My (this) web address is:
Http://edgarheinen.20m.com

ABOUT ME

My name is Edgar and I reside in Toronto,Canada. My interest is radio,electronics,and computers.I have been an SWL since 1962,and got my ham license in 1991,and I am on 2 meters mainly. I am into propagation prediction and analysis. I don't do commercial forecasts, just tips for anyone who needs them. It is a mainly personal interest for me.

WHY QRP?
Qrp operation will show how little power is necessary to maintain radio contact,and it provides a great challenge.It also tells what the threshold is for a particular radio circuit. Interference is reduced, leading to even more success with QRP. With ham radio going digital, and CW slowly going out of favor, QRP holds the fort and gives CW a reason to continue. Such modes as BPSK and other digital modes need at least a modulator and other relatively complicated circuitry. CW uses the bare minimum of parts.

THE RIG IS A.... 6SN7 HARTLEY

No joke..... some hams are using these venerable old rigs, and they are VFO and final all in one. Really easy to build and give VFO action with no crystal problems. Back in the 1920's this is all there was, tubes such as the '199 and 201-A were used with great success. Only 105 volts at 12 mA on the plate would let 8GZ, Loren Windom, work "MUCH DX '' on 40 Meters. Persistence would let him build up an impressive track record. Today, the 6SN7 will give a good boost over the poor tubes of the 1920's.

BREAKER 1-9 er

One enterprising CB er in England worked all over the world with only a legal 4 watts FM to a very well made CB vertical antenna with many good ground radials. He is on US channel 32 (27.325) his call is TW 26 and is on from 12 to 20 Hrs UTC. and maybe you can still hear him. The US stations can copy FM using slope detection, and this works very well.
See Popular Communications,
September 2000 page 30
February 2001 page 30

A REAL QRP ACHIEVEMENT

Information obtained from:
Amateur Radio Newsline, Report 1330 - February 7, 2003:
www.arnewsline.org
And the ARRL.
Bill Diggens, WA8LXJ, in West Union, Ohio made a positive identification of the beacon transmitter, at the QTH of ZS1J at Plettenberg Bay, South Africa. It operates on 7029 Khz at 100 MICROWATTS. This was heard on Tuesday January 29th. Diggens gave it a Readability R2, Signal Strength S1, and Tone T9. This is an RST219. It has been on air for the last 4 months. Bill has a very good antenna that puts a consistently good signal into South Africa, thus it also receives correspondingly well. He also used a 10 Hz. filter on his receiver. This makes the equipment lineup a bit out of the league for the average SWL. That 10 Hz filter means very good stability is needed at both the transmitter and receiver, otherwise the signal is lost. However, this gear netted the parties a new QRP record on 40 Meters, one that is very impressive.
He played the tape recording over the South African Net over the air on 40 Meters. This is about 82 Million miles per watt!!! ZS1J says his 100 microwatts was heard up to 1100 km away, by hams without tight filters, or big antennas. Even this is impressive, remember how low power 100 uW is!! It is 0.0001 watt!

MY BEACON MONITORING

I am presently keeping tabs on the ZS1AGI beacon from Natal, South Africa. on 7025 Khz. and 200 mW of power. That's 1/5 of a watt. I think I MIGHT have heard it on Feb 14, 2003 at around 0330 to 0400 UTC.
It runs a dipole at a bearing of East-West. This is a very good reception, at 200 milliwatts. Receiver used is a Yaesu FRG-7, a 70's classic. I was using only a window frame antenna, with a K-S RF Preselector.
The signal, very weak was about RST 219 or 229. This should be possible, it is 33 Db stronger than the ZS1J beacon that was on 7029 khz. Bill Diggens can hear the 200 mW beacon almost every night, due to his great antenna.
Apparently this beacon has been heard by several listeners in the US and Canada.
It was also copied quite well in Montevideo, Uruguay.
See the ZS5S webpage for beacon info, click on "bulletins", then find "beacons". He also lists inactive beacons, a big help in avoiding listening for dead beacons.
http://users.iafrica.com/z/zs/zs5s/index_buls.html

SOME HISTORY

In 1924 C.D.McLurcan , A2CM Sydney, Australia, worked VK toZL (1500 miles) on 240 meters(1250 kc.) with only 4 milliwatts to a vacuum tube oscillator !! The antenna was a T type 80 feet high, with a low feed impedance. This was 375,000 miles per watt!!

In 1925/26 Loren Windom,8GZ did some fantastic QRP work on 40 Meters running only 350 milliwatts Dc plate input power to a simple ''199" type tube Hartley oscillator, which used this feeble (by today''s standards) tube. From Columbus Ohio, he contacted: Adelaide,Australia;Wellington, New Zealand; Capetown, South Africa;and Brazil, plus a ship the "Kaimiloa" off New Caledonia. Also he worked all US districts W 1 to W 0.The antenna used was the Windom (half wave) at a height of 70 feet.It was fed by a singlewire feed worked against ground.Feed impedance was about 600 ohms. This was done during Dec 1925 and Jan / Feb 1926 (sunspot numbers were 61 at the time).Thus the receiving stations were getting his signals during their summertime,with higher QRN levels.This makes the feat all the more amazing.Such transequatorial contacts are better during the equinox periods.The consensus is that this work was of the "utmost difficulty" as the power level was very low,about 100 to 120 milliwatts rf output.This has been written up in QST several times over the years.The modern version of the Windom is the standard halfwave dipole. Loren scored about 33,000 miles per watt. Today's record is 4,395,833 miles per watt on 40 meters, but over a much shorter disance , 430 miles, by AA4XX.

In June,1924 G5BV worked 9CVR (England to midwest USA) on what is now known as 160 Meters with only 250 milliwatts input to a Hartley oscillator. The antenna was 18 feet high at one end and 35 feet high at the other end. This is 12,731 miles per watt. Phenomenal to say the least,for 160 meters. Power out was probably less than 100 milliwatts Rf to the antenna. Really wild for such a low frequency.

In 1926 F8GM worked several ZLs with 4 watts to a Hartley type tube rig on 40 meters. He got 6 reports of R-5 (about S-5 ) from 6 New Zealanders !

In the May 1940 issue of QST we read about the exploit of Court Matthews W6EAK, Hollywood , California. Court worked into Denver ,Colorado (W9VZZ) on 40 M with 7 mW (7 volts at 1milliampere) to a 6F6 oscillater, on March 6, 1940, at 1 AM Pacific time, getting an S-1 report. This was an 830 mile path for a score of 118,000 miles/watt. He used a 135 foot end fed wire antenna. Rf out was maybe 2 milliwatts.

The first transistor QSO ever, in Aug 1955 involved a power dc input of only 2 milliwatts to an XN2 transistor.It was done on 80 meters over a 160 mile path with an RST 459 report, W7UUZ to W7WPR on August 25,1955. Frequency was 3701 kc.

