In this episode we bring back our good friend Dan Quigley, N7HQ, to talk about restoring older radio equipment.  Should you return an old radio to it's original state or repurpose the chassis for a more modern project with the look and feel of a classic radio of the past?  We explore various approaches to restoring radio equipment including tools, test equipment and process.

Dan is the director of strategic programs at Flex Radio and brings decades of professional engineering and ham radio experience to the discussion.

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PODCAST: This Week in Amateur Radio Edition #1322 - Full Version Release Date: June 29, 2024 Here is a summary of the news trending This Week in Amateur Radio. This week's edition is anchored by Denny Haight, NZ8D, Dave Wilson, WA2HOY, Josh Marler, AA4WX, Don Hulick, K2ATJ, Will Rogers, K5WLR, Eric Zittel, KD2RJX, George Bowen, W2XBS, and Jessica Bowen, KC2VWX. Produced and edited by George Bowen, W2XBS. Approximate Running Time: 1:31:28 Trending headlines in this week's bulletin service: Podcast Download: https://bit.ly/TWIAR1322 Trending headlines in this week's bulletin service 1. FCC: ISPs Urge Court To Block FCC’s Net Neutrality Rules 2. AMSAT: AMSAT Board of Directors Nominees Announced 3. AMSAT: UPDATE: AMSAT Mail Alias Service To End August 1, 2024 4. WIA: Germany To Grant Remote Operation, DARC To Build Stations Around The Country 5. WIA: International Amateur Radio Union Monitoring System Report 6. ARRL: 2024 ARRL Field Day Wrap Up 7. ARRL: ARRL and Momobeam Introduce Dual Band Beam Antenna for Six and Ten Meters 8. ARRL: ARRL Club Grant Program, Application Deadline Approaching 9. ARRL: 25th Anniversary Of Route 66 On The Air 10. ARRL: Zion 2024 A New Amateur Radio Convention and Expo Event Takes Place July 12/13 In St. George, Utah 11. Australian Court Delivers Decision On Amateur Radio Death 12. Thirteen Colonies Special Event Operation Coming Up 13. Japan's Wartime Raids Over Australia Marked By Upcoming Special Event 14. Earthquake Awareness Added To Clubs Field Day 15. Australian Regulator ACMA Seeks Input On Proposed Repeater and Beacon Licensing 16. Listeners Via Shortwave Give Aid At Train Mishap 17. 4 Meter Privileges In Germany Are Extended Until The End Of 2024 18. California Amateur Documentary Film May Become A TV Series 19. Alexanderson Alternator Will Be On The Air 20. SpaceX Is Building A Craft To Intentionally Destroy The International Space Station 21. Upcoming Contests in RadioSport and Convention and Hamfest listings 22. AMSAT: Starliner brings another ham to the International Space Station 23. ARDC: ARDC announces Ashhar Farhan VU2ESE, Joins ARDC Board 24. FCC: FCC approves mysterious Space X device - The Starlink Mini Backpack Dish 25. ARRL: Amateurs are now gaming on the amateur radio digital modes (FT8) 26. A popular Massachusetts electronics retailer announces shutdown 27. Wifi router manufacturer receives FCC fine for selling overpower routers 28. NORAD improves tracking of amateur radio and civilian balloons Plus these Special Features This Week: * Working Amateur Radio Satellites with Bruce Paige, KK5DO - AMSAT Satellite News * Foundations of Amateur Radio with Onno Benschop VK6FLAB, will tell us how to access a radio remotely. * Bill Salyers, AJ8B - The DX Corner with all the latest radio sport news on DXpeditions, working DX, upcoming contests, and more * Weekly Propagation Forecast from the ARRL * Bill Continelli, W2XOY (SK) - The History of Amateur Radio. This week, Bill continues with the history of amateur radios Fallen Flags with a look back at the Hammerlund Radio Corporation * Will Rogers, K5WLR - A Century of Amateur Radio. This week, Will looks back at how one article published in the very first edition of QST, went on to organize relay stations ----- Website: https://www.twiar.net X: https://x.com/TWIAR Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/twiari YouTube: https://bit.ly/TWIARYouTube RSS News: https://twiar.net/?feed=rss2 Automated (Full): https://twiar.net/TWIARHAM.mp3 (Static file, updated weekly) Automated (1-hour): https://www.twiar.net/TWIAR1HR.mp3 (Static file, updated weekly) ----- Visit our website at www.twiar.net for program audio, and daily for the latest amateur radio and technology news. You can air This Week in Amateur Radio on your repeater! Built in identification breaks every 10 minutes or less. This Week in Amateur Radio is heard on the air on nets and repeaters as a bulletin service all across North America, and all around the world on amateur radio repeater systems, weekends on WA0RCR on 1860 (160 Meters), and more. This Week in Amateur Radio is portable too! The bulletin/news service is available and built for air on local repeaters (check with your local clubs to see if their repeater is carrying the news service) and can be downloaded for air as a weekly podcast to your digital device from just about everywhere. This Week in Amateur Radio is also carried on a number of LPFM stations, so check the low power FM stations in your area. You can also stream the program to your favorite digital device by visiting our web site www.twiar.net. Or, just ask Siri, Alexa, or your Google Nest to play This Week in Amateur Radio! This Week in Amateur Radio is produced by Community Video Associates in upstate New York, and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. If you would like to volunteer with us as a news anchor or special segment producer please get in touch with our Executive Producer, George, via email at w2xbs77@gmail.com. Also, please feel free to follow us by joining our popular group on Facebook, and follow our feed on X! Thanks to FortifiedNet.net for the server space! Thanks to Archive.org for the audio space.

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Foundations of Amateur Radio

Over the past week I've been attempting to work out what the IARU, the International Amateur Radio Union, actually does and how it works. I started looking into this because the IARU is this year celebrating a century since its foundation in 1925. You might think of the IARU as one organisation, but behind the scenes there are actually four, one for each so-called "Region" as well a Global organisation called the International Secretariat, headquartered at the ARRL in Connecticut.

The Regions have been negotiated by members of the ITU, the International Telecommunications Union. As early as 1927 the ITU documented differences in frequency allocations between Europe and Other Regions. In Cairo in 1938 it defined boundaries for Europe. In Atlantic City in 1947, the ITU defined three Regions, with specific boundaries, essentially, Europe and Africa, the Americas and the rest of the world.

As a surprise to nobody, this is purely a political decision, especially since radio waves don't get to have a passport and pass border control. The impact of this continues today, generations later. We still have this patchwork of frequency allocations, we still have exclusions, different band-edges and other anachronisms.

The Regions are further divided into Zones. When you start looking at the ITU zone map in detail it gets weird. For example, Iraq is in Region 1, neighbouring Iran has been specifically excluded from Region 1 and moved to Region 3. In case you're curious, Iran has been represented at the ITU since 1938.

Antarctica is part of seven of the 90 ITU zones and all three Regions, because of course it is.

