This year has been packed with thrilling activities: operating satellite passes from home, taking part in two special event weekends, and doing quite a few contests at Charlie GM1TGY’s house. With HF propagation back in full swing, 10m has been especially rewarding—it is fantastic to have something exciting to work on!

With that said, lets dive into some of the activities I have been up to this year. From exciting new challenges to old favourites, there has been plenty to keep the radio waves buzzing. Let’s get into it!

Contesting

Let’s be clear about my 2024 contesting activities—none of it has happened from home! Instead, I’ve been incredibly fortunate to operate from and alongside Charlie GM1TGY, who has gone above and beyond to make every contest entry possible. Not only has he put up with my company for multiple days at a time, but he’s also made sure we’re operating from a fantastic, well-equipped station.

Charlie’s setup, complete with yagis and plenty of space for antenna experiments, has been a dream to work from. This year, we added a 2-element 40m vertical phased array and the option to deploy an 80m vertical alongside our usual dipole. We have also been pushing to get on 160m more frequently, using an Inverted L strung between the two towers and receive antennas that really help us hear better. Fingers crossed for even more updates on that front in 2025!

Of course, 2024’s conditions have been nothing short of phenomenal, with 10m delivering the best propagation we have seen in years. Our QSO counts are a testament to that, and we have even managed to win a number of categories for Scotland. That said, 2025 will bring its own challenges as we try to improve on this year’s numbers—but that’s part of the fun, isn’t it?

Contests Breakdown

Satellites

2024 has been a year of highs and a few challenges when it comes to satellite operating, but overall, it’s been another exciting chapter in my amateur radio journey. Early in the year, my trusty Yaesu G-5500 rotator finally called it quits after many years of reliable service. Thankfully, the downtime was minimal—just a week—before a replacement was installed on the mast. A special shoutout to a good friend Dave M0GIW who’s been refurbishing the old rotator; fingers crossed, it’ll be back in action and ready to serve as a backup in the new year!

The start of 2024 saw much of my satellite activity focused on Greencube IO-117, a packet satellite in MEO orbit with an impressive footprint and excellent DX potential. One of the highlights was collaborating with Carsten OZ9AAR to implement the UHM function in the Greencube Terminal application, which helped reduce packet duplication by notifying operators when their transmissions were heard. It was a significant change for smoother operations! Unfortunately, Greencube began experiencing issues in late summer, and its absence has certainly been felt.

That said, the hobby never stands still. With a robust fleet of LEO satellites—both FM and SSB—still available, I’ve been back at it, chasing grid squares and working the horizon for that next exciting QSO.

A particular highlight this year was a gridsquare rove to the ever-needed IO97. Charlie GM1TGY kindly drove me to Cruden Bay, where I operated FM and SSB passes, logging around 40 QSOs and giving plenty of operators a new grid for their collections. It’s always satisfying to help fill those gaps in logbooks!

On the tech side, I’ve spent a couple of months experimenting with the CSN Technologies S.A.T satellite tracking unit. It’s been a fascinating piece of kit, and I’m looking forward to sharing a detailed review early in the new year.

GB2KDR

I’ve been reflecting on some of the highlights from our adventures with the Grampian Hilltoppers Contest Group. Two weekends stand out—our participation in International Museums Weekends (IMW) and Railways on the Air (ROTA) from the historic Dufftown Station, part of the Keith and Dufftown Heritage Railway. Both events were a fantastic blend of history, technology, and the spirit of amateur radio.

International Museums Weekends

IMW was a real highlight for us this year. Over two weekends, we managed to log an impressive 737 QSOs, most of which were made using FT8 and FT4.

The HF propagation gods were kind, giving us reasonable conditions to work with. There is something special about operating at railway station steeped in history, connecting with operators all over the world. Knowing that every contact shared a bit of our heritage with someone out there made each QSO even more meaningful.

Railways on the Air (ROTA)

ROTA brought its own set of challenges and rewards. Operating from Dufftown Station, we logged 112 QSOs over the weekend. Again, FT8 and FT4 carried the bulk of the workload, but we did manage to squeeze in a few SSB contacts.