Also in late 1955 W2JN worked W1GQU in Snowville, NH, 261 miles. W2JN was also heard in Harrington, Maine by W1BB at 430 miles. On Oct 16 he got a report of RST559 from W2PEO. All this done on 80 meters at 30 milliwatts dc input to a CK761/2N113 oscillator.

Another contact on 40M was W2RG to ZS (New Jersey to South Africa) using 216 milliwatts CW on 7002 kc. In 1958 Donald Stoner,W6TNS worked ZS6KD in South Africa on Sept 20, 1958 at 1410 Gmt, using only 96 mW to the final RF stage of his 2N370 two transistor rig. The report was RST 548 on 20 meters using a Gonset 3 element beam.This was a long path contact! The distance was 16,606 miles.

Other 96 mW CW contacts by W6TNS (California) were:
Sept 22/58 KL7BDK RST559 in Kodiak, Alaska
Sept 23/58 CE1AGI RST449 in Santiago,Chile
Sept 24/58 JA2YA RST 589 in Tokyo, Japan
Sept 24/58 ZL3PJ RST 549 in New Zealand
Oct 04/58 G2MA RST 529 in England

In the Nov 1960 CQ we read about ZL1AAX QSOing Kentucky on 20 meters with only 20 milliwatts! Rig was coupled to a beam antenna, making for a very good contact.

He also worked 160 miles on 80 meters with a tunnel diode oscillator at less than 1 milliwatt input!!

On Sept 13,1970,one WA8DDI, Livonia,Michigan, worked KH6FRQ in Hawaii at 0633 GMT, with an RST449 Report, using about 1 watt of Rf output to the antenna, the rig was a Ten Tec PM 2. This contact was on 40 meters and was done with a dipole at 35 feet height.

In the late 60's ( 1968 ),Wayne Green told about a friend of his working Europeans one after the other on 10 Meters using nothing other than a 1 Watt CB Walkie Talkie from his back yard in Boston, Mass. The output was 0.6 watt AM and the walkie talkie's whip antenna was used. Real Portable DX operation!!!

Around 1977 Ron Moorefield W8ILC in Ohio worked ZL and CN on 80 Meters using 2 watts PEP output on SSB using only an inverted V antenna, apex at 65 feet!!. The contact was SSB and an Argonaut transceiver was used.The record on 80 meters is about 850,000 miles per watt,but it is over a shorter path, 521 miles. In Dec.1981 Mike, WB9WFJ ( In Los Angeles ) worked Japan and a W2 ( Bath, New York ) with only 30 milliwatts Rf to an indoor antenna on 40 meter CW.

K4OCE worked ZL2AFZ on 20 meters from Greensboro, NC using only 3 Milliwatts to a 4 element Cubical Quad at 40 feet at 0353 Z on Mar 22, 1969. K4OCE got an RST of 329 in New Zealand. 8000 miles!!!!!

On March 18, 1979, G4BUE worked into the US on 10 and 15 meters using only 576 Microwatts!!!! The antenna was a beam, but this is still a very good contact. He also did work at 10 mw the following:W3MM, K8NZ, and K1ZZ all on 28 Mhz.

The all time record still is the KL7YU and W7BVV contact on 10 meters using a rhombic at KL7YU.
Done on Jan 21, 1970, at 1320 local time, the 1 MICROWATT signal at KL7YU was copied RST539 in
Portland, Oregon. The path length is 1650 miles. This figures at 1.65 BILLION miles per watt!!!!!!!

Done on Jan 21, 1970, at 1320 local time, the 1 MICROWATT signal at KL7YU was copied RST539 in
Portland, Oregon. The path length is 1650 miles. This figures at 1.65 BILLION miles per watt!!!!!!!

All time records per band:
160 M = 13,300 MPW
80 M = 851,339 MPW , over 521 mi, and 0.613 mW
40 M = 4,395,833 MPW , over 422 mi, and 96 uW
40 M= 82,000,000 MPW , WA8LXJ 's reception of Jan 29, 2003
20 M = 87,800,000 MPW
15 M = 19,250,000 MPW
10 M = 218,333,333 MPW with 6 uW over 1300 miles.
10 M = 1,650,000,000 MPW (KL7YU/W7BVV )
06 M = 134,200,000 MPW
02 M = 87,800,000 MPW

The information here is from the book ''History of QRP 1924-1960'' by Adrian Weiss: ISBN 0-9614139-1-3 (Library of Congress no.87-061707) and " The Joy of QRP '' by same author : ISBN 0-9614139-0-5 (Library of Congress no.84-062821)
Adrians address: 526 N.Dakota St. Vermillion,SD 57069 USA
Old address is: 833 Duke St. #83, Vermillion,SD 57069 USA
e- mail: aweiss@sundance.usd.edu

Adrians address: 526 N.Dakota St. Vermillion,SD 57069 USA
Old address is: 833 Duke St. #83, Vermillion,SD 57069 USA
e- mail: aweiss@sundance.usd.edu

Get these books: they are a treasure of reading material!!!

EXACT WAVELENGTH

Divide frequency into 299.792458 instead of 300 to get exact wavelength. The number 299.792458 is exact by definition, 1983 CGPM conference, and is to 6 decimal places only.

BEST OVERALL HAM BAND.......LOWER THAN YOU THINK

I believe that the best band is the one that is open to support propagation. Such a band is 40 or 80 Meters.Especially 40 at night.Even 160 Meters in winter nighttime. The FOT is of course THE best freq. to use at the time in question.The lowest useable ham band for long haul DX ing is probably 80 meters. On occasion on 160 meters one can do some great DX but the openings are shorter. On 160 one can work 1000+ miles with a good antenna and a fraction of a watt. So basically every ham band has its advantages for QRP. This year the 15 Meter band can be dead often, the SSN has been low at times. See:

http://www.dxlc.com/solar/

You bet that 10 Meters is going out now, it won't come back until 2008 or so.

THE VERY SIMPLEST TRANSMITTER
The lower three bands, 160, 80 and 40 meters allow you to build simple 1 transistor crystal controlled transmitters, capable of outputting 100 to 250 milliwatts of RF on CW, a very easy thing to do.  

This is due to the fact that fundamental frequency crystals are usually limited to 160/80/40 meters,certainly for the FT-243 types which don't like to oscillate on the third overtone.So the oscillator is limited to those bands. Loren Windom did indeed work VK, ZL, ZS,FK and PY from W8 with such low powers, all on 40 meters. Howard, W7BBX/4 apparently worked 45 states with such a rig, running 500 milliwatts DC input,all on 40 Meters. He got the following signal reports: Arizona: RST549; Connecticut: RST589; Idaho: RST349; Iowa: RST579; Texas: RST559; Utah: RST368. Howard used a dipole at a height of 20 feet only, yet he got very good results.The RF output was probably only 150 to 200 milliwatts! He did all this from Falls Church, Virginia, in March 1972. The rig used a 2N2104 transistor.