Zone 90, jammed between zones 35, 45, 61, 64, 65 and 76, almost as an afterthought, contains one landmass, Minamitorishima, an island that sticks 9 m above the water, has a 6 km coastline and is generally off-limits to the general public. The nearest land in any direction is over 1,000 km away. It's got an IOTA, Islands On The Air, designation, OC-073 and despite its isolation, has been activated by radio amateurs using JD1 prefix callsigns.

I live in Australia, ITU zone 58, part of Region 3, together with the two most populous countries on the planet, India and China and the rest of eastern Asia, but not the Former Soviet republics and most, but not all of Oceania, you know, because .. logic. From a population perspective Region 3 is the largest by several orders of magnitude, but you'd never know it if you went looking.

Why am I telling you all this?

Well, that's the international stage on which the IARU is representing amateur radio. In 1927 the underlying assumption was that each service, Amateur Radio included, had a global exclusive allocation. The reality was different. Spectrum was in such short supply that individual exceptions were carved out, which as I've said resulted in splitting up the world into regions, starting in 1938 and codified in 1947.

The IARU in 1925 is a different organisation from what it is today. In 1925 individual amateurs could become members. As soon as enough members from a country joined, they'd be grouped together. When there were enough groups, the IARU became a federation of national associations.

Over time, the IARU as a single body, evolved into the structure we have today. In 1950 in Paris, the IARU Region 1 organisation was formed. In 1964 in Mexico City, IARU Region 2 was created and in 1968 in Sydney, IARU Region 3 came to exist. You can see their online presence at the various iaru.org websites.

How it works is no clearer now than it was when I started. What it has achieved is equally unclear. I'm currently trolling through ITU World Radiocommunications Conference documentation going back to 1903 to discover references to Amateur Radio, but it's hard going. At least it's something. The IARU documentation is not nearly as extensive or up to date.

It appears that many, if not all, of the people working behind the scenes at the various IARU organisations are volunteers. If you feel inclined, there is an ongoing request for assistance, and before you ask, yes, I looked into helping out, but that will have to wait until funds permit.

If you have insights into the functioning of the IARU, don't be shy, get in touch. cq@vk6flab.com is my address.

I'm Onno VK6FLAB

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Hello and welcome to Episode 546 of Linux in the Ham Shack. In this episode, the hosts take a look at some of the variations of the newly released Fedora 40 distribution. Topics include installation, desktop environments, ease of use, ham radio readiness, quirks and more. A particular focus is the partitioning system and other potential issues. Thanks for listening and have a great week.

73 de The LHS Crew

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PODCAST: This Week in Amateur Radio Edition #1321 - Full Version Release Date: June 22, 2024 Here is a summary of the news trending This Week in Amateur Radio. This week's edition is anchored by Denny Haight, NZ8D, Dave Wilson, WA2HOY, Don Hulick, K2ATJ, Will Rogers, K5WLR, Mike LaMontain, KE2AWY, Eric Zittel, KD2RJX, George Bowen, W2XBS, and Jessica Bowen, KC2VWX. Produced and edited by George Bowen, W2XBS. Approximate Running Time: 1:39:51 Trending headlines in this week's bulletin service: Podcast Download: https://bit.ly/TWIAR1321 Trending headlines in this week's bulletin service 1. AMSAT: Starliner Brings Another Ham To International Space Station 2. AMSAT: Voyager 1 Is Back To Life, But For How Long? 3. AMSAT: AMSAT Mail Alias Service To End August 1st, 2024 4. AMSAT: Satellite Shorts From All Over 5. ARDC: Amateur Radio Digital Communications, Announces Ashhar Farhan VU2ESE, Joins Board of Directors 6. WIA: Alexanderson Alternator To Transmit Message On June 30th, 2024 7. FCC: FCC Approves Mysterious SpaceX Device: Is It For The Starlink Mini Dish? 8. ARRL: 2024 ARRL Field Day Is Here 9. ARRL: New Hampshire ARES Serves Mount Washington Road Race 10. ARRL: Colorado Teacher and Ham Accepted To The Albert Einstein Distinguished Educator Fellowship Program 11. ARRL: Gaming The Amateur Radio Digital Modes 12. ARRL: Meme Appreciation Month Is Being Billed As Not Your Average Special Event 13. ARRL: A Unique Special Event, Open To All Amateur Radio Operators, Will Take Place July 1 - November 30th 14. ARRL: ARRL Foundation Club Grant Update 15. Popular Massachusetts Electronics Retailer Announces Shuts Down 16. Wi-Fi Router Manufacturer Receives FCC Fine For Over Power Routers 17. YASME Foundation Announces Award Winners 18. US Military Improves Tracking Of Amateur Radio and Hobbyist Balloons 19. Queens Of The Mountains Ascend For Summits On The Air 20. Young Amateurs In Turkey Take Up Parks On The Air Activations 21. Upcoming RadioSport contests and conventions listing 22. AMSAT: The AMSAT mail alias service will end on August 01, 2024 23. WIA: The Square Kilometer Array under construction in a radio quiet zone, while overhead satellites shout 24. WIA: The South African Radio League takes the first steps toward World Radio Conference 2027 25. ARRL: Amateur Radio connects family members during a boating accident in Utah 26. ARRL: ARRL Teachers Institute kicks off summer cohorts 27. ARRL: The new Extra Class License Question Pool is released 28. Another cyberattack brings down the Society of Broadcast Engineers web page 29: Germany's new N class license makes its testing session debut at Ham Radio Friedrichshafen 30. A robust lineup of vendors and speakers will be at the upcoming 2024 Northeast Ham Exposition Plus these Special Features This Week: * Working Amateur Radio Satellites with Bruce Paige, KK5DO - AMSAT Satellite News * Foundations of Amateur Radio with Onno Benschop VK6FLAB, will take a look at 'Identity In Amateur Radio'. * The DX Corner with Bill Salyers, AJ8B with news on DXpeditions, DX, upcoming contests and more. * Weekly Propagation Forecast from the ARRL * Our own amateuar radio historian, Will Rogers, K5WLR, returns with another edition of A Century of Amateur Radio. This time out, we discover that vacuum tubes revolutionized radio, changing it more than any other single invention. He will have a close up look at Lee DeForest and the Audion. ----- Website: https://www.twiar.net X: https://x.com/TWIAR Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/twiari YouTube: https://bit.ly/TWIARYouTube RSS News: https://twiar.net/?feed=rss2 Automated (Full): https://twiar.net/TWIARHAM.mp3 (Static file, updated weekly) Automated (1-hour): https://www.twiar.net/TWIAR1HR.mp3 (Static file, updated weekly) ----- Visit our website at www.twiar.net for program audio, and daily for the latest amateur radio and technology news. You can air This Week in Amateur Radio on your repeater! Built in identification breaks every 10 minutes or less. This Week in Amateur Radio is heard on the air on nets and repeaters as a bulletin service all across North America, and all around the world on amateur radio repeater systems, weekends on WA0RCR on 1860 (160 Meters), and more. This Week in Amateur Radio is portable too! The bulletin/news service is available and built for air on local repeaters (check with your local clubs to see if their repeater is carrying the news service) and can be downloaded for air as a weekly podcast to your digital device from just about everywhere. This Week in Amateur Radio is also carried on a number of LPFM stations, so check the low power FM stations in your area. You can also stream the program to your favorite digital device by visiting our web site www.twiar.net. Or, just ask Siri, Alexa, or your Google Nest to play This Week in Amateur Radio! This Week in Amateur Radio is produced by Community Video Associates in upstate New York, and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. If you would like to volunteer with us as a news anchor or special segment producer please get in touch with our Executive Producer, George, via email at w2xbs77@gmail.com. Also, please feel free to follow us by joining our popular group on Facebook, and follow our feed on X! Thanks to FortifiedNet.net for the server space! Thanks to Archive.org for the audio space.

