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Awesome Jonathon…. Yes my side tone is a piezo buzzer…. The plan was to fix it but I’m used to it now 😂 73 and hope to hear u out there shortly.

Lately she has been “trusty”…. The relationship was a little rocky until I changed the finals. 73

@@TheArtofEngineering Next time you need any tubes I have about 100 in a box some brand new some old. I have no idea what they are I should make a list.

Thank you next time I’m inside it, I might give that a crack! Thanks for the tips and 73 OM de VK2AOE.

My PTT was good to go. I wonder how the attenuation is thru it? I need to check this. At the moment the plan is connect antenna on it to my loop on the ground and listen on the SDR HF DISCOVERY. The PTT is activated by the Hermes Light II …. My HOMEBREW antenna switch box has an isolation on transmit detect (that sometimes works?). So the SDR will be my listen rig when playing with my dodgy QRP xmitters! 73 de VK2AOE

@@TheArtofEngineering Sounds good, be interesting to compare your findings with my own. I've yet to get around to testing the insertion loss but when in shared mode (SDR & Transceiver) it is noticeably higher than the stated figure. To be expected I supposed as it is behaving as a switched RX splitter in this mode. 73's

At 7mins 47 seconds is the active filter schematic using op amps. I used a kit build audio amp. I am a tinkerer and I build “organically”. There are lots of op amp active filter designs online (most likely better than mine😂). Have a play with some op amps and enjoy the journey . If I get a moment I will sketch it up and post it….but I fear that I made so many mods ….and it was so long ago it might be inaccurate 73 de VK2AOE

That would explain how loud that signal was!

George was a ship’s RO which also gives him the super power of drinking beer whilst keying

I would struggle if it was a rag chew, but the POTA/SOTA exchange is pretty predictable. Thanks for the comment. The main thing is that you are giving CW a crack (if you think it is worthwhile) and you are enjoying ham radio! 73 de VK2AOE

It ended up mono band 40m with 2 capacitors on a colpitts oscillator. I would like to try pin diode band changing (like on my QRP LABS rigs). One day? 73 and TNXS FER the comment.

@@DAVIDGREGORYKERR can’t say I have. Haven’t done an SSB rig yet. I have an Oz QRP SSB kit not yet built….

Alas I am not a very competent repair person. No insurance etc etc If the problem is the transistors I am happy to send them to you though. Use the channel email and Let me know u emailed me as I don’t check it that often. What is the symptoms?

You should. There is lots of slow code happening now. I love the simplicity of the gear you can run. Thanks for the comment and hope to hear you out there dit dit! 73 de VK2AOE

Do it !!!! You’ll always be grateful you spent the time to learn. 10 mins at a time. Couple of times a day. Slow stuff you can pick up. Then speed it up. It’s the mode for kings…and the odd beer drinking hooligans with radios

@@MidlifeRenaissanceMan I'm blown away at the distance you can reach with cw compared to voice on ssb.

@@klejzbigniew true. And the gear can be so simple if you want to build something. A few transistors will get you a few watts. Some carefully crafted circuits will get you 20-30W without too much expense. 20W is an S point over 5W and doesn’t have a huge current requirement at 12V. But as far as learning the code. Just start. Learn the letters, numbers ? / and <BT> which is the break character. I used Morse Whisperer to learn the characters. That’s 10WPM sent at 5WPM. I then did the Lockdown Morse sessions to get myself up to 20WPM sent at 10WPM. Tuesday nights, here in Aus, you can get on the air at 5-8WPM and people will slow down. In fact it’s running now on 40m. I might get on. Have to extend the antenna back up. Might just poke the loop out the window. See how that goes instead.

I do remember the rocket launch. you launched it, not into the wind but downwind.....the trailing rope turned the rocket up wind. Anything that involves throwing for me is a dead loss!!!! TNX FER the comment OM 73. Alas my time at sea was short and spent mostly answering the satellite phone

@@williambrooks6629 it was a light line, so, like our ability to hold our alcohol, it was less than spectacular

@@MidlifeRenaissanceMan That magnetic loop has me intrigued. Is the capacitor on the top a home mad one?

@@PaulaBean Short answer …. YES! I’m sure VK2NAP will elaborate! There is a video on the end screen world Pixie day where we play with the same antenna as n my backyard. It is a cracker of an antenna 73 de VK2AOE

@@TheArtofEngineering Ah, you mean czcams.com/video/ybLSKLKypA0/video.htmlsi=-JVoQl6rkpdqyZ6V&t=143 where there is mentioned a 'secret capacitor' like the spice mix of KFC 🤪🤪 Well I'm really curious about that capacitor!