Propagation wasn’t on our side this time around—conditions were poor, and every contact felt like a small victory. But that’s amateur radio for you! The magic lies in persevering, overcoming those challenges.

Both weekends were a wonderful reminder of why we do what we do. It’s not just about the QSOs (though they’re always satisfying); it’s about the connections—connecting history to the present, connecting our local heritage to the world, and connecting with the global amateur radio community.

Cloudlog

it is time to reflect on the progress of Cloudlog, my open-source logging application for amateur radio operators, and its companion desktop application, Cloudlog Aurora. While the pace of development may have slowed a little, there’s still plenty to celebrate—and lots to look forward to in 2025!

When I first started Cloudlog, the goal was simple: build a no-nonsense logging application that focused on core features without the bloat that so many amateur radio apps tend to suffer from. I think it’s fair to say we’ve reached that sweet spot—most of the main features are in place, and the project continues to hum along nicely.

This year has been all about bug fixes and general improvements—a bit of polish here, a tweak there. But 2025 is going to be an exciting year for development. Here’s what’s on the horizon:

• A New Band Map: The current band map will get a complete overhaul to make it more like the ones you’d find in serious contesting software.
• Simplifying Contesting Features: I plan to give this a fresh look, simplifying the interface and improving the underlying code.

If you’re new to Cloudlog, it’s a PHP-based logging app you run on your own web server and access via a browser. It’s open source, so feel free to check it out and join the fun at Cloudlog on GitHub.

Cloudlog Aurora: Bridging the Gap Between Hardware and the Web

2024 was a big year for Cloudlog Aurora, the desktop application that acts as a gateway between your radios and Cloudlog. It’s like the Swiss Army knife of amateur radio tools, and here’s what it’s been up to this year:

• Interfacing with WSJT-X Applications: Seamlessly log those digital mode contacts.
• CSN & SatPC32 Connectors: Automatically show satellite information in Cloudlog.
• TCP Server: Handles ADIF packets, talks to the GreenCube Terminal program, and even does callsign lookups against your logbook.

On the development side, Aurora has been a fun playground for my C# programming skills, and it’s grown quite a bit this year. To close out 2024, I’ve been hard at work adding some exciting new features:

• Hamlib Support: Rig control for multiple radios? Check.
• SunSDR’s TCL Protocol: Now supported for even more flexibility.
• Winkey Support: For all you CW enthusiasts out there.

These updates will roll out in Q1 of 2025, so keep an eye out! If you haven’t tried Cloudlog Aurora yet, you can download it at aurora.cloudlog.org.

Cloudlog and Aurora have come a long way, but there’s still so much more to explore. Whether it’s more features, or just finding new ways to integrate with the growing amount of amateur radio tech, I’m excited to see where the next year takes us.

Thanks to everyone who’s supported, contributed, or even just logged a QSO using Cloudlog this year. Here’s to another year of innovation and making ham radio even more fun!

Wrapping up

As I look back on everything that made 2024 such an incredible year, I’m reminded of the amazing friendships, challenges, and opportunities this hobby brings.

73 and Happy New Year!

The post 2024 Wrap up appeared first on 2M0SQL.

• Improved memory footprint
• Updated audio recording library
• Added support for SatPC32ISS (Thanks to Dave M0GIW)
• Small improvements to the user interface.

You can download version 2.0 at https://www.2m0sql.com/pass-recorder/

The post Pass Recorder Version 2.0 Released appeared first on 2M0SQL.

Funding Open Source Ham Radio Projects

This month, I launched a Patreon account this came about after a chat with Paul, M0TZO as I was trying to figure out the best way to perhaps be able to spend more time on things like Cloudlog during the working day – rather than evenings when healths poor usually.

After a 15mins we had a profile set up and after a couple of tweets, I had 5 supporters, its currently sitting at 13 now at only just over 2 weeks which is far more than I expected and is quite humbling.