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Foundations of Amateur Radio

So, I have a confession. I don't know everything. Shocking right?

Over the past too many months, actually, come to think of it, years, I have not been on-air with my station on HF using FT8 or Olivia, modes that use tools like "WSJT-X" and "fldigi". This has not always been the case. For a time I used a tiny computer running those tools. It had plenty of issues related to its size and capacity. Overwhelmingly it was slow, unsurprising since it was released in 2009. After one particularly frustrating session where I had to recompile WSJT-X on an older 32-bit operating system using an Atom processor, I decided that this was not helping me, and I put it away.

The idea was to use my main computer that could do all the heavy lifting without cracking a sweat. To make this happen the traditional way, I'd be expected to physically connect the radio to the computer. I'm not a fan of doing that, given the potential damage that RF could do to my computer, not to mention that I have a sit-stand desk on wheels that I move around my office as the mood or the light takes me, if you're interested, I found a mobile lectern that the computer is clamped to. Works great, been using it for years.

RF aside, moving around the office is not conducive to plugging in a radio that comes with power, coax, audio, control, microphone and expects to have some space around it to actually use it. No problem, I have a RemoteRig, a device that comes in two parts. You connect one unit to the radio, the other to the head, that is, the removable faceplate of the radio, and using a network connection, you can have the head in one place and the radio in another. The two units don't have to be in the same room, let alone the same country.

I figured that I could replace the second half of the system, the head and its unit, and instead use software on my computer to get the same functionality and be up and running in minutes. That was several years ago. Interestingly, whilst I'm putting this together I did a search for "RemoteRig protocols" and learnt a few things, so perhaps this path isn't quite as dead as I feared. I've reached out to Mikael SM2O and if that comes to anything I'll let you know.

In the meantime I've been trying to figure out how to operate my radio in software only. I can control the radio if I physically connect a computer like a Raspberry Pi to it and use "rigctld" to interact with it. This gives me access to all the standard CAT, or Computer Assisted Tuning commands. In other words, I can change band, mode, frequency, trigger the transmitter, all the stuff that you need to get on-air to make noise.

There's only one bit missing, the noise, as-in audio, either coming from the radio, or going to it. I suppose I could trigger a carrier and use it to send Morse, but that doesn't give me receive capability. I've tried using network audio using "pulseaudio" - it never worked right. I've made USB hot-plug scripts that allow you to connect a USB device into a computer and access it across the network on another computer - it mostly works for sound, but reliable is not a word I'd use. I've looked at using the USB sound card in the audio mixer on my desk, but it's subject to all manner of funky restrictions and random audio dropouts. I could use a virtual screen and connect to a Raspberry Pi that's physically connected to the radio, but that's leaving all the hard work on the Pi, rather than the computer that I'm currently using with several orders of magnitude more capability.

Whilst we're discussing this, one of the reasons I like the idea of a software defined radio like a PlutoSDR, is that the stuff coming out of the radio, and going into it for that matter, is already digital. It takes away a whole lot of complexity, admittedly replacing it with software, but that's where I feel more comfortable.

Which brings me to you.

As I said, I don't know everything.

What are you doing in this space? Are you actually on-air with your contraption, or is it still in the planning stages? Are you sending audio, or digital data across the network? Does your system have the ability to swap out a radio and replace it with something completely different? Do you rely on functions available on the radio, or could it be used for a 1950's valve radio, a twenty year old one, a current model, or any number of software defined radios without issues? Finally, is it Open Source?

I confess that I'm not holding my breath for an answer, but there is a chance that you're similarly intrigued by this collection of questions that you will poke your head above the fence and make yourself known.

I'm Onno VK6FLAB

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In this episode we meet Colin Vallance, KC8DHY, a professional network engineer who also manages the WiFi network at DefCon and other events.  We talk with Colin about how to set up your network in the ham stack.  We also have a round table discussion about our plans for Field Day 2024.

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PODCAST: This Week in Amateur Radio Edition #1320 - Full Version Release Date: June 15, 2024 Here is a summary of the news trending This Week in Amateur Radio. This week's edition is anchored by Chris Perrine, KB2FAF, Dave Wilson, WA2HOY, Don Hulick, K2ATJ, Will Rogers, K5WLR, William Savocool, K2SAV, Eric Zittel, KD2RJX, George Bowen, W2XBS, and Jessica Bowen, KC2VWX. Produced and edited by George Bowen, W2XBS. Approximate Running Time: 1:20:54 Trending headlines in this week's bulletin service: Podcast Download: https://bit.ly/TWIAR1320 Trending headlines in this week's bulletin service 1. AMSAT: AMSAT Mail Alias Service To End August 1st, 2024 2. AMSAT: Satellite Shorts From All Over 3. WIA: Square Kilometre Array Under Construction In Radio Quiet Zone As More Satellites Shout From Above 4. WIA: South Africa Takes First Steps To World Radio Conference 2027 5. WIA: A Wiki For Open Source In Amateur Radio 6. ARRL: 2024 ARRL Field Day is Next Weekend! 7. ARRL: Amateur Radio Connects Family Members During Utah Boating Emergency 8. ARRL: ARRL Teachers Institute Kick Off Summer Cohorts 9. ARRL: New Amateur Extra Class Question Pool Has Been Released 10. Another Cyber Attack Brings Down Society Of Broadcast Engineers Webpage 11. Deadly Bangladesh Cyclone Remal Causes A Reunion 12. The Deutscher Amateur Radio Club Remote Operations In Development 13. Germany's New Class N License Exams Will Be Available At Ham Radio Friedrichshafen 14. World Wide Flora and Fauna Sees Russia Withdraw 15. 3D Printer Homebrews A Relationship 16. Amateur Radio Operators and Amateur Astronomers To Share Facility 17. Celebrate Inclusion On The Air With The Pride Radio Group 18. Silent Keys In India Include A Noted Author and A Photographer 19. Robust Lineup Of Vendors and Speakers At The 2024 Northeast HamXposition 20. Scanning Software Developer N5JMZ SK 21. IARU: International Amateur Radio Union Region One Ham Challenge is announced 22. WIA: The fun that's Ham Radio WInlink has the final word 23. ARRL: Ham Radio 2024 International Amateur Radio Exhibition Will Be Held June 28-30 In Friedrichshafen 24. ARRL: Annual Lighthouse and Lightship weekend is coming up in August 25: ARRL: Special Event Station Operation to celebrate Flag Day Plus these Special Features This Week: * Working Amateur Radio Satellites with Bruce Paige, KK5DO - AMSAT Satellite News * Foundations of Amateur Radio with Onno Benschop VK6FLAB, will talk about "Long Wave Radio" * The DX Corner with Bill Salyers, AJ8B with news on DXpeditions, DX, upcoming contests and more. * Weekly Propagation Forecast from the ARRL * Bill Continelli, W2XOY - The History of Amateur Radio. This week, Bill takes a look at the history of Hallicrafters. ----- Website: https://www.twiar.net X: https://x.com/TWIAR Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/twiari YouTube: https://bit.ly/TWIARYouTube RSS News: https://twiar.net/?feed=rss2 Automated (Full): https://twiar.net/TWIARHAM.mp3 (Static file, updated weekly) Automated (1-hour): https://www.twiar.net/TWIAR1HR.mp3 (Static file, updated weekly) ----- Visit our website at www.twiar.net for program audio, and daily for the latest amateur radio and technology news. You can air This Week in Amateur Radio on your repeater! Built in identification breaks every 10 minutes or less. This Week in Amateur Radio is heard on the air on nets and repeaters as a bulletin service all across North America, and all around the world on amateur radio repeater systems, weekends on WA0RCR on 1860 (160 Meters), and more. This Week in Amateur Radio is portable too! The bulletin/news service is available and built for air on local repeaters (check with your local clubs to see if their repeater is carrying the news service) and can be downloaded for air as a weekly podcast to your digital device from just about everywhere. This Week in Amateur Radio is also carried on a number of LPFM stations, so check the low power FM stations in your area. You can also stream the program to your favorite digital device by visiting our web site www.twiar.net. Or, just ask Siri, Alexa, or your Google Nest to play This Week in Amateur Radio! This Week in Amateur Radio is produced by Community Video Associates in upstate New York, and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. If you would like to volunteer with us as a news anchor or special segment producer please get in touch with our Executive Producer, George, via email at w2xbs77@gmail.com. Also, please feel free to follow us by joining our popular group on Facebook, and follow our feed on X! Thanks to FortifiedNet.net for the server space! Thanks to Archive.org for the audio space.

