Odds and ends

W2LJ QRP - When you care to send the very least!

By: QRP - When you care to send the very least!

9 April 2024 at 11:10

I managed to get outside for just a few minutes yesterday as the moon was approaching maximum coverage of of the sun (90%) at 3:24 PM local time. I took a small shipping box and punched a hole in the side with a thumbtack. It projected a very tiny, but totally sharp image of the moon covering the sun revealing only a small crescent of sunlight. Of course, this is New Jersey after all, and clouds came in for the actual moment of maximum eclipse. But I can say I saw it. This reminded me of the eclipse of 1972, when I had my 3" refractor telescope set up in the backyard, projecting a magnified image onto a white piece of cardboard.

A co-worker managed to snap this with his iPhone.

BTW, Sean Kutzko KX9X was doing some AM Broadcast Band DXing during the eclipse. He observed that during the maximum period of darkening at his QTH, he was able to hear AM stations from over 500 miles away, that he normally can only hear at night. The D Layer was definitely affected! He recorded the AM Band during the eclipse from start to finish and will go over it in detail over the next few weeks, in order to get a better feel as to how propagation was affected.

I saw on Facebook yesterday, where Alex PY1AHD of AlexLoop fame has become a Silent Key:

It is with extreme sadness and sorrow that I share the passing of our friend and colleague Alex Grimberg (PY1AHD), AlexLoop, due to his renowned work with magnetic loop antennas. Inestimable loss for Brazilian amateur radio, an enterprising and visionary colleague - We are all saddened.

I got word from my friend that he was encouraged by your comments regarding using a local WebSDR as a receiver. He was able to hear stations on 20 Meters via the Web that he was not able to hear on his K3, due to the solar panel noise. He made three successful QSOs on 20 Meters and will most likely use WebSDR for making contacts on 14 MHz and above. Thanks for your encouragement! I'm very happy for him - he had been disappointed (that's putting it mildly) with his situation. It's good to know he can be on the air again.

My KM4CMT EFRW UNUN kit was delivered yesterday. I hope to have it built and ready to go for "Amateur Radio Day At The Library" on April 20th. If I don't have it ready, I'll probably employ the PAR ENDFEDZ or perhaps the EARCHI EFRW that I already have in the backpack. It's not that the kit is a complicated build - far from it. It's a matter of finding time. The next few weekends are really filled up now that lawn mowing season has started up again.

72 de Larry W2LJ

QRP - When you care to send the very least!

Scanning the Airwaves
AJ3DI SK
20 August 2023 at 16:15

AJ3DI SK

Scanning the Airwaves

By: noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Mannion)

20 August 2023 at 16:15

Jim Fisher, AJ3DI passed away a few weeks ago. I met Jim at Winter Field Day in 2022 down in Pennsylvania. I followed him on Twitter. He was a real helpful ham, especially to my friends down in Philly who now miss his dearly.

I can't really say much more because I didn't Jim that well, but to measure his impact he had on the Philly ham scene, here's a few others posts and his obituary.

Jim's obituary

RIP Jedi Jim Fisher, AJ3DI

Sales Whore University

Scanning the Airwaves
NEAR-Fest XXVI
15 October 2019 at 19:30

NEAR-Fest XXVI

Scanning the Airwaves

By: noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Mannion)

15 October 2019 at 19:30

Last Friday and Saturday, I attended my first ever hamfest.

NEAR-Fest stands for New England Amateur Radio Festival and is a hamfest that has been occurring every May and October at the Deerfield Fairgrounds since 2007. It was spawned from the ashes of a similar hamfest, The Hosstraders Tailgate Swapfest which had it's last event in October 2006.

At our September meeting of the North Shore Radio Association, it was brought up that NEAR-Fest was just under a month and that something should be organized to sell off some of the silent key stash we had (including me with three boxes of books).

At the end of September, on our usual Sunday night net, I called in via EchoLink to see if I could round up some help. Then a few days later, at the start of October, I posted on our Yahoo Groups mailing list to see if I could enlist some more help.

In the end, the club treasurer, Eric, KA1NCF, a ham friend of his who lives down the street from him, Joel, N1KTH and myself went to Eric's shed to go through the pile of SK stuff (not counting the boxes of books I had) to see what we could take up.

The boxes included a box full of kit radios such as Heathkit and one small Ramsey kit.

Also in the pile, was the Pilot A.C. Super Wasp seen in the box in my post about the initial discovery of W1OCY's hidden treasure.

On the evening of Thursday, October 9th, we met at Eric's and packed up the boxes. Next morning, I woke up early and made the hour-fifteen trip to Deerfield Fairgrounds. Brian, WO1VES, another club member who runs the Nut Net every night on our club's repeater set aside some space for me and Joel next to his Nut Net tent. However, since we didn't have a current club pass and and Joel left late, we weren't able to get in during the 8am club hour and had to wait for general admission entry at 9am.

The line to get in

Our setup early on the first day.

Within minutes, we had already sold an entire box of vacuum tubes for $100. We were selling books for about one dollar; one of the boxes being extremely heavy, nearly throwing my back out carrying it and pricing everything based on how much we felt it would go for. I printed out my January blog post about W1OCY's background and finding the hidden stash. I also chatted with some other members of the NSRA who made the journey up on their own.