As a Patreon you get a range of perks from mentions on open source product pages, personal thanks messages, weekly updates and the highest tier gets a fully hosted copy of Cloudlog. If Patreon turns out popular I’ll try to get some merch for some of the projects done.

On top of that, I’ve had several donations via PayPal and due to these combined, I can now spend a whole working day working on Cloudlog completely guilt-free.

Become a Patron!

SARTG RTTY Contest

Taking part in SARTG RTTY Contest wasn’t at all planned, it was during the 7 days my parents were down south visiting my sister so had the house to myself and not much else todo.

Rather than commit to doing an all band effort, I settled on doing a few hours on 40m, which actually turned out to be 2 hours 30mins of operating Saturday evening.

That said managed to work around Europe and 1 contact into the states

WhatsMyLocator Moving to OSM

Since 2006 WhatsMyLocator has been providing the service of changing an address into grid square and then WAB Squares, of course during this time the web has evolved and the Google Maps API that we used came paid.

Sadly this is an issue due to the amount of traffic the website gets and I don’t want to plaster it in advertisements, the solution was to change WhatsMyLocator to OpenStreetMaps and a new Geocoder both which are free which means I sleep better not worrying that it will generate a huge bill at the end of the month.

The only difference users will see is the maps look a bit different and when you type an address it doesn’t automatically correct it, I’m hoping that feature will return in a future update.

1673 QSOs so far in 2019

Much to my surprise, I’ve already passed last years QSO total by 239 QSOs, I’m hoping this means that I’ll easily pass the 2500 contacts mark by the end of the year.

I need to put some more effort into trying to get on for HF Contests, which would boost the numbers a lot. I’m hoping to take part in CQWW RTTY which will probably be a single band effort for a few hours.

Cloudlog

Some perhaps aren’t aware that for some time now I have been making my own logging application called Cloudlog, but instead of it running on the desktop it runs on a web server and you use it within the web browser. This is then supported by a number of desktop applications/scripts that do rig control.

 

More About Cloudlog

Working DX via satellites is great fun

Extracts from the logbook

Not a huge amount of new squares, but did snag some new DXCCs and also grid squares so that’s never bad, let’s delve into some of the more interesting bits.

Doug N6UA was roving on the 1st of August, on AO-7 at 18:10z managed to snag DN93, then on the 2nd managed DN75 on the same satellite at 17:11 these where both new squares and states South Dakota & Montana.

Tor DJ8MS has been roving (4th of August onwards) in Sweden and Norway this meant some new squares, JP61, JP62, JP52, JP73, JN84, JN85, JP95, JP96, KP06, JP97

Worked CY9C on the 5th of August at 14:08z via AO-91 on a two-degree elevation pass, this not only was a new grid square FN97 but also DXCC Saint Paul Island, was pleased to get this in my logbook, last QSO with CY9C was a few years back at the old QTH in Oxford, England.

Chris VO2AC in FO-93 via AO-91 on the 14th August

Oliver F5RRO/P in JN23 via AO-91 on the 20th August

Club station DK0BT in JN59 via AO-91 on the 25th August

Andy DL6AP/P in JO54, JO64, JO54 (New Square), JO63 (New Square) via AO-92 on the 26th August.

Gareth CT7/G0MFR in IM56 via AO-92 on the 26th August

Joe KE9AJ in EM59 via AO-7 on the 28th August

Jerome F4DXV has been roving while on holiday and this meant picking up some new squares CT7/F4DXV in IN60, IM58, IM59 and EA/F4DXV in IN82

Chris VO2AC/1 in GN27 on AO-91 on the 29th August

Dana VE1VOX in FN85 on AO-91 on the 27th then again on AO-92 on the 29th August

FO-99 Transponder Activated

FO-99’s Linear transponder was once again activated on the 24th of August for one orbit over Europe, this was per the teams released schedule on Twitter.

I made sure that I reminded everyone to maximise QSOs and it worked at 10:14z it came up over the horizon and I worked G0IIQ, PE1NIL, EA5TT, IU2EFA and IW3HRT.