💾

Foundations of Amateur Radio

The recent "incident" at the ARRL in which it disclosed that it was the "victim of a sophisticated network attack by a malicious international cyber group" brings into focus some serious questions around our community in relation to identity and privacy.

Let's start with your callsign. Right now in Australia you can use the official register to look for VK6FLAB. When you do, you'll discover that it's "Assigned to Foundation". That's it. No mention of who holds it, where it's registered or how to contact the holder, none of that.

In the case of my callsign, because I haven't surrendered my apparently now legally useless license, you can still search the previous system, the Register of Radiocommunications Licenses and discover that it's held by me, but as soon as it expires, that record will vanish and the relationship between me and my callsign will be lost to the public.

Also, there are no dates associated with any of this. You cannot use the current or previous system to discover if I held my callsign in November 2010 or not. In case you're wondering, no, I didn't, I was licensed a month later. Right now if you look for VK6EEN on QRZ.com, you'll see that it's linked to CT1EEN, but when was that information last updated? I know for a fact that I became the holder in November 2020. It appears that Sam CT1EEN used it around the turn of the century, about 24 years ago, but precisely when and for how long, is unclear.

So, from a public disclosure perspective, the links between me and my callsigns are tenuous at best.

Before I continue, I will point out that this is not unusual. For example, you can see the number plate on my car as I drive down the street, but most people don't have the ability to link it to me.

Similarly, Ofcom in the United Kingdom released a list of allocated amateur callsigns after a freedom of information request. It's unclear if this information is updated, or if it requires a new request each time. Like Australia, the dataset contains the callsign, the type of license and when the record was last updated. Nothing else.

In contrast, the United States has a full license search that returns name, address, issue and expiry dates. Japan offers both a search tool and downloads. Interestingly you can see if a callsign was previously licensed and when, but not by whom.

No doubt each country has their own interpretation in relation to how this is handled and as was the case in Australia, this is ever changing.

This leaves us with an interesting phenomenon.

We use callsigns on-air to identify ourselves, but the relationship between the callsign and our identity, let alone when, is not guaranteed for a significant proportion of the amateur community.

So, how does this relate to the ARRL incident?

Radio amateurs like to make contacts with each other and collect those contacts like you might collect stickers or postage stamps. For decades we've used QSL cards, essentially a postcard sent from one amateur to another to confirm a contact. When you collect enough cards, you can apply for an award, like the DXCC, showing that you made contact with one hundred different so-called DX entities.

In the era of computing, some organisations, like the ARRL, came up with the idea of using the internet to exchange these contacts instead of using a postcard. This reduced delays and was presented as a system to make the process more secure by requiring that people electronically sign their contacts, but could only do so after identifying themselves using traditional means, like providing copies of their license, their passport, etc. The ARRL called it Logbook of the World, or LoTW, and it was adopted by the amateur community around the globe.

While the ARRL continues to state that it only holds public information on its member database, it has made no such assurances about the LoTW system. There is personal and private information that the ARRL has and there is no indication at all what happened to it.

Other systems such as QRZ, eQSL, Clublog and Hamlog offer similar systems with various levels of authentication and verification. A new player, HQSL, is confusing the issue by offering cryptographically signed QSL cards, boasting that their system is decentralised and not restricted to any single service, but immediately requires that you sign-up with Hamlog to get going.

So, we have several organisations offering electronic logging, contact confirmation and security which claim to guarantee that this callsign contacted that callsign at a time and date, on a band, using a mode.

One problem.

None of this is real.

For starters, there is no guarantee that the station operating VK6FLAB was me. There is also no record guaranteeing that I'm the holder of VK6FLAB, or any proof that I am who I say I am. There is also no guarantee that the person confirming a contact between VK6FLAB and you is me. So, we're creating a phantom secure system that's attempting to fix the wrong problem.

In golf, when you start playing for rankings, rather than a round at the 19th hole, the process used to verify your score is dependent on peer review. You cannot mark your own score-card, someone else does.

In amateur radio we've built this electronic house of cards to track whom we've talked to and when, but it's a mirage when looked at closely.

While a DXCC award is worth nothing more than a personal achievement, we cannot go on pretending that identity verification services like LoTW are real, nor can we continue to accept that organisations like the ARRL should demand and store valuable identity information.

I'm Onno VK6FLAB

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It's time once again for The Weekender. This is our departure into the world of hedonism, random topic excursions, whimsy and (hopefully) knowledge. Thanks for listening and, if you happen to get a chance, feel free to call us or e-mail and send us some feedback. Tell us how we're doing. We'd love to hear from you.

