Month: November 2016

Phasing Line is a Success, Sweepstakes Too

Phasing Line Is a Hit!

Our first episode of The Phasing Line Podcast was a hit. People really seem to love the new style – at least maybe our target demographic does (younger people, sub age 40, who are already a little experienced in ham radio). I’m excited for episode 2 – if we can find the time to record. I want to shoot for a biweekly release date but Marty and I have tumultuous schedules, so that is TBD. I do want to say we are planning an interview with a rising ham, so that will be exciting!

The big takeaway from the first episode was to avoid interruptions, so that will be fixed. Marty and I both think faster than we can speak too, and the fast-paced topic jumping with tons of tangents can be decisive – some like it, some don’t. We’ll be fine tuning the podcast as it goes on.

But it was such a success that it sparked interest in an old podcast I co-hosted, the Youth in Amateur Radio Podcast (YARP). 18-year old Jacob Keogh KDØNVX has taken the lead and re-branded it to The Noisy Key (jealous of that name) which will probably be a round-table similar to ICQ podcast, perhaps a bit more focused on a single or few topics, unlike the unfiltered consciousness which is The Phasing Line. All of which is to be determined as they work bringing the first episode.

Sweepstakes at WØEEE

WØEEE had another clean sweep during the ARRL SSB Sweepstakes. I came down to help educate and train new guys on HF contesting, spending a lot of time on a whiteboard.

Here’s an album. Click on the photos to make them bigger:

All that mattered (aside from getting the sweep) was that everyone had a ton of fun. It was really great how many people showed up, showed interest, logged, and got on the air. We made 227 QSOs in all 83 sections, so we didn’t really shoot for high numbers, and our antenna system got us down, but it was still a lot of fun. I also got to work Marty twice, lol!

We had to break out the amp for the last two sections of the sweep – PAC (pacific, aka Hawaii) and AK (Alaska). They were working huge pileups since they came on very late in the contest. But, we didn’t have an interface with the FT-897…so I had to do it manually, without ALC. Luckily the SB-220 has a soft-key relay that lets you use a simple switch to key the amp instead of 120V – that would have fried everything!

It worked! Not sure how bad the signal was coming out of the amp, but I drove it clean and it seemed to be linear, haha!

WØEEE Score Summary:

Operator(s) : N0SSC, AA0RN, N0SFK, KE0CFK, Alex Hoeft

Operator Category : MULTI-OP
Assisted Category : ASSISTED
Band : ALL
Power : HIGH
Mode : SSB
Default Exchange : S 31 MO
Gridsquare : EM47CW
Name : Missouri S&T ARC
Address : 301 W 16th St
City/State/Zip : Rolla  MO  65409
Country : UNITED STATES
ARRL Section : MO
Club/Team :
Software : N1MM Logger+ 1.0.5982.0
Band QSOs Pts Sec Pt/Q
3.5 109 218 26 2
7 60 120 25 2
14 52 104 29 2
21 6 12 3 2
Total 227 454 83
Score : 37,682
Rig : FT-897
Antennas : 80m trapped dipole, 40m dipole, 80m OCFD windom 20′ above ground
*************************************************
Breakdown by Operator
*************************************************
Operator 80m 40m 20m 15m Total  Accum
AA0RN 57 23 6 86 86
ALEX 3 3 6 92
KE0CFK 18 6 24 116
N0SFR 10 10 126
N0SSC 24 34 37 6 101 227
Total 109 60 52 6 227 227
*************************************************
W0EEE Max Rates:
*************************************************
2016-11-20 0612Z – 2.0 per minute  (1 minute(s)), 120 per hour by AA0RN
2016-11-20 0623Z – 1.2 per minute  (10 minute(s)), 72 per hour by AA0RN
2016-11-20 0657Z – 0.7 per minute  (60 minute(s)), 40 per hour by AA0RN KE0CFK
*************************************************
W0EEE – Off Times >= 30 Minutes
*************************************************
2016-11-19 2100Z – 2016-11-19 2105Z     00:06  (6 mins)   (Start late)
2016-11-20 0328Z – 2016-11-20 0357Z     00:30  (30 mins)
2016-11-20 0847Z – 2016-11-20 1450Z     06:04  (364 mins)
2016-11-20 1509Z – 2016-11-20 1609Z     01:01  (61 mins)
2016-11-20 1734Z – 2016-11-20 1817Z     00:44  (44 mins)
2016-11-20 1859Z – 2016-11-20 1939Z     00:41  (41 mins)
2016-11-20 1941Z – 2016-11-20 2022Z     00:42  (42 mins)
2016-11-20 2138Z – 2016-11-20 2215Z     00:38  (38 mins)
2016-11-20 2312Z – 2016-11-21 0243Z     03:31  (211 mins)
Total Time Off 13:57  (837 mins)
Total Time On 15:47  (947 mins)
**************************************************
W0EEE Runs >10 QSOs:
**************************************************
2016-11-20 0602 – 0724Z,    3671 kHz, 51 Qs, 37.0/hr AA0RN
2016-11-20 0807 – 0824Z,    3804 kHz, 14 Qs, 50.7/hr N0SSC

 

Thanks for reading! I will follow up this with a post detailing some ideas for college clubs to increase activity, and some ideas for contest coordinators to make contests better for school clubs and younger people as well.