Doug de Maw built a Tuna Tin rig using two 2N2222 transistors ( see May 1976 QST ). It gave good results on 40 Meters using only a sloping dipole. Power output was 250 to 350 milliwatts. Every call district was worked in the continental US, maybe ? even KL and KH6, but he didn't say. All reports were at least RST 449. A few closer in were RST 599. First contact was with K4DAS in Miami. Doug got an RST 569 report from him. All the contacts were done from Connecticut. This is a "no problem" rig.

FT-243 Crystals, like old Chevys and Fords are great relics of the past.
So polish up your straight CW key and fire away....SKN is every night, not just New year's.

So polish up your straight CW key and fire away....SKN is every night, not just New year's.

POWER SUPPLY

Use a good 2 amp transformer and 3000 to 6000 uF filter capacitor and an LM-7812 regulator to run your QRP rig. The 7812 unit is a fool- proof "one stop shopping " regulator, giving lab supply quality. Or even better is the LM-317 for variable voltage. Avery simple way to get excellent voltage regulation.

HIFERS.....REAL QRPER'S.

The license free band at 13560 Khz is occupied by quite a few Hifers in the US and some other countries. Like W4DEX in Stanfield, North Carolina. See his beacon results on his webpage for the Medfer and Hifer beacons. See www.W4DEX.com

They put out only 2 mW in the US, but cover vast distances because they use QRSS mode for about 20 db gain over regular CW. In other countries power levels vary, 100mW being the highest allowed. The Atlantic has been spanned with only 5 mW, but this was done on 20 Meters. In Canada there is a second band allowed at 6765 to 6795 Khz, with output power of 6 Mw ( 10,000 uV / Meter at 30 Meters field strength allowed ). This could give some interesting DX, a VE7 was on 6777.64 Khz. ID is "TL". See above about what Bill Diggens did with receiving ZS1J, 7029 Khz, 100 uW from South Africa in Ohio,USA.

has been spanned with only 5 mW, but this was done on 20 Meters. In Canada there is a second band allowed at 6765 to 6795 Khz, with output power of 6 Mw ( 10,000 uV / Meter at 30 Meters field strength allowed ). This could give some interesting DX, a VE7 was on 6777.64 Khz. ID is "TL". See above about what Bill Diggens did with receiving ZS1J, 7029 Khz, 100 uW from South Africa in Ohio,USA.

FREE RADIO SERVICE HOLLAND

They did some QRP tests on 6314 khz ( Dec 2002 ) and were heard all over Western Europe with only 1 milliwatt!! They used FSK from a homebrew transmitter. Check out the audio files. Some receptions were done with very narrow IF filters on the radio, others were wide open. Tests were done at several power levels, up to 60 mW. The antennas were not too high, nothing special.

CQ PROPAGATION CHARTS

The best propagation info (printed, in a magazine) can be found in CQ magazine in Tomas Hood's column.He gives a summary for various areas of the world,with a propagation index for various times of the day.DX charts are for 250 watts CW and each index number is 10 db higher or lower.So if a particular place has an index of 4, then dropping power by 30 db will take you to an index of 1.Under above normal conditions this will be a signal of S-3 to S-6 ,of course at 250 milliwatts.If the index is a 1 to start with, then you can't drop power, 250 watts will be S-3 to S-6. Following is the breakdown for ABOVE NORMAL conditions: (prop index in parenthesis ):[ (4)= 250 mw];[ (3)= 2.5 W];[ (2)= 25 W];[ (1)= 250 W]; That is, you can go down to 250 milliwatts power and still get an S-3 to S-6 report under above normal conditions IF the propagation index is ( 4 ).This is spelled out in the box "last minute conditions''. Read the column thoroughly and you'll get it. Each S-unit is 3 dB. For short skip the power is 75 watts, and DX paths it is 250 watts.Tomas gives a lot of info in the two sidebars in the monthly articles.If you interpret it properly you'll get good forecasts.

See his website at: www.hfradio.org It has the CQ "last minute" charts on his website.
With the CQ issues, you notice that the propagation indexes do not change that much over the annual season, on the lower bands, usually.
This column is published monthly in CQ magazine. The CQ charts reflect the possibility of QRP.

With the CQ issues, you notice that the propagation indexes do not change that much over the annual season, on the lower bands, usually.
This column is published monthly in CQ magazine. The CQ charts reflect the possibility of QRP.

PROPAGATION FORMULA

Radio signal strength can be predicted, by computer propagation programs and by simple formula, such as this one: DBW= minus[ 37.55 +20 log(D) +20log(F) --10 log(P) +Ads +Misc +Hourly median] Ads is adsorption in Db and goes to zero on a darkness path.Misc is miscellaneous loss in db.Hourly median is 50% time averaged extra loss and is 9 db for temperate circuits, 19 db for long auroral circuits, 28 db for polar circuits. D is in miles,P is in Rf watts, and each factor is in db. Inside the brackets losses are positive,but the whole thing is a negative number like minus 135 dbw for example. See Peter Saveskie, TAB # 1146.The TAB Book series.

MINIPROP AND DX PROPAGATION.

Program Available at : < www.qsl.net/w6elprop >

In 1925/26 Loren Windom,8GZ did some fantastic QRP work on 40 Meters running only 350 milliwatts Dc plate input power to a simple ''199" type tube Hartley oscillator, which used this feeble (by today''s standards) tube. From Columbus Ohio he contacted: Adelaide,Australia:Wellington, New Zealand: Capetown, South Africa: Plus a ship the "Kaimiloa" off New Caledonia. This was done during Dec 1925 and Jan / Feb 1926 (sunspot numbers were 61 at the time). So what does this have to do with Miniprop? LOTS.

First of all, his feat can be used to "calibrate" this program, as it was a real event. To do this, go to "options" and then "prediction paramaters". Set noise(residential) bandwidth to 100 Hz. Also set minimum radiation angle to 3 degrees. Then go to "frequencies and constants" and set the frequency to 7.5 Mhz . The band was 7 to 8 Mhz back then , and then set the constant to minus 10 db (the program is normalized now to 100 milliwatts Rf output.The two QTHs are W8 and VK5. Make sure the program outputs as Signal to Noise. Go to Graph display. Observe how the S/N output is. Now with the settings left as is, do other call areas from your QTH and you will know what 350mW to a Hartley rig could do with same antenna and sunspot number,under excellent conditions. Miniprop thus calibrated says that 8GZ made the contact from Columbus to Adelaide, Australia, this agrees with the real-life situation. This is probably what the case was, somewhat difficult CW work. With 105 volts at 12 mA to the plate of the Hartley, he did work "MUCH DX", a fact verified by Miniprop. So polish up that 6SN7, and go to it!