73 de The LHS Crew

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PODCAST: This Week in Amateur Radio Edition #1319 - Full Version Release Date: June 8, 2024 Here is a summary of the news trending This Week in Amateur Radio. This week's edition is anchored by Chris Perrine, KB2FAF, Dave Wilson, WA2HOY, Don Hulick, K2ATJ, Rich Lawrence, KB2MOB, Will Rogers, K5WLR, Marvin Turner, W0MET, Eric Zittel, KD2RJX, George Bowen, W2XBS, and Jessica Bowen, KC2VWX. Produced and edited by George Bowen, W2XBS. Approximate Running Time: 1:38:23 Trending headlines in this week's bulletin service: Podcast Download: https://bit.ly/TWIAR1319 Trending headlines in this week's bulletin service 1. AMSAT: Setting Up Your Own Satellite Ground Station With SatNOGS 2. AMSAT: SpaceX Aims For Successful Reentry In Fourth Starship Test Flight 3. AMSAT: Satellite Shorts From All Over 4. IARU: International Amateur Radio Union Region 1 HAMChallenge 2024 5. WIA: Peeking Underground With Giant Flying Antennas 6. WIA: The Fun That's Ham Radio Winlink Has The Final Word 7. Japanese AM Broadcast Stations Begin Suspensions 8. ARRL: ARRL Systems Service Disruption Update 9. ARRL: 2024 ARRL Field Day Is Two Weeks Away, Free Shipping on Field Day Merch 10. ARRL: HAM RADIO 2024 International Amateur Radio Exhibition Will Be Held June 28-30 In Friedrichshafen 11. ARRL: ARRL Affiliated Club In MS Donates 3D Printer, Books, To Local Library 12. ARRL: The 13 Colonies Special Event Is Announced 13. AMSAT Is On The Receiving End Of Project OSCAR Shutdown and Assumes Satellite Duties 14. Parks On The Air Sweeps Across Puerto Rico 15. Summits On The Air Explodes Across The EU 16. STEM Amateur Radio Club Launches Radio Equipped Balloon 17. Special Delivery From The Moon Is Underway 18. Boeing's Starliner Successfully Docks With The Space Station After Challenging Rendezvous 19. International Lighthouse and Lightship Weekend Registration Heats Up 20. Orlando HamCation Now Accepting 2025 Award Nominees 21. Upcoming RadioSport Contests and Area Conventions and HamFests Listing 22. International Style On-Foot T-Hunt Wraps Up In California 23. ARRL: FCC opens comments about Coronal Mass Ejections communications impacts 24. ARRL: How to find a Field Day Site 25. ARRL: Section Manager Election results 26. ARRL: The ARRL Foundation announces the return of the club grant program for 2024 27. ARRL: The 2024 ARRL Kids Day event will take place June 15th and June 22-23, 2024 28. FCC: FCC Chairman proposes new rules for accidental space explosion risks 29. ARRL: June Volunteer Monitor Report Plus these Special Features This Week: * Working Amateur Radio Satellites with Bruce Paige, KK5DO - AMSAT Satellite News * Foundations of Amateur Radio with Onno Benschop VK6FLAB, will talk about the "ARRL Incident of May 2024" * The DX Corner with Bill Salyers, AJ8B with news on DXpeditions, DX, upcoming contests and more. * Weekly Propagation Forecast from the ARRL * Bill Continelli, W2XOY - The History of Amateur Radio. This week, Bill begins a four part series on the history of several legacy radio companies. This week, Bill begins with an in depth look at The National Radio Company. ----- Website: https://www.twiar.net X: https://x.com/TWIAR Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/twiari YouTube: https://bit.ly/TWIARYouTube RSS News: https://twiar.net/?feed=rss2 Automated (Full): https://twiar.net/TWIARHAM.mp3 (Static file, updated weekly) Automated (1-hour): https://www.twiar.net/TWIAR1HR.mp3 (Static file, updated weekly) ----- Visit our website at www.twiar.net for program audio, and daily for the latest amateur radio and technology news. You can air This Week in Amateur Radio on your repeater! Built in identification breaks every 10 minutes or less. This Week in Amateur Radio is heard on the air on nets and repeaters as a bulletin service all across North America, and all around the world on amateur radio repeater systems, weekends on WA0RCR on 1860 (160 Meters), and more. This Week in Amateur Radio is portable too! The bulletin/news service is available and built for air on local repeaters (check with your local clubs to see if their repeater is carrying the news service) and can be downloaded for air as a weekly podcast to your digital device from just about everywhere. This Week in Amateur Radio is also carried on a number of LPFM stations, so check the low power FM stations in your area. You can also stream the program to your favorite digital device by visiting our web site www.twiar.net. Or, just ask Siri, Alexa, or your Google Nest to play This Week in Amateur Radio! This Week in Amateur Radio is produced by Community Video Associates in upstate New York, and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. If you would like to volunteer with us as a news anchor or special segment producer please get in touch with our Executive Producer, George, via email at w2xbs77@gmail.com. Also, please feel free to follow us by joining our popular group on Facebook, and follow our feed on X! Thanks to FortifiedNet.net for the server space! Thanks to Archive.org for the audio space.

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Foundations of Amateur Radio

If you've heard the phrase "shortwave listeners", you might have wondered what on earth that was all about.

It relates to the length of a radio wave used to transmit information. The length of a radio wave is tied to its frequency. The longer the wave, the lower the frequency.

When radio amateurs talk about bands, like for example the 40m band, we're talking about a range of frequencies where the wavelength is around 40m. From a frequency perspective, this is around 7 MHz. The 160m band, at about 1.8 MHz, or 1,800 kHz is considered the beginning of the short wave bands.

This implies that there are longer waves as well. If you've ever seen or owned a mid 1980's transistor radio, you'll have seen the notation MW, which stands for Medium Wave, today it's called the AM band. Older radios might have the notation LW, or Long Wave.

The medium wave band is a broadcast radio band that runs between about 500 and 1,700 kHz. The wave length is between 600 m and 170 m.

When radio was still in its infancy, there was also a popular long wave band, with wavelengths between 800 m and 2,000 m, or 150 to 375 kHz.

Today much of that has gone by the wayside. With the advent of digital radio, in Australia it's called DAB+, Digital Audio Broadcasting, the whole idea of "wave" has pretty much vanished.

Some countries like Japan and the United States are in the process of discussing the phasing out of the AM broadcast band. Much of that appears to be driven by car manufacturers who claim that the AM band is no longer useful or used, but forget to tell anyone that they really want to stop having to put AM radios in their cars because it's difficult to isolate the electrical noise from their modern contraptions in order to make it possible to actually listen to that band.

If you ask me, it's a good incentive to make electronics RF quiet, something which is increasingly important in our wirelessly connected world.

This might lead you to believe that all activity on air is moving to higher and higher frequencies, but that's not the case. The properties that made long wave and medium wave radio possible in the early 1900's are still valid today. For example, there are WSPR or Weak Signal Propagation Reporter beacons on the 2200m band, or at 136 kHz.

Whilst your RTL-SDR dongle might not quite get down that low, most of them start at 500 kHz, you don't need to spend big to start playing. My Yeasu FT-857d is capable of tuning to 100 kHz, plenty of space to start listening to the 2200m band, even if I cannot physically, or legally, transmit there.

