PA0O ham radio

Have been busy  this afternoon went shopping got a FTDI US232  USB-RS232 (39€) interface hopefully to solve the communication problem with N1MM. It did run immediate the driver was found in the system already. But... DTR/CW is not driven on my Notebook on my other Laptop it works normal Latest FTDI driver. DTR is only short active at init of the port. Seems a software problem. So still not a solution hardware and software is resisting to cooperate .  Same time purchased some extra high grade capacitors  WIMA FKP1 to tune the QTX 501kHz  down to 474.2kHz  I was testing my M.W. QTX again at 474.2 kHz.  our new M.W. allocation in 2013. Before even thinking of building a bigger MW PA  I should at least be capable to get this small PA working stable. Now at reduced power  20V  5A limited  to keep the IRF540 save. Also used the IRL540  designed for logic level that one worked in the 500kHz version 2010 okay but could not...

again a page full continuous decodes of WE6XGR  Sunday morning. only 1 time decoded   partly  WE2XGR/2  in FN31LS weak signals  -17dB  as best only  Overall propagation weak.  In the WAERTTY  low activity 0148 -25  1.8   0.499500  0 WE6XGR FN12 50 0154 -27  2.4   0.499450  0 <...> FN31LS 47 0204 -25  1.8   0.499500  0 WE6XGR FN12 50 testing my QTX  500kHz  I have used that one before at 502.4 kHz in 2010 The first power on the 6.3A fuse was blown. Already lost 2 IRF540 while testing the output on a dummy load trying to tune down to 475 kHz  gave high currents and lost the IRF540 at 500 it seems  to work okay. If  I can believe my power meter the output is well over 100W at 6A 24V input  never had that much output from this simple but genius design. But the IRF540 can not handle this level and breaks down after 10seconds ...

W2ZM announced to be on air again last night The Flex1500 +  K9AY loop rx antenna tuned to USB dial 498kHz After having all settings VAC and VsP done I did not see a trace yet left WSPR in receive and went to bed. Above expectation next day a saw a screen filled with decodes   100% TX duty cycle it started way after midnight here strongest was -13  0454UTC   first decode 01:48  2012-11-06 01:48   WE6XGR   0.499500   -28   0   FN12   10   PA0O   JO33hg   5988   47 0446 -17 -0.1   0.499500  0 WE6XGR FN12 40 0448 -18  0.0   0.499500  0 WE6XGR FN12 40 0450 -15 -0.2   0.499500  0 WE6XGR FN12 40 0452 -15  0.0   0.499500  0 WE6XGR FN12 40 0454 -13  0.0   0.499500  0 WE6XGR FN12 40 0456 -16  0.0   0.499500  0 WE6XGR FN12 40 0458 -24 -0.2...

In order to fi nd some solution to the logging problems I plugged a faster i 7   W7 Lapto p to the w ireless keyboard and the 22" TFT above my radio operating position. 1 7 CW QSO's in the Ukraini an contest went fine. N1MM was fast responding   no delays  in T/R confirm messages. While just having entered   W9EWZ . QSO nr. 18 The frequency display/band ruler went cra zy again and whiped out W 9 EWZ from the input field.. the msgbox  s tops the polling  click on retry starts it agai n. Why not just continue polling and showing an Offline sign without the need of manual resetting ? arrgg This time even the reset interface di d not recover the CAT connection I am having a rs232 break out monitor to watch the data over the CAT connection  still the K3 was sending data strings to the PC  in response to the N1MM polling   the K3 does not send data without being asked for by a command. But the data to N1 MM seem s...

 WSPR  80 and 160  zero DX  still closed 10M     1x VK7AB     many DU1MGA  and HS0ZBS  last 24 hours  2012-11-03 06:30   PA0O   28.126151   -23   0   JO33hg   5   VK7AB   QE37ne   16905   84   2012-11-02 10:26   DU1MGA   28.126064   -6   -1   PK04lc   5   PA0O   JO33hg   10286   327   2012-11-02 12:54   PA0O   28.126175   -24   0   JO33hg   1   PU2BFG   GH64ci   9248   232   2012-11-02 09:38   HS0ZBS   28.126144   -12   0   OK03ss   5   PA0O   JO33hg   9106   323   2012-...

I did S&P  looking for goody's  not full time contest. The propagation did peak  Thursday at 10m  a bit too earl y   Just in the weekend the propagation was in a dip but still 10M sho wed  a lot activity  and good dx like KH7 X strong over longpath. N1MM  K3.  I am having more and mo re problems CAT connection is lost  with overflow error pop-up very often . Asking  to send error report almost every few minutes. T he  frequency ruler gives wild frequency's  and the inpu t field is wiped out. I experience t his problem  long time now .   I think it started since the switch   from XP / W2000 to W7 few years back although  also with XP I noticed this problem but rare.  I have n ot observed communication problems when using a normal system comport and W2 k  or XP I think I can say.  V ery an no ying  and some QSO's where lost . This did not happen often ...