We made a good amount of money the first day and realized we might need more stuff as the day winded down, including the Super-Wasp which we didn't bring up. (Including one ham who recognized what it was) As I wasn't staying overnight like Joel was, I decided to make the trip back to Eric's house and pick up more stuff after letting him know I was coming.

Myself in the front and Joel behind me

Driving back through a slight rain storm from a pitiful subtropical storm Melissa, I stopped at Eric's house and loaded up the back of the Jeep with more boxes of items, aside from the books which I brought with me to keep from getting wet. Then I headed home and got some sleep.

My Jeep loaded up for the second day

Our tent next to the Nut Net tent on the second day

I arrived the next morning around 8 and brought the items over to the tent to sell. The day progressed nicely, I popped on the RedditNet IRC chat from time to time as Internet was very spotty, dropping between LTE down to HSPA and sometimes EDGE and very often no signal. One of the others in the IRC let me know he was coming up to NEAR-Fest later the day. He did eventually stop by our tent. We sold the Super-Wasp. And we made some more money for the club. I also managed to pop in the commercial vendor buildings. Eventually, the end of the day came and we broke everything down and headed home to put what we didn't sell back in Eric's shed for the time being.

This was the heaviest box and I nearly threw my back out carrying it over to our table

Thankfully by the end of the day it was empty.

The first commercial building.

The second commercial building.

I'm already looking for NEAR-Fest XXVII in May. Hope to see you then!

73!

P.S.

For an album of photos from the first day of NEAR-Fest, click here.

For an album of photos from the second day of NEAR-Fest, click here.

An update on W1OCY's treasure

Scanning the Airwaves

By: noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Mannion)

7 April 2019 at 15:02

Back in January, I posted about silent key ham W1OCY and his trove of old ham radio items plus other odds and ends that went undiscovered for 8-9 years in a warehouse in Peabody, Massachusetts.

I missed out on our club's February meeting due to work commitments, but got an update at our club's March meeting.

At the time, we hadn't sold anything, but now I can report, that we've sold a lot of stuff and made a nice profit for the club, which is important because we just installed a UHF DMR repeater through the New England Digital Emergency Communications Network (NEDECN).

We're still not done, I have still have some of the books in storage as do others. If you need more information or are just interested, email me here.

W1OCY's hidden treasure

Scanning the Airwaves

By: noreply@blogger.com (Patrick Mannion)

30 January 2019 at 18:43

W1OCY, Everett E. Chapman, is a silent key. He died in 2010, just two days shy of the new year at the age of 85. He was born on April 30, 1925 in Glen Cove, NY and grew up in Vermont and New Hampshire.

He served his country in the United States Navy during World War II and was part of the V-12 Navy College Training Program at Dartmouth College. He was at least an Ensign based on items we found in this "treasure." I don't know if he reached any higher ranks, I've tried searching through US Navy Registers online and so far, I haven't found anything.

He graduated from Dartmouth in 1948 with an A.B. and entered the business world in 1955 working for Dynatrol and other places in the aerospace industry such as Raytheon based on his collection of papers we found.

He didn't have much family, didn't marry, at least from what I can tell and obviously no kids. He was survived by brother Donald, who is still alive and will turn 90 on April Fools' Day this year.

He was an Extra-class ham. In fact, his license just expired in May, but hasn't been cancelled because no one has brought his passing to the FCC's attention yet.

And it seems that's how this "treasure" trove of old ham radio equipment and books went undiscovered for nearly 8 years before it was found.

I am member of the North Shore Radio Association, and it appears maybe at one time, so was Mr. Chapman based on a empty binder that was found with a tab labeled North Shore Repeater Association, the club's old name.

Anyways, one of club members, Jim Palmer, KB1KQW, works for Peabody, Massachusetts' public access cable station, Peabody Access Telecommunications/Peabody TV. PAT is based in an old industrial park, known as the Foster St. Complex, located next to the Eastman Gelatine plant.

Jim was asked by the landlord to take a look at stash of old radio equipment found in one of the adjacent buildings.

What was found could be nothing short of "hidden treasure."

W1OCY had tubes galore, old radios that are older than most of us, homebrew equipment and books, books galore. I was told it was on six pallets, but it was managed to get condensed down into four pallets.

I've only taken a brief look at the radios as so far my only night helping (due to my work schedule) was sorting the books.

Everett was an interesting and eclectic ham, suffice to say. He had many, many books on amateur radio and electronics, but also books on the Civil War, military uniforms, military horse saddles, military belt buckles, woodworking, machining, model trains and various types of engines. Not to mention the piles and piles of periodicals such as Science and Mechanics and good ole' Popular Mechanics.

So what do we plan to do with this "treasure"?

Auction it and sell it and raise funds for the club. We plan to list some of the stuff on eBay, we also plan on hitting up the local ham fests and fleas to sell it such as NEAR-Fest and Boxboro, the ARRL New England convention. I suggested the Flea at MIT. Some stuff will probably be bought to Hamcation and Hamvention too.

UPDATE: We've sold some of the items, click here for more information.

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