If you want to build your own receiver, you can check out the weaksignals.com website by Alberto I2PHD where you'll find a project to build a receiver capable of 8 kHz to 900 kHz using a $50 circuit board.

If that's not enough, there's radio experimentation happening at even lower frequencies. Dedicated to listening to anything below 22 kHz, including natural RF, with a wavelength greater than 13 km, Renato IK1QFK runs the website vlf.it where you'll find receivers and antennas to build.

Given that most sound cards operate up to around 192 kHz, you can start by connecting an antenna to the microphone port of your sound card and use it to receive VLF or Very Low Frequencies. On your Linux computer you can use "Quisk" to tune.

There are VLF transmitters on air. For example, SAQ, the Grimeton Radio Station in Sweden opened on the 1st of December 1924. Capable of 200 kW, today it uses about 80 kW and transmits twice a year on 17.2 kHz.

While we search for higher and higher frequencies, there is still plenty of fun to be had at the other end of the radio spectrum. Consider for example that VLF or Very Low Frequency radio waves, between 3 and 30 kHz can penetrate seawater.

I'll leave you to explore.

I'm Onno VK6FLAB

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In this episode we meet Hamilton Carter, KD0FNR and his daughter, Hamie Carter, KO6BTY.  This amazing father / daughter team have build and deployed multiple creative radio projects.  One in particular, Project TouCans, puts a QRP transciever right at the dipole antenna feed point eliminating coax cables and communicates with the operator's station over Bluetooth.

Follow along on thier radio adventures on their blog page at https://copaseticflow.blogspot.com

 

 

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PODCAST: This Week in Amateur Radio Edition #1318 - Full Version Release Date: June 1, 2024 Here is a summary of the news trending This Week in Amateur Radio. This week's edition is anchored by Denny Haight, NZ8D, Dave Wilson, WA2HOY, Don Hulick, K2ATJ, Will Rogers, K5WLR, Eric Zittel, KD2RJX, Marvin Turner, W0MET, George Bowen, W2XBS, and Jessica Bowen, KC2VWX. Produced and edited by George Bowen, W2XBS. Approximate Running Time: 1:57:44 Trending headlines in this week's bulletin service: Podcast Download: https://bit.ly/TWIAR1318 Trending headlines in this week's bulletin service 1. AMSAT: Project OSCAR Discontinues Operations, Donates Remaining Funds to AMSAT 2. WIA: Happy 99th Birthday To The South African Radio League 3. WIA: WSJT-X SuperFox Mode Is Announced 4. ARRL: ARRL Volunteer Examination Coordinator Services Update During Systems Disruption 5. ARRL: Solar Activity Significantly Affecting The Ionosphere and Propagation 6. ARRL: FCC Opens Comments About Coronal Mass Ejection Communications Impacts 7. ARRL: How To Find A Field Day Site 8. ARRL: Section Manager Election Results 9. ARRL: Cliff Ahrens, K0CA, Former ARRL Midwest Division Director, Silent Key 10. ARRL: SEA-PAC Hosting ARRL Northwestern Division Convention May 31st through June 2nd 11. ARRL: The ARRL Foundation Announces The Return Of The Club Grant Program For 2024 12. ARRL: The 2024 ARRL Kids Day Event Will Take Place June 15th and June 22nd and 23rd 13. CQ: 2024 CQ Amateur Radio Hall of Fame Inductees Announced 14. HamCation Accepting 2025 Award Nominations 15. India Experiences First Major Cyclone Of 2024, Amateurs Were Ready 16. Renovation Is The Keyword As Radio Caroline Plans Improvements 17. Operators In New Zealand Warm Up For Their Straight Key Night 18. Innovative Antenna Design and Its Military Potential Sees Engineer Suing An Ex-Employer 19. Amateurs Donate A "Shack" To A Non-Profit Campground In Missouri 20. A Couple Of Amateur Radio News Shorts From All Over 21. Ham Exemption Restored To Pennsylvania Hands Free Law - CW Going Mobile 22. FCC: FCC Chairman Proposes New Rules For Accidental Space Explosion Risk 23. June Volunteer Monitor Report 24. Upcoming Hamfests and Upcoming Conventions 25. AMSAT: AMSAT At Hamvention 26. ARRL: 2024 ARRL National Convention Hosted at Dayton Hamvention Concludes 27. ARRL: 2024 ARRL Youth Rally A Success at Dayton Hamvention 28. WWVB Operating At Reduced Power Due To Antenna Damage 29. Omnispace and Starlink Battle Over Frequency Coordination and Interference 30. ARRL: 2024 ARRL National Convention a Success 31. ARRL: 2024 ARRL National Convention Forums Available On YouTube 32. ARRL: International Amateur Radio Union Elections Recap 33. ARRL: Dayton Hamvention Attendance Is Announced and a New Record Is Set Plus these Special Features This Week: * Working Amateur Radio Satellites with Bruce Paige, KK5DO - AMSAT Satellite News * Foundations of Amateur Radio with Onno Benschop VK6FLAB, will discuss the origins of our amateur radio bands. * The DX Corner with Bill Salyers, AJ8B with all the latest news on DXpeditions, DX, upcoming contests, and more.. * Weekly Propagation and Solar Weather Forecast from the ARRL. * Bill Continelli, W2XOY - The History of Amateur Radio. This week, Bill takes us aboard The Wayback Machine to explore the history of amateur radio repeaters in part two of this special report. * SPECIAL REPORT: From the just concluded Dayton Hamvention, we will hear a talk given by Riley Hollingsworth, K4ZDH ARRL Volunteer Monitor Program Administrator at the 2024 Dayton Hamvention during the Good Operators and Interference Forum. ----- Website: https://www.twiar.net X: https://x.com/TWIAR Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/twiari YouTube: https://bit.ly/TWIARYouTube RSS News: https://twiar.net/?feed=rss2 Automated (Full): https://twiar.net/TWIARHAM.mp3 (Static file, updated weekly) Automated (1-hour): https://www.twiar.net/TWIAR1HR.mp3 (Static file, updated weekly) ----- Visit our website at www.twiar.net for program audio, and daily for the latest amateur radio and technology news. You can air This Week in Amateur Radio on your repeater! Built in identification breaks every 10 minutes or less. This Week in Amateur Radio is heard on the air on nets and repeaters as a bulletin service all across North America, and all around the world on amateur radio repeater systems, weekends on WA0RCR on 1860 (160 Meters), and more. This Week in Amateur Radio is portable too! The bulletin/news service is available and built for air on local repeaters (check with your local clubs to see if their repeater is carrying the news service) and can be downloaded for air as a weekly podcast to your digital device from just about everywhere. This Week in Amateur Radio is also carried on a number of LPFM stations, so check the low power FM stations in your area. You can also stream the program to your favorite digital device by visiting our web site www.twiar.net. Or, just ask Siri, Alexa, or your Google Nest to play This Week in Amateur Radio! This Week in Amateur Radio is produced by Community Video Associates in upstate New York, and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. If you would like to volunteer with us as a news anchor or special segment producer please get in touch with our Executive Producer, George, via email at w2xbs77@gmail.com. Also, please feel free to follow us by joining our popular group on Facebook, and follow our feed on X! Thanks to FortifiedNet.net for the server space! Thanks to Archive.org for the audio space.