CALIBRATING MINIPROP

For a FINAL verification, input he following, into the program:

Minimum Radiation angle: 3 degrees*
Time: December or January. ( Any year )
Sunspot number: 62
K index: 1* for excellent conditions.
Terminals: W8 and VK5.
Noise Bandwidth: 100 Hz. Use Residential value*
Constant: 0 (Zero) (Db)*
Will give predictions for Excellent conditions.

Time: December or January. ( Any year )
Sunspot number: 62
K index: 1* for excellent conditions.
Terminals: W8 and VK5.
Noise Bandwidth: 100 Hz. Use Residential value*
Constant: 0 (Zero) (Db)*
Will give predictions for Excellent conditions.

The program will be set to 1 watt of CW and a dipole at 0.5 wavelength height, and for excellent conditions.For a W8 to VK5 path,the output S/N should be about plus 12 to 13 db, if you did it correctly, and this will reflect what Loren Windom did. Now without resetting the values marked * ( in options ), just change the terminals, SSN , K index and time to see what 1 watt CW can do, for whatever locations and times you choose.

MINIPROP MATERIAL

Miniprop usage text: Program Available at : < www.qsl.net/w6elprop >

Miniprop additional text follows:

Miniprop considers : DBW= minus [ 36.55 +20log(D) +20log(F) -10log(P) + IONOSPHERIC ADSORPTION ] + [Land Reflection Losses]

Other losses such as Tx line loss, power difference from preset value of watts Rf, Hourly median, and other miscellaneous losses are NOT considered by Miniprop, these values must be added, in the area called Constants, (in the Options area ) Miniprop values are in DB relative to minus 143 dbW or 1/2 microvolt into 50 ohm reciever matched load, OR S/N output. Miniprop is characterized assuming your constant, free space, dipoles. Miniprop PLUS has Graph and has a real S/N output. You need to "doctor" the program to make it work for QRP work, and ALWAYS use the S/N output, as the other output has no meaning, for QRP work.

1. losses are - , gains are + Add these values together. The constant will probably be negative in value. (Remember, this program assumes a chosen value for the constant being used.) Watch your numbers carefully. The output of program (miniprop plus) is in S/N above 0 Db or threshold of copy, that is, 0 db would be right at threshold of copy. Miniprop plus is the WINDOWS version. Available at[ www.qsl.net/w6elprop ] In the options area of the menu is "prediction parameters" which has a value called "noise bandwidth". This is the required signal strength expressed in different terms.Required S/No in db must be converted to the equivilant noise bandwidth in HZ. A required S/No of 20 db becomes a 100 hz noise bandwidth.This is the threshold value for CW.

AA4XX BEACON RESULTS...........FROM RALEIGH, NORTH CAROLINA

7/4/95 7052.0 AA8LF MI 500 MICROWATTS 1.16 MILLION MILES PER WATT

11/25/95 7004.0 WA3YON MA 250 MICROWATTS 1.61 MILLION

11/25/95 7004.0 K3TKS MD 250 MICROWATTS 1.02 MILLION

12/25/95 7004.0 WA3YON PA 250 MICROWATTS 1.62 MILLION

12/25/95 7004.0 W8AC OH 250 MICROWATTS 1.71 MILLION

12/26/95 7004.0 K3TKS MD 250 MICROWATTS 1.02 MILLION

12/26/95 7004.0 KA3WTF PA 250 MICROWATTS 1.63 MILLION

12/31/95 7021.0 KE30A PA 200 MICROWATTS 2.02 MILLION

12/31/95 7021.0 KE3IK PA 200 MICROWATTS 2.03 MILLION

" Had the good fortune to have Fran Slavinski, KA3WTF, answer my 250 mW CQ on 7040 Khz (a distance of 425 miles). Before the QSO was over, Fran was copying me solidly at 10 mW. We made a schedule for the following Saturday morning and Fran managed to copy me at 900 microwatts,distance was approx 430 miles."--AA4XX

Contact done eventually at 221 microwatts.

The record is now 96 MICROWATTS for this path, 430 miles, same operators, still 40 meters,or 4,395,833 MPW.

RST SCALE

Readability
1 Unreadable.
2 Barely readable, occasional words distinguishable.
3 Readable with considerable difficulty.
4 Readable with practically no difficulty.
5 Perfectly readable.

Signal Strength
1 Faint signals, barely perceptible.
2 Very weak signals.
3 Weak signals.
4 Fair signals.
5 Fairly good signals.
6 Good signals.
7 Moderately strong signals.
8 Strong signals.
9 Extremely strong signals.

Tone
1 Sixty cycle a.c. or less, very rough and broad.
2 Very rough a.c. very harsh and broad.
3 Rough a.c. tone, rectified but not filtered.
4 Rough note, some trace of filtering.
5 Filtered, rectified a.c. but strongly ripple-modulated.
6 Filtered tone, definite trace of ripple modulation.
7 Near pure tone, trace of ripple modulation.
8 Near perfect tone, slight trace of modulation.
9 Perfect tone, no trace of ripple modulation of any kind.

S-METERS -NOT CRACKED UP FOR WHAT THEY COULD BE !!

Many S- Meters are inaccurate. Basically they seem to indicate only 3 db per S-unit average from S-1 up to S-9, then they show dB's from S-9 upwards. An S-9 signal is then only about 27 db above MDS. This compares to 6 db per , or +48 db above MDS under conventional IARU rating. Tomas Hood even gives only 3 db per S-unit in his propagation columns in CQ Magazine.The Japanese S-Meter scale is S-9 is 25 uV in 50 ohms, and each S-unit is 3 dB exacly. You will need a lab calibrated signal generator to really verify all this. But then you could mix the signal generator signal through a hybrid combiner with noise from your station antenna and determine MDS directly in terms of DBW or DBM generator output. You will not even need Signal to Noise theory as this will bypass that too. The Signal Gen/Hybrid method would give you a direct, actual idea as to what the limit is in DBW,for YOUR radio, YOUR ears and YOUR noise location, and takes care of local noise variations. The hybrid will have a loss, but since both input ports would have the same loss,it would cancel out. But you have to use your full size antenna to give the proper noise level. The output of the hybrid would be fed into the antenna terminals of the reciever. A hybrid circuit is in the ARRL Handbook. It uses one ferrite core and 3 resistors.

A PRACTICAL ANTENNA

A simple and good antenna is a halfwave endfed wire,any even multiple length will do.The high feed impedance will guard against too much ground loss. Use a simple ''L'' network for matching.