Phasing Line Podcast – Episode 1!!!!

Our hard work has come to it’s end. We have published episode one of The Phasing Line Podcast. It was originally about an hour twenty, but cuts and removal of um’s and uh’s shaved it to just under 45 minutes.

Find it on iTunes, Stitcher, Pocketcasts, Overcast, and at http://phasinglinepodcast.com or right here:

 

We attempt to talk about who we are, winning cookies in CQWW, packet spotting and pileups, contest operating and logging techniques, ARES and some of the bad things about ham radio, Youngsters on the Air, and cats.

I wanted to have a two-guys-and-a-mic style podcast about ham radio, without any script or topic – just winging it. It’s focus is on whatever comes to mind, as well as the progression of the hobby…aka youth in amateur radio. We plan on doing interviews, giveaways, and for now we intend keep it ad-free because ad’s suck! Until we need more bandwidth, at least. If you’re so inclined to donate, email Marty or I, and we’ll be happy to talk about buying me a Flex 6700 or Marty a couple dozen IC-7300’s since he’s in to that single-operator, twenty-radios sort of contesting. 🙂

Let us know how we did and how we can improve! Tweet at us at https://twitter.com/phasingline or email us – we’re good on QRZ!

And also find us on Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/PhasingLinePodcast/
About the hosts:
Sterling, N0SSC: 24 year old electrical engineer from St. Louis, Missouri who’s in the hobby for contesting, youth engagement, and just about everything else. He’s a former ARRL youth editor. http://n0ssc.com

Marty, KC1CWF: The infamous “chicken with fries,” Marty is a 14 year old ham radio genius from Waban, Massachusetts who loves contesting, DXing, building stations and mentoring others. https://chickenwithfries.wordpress.com/author/kc1cwf/

hab.education: Promoting STEAM to Youth with High Altitude Ballooning

Finally, something to get my mind of this crazy election.

I met this guy at Dayton one year, and totally forgot about it.

Dustin (@BalloonEDU) is a clone of mine, or perhaps I’m a clone of his..basically our mindsets align strangely closely regarding ham radio, education, STEAM (science, technology, engineering, art/design, math…which used to be STEM now Art/design gets a mention) promotion and high altitude ballooning. I met him at Venture Cafe in St Louis, which is a place where young professionals (aka yuppies) meet to find people to collaborate, kickstart, and invest in their ideas.

In my case, I went the first time for free beer. Little did I know I would find a ham.

Dustin, KE0BVB, is a leader of hab.education – a volunteer-based educational program that promotes STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art/Design and Math) by having school kids build and launch high altitude balloons.

It was just last month when I started up my Echoloon project.

He and I met after some of my college friends started texting me.

“COME NOW. VENTURE CAFE. HAM RADIO GUY. HE DOES HIGH ALTITUDE BALLOONING. COME NOWWWW.”

I bolted to the car, sped my way there, and signed in, skipping the line for free beer. I got to the conference room they were in a bit late, just after his talk, meanwhile a man from Stofiel Aerospace was giving a talk on his balloon-launched orbital rocket company…that’s pretty cool! Turns out Mr. Stofiel was turning towards Dustin for his expertise on high altitude balloon tracking.

This was all too awesome. With my Echoloon idea, and my work with FaradayRF, now hab.education…this was all coming to a head.

We talked for only a few minutes and unearthed the single most detrimental issue in ham radio high altitude ballooning – fragmentation. Like I mentioned in my Echoloon post, hardware and software development in high altitude ballooning and ham radio in general is all over the place! It’s fragmented. There’s the California Near Space Project, K6RPT, there’s Bill Brown WB8ELK, there’s ARHAB, and UKHAS…and dozens more! Those are just the biggest names. They even have made their own freakin’ Balloon Open Hardware License!

They’re all over the place, and I don’t think there’s been a lot of cross-talk between them, and some are choosing to develop their trackers and payloads in closed-source secrecy, and man, that’s a bummer. We could really rule the skies and help STEAM education a lot with a standard platform specification. That’s my side-goal for Project Echoloon.

I really want to bring everyone together. I wonder if anyone’s started a High Altitude Balloon consortium or annual conference……

http://www.stratoballooning.org/conference

lol. Just missed it. 🙁

So yeah. I got so excited about this encounter that I called Neil Rapp in excitement to get it off my chest during his HamTalkLive! call-in show. I come in around 24:20. Haha.