It’s disappointing that the satellite isn’t on more but the team have said on Twitter that they hope to release it again on some orbits in September and October fingers crossed!

Audio: https://1drv.ms/u/s!Ape44qp3KTXP3D_yAJnWV8I2JsXg?e=sPZeey

Much to my surprise FO-99 transponder was on again on the 31st of August, Dave G0IIQ sent me a message on WhatsApp and we had a qso on the 12:22z pass, it was low at 8 degrees elevation for me and 2 degrees for Dave but we both reported hearing each other at well over S5.

The post August Shack Report appeared first on 2M0SQL.

23cm Helix Antenna

This month I added a 20 turn helix from Wimo, with a stated gain of 13dB it should, in theory, be decent, it’s wired back to the shack with a 20m length of LMR400.

What has surprised me is the limited number of people who seem to use AO-92 L/V so far only working G0IIQ, OH5LK and PE1JPD.

It is working well as I can activate the AO-92 repeater with just 2 watts from the radio but 10 watts from the ICOM IC-910 does give good results.

However have to look at the long term, this will be useful once ESEOs FM Repeater gets activated and I suspect we might see further satellites use 23cms uplink to spread some of the congestion seen on 2m and 70cm.

Cloudlog

Some perhaps aren’t aware that for some time now I have been making my own logging application called Cloudlog, but instead of it running on the desktop it runs on a web server and you use it within the web browser. This is then supported by a number of desktop applications/scripts that do rig control.

March saw quite a reasonable amount of work on it, as you can expect there’s a fair amount of legacy code and one of the biggest issues was the frontend was using a very old version of Bootstrap which is a user interface framework so my focus has been moving to the latest version and trying to give Cloudlog a more modern feel.

Of course, being the fact its open source its freely available for anyone to use at no cost and quite a few users contribute changes and fix bugs which are always appreciated.

For those who don’t want to set it up themselves via my company magicbug, I offer hosted instances for £3 a month which covers hosting and they update once a month

Download Cloudlog

Working DX via satellites is great fun

Extracts from the logbook

W5PFG in FN57, FN67 on the 2nd of March via FO-29 this was thanks to a tip-off from Dave KB1PVH.

Joe KE9AJ provided me with DN70MD on the 5th of March, then EM19 on the 13th, both via AO-7.

Gabe AL6D has been in Europe from the 2nd till the 13th of March operating as LY/AL6D (KO16) Lithuania, YL/AL6D (KO26) Latvia, RA/AL6D (JO94) Kaliningrad, OH0/AL6D (JP90) Aland Islands, OH/AL6D (KP20) Finland. This provided me with a couple of new DXCCs & squares, but importantly confirmations on ARRLs LoTW system.

LO-87 has to be one of the most underused satellites due to it only being activated over Madrid I believe it’s also quite noisy and you need to run a bit more power than usual, but managed to work G0IIQ and DJ8MS for arranged contacts

The 16th of March was a good day working IU1LBM in JN43 via XW-2D for a new square, then E74KM appeared on a SO-50 pass on the 16th of April in JN85 Bosnia-Herzegovina, this was a nice surprise as not only was it a new country for myself, it was his first satellite contact I later found out via email.

Ron AD0DX/VE3 was active on the 28th of March on the 17:57 AO-7 pass in EN95, FN05.

Gabe AL6D after his European trip went out in his plane on the 29th of March and activated BO69 which was a new square, also missed another square due to AO-7 flipping modes which is always frustrating.

On the 30th I got called by N0KK in EN35HA which was a new square on AO-7 along with the usual gang from North America (K8YSE, VA3ECO, K3SZH)

CT7/EA5GX was on from IN50 on the 31st March, which if confirmed on LoTW will be a new square for awards worked on AO-91 and SO-50

Later on, that day also worked KE9AJ in EN53 for a new grid square and also Wisconsin state.