@@PaulaBean the capacitor is motorised. It’s manually tuned with the aid of a VNA or the SWR sweep on the radio. The other thing of note is the ratio of windings on the toroid feedline transformer. The loop covers 20-40m but the radiation resistance drops as you lower the frequency. You need more windings on the 40m band than the 20m band. I have made two of these loops. This larger one which in various iterations has performed incredibly well. The second is a smaller one which I can poke out the window of a first floor room and operate on 20 and 40m Now, unlike many loops you may have seen, these loops will take the full 100W out of a transceiver. Earlier ones weren’t quite as robust, but were still able to take 50w before immolation. We have been talking for over a year now of doing a separate channel that would be a little more structured / focussed where we can go into more details on the stuff we do and some of the theory vs practical aspects of the hobby. Sadly our commitments and priorities haven’t allowed this just yet…..but watch this space. There will be more to come 73 DE VK2NAP dit dit

@@MidlifeRenaissanceMan Thanks!

@@youtubeaccount931 Romeo that! 🍺

Red wine would suffice, too.

@@krjames5880 yes it was a great day! Stay tuned for part 2 next week 73 de VK2AOE

@@krjames5880 it was surprisingly productive too. Once we gave up on the 500mW on 40m and tuned that loop up to the 20m band, hooked up the old Xiegu DDS analog radio….

Glad you enjoyed the video. It was surprisingly successful too. That loop is deceptively effective even on 40m. The base / stand is a little weighty, but so is beer in glass bottles, and worth the effort to make the overall experience more enjoyable

Red wine 🍷 tonight 😂

It was damn fine beer. Some German brew from our local independent grog shop

Yes and Doc Mag can null the noise and provides stellar S/N ratio.

@@TheArtofEngineeringa bit like the camera mics. One worked and one didn’t Let’s see how many comments we get asking about the mag loop.

@@MidlifeRenaissanceManyes suitably arty “Wolf Creek” aesthetic! 😝🍷🍺🍷🍺🍷

@@TheArtofEngineering I haven’t managed to get 10 and 15m matched with any efficiency using the toroid match. Been a bit ordinary. I’m thinking that the 4m and 3m loops are a little too long and so the turns ratio for those bands is a little too low and as a result the coupling suffers. But you’d see a higher corresponding SWR, so where is it going ???? I’m not seeing a high SWR. It’s less than 2. The poverty loop made of 2.5m of RG8 has 10dB over the 3m aluminium strap loop on 10m with some initial tests More experiments to do. I’d love to try a 13m loop on 80m. The 8m and 5m lengths joined together. Use all 20m of the loop and work too band. It would be 7m wide, but strung up between a couple of trees….. More engineering and experimenting time needs to be spent on this project. But a loop for 40m through 20m, that takes a 100W…I can say I have achieved that. A bit of refinement is optional, such as the auto cutoff that I have in the poke-out-the-window-tenna, and some cable management, and a battery pack / switch thing that was a little less _ephemeral_ Essentially the hard work is done. Cheers 🍻

No idea, but doubt it will work well? The attenuation will be very high and perhaps the SWR. I still need to check the attenuation, as rumour has it that attenuation even within the quoted frequency range is high?...let me know if you find out! 73 de VK2AOE

@@johnhess351 Never seen that done? Might work…. but if it needs too much squashing might effect the directional characteristics? I guess might be worth a play…

@@johnhess351 Never seen that done? Might work…. but if it needs too much squashing might effect the directional characteristics? I guess might be worth a play…

Yes…. All the cupboards and benches in my shack are skip bin rescues! The bulk of it from my old “night job” at a University in Sydney.

One day I might just learn to kicad design and do it! It did take some head scratching to get going…. and what was left of my hair! 😂😂 73 de VK2AOE

@@DonzLockz hi Don …. You on the air, HF yet? You know me …. No see…. No do! 🤣🤣 The cuckoo clock is still on the wall and the bell hasn’t fallen down and broken anybody’s foot…. So win win!!!! 73 de VK2AOE

@@TheArtofEngineering haha, you're a 🤡... in a good way. Lol. I recently bought a 706MKII, a tuner, end fed and some coax but still waiting on the coax. QSL Comms just shipped it but it was ordered on the 7th July, go figure! I still have the 80-10 to install... should have bought a 40-10. Oh well, should be up and running soonish either way.🙏😁

Thanks for this info ! Just took mine portable in a park nearby worked New Zealand from Oz. Just using a couple of diodes to drop my battery Voltage…. But your arrangement would be much more stable ! 73 de VK2AOE

@@TheArtofEngineering Honestly, I wish it was as easy to power my larger radios from a USB-C power bank, but there are, as yet, almost no power banks or even laptop USB-C PD power supplies putting out the necessary amperage at 12V to power, say, an FT-710 at full power. But the fact that I can easily power my QMX, future QMX+, and Hermes Lite 2 this way is pretty nifty.