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Foundations of Amateur Radio

Today I want to talk about something that might feel only tangentially related to our hobby, but it likely affects you.

Recently the ARRL announced that it was "in the process of responding to a serious incident involving access to our network and headquarters-based systems". A day later it sought to assure the community that the "ARRL does not store credit card information" and they "do not collect social security numbers" and went on to say that their "member database only contains publicly available information". Five days after that it's "continuing to address a serious incident involving access to our network and systems" and that "Several services, such as Logbook of The World(R) and the ARRL Learning Center, are affected.", but "LoTW data is secure". Over a third of the latest announcement, more than a week ago, was to assure the community that the July QST magazine is on track but might be delayed for print subscribers.

Regardless of how this situation evolves, it's unwelcome news and much wider reaching than the ARRL.

LoTW, or Logbook of The World, is used globally by the amateur community to verify contacts between stations. The IARU, the International Amateur Radio Union, is headquartered at the ARRL office.

I've been told that I should have empathy and consider that the ARRL is only a small organisation that may not have the best of the best in technology staff due to budget constraints and finally, that LoTW being down for a few days is not going to kill anyone.

All those things might well be true and mistakes can and do happen.

The ARRL has been in existence for well over a century, bills itself as the answer to "When All Else Fails" and has even registered this as a trademark, but hasn't actually said anything useful about an incident that appears to have occurred on the 14th of May, now over two weeks ago. By the way, that date is based on the UptimeRobot service showing less than 100% up-time on that day, the ARRL hasn't told us when this all occurred, it didn't even acknowledge that anything was wrong until two days later.

This raises plenty of uncomfortable questions.

What information did you share with the ARRL when you activated your LoTW account? For me it was over a decade ago. I jumped through the hoops required and managed to create a certificate. What information I shared at the time I have no idea about. As I've said before, I do know that security was more extreme than required by my bank, even today, and the level of identification required was in my opinion disproportionate to the information being processed by the service, lists of amateur stations contacting each-other.

Something to take into account, on the 30th of October 2013, Norm W3IZ wrote in an email to me: "Data is never removed from LoTW." - I have no idea how much or which specific information that refers to.

If you used the ARRL Learning Center, what information did you share? If you're a member of the ARRL, or you purchased something from their online store, what data was required and stored? Is the data at the IARU affected? What infrastructure, other than the office, do they share?

While I've been talking about the ARRL, this same issue exists with all the other amateur services you use. QRZ.com, eQSL.cc, eham.net, clublog.org, your local regulator, your amateur club, your social media accounts, all of it.

What information have you shared?

Do you have an internet birthday, address and middle name?

Recently I received a meme. It shows two individuals talking about life, the universe and everything. They discuss their favourite books, the first movie they ever watched, the name of their pets, what car they learnt to drive in, their interests and other things you talk about when you meet someone new and interesting. The last image of the meme shows the heading: "Security Questions Answered, Welcome Amanda."

So, my question is this: What's your favourite colour and your mother's maiden name?

Seriously, next time you access a service online, have a look at what data that service has. When you sign up, consider the requirements for the service and how much information that's worth. Do you really need to send your birthday, your gender and your physical address with a copy of your passport or another government approved identity document? If you're being asked for the name of your first pet, consider answering something unique. In my case, I generate a random string of characters to use as an answer for each security question.

The ARRL "incident" is the tip of the iceberg. This problem is't going away, it's only going to get bigger and happen more often.

Final observation. With the potential of a global shopping list for thieves coming out of the database at the ARRL, will you be sharing your station address next time and if you're subject to the GDPR, the General Data Protection Regulation, perhaps it's time to ask your online service providers just exactly what they're doing to protect your information, and that includes the ARRL.

I have sent two emails to the ARRL in relation to these questions, but have yet to receive an acknowledgement, let alone answers.

By the time this reaches you, perhaps the ARRL has answers to my questions and more.

I'm Onno VK6FLAB

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Hello and welcome to Episode 544 of Linux in the Ham Shack. In this episode, the hosts discuss short topics including Hamvention 2024, the exploit affecting the ARRL and LoTW, Winamp, Rufus, a discussion on privacy in social media and much more. Thanks or listening and have a great week.

73 de The LHS Crew

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Kirk Kleinschmidt, NT0Z, has a deep background in radio and communications having spent over 30 years writing about radio.  Kirk is a former Assistant Managing Editor for QST by the ARRL, aughor of the book Stealth Amateur Radio and has been a regular columnist for Monitoring Times and Popular Communications.  You can follow Kirk today in his regular columns appearing in the Spectrum Monitor electronic magazine.  Kirk offers up his perspective on amateur radio in this episode.