The singlewire fed Windom is a real example of a "no problem antenna" -No leaking coax, no twisting twinlead, no stiff RG8 cable!! And multiband operation to boot!! The Windom is cut to length,fed 33% from one end,either by open line or singlewire.It is resonant and will radiate well.A double extended zepp will also work but has a high swr in the feedline,openwire line is necessary.Loren Windom did his DX before SWR bridges and coax feedlines. Relatively little was known as compared to today.Today a good antenna is a centerfed dipole fed by 300 ohm line and a good tuner using a 1:1 CURRENT type balun.Voltage type baluns dont like reactive loads.At tuner resonance the system will work well. But height is very important.Also the loop antenna is a great performer.Depending on the shape,one can get good low angle radiation.Usually has to be cut to length,1005/F in feet,Mhz.At 100 ohms feed R it gives fairly good match to 300 ohm line. One ham believes the number 1038/F rather than 1005/F should be used .This is a better match than feeding a double extended zepp.The loop can be an equilateral triangle,point down,fed at bottom,thus less feedline needed. The SWR on the line would be 3:1 approx. Such an antenna has a gain of +5.24 dbi at 15 deg. radiation angle.Actual impedance, ( 117- j 23) and can be fed by 300 ohmTV line. Bottom of triangle is 35 feet above ground.I think it is one of the better DX antennas around.It also will give better S/N on receive as well. For end fed wires use a length just shy of 1/2 wavelength so the impedance is high but not too high with some XL thrown in. L=983.6(N-0.025)/F where L=feet,and F is in mhz. N is no. of full wavelengths of wire. Apparently if N = 0.456 one gets good radiation ( 0.456 wavelength). or you could use 0.956 wavelength, it just repeats every 1/2 wavelength. A simple L-network will match up the antenna.

Or try a 40 Meter groundplane antenna, fed with 450 ohm ladderline, or 300 ohm Tv twinlead , for a "killer" antenna. Just ask W1AB about it! He got 30 db over S9 in the Czech Republic 2 hours before sunset, at W1AB, running 100 watts CW on 40 meters. This thing even outperformed his 160 meter antenna on 160 meters, even though the groundplane was only made for 40. It uses 3 radials and one vertical radiator, each 33 feet long . The radials are about 10 feet off the ground, drooping down. The ladderline feeds at the juncture of all 4 wires. He said it is a real multiband antenna.

See G4FGQ ''s download site: good antenna programs (DOS mode)

http://www.btinternet.com/~g4fgq.regp/page3.html#S301

Long Delayed Echoes-What are they?

I Have just read about this in the February 2005 CQ magazine, by Mac Obara and this is very fascinating. Basically we are dealing with radio transmissions coming back to us after having been reflected off some ionized belt circling the solar system at about 297 AU from the earth, or 298 AU from the sun. One AU is the Sun-Earth distance, or 93,000,000 Miles. This belt seems to be beyond Neptune. There seem to be other belts too. This explains the various echo times.

The farthest echo seems to be from the 297 AU distance, and it was returned after 82 hours!!!! This occurred on 160 meters, of all places, a band not known for DX!! At least not like on 20 meters, so it is all the more amazing!! The feat was accomplished on January 18, 2004, for the transmit time. Most of these LDE receptions were done by JA's in Japan.

How can this happen? Would the path loss not be astronomical??? NO! The reason why is because the signal gets reflected off the circular belt, and refocussed back to the origin. The only loss would be the 2 transit losses thru the earth's ionosphere, and the loss in reflection of the belt, and the absence of the belt in most of the sky, off the target plane. Say the belt only reflects back one-millionth of the signal. That is a 60 db loss. And if the belt covers only one-thousandth's of the sky, another 30 db loss. Add two transit losses through our ionosphere of 20 db each, 40 db total, we get a grand total of 130 db "path loss". If you transmit with ONE WATT you will be at 0 dbw outgoing, and the return signal will be at minus 130 dbw, or S-5. Actually, in practice it may work out this way, the signals seem to be stable at RST 559, at levels around 100 watts. The loss for MOONBOUNCE signals is MUCH MORE than for this mode, because the moon reflects back only a tiny portion of the signal it gets.

Does this happen all the time? No. Only from October to February, and throughout the solar cycle, except 2 years centered around the solar peak. One has to transmit at 2000 to 2200 Hours local time, but reception is okay from dusk to dawn. It is reported that the receptions are only of about 20 minutes duration. Only frequencies below 4 MHz seem to work for these extreme LDE's of several hours plus. You may have heard these signals, without knowing it, because if you hear one, you cannot verify if it is an LDE echo unless you contact the station, but he will not answer because he was on the air hours ago!! SWL's cannot really find out, for they would have to phone up the station to see if it is transmitting right at this time. And hams do not get answers to some calls they make. So, many of these signals get mistaken for real ordinary signals. But if you do hear a G station in W8 land at dawn, on 160 meters, you know that something funny is going on!!

W6BNB reported that W6XXX got LDE's on his signals ( 3555 khz ) as well, coming back to him about 30 minutes later, his entire net control session coming back. But he could not hear any of the stations he contacted during NCS. Very strange indeed.

W6BNB said that when sending a series of dots on CW with fast break- in, he could hear the echo coming back, which would just be a once round the world signal. This can also be quite common, but still exciting. From his article in the June 2004 CQ magazine.

What does this have to do with Radio? It is the sheer excitement of hearing one of these signals, which are extreme DX, your best chance at extraterrestrial radio work.

With computers and robot receivers, radio hams can set up a test station to probe this phenomenon more thoroughly. This is absolutely the farthest you can "DX" without expensive "SETI" like gear and big dish antennae and lab equipment.

THANK GOD FOR DOS!!

Many ham radio programs are written in DOS. See above G4FGQ: a great collection of good old DOS programs!!! Windows NT, 2000, and XP will run these in full window mode, a real convenience. Most DOS programming is easier than Windows programming, thus allowing more people to do it. G4FGQ's programs will run fine as DOS programs, they don't need a Windows platform, they will run on old computers too. There are no Windows equivilants of his programs as far as I know.

http://www.btinternet.com/~g4fgq.regp/page3.html#S301

Also check out Hamcalc available on the CQ Magazine website. It is also DOS, but what a plethora of basic programs!!!!!!! Believe me, you cannot live without it if you homebrew!! Only the CQ site has the latest version of Hamcalc; other sites may carry bad versions of this program. You can run any computer in DOS only by hitting the F8 key at bootup or using a startup diskette on bootup, to prevent the computer from going into windows, if your session only requires DOS.

If you run Windows XP, make your startup disk in the a: properties/format/make dos startup diskette.

Put the disk in before powering up your computer, then at Dos prompt, change disks to the one with the Dos program on it. Type dir a: to see contents. Run filename.exe or filename.com to start program.

