decided to buy a Breedlove Antenna Mount after hearing about them from Matt KEØLNU, who had installed one in his vehicle. See https://www.breedlovemounts.com & my son Alexander, who works for a company that installs custom equipment for police and official vehicles came over and professionally installed the mount for me. He knew how to remove the headliner properly then setup and seal the antenna mount. With our Colorado weather he really knew how to do the job efficiently and quickly.
Alex removing the headliner in the Tacoma
The inside of the room with the mount connected to the coax
The mount sealed and on top of the truck
The mounts come in different diameters as you can see on their website. They make all kinds of mounts with different connectors for just about any antenna and setup you can imagine. I am really looking forward to how well this setup works, and so far, it is
really performing well, both in coverage and stability.
The final installation of the mount and Diamond antenna.
Here is yet another system that is working towards getting on the SkyHubLink system.
NØSTY Andy & KEØHFK Corey in Akron Colorado have set up this repeater for part of north eastern Colorado and are working on frequency co-ordination. More will follow on this one in 2020. AND we are working on other repeater connections in Colorado and SE Wyoming currently. Its really exciting to see how the system is growing and the participation from other systems is furthering towards the communication needs of the region!
OK now this is cool! This is the Bakerville APRS digipeater solar powered at 13,000 feet on a mountain near Grays and Torres Peaks in Colorado. This APRS Digi covers the front range and along I-70 from 100 miles east of Denver to way up in the mountains, and as you can see in the above picture can only be accessed well in summer, although obviously someone took this picture when the snow wasn’t that bad. See the link: https://aprs.fi/#!mt=roadmap&z=11&call=a%2FBVILLE&timerange=3600&tail=3600
To see the real time information. Skyler and I want to hike up to this sometime near Georgetown CO. There is a road that goes nearly up to it as I understand it but will have to search before making a trip like that!
So while on a work away mission I ran the SBE Chapter 73’ of the Air SKYHUBLINK NET from my hotel room using the cell phone hotspot to connect to the internet, and the Raspberry PIØ radio hotspot and the FT-2DR handheld while monitoring the SkyHub (http://skyhublink.com/status/) on the laptop and using TeamViewer on the iPad to monitor Fusion connections. The NET went really well even though I had a drop or two in audio. And it really showed the versatility and easy connection made with this system from a remote location. We are also starting to get folks checking into the NET with Hotspots using both DMR and Fusion. The system now has a D-STAR connection via the XRF031C DSTAR BRIDGE. PLUS, for those of you who still can and want to use IRLP, The DENVER REFLECTOR # 9870 is online into the SkyHubLink system. Skyler has worked hard getting the system on all modes in the last month. Now, analog AllStar, Fusion, DMR, P-25, and IRLP are all available. See the list of normally connected repeaters at http://skyhublink.com/repeaters/.
NET CONTROL OP running the NET from Sterling CO
And then back home in Denver listening to aircraft talking to KDEN (Denver International Airport) on the Yaesu FT-991A. Very versatile and fun radio with many features to enjoy! My favorite rig of all time for sure!
One evening while watching one of the Denver TV stations during a snowstorm in Denver recently I spotted this. The news/weather vehicle sported a “Flux Capacitor” behind the reporter. Really very visible in the video, and you could tell they framed the shot to make sure it showed. Pretty clever I thought!
And thanks to my contractors and ALL HAM CREW for the help in getting up the brand new dish at one of the sites in NE CO! Yours truly KEØVH, NØSTY, KEØHFK, and WØSKY!
AND, Say HELLO TO Bernie N3ZF, operating Yaesu Fusion on Wires-X from his FT-991A in Wheat Ridge CO! He has worked nearly 100 countries via Wires-X and the America Link room on the 449.625 Fusion repeater on Lookout Mountain above Golden Colorado west of Denver.
Check this out! A 3D printed case for the Nano VNA antenna analyzers that are really
making a hit on the amateur radio market. You can get one of these for $35 to $100 on Amazon and other vendors. Next month I will try to do a small review on these as I own one myself. It really works well. Robert KC8GPD has the really cool set that includes a shielded case, calibration kit and other cables. Check them out at:
https://smile.amazon.com/s?k=Nano+VNA&i=instant-video&ref=nb_sb_noss_2
and the 3D printed cases at:
https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3818979
Thanks to my good buddy Mark NØXRX for turning me on the case webpages.
Are you doing digital modes on HF where accurate time is very important? Here are two time sync programs that a lot of hams use:
https://www.meinbergglobal.com/english/sw/ntp.htm
http://www.thinkman.com/dimension4/
I wonder if we can’t get budget for this next year! Thanks W9BNO!
SEE YOU NEXT YEAR! Here comes 2020!
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4 Years AGO: http://www.smpte-sbe48.org/wp/2015/12/
5 Years AGO: http://www.smpte-sbe48.org/wp/2014/12/
6 Years AGO: http://www.smpte-sbe48.org/wp/2013/12/
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