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PODCAST: This Week in Amateur Radio Edition #1317 - Full Version Release Date: May 25, 2024 Here is a summary of the news trending This Week in Amateur Radio. This week's edition is anchored by Denny Haight, NZ8D, Dave Wilson, WA2HOY, Don Hulick, K2ATJ, Will Rogers, K5WLR, Eric Zittel, KD2RJX, Chris Perrine, KB2FAF, George Bowen, W2XBS, and Jessica Bowen, KC2VWX. Produced and edited by George Bowen, W2XBS. Approximate Running Time: 1:29:11 Trending headlines in this week's bulletin service: Podcast Download: https://bit.ly/TWIAR1317 Trending headlines in this week's bulletin service 1. AMSAT: AMSAT At Hamvention 2. AMSAT: Lost and Found: Missing Satellite Rediscovered 3. AMSAT: Satellite Shorts From All Over 4. ARRL: 2024 ARRL National Convention Hosted at Dayton Hamvention Concludes 5. ARRL: 2024 ARRL Youth Rally A Success at Dayton Hamvention 6. ARRL: ARRL Headquarters Based Computer Systems Fall To Hackers 7. Right To Repair Law For Electronics To Debut In California 8. WWVB Operating At Reduced Power Due To Antenna Damage 9. Omnispace and Starlink Battle Over Frequency Coordination and Interference 10. Theresa Cruz Aniceto DW3TRZ SK 11. World Cup Cricket Tournament Is Seeking Amateur Radio Operators 12. Leo McHugh EI8BR, CW Mentor SK 13. Permit Is Granted For USA Radio Orienteering Event 14. Youth Operators To Be Featured In Rotuma DXpedition 15. Two Amateur Radio Projects Receive Software Awards 16. Radio Caroline, Britain's Pirate Radio Station Broadcasting From Sea, Turns 60 Years Strong 17. ARRL: 2024 ARRL National Convention a Success 18. ARRL: 2024 ARRL National Convention Forums Available On YouTube 19. ARRL: 2024 ARRL Field Day is One Month Away! 20. ARRL: International Amateur Radio Union Elections Recap 21. Northeast HamXposition and ARRL New England Division Convention announced a major addition to its program 22. Two dozen amateur radio groups will be activating different parks in and around Puerto Rico on May 26, 2024. 23. Beginning June 1, 2024, amateur radio clubs will activate special event stations for the 80th anniversary of D-Day. 24. ARRL Contest sheet and upcoming hamfests and conventions 25. FCC: FCC Votes To Reestablishes Net Neutrality Rules 26. AMSAT: 2024 AMSAT Board of Directors Election – Call for Nominations 27. WIA: Researchers Say Satellite May Imperil The Earth's Magnetosphere 28. FCC: FCC Launches New Spectrum Steering Team To Implement White House National Spectrum Policy 29. US National Weather Service Suggests Amateurs Prepare For Upcoming Hurricane Season Plus these Special Features This Week: * Working Amateur Radio Satellites with Bruce Paige, KK5DO - AMSAT Satellite News * Foundations of Amateur Radio with Onno Benschop VK6FLAB, will discuss The Nature Of Inspiration * The DX Corner with Bill Salyers, AJ8B in the DX Corner, with all the latest news on DXpeditions, DX, upcoming contests, and more.. * Weekly Propagation Forecast from the ARRL * Bill Continelli, W2XOY - The History of Amateur Radio. This week, Bill takes us all aboard The Wayback Machine to look at Part One of his series on the History of Amateur Radio Repeaters. ----- Website: https://www.twiar.net X: https://x.com/TWIAR Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/twiari YouTube: https://bit.ly/TWIARYouTube RSS News: https://twiar.net/?feed=rss2 Automated (Full): https://twiar.net/TWIARHAM.mp3 (Static file, updated weekly) Automated (1-hour): https://www.twiar.net/TWIAR1HR.mp3 (Static file, updated weekly) ----- Visit our website at www.twiar.net for program audio, and daily for the latest amateur radio and technology news. You can air This Week in Amateur Radio on your repeater! Built in identification breaks every 10 minutes or less. This Week in Amateur Radio is heard on the air on nets and repeaters as a bulletin service all across North America, and all around the world on amateur radio repeater systems, weekends on WA0RCR on 1860 (160 Meters), and more. This Week in Amateur Radio is portable too! The bulletin/news service is available and built for air on local repeaters (check with your local clubs to see if their repeater is carrying the news service) and can be downloaded for air as a weekly podcast to your digital device from just about everywhere. This Week in Amateur Radio is also carried on a number of LPFM stations, so check the low power FM stations in your area. You can also stream the program to your favorite digital device by visiting our web site www.twiar.net. Or, just ask Siri, Alexa, or your Google Nest to play This Week in Amateur Radio! This Week in Amateur Radio is produced by Community Video Associates in upstate New York, and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. If you would like to volunteer with us as a news anchor or special segment producer please get in touch with our Executive Producer, George, via email at w2xbs77@gmail.com. Also, please feel free to follow us by joining our popular group on Facebook, and follow our feed on X! Thanks to FortifiedNet.net for the server space! Thanks to Archive.org for the audio space.

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Foundations of Amateur Radio

The origin of our amateur bands

It's hard to imagine today, but there was a time when there was no such thing as either the 80m or the 20m amateur band, let alone 2m or 70cm.

Picture this. It's the roaring 20's, the 1920's that is. Among a Jazz Age burst of economic prosperity, modern technology, such as automobiles, moving pictures, social and cultural dynamism, the peak of Art Deco, we're also in the middle of a radio boom where the world is going crazy buying radios as fast as they can be constructed, there are hundreds of licensed broadcasters, the bands are getting crowded, radio amateurs have been banned from the lucrative radio spectrum above 200 meters, and can only play in the "useless short waves" using frequencies greater than 1,500 kHz. And play they did.

On the 2nd May 1925 amateurs proved they could communicate with any part of the world at any time of the day or night when Ernest J. Simmonds G2OD and Charles Maclurcan A2CM made a daylight contact between Meadowlea, Gerrards Cross, Buckinghamshire, England, and Strathfield, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia on what we now call the 20m band. This contact occurred not once, but regularly, for several days, using 100 Watts.

To give you a sense of just how big news of this feat was, on the second scheduled contact the Prime Minister of Australia, Stanley Bruce, sent a message to England's Prime Minister, Stanley Baldwin: "On occasion of this achievement Australia sends greetings."

If you recall, the IARU, the International Amateur Radio Union, was a fortnight old at this point. Less than a year later contact was made using voice.

Between the banning of radio amateurs from frequencies below 1,500 kHz at the London International Radiotelegraph Conference in 1912 and the Washington International Radiotelegraph Conference in 1927 the world had irrevocably changed. In 1912 the discussion was almost all about ship to shore communication. By 1927, the world had tube transmitters, amplitude voice modulation, higher frequencies and what the 1993 IARU President, Richard Baldwin, W1RU calls, "literally an explosion in the use of the radio-frequency spectrum".

In 1927 individual countries were beginning to control the use of spectrum, but there was no universal coordination, no international radio regulation and as we all know, radio waves don't stop at the border.

Richard W1RU, writing in 1993 says: "In retrospect, the Washington conference of 1927 was a remarkable effort. It created the framework of international radio regulation that exists even today. It had to recognize and provide for a multitude of radio services, including the Amateur Service. It was at this conference that amateur radio was for the first time internationally recognized and defined. Bands of harmonically related frequencies were allocated to the various radio services, including the Amateur Service."

While the IARU was two years old, it really hadn't represented amateur radio on the international stage, until now.

The 1927 conference defined an "amateur" as a "duly authorised person interested in radio electric practice with a purely personal aim and without pecuniary interest."

The harmonically related frequencies that were allocated to the Amateur Service are recognisable today. I'll use current band names to give you some context.

1,715 kHz to 2 MHz, or 160m, 3.5 to 4 MHz, or 80m, 7 to 7.3 MHz or 40m, 14 to 14.4 MHz or 20m, 28 to 30 MHz or 10m, and 56 to 60 MHz or 6m.

Of those, the 20m and 80m bands were exclusive to amateurs. The 10m and 6m bands were shared with experimenters and the 160m and 80m bands were shared with fixed and mobile services. You'll notice the absence of bands we use today, the 2m and 70cm bands, 15m and the so-called WARC bands to name a few.

The final ratified document goes into great detail about the requirements, the restrictions, how to deal with interference, how to allocate frequencies and numerous other provisions, many of which will look familiar, almost a hundred years later, if you've ever looked at the rules and regulations under which you operate as a licensed amateur today.

There were various radio amateurs at the 1927 conference, but as Richard W1RU puts it: "much of the credit for the success of amateur radio at that conference has to go to two representatives of ARRL -- Hiram Percy Maxim, president of ARRL; and Kenneth B. Warner, Secretary and General Manager of ARRL."

While Richard points to their roles in the ARRL, you might recall that Hiram was elected international president of the IARU and Kenneth its international secretary-treasurer.

Whichever way you look at it, whichever organisation you credit, today we have amateur bands thanks to those efforts made nearly a century ago.

I'm Onno VK6FLAB

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