Over the years, being lucky to live in an area not yet terribly blighted by light pollution, I've seen a number of aurorae from Anglesey. Some have been quite impressive, notably the display of March 2014.March 2014 aurora seen from Anglesey. This was the strongest I'd seen since 8-9 November, 1991. I've also been lucky to have a long relationship with Iceland, and was lucky to witness a

A recent comparison, which I highlighted at the time was only a quick test done in poor weather and needed more work, resulted in my concluding that the generic Chinese mini-whip system has some broadband noise. This noise was absent when using the PA0RDT mini-whip at the same time.My generic Chinese mini-whip system.  I realised during an early morning hours session of reception today that

A long time ago, back in the early 1970s, when oil companies already had eerily predictions of climate change locked away from the public's eyes, the name 'Ekofisk' was well-known amongst school-age children. I well remember learning about it, all that time ago.Ekofisk was then - and remains now - a large oilfield complex out in the very middle of the wild North Sea. 'EKO' beacon, slap-bang

This past Sunday was an odd day, even by Sunday standards. We had a massive storm coming in from the Atlantic, so everyone had gone into that usual pre-storm do nothing sort of mode. I spent all day reading The Great Post Office Scandal, an issue I've followed for years but hadn't acquired the book.To make some use of the day, I went to bed and got up a couple of hours later to take the PA0RDT

This morning, I concluded listening to my captured spectrum from two nights ago, logging maybe a hundred or so NDBs from all over Europe. Now, before you laugh and say this is not DX, remember this was only a 10-minute recording made during the early evening in the UK. So DX was not the objective in this exercise.Path to PIS.The last NDB - and one of the most distant (at 1687km) I heard from this

It's been cold recently, but also calm and dry, so a good time to test out the PA0RDT mini-whip again - this time, on NDB signals. The whip was suspended about 8m up with a glass fibre pole.It's much more convenient to record a spectrum captured by SDR and analyse it in the comfort of home, rather than trying to decode weak signals by ear in a cold car, so I did exactly that - though not without

The latest field outing to test the PA0RDT and generic Chinese mini-whips against one another gave good results for both.Connecting up in the field. Chinese unit on the left. I'll spare myself the time-consuming process of uploading each and every video of the stations listened to and will give you the plain results instead! Blue background simply highlights the strongest signal, if any.

Interest in the remarkable mini-whip antennas - actually e-field probes, rather than antennas in the usual sense - continues here in now rather cold north Wales, where mountain waterfalls are currently frozen solid.Today saw the arrival of the PA0RDT mini-whip system, which I bought because of its reputation for high-quality build and out of curiosity with how a generic Chinese mini-whip, widely

I still have little time for radio these days. When I do get some time, I've tended to develop the listening side of things over on the MW, LW and VLF frequencies, herded there by recent efforts to receive SAQ, which have been successful.For the 17.2kHz SAQ signal, I first tried the standard solution of a 3m-circumference coax sheath loop (RG-213) with a nice amplifier made by George Smart (

Yes folks, the equinox that, from this point on, takes us into winter, is upon us again!I always try to do some WSPR receiving down at the beach, facing the incoming signals along the morning long path, whenever I can at the quinoxes. During the pandemic lockdowns - I shudder to remember them - the ability to get out onto the beach and meet some local people was part of my survival strategy.Nice,

I'm continuing with side-by-side experiments using different numbers of radials on elevated 1/4 wave verticals.Ready for deployment. The feedpoint is at 1.5m when installed. Last evening, I set up two identical antennas for 14MHz, one with four radials, the other with only two. My previous post compared two radials with only one. The experiment ran between 17:06 and 18:24UT, so it's a

A recent article online raised an interesting question about the use of one radial, rather than eight for a 1/4 wave vertical antenna and whether the modelled slight directionality of the resultant pattern for the former would be seen in practice. The author concludes that the real antenna performed in accordance with the model output. Firstly, it's good to see the model being questioned and

It's that time of year again when summer is drawing rapidly to a close, and the terminator lines up nicely between the UK and Australia.Time for some beach work with WSPR!Modelling using Proppy HF showed that 14MHz would exhibit a fairly sharp rise to a peak in propagation between the two regions, which looked like this, based on a 1/4 wave receiver and 8-ele transmitter (the maximum available

A nice, if rather glacially-paced video popped-up on my YouTube feed last night. It's an unboxing-through-to-testing sequence that does a nice, if rather superficial job of demonstrating the potential of a magnetic loop antenna.It's fairly small and multibanded, yes. But I would expect most neighbours to commence immediate warfare, should they wake up to this, one morning. Image: Lutz-electronics

I was lucky, a couple of days ago, to randomly visit the Alexanderson Association website, where a notice had been hurriedly put up of tuning tests of SAQ to take place ahead of Alexanderson Day transmissions on July 02, 2023.Mutliple tuned VLF antenna at SAQ, Varberg, Sweden.The system I use to listen-in to SAQ is fairly standard, being a 3m-circumference RG213 coax loop connected to a

There hasn't been an awful lot of time for radio of late. Summer activities are many, and the propagation on HF isn't too spectacular, as is often the case.  144 and 50MHz are doing pretty well, and these are the bands of interest for me for the coming years.One radio-related thing I've been re-engaging with is attendance at the local club. I joined the club some years ago, but didn't stay

I've been playing with end-fed wires for the first time in years these past few days. Not so much because I expect stellar performance, but because I want a simple, easy-to-erect, reasonably effective multiband antenna for International Marconi Day.Sunset approaches for the EFHW on 80m. To be clear, by end-fed wire, I mean a 49:1 unun connected to a wire half a wavelength long at the lowest

With much warmer, if still rather variable weather in the air now, attention is turning to peparations for International Marconi Day on April 22nd.I don't have a van or a property from which to operate at the site of Marconi's Carnarvon VLF station, so equipment rationalisation is critical - not least because I have to carry it part-way up a north Wales mountainside!Marconi's trans-oceanic VLF

A long time ago, when I started out in ham radio, I bought an EARCHI end-fed wire antenna. It was very cheap and very simple but, with a ~10m wire attached and run up a 10m fishing pole, it gave me access to 40m for the first time. I still remember well a nice QSO with someone on a boat in mid-Atlantic on 40m with it. But, over time, I moved on to delta loops, though I never did have an