These are of course only the contacts which stood out and was a part of many contacts over the month, it was good to hear new UK / French stations on FM passes and now as we’re in spring I hope this will only increase although passes might become a bit congested.

Diwata-2 Repeater Tested

During the weekend of the 23 to 24th of March, the operator of Diwata-2 released a schedule for the satellite to enable the FM Transponder which is U/V.

On the 23rd I was able to open the satellite and put some calls through it, one thing I did notice was that it needed a bit more power at around 20w and I lost access at 10 degrees and below on elevation.

On the 24th I had arranged to have a contact with Peter G0ABI which we completed and tried to get a few more contacts but no one else was heard.

It was back on during the 30th of March and worked G0ABI, DK3WN and EA5TT on the 14:13z pass sadly doesn’t seem to be getting much use but maybe people not aware of its temporary scheduling.

Cable Routing

Since moving into the current house, all the cable runs have just run across the garden with the hope everyone will stand over them, which is fine, but as runs increase its become a bit of a pain, so I took the decision to purchase some PVC pipe from the local hardware store and have fed all the runs down two sets of pipes to the house.

This comes up a post where I’m going to terminate anything that doesn’t need to come inside, or adding surge protectors to coax, the next steps getting a more permanent hole in the side of the house for bringing cables in.

The post March Shack Report appeared first on 2M0SQL.

However with winter now drawing to a close its time to get back to doing shack work, I didn’t suffer too much damage that I’m aware of which is always good and means one less thing to worry about.

QO-100

Es’Hail-2 now designated QO-100 is now available for use with both its wideband and narrow band transponders, with plenty chatter on newsgroups and social media.

Most would have been surprised I wasn’t on from the start, I decided to hold back and just see what was going to happen before investing, however I have now got my channel master 1.2m offset dish mounted on a 6ft steel pole & concreted in the ground during the nice period of weather we experienced in Scotland.

I have this connected to an SDRPlay in the shed and have been listening to the downlink with great success, now once the weather improves more I’ll work on the transmit side.

Best Stuff from the Logbook

Plenty of good DX has been worked on the low earth orbit satellites, guess moving did have one bonus that VUCC/DXCC started again.

• 02/02/19
  • WB8RJY (EN72) AO-7
  • KC9ELU (EM-79) AO-7
• 05/02/19
  • OY1R (IP62) AO-91
• 10/02/19
  • OZ/DJ8MS (JO45) AO-7
• 10/02/19
  • K9UO (EN70) AO-7
  • K8YSE (EN91) AO-7
  • VE4AMU (EN19) AO-7
  • LX1BB (JN39) XW-2F
• 15/02/19
  • MM0EDZ (IO87) AO-92 (my own square! But eddies new and trying sats)
  • R9LR (MO27) FO-29
  • OH8MBN (KP25) FO-29
  • M6GAN (IO91) FO-29 (first time I’ve worked m6gan)
  • N3GS (EM28) AO-7
  • WB8RJY (EN72) AO-7
• 16/02/19
  • K2CKA (FM06) AO-7
  • N9EAT (EN41) AO-7
  • DM19LGS (JO60) AO-92 (special call but didn’t write down what)
  • N1AIA (FN43) AO91
  • 3A/EA4NF (JN33) CAS3B
• 17/02/19
  • These two where at 11:51z in the morning, it would be nice to hear more VE on!
    • GB3RS (IO91) AO-7 (It was G3ZAY on the mic)
    • VE4AMU (EN19) AO-7
  • 14:23: N1AIA (FN53) & N1CMD (FN42) on AO-91
  • 1525: CT3FM (IM12), VE4AMU (EN19), WB8RJY (EN72) on AO-7
• 23/02/19
  • K3SZH (FN10), K8YSE (EN19) – AO-7
  • OH2HOT (KP10) – FO-29
• 24/02/19
  • G7OGG (IO80) AO-91 (not a new square but a new callsign)

Wrapping Up

Sorry for the rushed report, I promise Aprils shack update will be much better as there’s lots to report including antenna work and interesting DX in the log.