If your computer runs Windows 98, you can start the computer in DOS only, by hitting the F8 key, at bootup, or by putting a system floppy disk in the slot BEFORE turning on the power. This startup disk can be created by putting a newly formatted disk in the computer and typing sys a: at the DOS prompt and the disk will be created for future use. Using this disk at bootup puts the computer in real DOS mode, with no Windows running. To get out of this, remove all disks, hit CTRL+ALT+DELETE, and reboot normally. While in Real DOS, run your DOS programs off floppy disks, this makes getting to the program easier.

THANK GOD FOR BASIC!!

Like VE3ERP's fine collection, they are all Basic language, a precursor of DOS, and they are really good and useful, no need for Windows, as all calculations can be done well in these platforms. Most of these programs have not been rewritten for Windows. Basic programs by themselves can be run using GW Basic.

DO REAL HAM RADIOS GLOW IN THE DARK?

YES.
(Reminds me of Tom Kneitel's great editorials and Q&A pages in the old Electronics Illustrated Magazines.)

AND NOW.....THE MOON

A real earlyness repeater.....open to anyone with a ham license and who has 1 kw of Rf to spare. Really tempting since you can get a yagi up and running and key up on Vhf. Startup is a bit difficult, some heavy duty hardware is needed and some real estate, but once on, you are ready to "rock and roll". Conditions vary, but within certain bounds. You can do it with 100 watts, if the other station has a big array to hear your weaker signal. No doubt, someone is going to do QRP here, but don't expect 1 watt Qso's . More stations need to get on, to get the momentum going. CW is the practical mode here. Path loss is about 245 to 253 db.

PIONEERS

Yes, we talked about Loren Windom already, but just think, what he did with that tiny,feeble little 199 tube, running a measly 5 milliamperes at 75 volts to the plate......I mean, did he expect results??? This is an example of earlyness, wonderness. Pioneering all the way, having no idea if it will work, and never looking back. And boy did he do great stuff, on the 40 meter band to boot, with only a 1/2 wave Windom! One ZL used a tunnel diode at 1 mW input to transmit 160 miles on 80 meters. Or Robert Ritz , W7UUZ, doing a 175 mile QRP contact on 80 meters with an XN-2 (Motorola) transistor in Aug 1955. Running only 2 milliwatts DC input to his transistor. This transistor was not designed for HF usage, but he used it anyways, it could only take 4 milliamps of current, otherwise it would blow and go west, (destroyed ). 20 mW was the maximum power dissipation. They used stuff that wasn't really designed for the work they were doing.
Using something for the first time and not knowing where it will lead you. Great stuff !!
Believe me, you will see what I mean, especially if you lived through it. For a good taste of the subject of transistors in the early 1950 s see:

Using something for the first time and not knowing where it will lead you. Great stuff !!
Believe me, you will see what I mean, especially if you lived through it. For a good taste of the subject of transistors in the early 1950 s see:

http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/Andrew_wylie/

CREDITS

Credits: Much of the information here is from the book ''History of QRP 1924-1960'' by Adrian Weiss: ISBN-0-9614139-1-3 and " The Joy of QRP '' by same author : ISBN 0-9614139-0-5

MY ALUMNUS

Dunton High in Montreal was my high school from Sept 1963 to June 1967. I enjoyed the time there.

Great days. Great music. The Beatles, Rolling Stones, and so on. Those were the days when radio was still king. Like : ~~~~ 77 WABC!~~~~~ and Cousin Brucie..... the famous "chime time".

See the websites at these addresses:

http://www.duntonhigh.homestead.com/

http://www.duntonhighalumni.com./

http://www.wabcradio.com/

ECHOES OF THE PRESENT

Some time ago, ( February 2002 ) I was tuning the 17 and 21 Mhz SWBC bands. On 21610 kc. at 1530Z I heard Radio Espana Al Exterior with a really pronounced echo on the signal. Also heard this echo on VOA 17640kc. at 1628Z, later on 21610kc.at 1650Z ( Radio Espana again ), and finally VOA on 17895kc. at 1722Z. Recently, in October 2004, I heard some again, on DW from Wertachtal, Germany, on 15275 khz.

What are these echoes? They seem to be multipath echoes, from at least 2 simultaneous paths, one direct, and the other longpath. The time delay of the longer path causes the echo. This effect seems to be quite common, at least on the higher bands during sunspot maxima. The longpath signal seems to be 40-50 db down from the direct signal.The effect varies in intensity as propagation changes. I have heard the echo effect on strong signals, and fainter ones. The effect makes it hard to understand the speech, but music seems to be quite unaffected, and one hardly notices the echo effect. I have heard of situations of around the world radio reception having been made, ( for true round the world reception one would be at the transmitter site and then one cannot hear the long-path signal ! ).However, when listening to an ordinary SWBC transmission, most times one hears good audio. Sometimes there is an anomaly,and the echo effect proves inconclusively that multipath is happening. This is really a fine opportunity to enjoy unusual reception (the longpath to here is 21,000 miles because the direct path is only a few thousand miles).This is the easiest way to hear freak reception and be sure of it.In the 1930s to mid 1960s, before satellites, this was a good way of hearing echoes. Years ago I heard VNG 7500 kc. in the afternoon here........it was long-path. It was very faint but you could hear the signal. Before VLW-9 on 9610 kc. Perth, West Australia was closed down, one could hear this almost antipodean station here in Toronto in the morning until 1600Z signoff. It was the farthest regular broadcast station audible here.

What can you do? Just listen regularly and note any strange reception such as echoes, etc. The mornings seem to be fruitful for this reception.Your area may have a different time due to the positions of the stations. I heard this opening on a simple analog portable with only a whip antenna. Go enjoy this while you can. I have tried for the echoes recently, in October 2003, and have heard a few and they are less than in February,2002. Try the 16 Meter band---it seems to be the best for this.

EARLYNESS......WONDERNESS

Earlyness, Wonderness..........what does it mean?----you will soon know!

First the police...... During the early days one could hear Police on the radio band 1610 to 2800 khz !! No it is not a typo- I actually heard Laconia, New Hampshire on about 1630 khz. ( from Montreal, 1963 ). You could hear many cities from the US during the 1930's and 40's. Try doing this today!! One police department ran 1 kw to a vertical antenna in Illinois, and were heard in New Zealand!! This was all AM modulation. The Laconia station must have been one of the last on this frequency range. Many were also on 40 Mhz where one could at least hear them via skip during high solar cycles, but even that is gone now. Even TV was there, as I heard BBC-1 there in Dec. 1979!!! On about 41.5 Mhz was the Fm audio from London! I also heard some buzz around 45 and 49 Mhz which were video carriers. Now only New Zealand is there, just inside the 6 Meter ham band. But channel 2 offers some good Dx possibilities, but it is better if you are off the heavily populated mainlands of USA and Europe. This too will disappear with HDTV.......