@@colincolin30 Hi Colin …noticed you do some work on the Vampire at the museum. Cool stuff! I visited with my cousin months ago …. Made me nostalgic about my short stint at sea …. Not in the military but merchant marine. Saw the shack from outside. I guess they decommissioned the original-big HF transmitters ? Anyway hope to QSO agn …. Maybe from the ship? 73 de VK2AOE.

Yep all part of the "fun" :) Making hay while the school holiday sun shines de VK@AOE

Not sure? I’m running Thetis. I’ve never used gnu radio but it looks fascinating….. my problem is there is so much to learn and master!!!…. Do I play with gnu… or design PCB’s on KICAD … etc etc. 73 de VK2AOE

Thanks for the comment. I worked him briefly the other day on 40m CW. Still an active ham. A true and modest gentleman. I have thus far built his miser linear DC shack PSU (used 2 rewound microwave transformers in series ). Also have built a SMPS filter and his field strength meter and part of his little mate transceiver (rcv section). I agree thoroughly, his designs are tried and tested.73 de VK2AOE.

Great idea....I did one for 2m and 70cm so might give that a crack. 73 de VK2AOE

We have 10m but not 27megs…. It went into 27 (11m band?) first boot up ?? Now it is behaving itself after factory reset and reload of firmware. Worked CW last night Sydney to Adelaide 1000 km plus and very nice receive on 40m (signal RST 579). 73 and thanks for the comment. As for buying rigs…. I buy kits and have avoided the BIG shiny expensive rig in favour of buying boat anchors, kits, parts and test gear…. To “save” money 😂😂😂😂😂 …

11m used to be a ham band once upon a time….it still is according to my FT101B where _B is for Boat anchor_

@@MidlifeRenaissanceMan he he he…. How you been?? I have been building and nerding it hard…. Alas domestic realities have been ruining my commitment to ham and poor personal hygiene 😝😝. About to start the QRP linear amp now 73 Mr CW.

Yes! 73 de VK2AOE

73!!!

@@TheArtofEngineering Love your videos.

Tu for the comment. Most of the knowledge was other people’s knowledge! It is great how generous hams are!! 73 mate.

Hi Justin ...I'm away a few days will get back to you shortly with that info 73

@@TheArtofEngineering thank you!

Me again... I have been very organic in my approach so schematic is problematic for the monster....pretty sure it is a bog standard VXO colpitts stage 1 and npn transistor keyed buffer. I think it is built like the Swedish Pixie in the Pixie files link below - Find the "Swedish Pixie" I only used the xmit stage as the rcvr was problematic for me. www.gqrp.com/The_Sprat_Pixie_File.pdf I then up the power with a BD139 stage care of Peter Parker gets me 1.5-2 watts. go to 14 mins 27 secs video link belowfor cct. czcams.com/video/CPmKFJGvc8w/video.htmlsi=dmfJeY1FMJMCzZ7s All very basic stuff but it works for me for sh#$%ts and giggles! Hope this helps....happy homebrewing! I just spent 2 days building a QMX mini from QRP Labs and it is D.O.A :((((. 73

Good point …. Gotta try for kiwi land 🐑🐏🐑🐏🐑🐏🐑🐏

Hi …. Yes lotsa fun! Here is a link to my other video. You don’t have to watch it just read the video description! Used to be just 80m TUESDAY evenings 0900UTC to as late as 1400z. So this description doesn’t tell u new 40m net, which is very popular! 0700 - 0900z 40m 7.025 - 7040 k 0900 - 1100z 40m freq as above 80m 3.540 -3.570 k 0900 - 1300z 80m freq as above Also email Mark Bosms and get on the email rag chew newsletter (all part of the fun!!) mark.bosma@icloud.com 73 and thanks for popping by! czcams.com/video/cKUpTPViK94/video.htmlsi=zzHF9oIog89KGLPW

I just masked off the Gyprock wall and used blackboard paint. Fun place to noodle ideas! 73 de VK2AOE

@@TheArtofEngineeringThanks sir

Thank you....I normally calibrate whenever I change the range of "stimulus". I must of not done it in this case. Thanks for that tid bit of useful information that I didn't know! Just tried it and 100% correct. Nice to know as it will remind me to do it! 73 and TU OM most useful.

I think it is black paint :)

For me ...perhaps the only way!!! :)

I buy a lot of of stuff on Ali Express. The component quality is often hit and miss though....all part of the fun I guess? 🤣🤣 Thanks for popping by! 73 de VK2AOE

Yes! It snapped together in such a satisfying way. Totally agree the solid weight in the palm of your hand and performance makes it amazing value. This is why I will be shopping again tonight before the “good thing” comes to an end! 😜 73 and thanks for popping by. De VK2AOE