The post February Shack Report appeared first on 2M0SQL.

Preface: I wrote this post nearly 2 years ago with the idea of posting it but decided to hold off, but I think I should post it as HamTests played a pivotal part in my life.

HamTests fully closed in August 2018 with the question pool released to the community to use in anyway they liked.

Most of my close friends will remember that around 2 years ago, I announced I was stepping aside from helping run HamTests which at the time was probably the UK’s biggest website todo with amateur radio training, the site first started when I was at university after some discussions with Paul, then over time grew from 100 users to over 15,000.

It gave me a chance to learn how to run large scale online learning environments, although HamTests was largely about mock exams we did have many other resources on the site and it went from some rather crappy code I’d written on my 6am commutes to university to using Moodle.

We always kept the service free and it was largely funded at first by donations, advertising from Google AdSense or from our own back pockets.

It was a great way to interact with people who sometimes were just coming into the hobby and supporting them as they developed their knowledge and it was a great way making friendships.

But at the same time it could be testing on your mental strength with some of the hassle that came with it from accusations of copying real questions to others who just wanted to find fault that never existed.

However after helping developed the site into its current form I decided to step aside at the time there was lots of hearsay regarding the reasons, but it ultimately came down to a couple of things these mostly being health and lack of time with focus needing to be on running my company magicbug.

During the early years I was juggling finishing university (first class degree non the less) to switching to running a company which was developing large VLEs for companies and local government based off the back of a website a made with a friend for fun.

As time went on ideas flowed and we set up a separate forum called HamRadioForum which grew and again needed time to maintain and support.

HRF has its referred to is still run on my company servers and I support Paul with keeping it online.

In 2017 it hit the point that change needed to happen, HamTests was taking a heavy backseat in my life while I was either sat in the hospital in A&E or in clinics while they tried to diagnose more issues from heart problems to epileptic seizures which brings us up till now 2019. Nearly a two year after standing down, although I’m still around to offer Paul as much technical support I can it’s down to less than an hour every couple of months and I guess that will completely dry up.

What’s planned?!

While I stood down from HamTests I’m of course still running my company still maintaining VLEs and now building websites for local small businesses up to large corporates my minds of course still into Ham Radio with things I want to do.

Biggest thing I’ve been working on is my own web based logging app called Cloudlog, while not hugely popular it was purely built for my own enjoyment.

This has never been made to be a product and I honestly don’t think it ever will be, I’m building it purely to suit my interest in the hobby.

However a few people do pay a small amount to have it hosted on my company servers and I deal with keeping it updated.

I’ve also recently been getting far more involved in the Amsat community and I hope that long continues, however the lurking hunger for HF pile ups still exists and I hope to get back into contesting more from Scotland in the coming months.

Will I ever go back to running large free Ham Radio websites in the near future, I suspect not, but you might find small tools popping up.

You can still do the mock tests at a site called RadioTutor.

The post Leaving HamTests, Refocusing appeared first on 2M0SQL.

NO-84 (PSAT) was launched in 2015 and although it’s been in orbit for some time, you will find a lot of people have only used the APRS Digipeater which is also a payload on the satellite, however, the main payload is a PSK Transponder.

Uplink is on the 10m PSK frequency of 28.120 USB and it downlinks on 435.350 FM (PSK31), the satellite builders recommend using up to 75w into an omnidirectional antenna on 10m.

Antennas

In my own experience of using NO-84, I was using a 10m dipole which worked reasonably well, but I found the best antenna for myself was a 10m GP this was easy to build with a small fibreglass fishing rod, wire and a dipole centre I made one for less than £10 (Bargain!)

I found with this setup I was able to activate the transponder with as little as 10w, however, of course, increasing the power made sure that NO-84 could hear my signal a lot more.