I was born in Feb, 1950, at a critical time in man"s evolution. It was at this time that kids born on or about this date would be deluged with the wonder of fantastic optimism about the future. For in September,1959 the Russians photographed the backside of the Moon. It so happened that these 3 probes ( Luniks 1 ,2 , 3 ) used radio frequencies that could be received by anyone with a good shortwave receiver. This afforded the knowing person the ability to do something that you cannot now do anymore unless you have a farm full of satellite dishes. Two of the probes missed the moon and were heard as they headed further out, with still good signals on about 19990-19999 khz, a shortwave frequency. Lunik (one of the three ) is now 197,000,000 km orbital radius from the sun, orbiting once every 450 earth days. It is the first "planet " created by man ever. The other Lunik is also in Solar orbit, but a slightly different period. I remember hearing about it in Ville D' Anjou ( Montreal ,Canada ) at the time. See the site:

http://www.ville.anjou.qc.ca/entree.htm

And then there was ECHO 1 and later ECHO 2, which were large "balloons" sent into earth orbit. Echo 1 was launched on August 12, 1960 and stayed up until May 1968. Echo 1 was the most often seen space object by the general public EVER ! ( before or since ).It orbited about 1000 miles high, and was a passive radio reflector.I remember seeing it myself in 1960.My impression was: if this is only the beginning, what will we see in 30 years' time???? People made the effort to look, and the news media made the effort to publicise the orbital times. But alas, it didnt turn out that way. Today's satellites are very hard to see, certainly from the big city. Nowadays nobody seems to care much anymore, at least that is my impression. That such an early effort could engender such wonder speaks for "Earlyness, Wonderness !!!. Every two weeks or so Walter Cronkite would count you down to another launch....eventually to Apollo 11. Everyone knows what they were doing on July 20,1969. Heady times they were, all right, no doubt about it.And you didn't need to smoke dope to get "high". One expert says we could have landed on MARS by about 1984 if the pace of progress had kept up !! Nothing comparable is being done today, just Shuttle missions. Hopefully we will have a good ham radio presence on the ISS to excite a lot of school kids into ham radio! But even the ISS is only going around the Earth in orbit. In the 1960 's (and later) you could hear Russian satellites just below 20 MHZ on any good shortwave receiver.I myself heard one of the last ones on the old band, Salyut 7 on 19.954 Mhz in Sept 1988 on a portable SW receiver.

I only had a Heathkit AR-3 at the time, a bit lacking on 20 mhz. In March 1976 I heard my first satellite, CHINA 1 on 20.017 Mhz, just above WWV. It was really weird doing this, hearing an ET signal for the first time. Today one needs sophisticated gear to hear Voyagers 1 and 2. But it would be a real treat if one could do it. Pioneers 10 and 11 are dead, the transmitters no longer working. These craft are travelling through space to distant worlds.The farthest, Voyager 1 is 89.421 AU from earth (as of Sept, 2003 ). One AU is the Sun-Earth distance, 93 million miles. Nasa has made contact with Pioneer 10 on March 1,2002 by beaming a signal from a radio telescope east of Los Angeles, and 22 hours and 6 minutes later the return signal was heard in Spain !! 7.4 Billion miles!!!The return signal was loud and clear. Launched March 2, 1972. In his book, Carl Sagan says that the earliest TV signals are now about 55 light years from earth, travelling forever through space. Earlyness, wonderness gets the prize...the earliest signal is the farthest. (This is true...the signal never dies out, but eventually sinks into the noise). But there is a limit as to how far they can be heard.........S/N! I am certain TV signals cannot be reproduced too far from earth because TV signals are wide.....5 mhz wide. One could conceivably calculate what the limit is. The biggest problem is the wide occupied bandwidth. The receiver has a noise floor that limits the extent of the DX.Also, as the earth turns, the RF sweeps across the sky, giving any target only a brief bit of signal. TV stations spew the signal out low to the ground, so the circumference of the earth (seen from space) would send out the signals. We should have sent a slow CW signal of high power on one of the frequency windows ( less gas absorption ) so that the narrow signal could be better copied. Any civilization would know what an on-off keyed signal would mean.....a fundamental modulation method. Just dont key at the same rate as the pulsars and quasars do.....avoid confusion. The Drake equation offers hope that we are not alone. Sagan hints at the fact that up to 10 civilizations could exist in the Milky Way galaxy, right now. But where, what direction do you aim at? The universe is incredibly huge!!! There is no agreed upon Net Frequency to listen on......like 146.52 on 2 meters. It is worse than finding a needle in a haystack. High gain, steered (aimed) antennae would be needed, making for a narrow beam, very selective aiming. Sagan says the Arecibo radio telescope could send a signal 15,000 light years distance to another comparable radio telescope. That would mean up to 30,000 years for an answer. But Arecibo is fixed, so the signal would sweep the sky, making long messages to any civilization out of the question.

On Jan 29, 2003 we had the second shuttle accident in the program. Seven dedicated NASA astronauts were lost. Hopefully there will be no more mishaps. During the 1960's, the Apollo program went fairly well, except for the close call with Apollo 13. No US astronauts were lost in flight during the most heady part of the program, up to the moon walks. The early part of the space program , we got our money's worth out of it. Maybe one day we will be heading out to Mars and make a great discovery. Check out '' Coast to Coast '' with George Noory on late evening AM talk radio. He has lots of space related stuff on his show.

VANGUARD 1, A WONDER
Still in orbit, launched in the late 1950’s this satellite will be up for many, many years still, like about 1000 years!, unless some space agency recovers it to be displayed in a museum, which I think will not happen. Another example of earlyness wonderness, one of the first satellites launched also being the most likely to be in such a long orbital time.

Still in orbit, launched in the late 1950’s this satellite will be up for many, many years still, like about 1000 years!, unless some space agency recovers it to be displayed in a museum, which I think will not happen. Another example of earlyness wonderness, one of the first satellites launched also being the most likely to be in such a long orbital time.

CRYSTAL RADIOS

These can be real fun, if you are running a good outside antenna. Several afficionados in the US have been getting nighttime DX of the larger clear channel stations like 1500 to 1700 km away. I myself heard two stations about 200 to 350 miles distant back in 1963 in Montreal. See WKBW below. The DX type crystal radios have double tuning usually, and sometimes the "Tuggle" front end, created by Mike Tuggle of Hawaii, is used for added selectivity. He can hear US mainland stations over there. No amplification is allowed, only passive circuits. Another listener in Germany got Saudi Arabia on 1521 in Germany on one of these sets!!! That is 4000 Km plus!!

See: http://www.thebest.net/wuggy/default.htm

77 WABC !!!!!!!

When I got my first transistor radio in April 1963, great excitement was experienced when listening to the AM band ( only band on radio ). At night I could get many BCB stations from the US, such as WABC, WOWO, WCBS, WWVA, WBZ, and many others, too many to mention here. It was a tiny 6 transistor radio, palm sized, very compact.But the DX rolled in! WCCO 830 was the furthest DX from Montreal, until it picked up Radio Americas on 1165 kc from 1965 to 1968. This Clandestine station was on Swan Island, Honduras, and put in a good signal almost every night! The only other comparable DX was PJB 800 Bonaire. But WABC could have been the best, playing oldies all night long, with Cousin Brucie as the illustrious DJ! The famous Chime Time rang out after virtually every song. Too bad they went all talk in 1982. I can hear them well in Toronto, just like in Montreal. See the links:

http://www.hawkins.pair.com

http://www.wabcradio.com/

WKBW 1520

This 50,000 watt radio station was picked up by me along with 1540 WPTR Albany NY, on a crystal radio set in Montreal at night in 1963, near the sunspot minimum. I used only a lamp for an antenna!! Remember them telling you to use a lamp or telephone finger stop for an antenna??? HA!.... WKBW was 330 miles from Montreal, and the reception really shocked me. No amplification at all and I could hear both stations "fighting it out " together on the dial. Heard at a friend's apartment building, on the third floor level, and I could not hear them at my house due to a lower antenna level. Later with a better outside antenna I could

indeed get them too. Many crystal radio afficionadoes can get DX on their sets at night, like several hundred miles distant.See Bill Dulmage's website about this station.
http://www.billdulmage.com/
http://www.kb1520.com/

http://www.billdulmage.com/
http://www.kb1520.com/

PLAYING RADIO

Two years after getting the little radio, in April 1965, I saw two of my friends using a pair of CB Walkie- Talkies. They were on 27.125, CB channel 14, and the units fascinated me. A sked was made for the evening when I heard them on my Heathkit AR-3 reciever. Copy was quite good, the CB walkies were about 200 yards from my home. I could hear the two guys talking to each other. For a kid who didnt know much about radio propagation, this was exciting stuff ! Reception was about S-9 at the time. Later(1965 ) I read about the units made by International Crystal Manufacturing Co. that ran 100 milliwatts to a 5 foot dipole on the roof.The transceiver was at the operating position and the TX unit was at the midpoint of the dipole, up on the roof.They claimed 1000+ miles of range on skip, impressive. Later, in the CQ 50 Year anniversary edition ( January 1995 ) they said that these rigs were put on 10 Meters and were used to work International DX. Now I know that the N7LT beacon on 28248khz was heard in ZS land at the 50 mW output level ! Quite an improvement on my reception. I myself have heard this beacon at an S-1 level when the 50 mW level was transmitted.

BEACONS

Try to get this beacon, 7025 kc. ZS1AGI 200 milliwatts, George Airport, Capetown, South Africa. 24 hours/day CW beacon. The ZS1AGI grid square is KF16EA.
I am not sure yet, but I may have heard it at about 0345 Utc on Feb 14, 2003. The signal, very weak was about RST 219 or 229. In the absence of QRM you could copy quite well the faint CW signal. It is there for your keen ears to hear!!
Of course, the NCDXF beacons on 14100 and 21150 give good entertainment when the 10 meter beacons
are no longer audible. See www.ncdxf.org for schedule and info.

I am not sure yet, but I may have heard it at about 0345 Utc on Feb 14, 2003. The signal, very weak was about RST 219 or 229. In the absence of QRM you could copy quite well the faint CW signal. It is there for your keen ears to hear!!
Of course, the NCDXF beacons on 14100 and 21150 give good entertainment when the 10 meter beacons
are no longer audible. See www.ncdxf.org for schedule and info.

G3USF BEACONS LIVE

Real live beacons off air..................

http://www.keele.ac.uk/depts/por/28.htm

http://www.keele.ac.uk/depts/por/50.htm

( hilite one line at a time, right click, copy, paste to browser address line )

LINKS............WEBSITES

Some Websites:..........( hilight ONE line at a time, right click, copy, paste to empty browser address line, don't type manually......too tedious ! (These are not clickable links)

http://www.ac6v.com/ This is the BIG one...all you will need!

http://www.qsl.net/on7yd/

http://www.computerpro.com/~lyle/

http://www.ussc.com/~turner/qrss1.html

http://www.computerpro.com/~lyle/weaksigs/weaksigs.htm

http://elbert.its.bldrdoc.gov/pc_hf/hfwin32.html

http://www.lareau.org/pitc.html

http://www.btinternet.com/~g4fgq.regp/page3.html#S301

http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/Andrew_wylie/

http://www.cs.ucl.ac.uk/staff/S.Bhatti/D51-notes/notes.html

http://www.g3ycc.karoo.net/

http://www.keele.ac.uk/depts/por/28.htm

http://www.keele.ac.uk/depts/por/50.htm

http://fohnix.metronet.com/~nmcewen/ref.html

http://www.cybercomm.net/~slapshot/swlmarks.html

http://www.lwca.org/library/lfprop/adcock/lfprop6.htm

http://www.dxlc.com/solar/

http://www.qrpworld.com/welcome.htm

http://www.qsl.net/wa0jcv/Shop.htm

http://www.qsl.net/ik6bak/beacon.html

http://www.qsl.net/n7lt/

http://members.aol.com/WN1ION1967/wcchistory.htm

http://www.qsl.net/es4rlh/ham/software.htm

http://www.qsl.net/vk2zto/ISM_22M/exp_bcns.htm

http://www.inforamp.net/~funk/

http://www.qrparci.org/qrplacc.htm

http://www.computerpro.com/~lyle/

http://www.duntonhigh.homestead.com/

http://www.ipass.net/~whitetho/buildbcb.htm

http://www.ville.anjou.qc.ca/entree.htm

http://www.live-radio.net/info.shtml

http://hawkins.pair.com/wlw.shtml

http://www.bomarcrystal.com/

http://jhbunnell.com/

http://www.hawkins.pair.com/voaohio.html

http://dx.qsl.net/propagation/index.html

http://www.radiodx.com/spdxr/edxt.htm

http://www.icmfg.com/

http://www.arrl.org/tis/info/qrpprojs.html

http://www.camp-x.com/

http://www.e-discounter.net/qrparci/

http://www.radiodx.com/spdxr/edxt.htm

http://www.heavens-above.com/

http://www.simtel.net/pub/msdos/hamradio/

http://radioworks.com/ccwcover.html

http://members.aol.com/djadamson/arp.html

http://www.zeesen-dm2awd-radio.de/index.htm

http://www.g3ycc.karoo.net/

http://www.qsl.net/yo4aul/siteyo/software.htm

http://www.arrl.org/news/features/2001/09/26/1/

http://www.billdulmage.com/

http://kropla.com/dialcode.htm

END OF WEBPAGE

"K"

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