Software

Transmitting

Of course, with this satellite doppler is a consideration and although you can use a standard PSK31 application for transmitting and receive you’ll see your signal has the Doppler curve on it, however, K0SM has produced a simple application called DopplerPSK

Setting this up is simple, you download the application which is Java and launch it and then set some parameters. In Station -> Edit Station Information you specify your location like you would with any other tracking application. You then select the satellite you want to use by going to Satellite -> Choose Satellite and select NO-84.

It’s worth noting you’ll need to manually update the TLEs, these are stored in the /tle/ subdirectory. I’d recommend using the https://www.amsat.org/tle/current/nasabare.txt once you have updated the TLEs relaunch the application.

Select the output soundcard by clicking on Audio Device in the menu and selecting the correct one, remember this is the audio going to your radio.

On the main screen of DopplerPSK you’ll notice you have some tracking information and boxes update the MyCall with your own callsign and press update. Notice below that there are prepopulated text inputs and radio buttons to represent the one that has been selected for now use CQ.

Its generally recommended you transmit the whole time NO-84 is passing over. The other station will be on a different frequency to yourself, update their callsign in DXCall and the exchange and hit the Update button, again then select the message you want to send till the contacts complete. Then go back to CQ or reply to someone else if their calling CQ, this method seems to work well.

The above screenshot is DopperPSKs main screen.

The above image shows FL-Digi decoding multiple signals, in this case, 2E0SQL and the satellite’s beacon.

Receiving

To decode the signals, I personally recommend using a PSK application that supports multi decoding, for instance, FL-Digi, you can watch all the stations on the passband and your own and carry out your contact with ease.

Remember that if NO-84 doesn’t hear a PSK31 signal on 28.120 the transponder will not turn on unless it is sending its beacon signal.

Final Thoughts

Hopefully, this gives you some idea how to setup DopplerPSK to complete a NO-84 PSK QSO. It’s worth keeping in mind that activity can be low, so do not be scared to ask for prearranged contact.

Useful Links

• DopplerPSK – http://www.frontiernet.net/~aflowers/dopplerpsk/dopplerpsk.html
• 1/4 Wave Ground Plane Antenna Calculator – https://m0ukd.com/calculators/quarter-wave-ground-plane-antenna-calculator/

Downloads

• DopplerPSK-Quick-Start-Guide
• DopplerPSK version 0.2

The post Using the NO-84 (PSAT) PSK Transponder appeared first on 2M0SQL.

I’m hoping this will be in the next couple of weeks, but probably in a much lower location as winter is rapidly approaching and things won’t get any better.

I can report however that the Airspy HF+ SDR along with wxtoimg and virtual audio cable has been working excellent up till then, I’m expecting the next version will switch the decoding system off a Windows computer and onto something Linux based with a low-cost ARM board and look forward to documenting that.

I’m seriously considering the SDRPlay RSPDuo and splitting the QFH across the two receivers so that I can decode two passes at once if there’s a pass clash, something to consider.

The post NOAA Weather Satellite Images Offline appeared first on 2M0SQL.

G3AAJ Trophy

This weekend I was honoured to be awarded the G3AAJ Trophy by AMSAT-UK during their gala dinner at the recent AMSAT-UK Colloquium. This is awarded annually, to the individual (or group of individuals) who have given outstanding service to the amateur radio satellite service.

It was a shame to not be able to attend the event due to poor health, but Peter G0ABI accepted it on my behalf.

The post Awarded the G3AAJ Trophy by AMSAT-UK appeared first on 2M0SQL.

Pass Recorder interfaces with SatPC32 via its DDE interface and automatically records a pass if its above 0 degrees to a high-quality wav format, this audio quality does, however, generate slightly larger files with an average pass being about 60mb, but AO-7 passes are more in the range of a 100mb.

However, for a proof of concept it’s working well and I’m planning to make some improvements and allow dropping the audio quality which will reduce the size for those who want that, I’ve also had some requests to support other applications, which I have no objection to, the next supported application will be WXTrack by David, GM8ARV.

You can grab the application by going to https://www.2m0sql.com/pass-recorder/ the tool is free but donations are appreciated.

The post Pass Recorder Launched appeared first on 2M0SQL.