The Newsletter of the Livingston Amateur Radio Klub (LARK) Howell, Michigan
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The LED The newsletter of the Livingston Amateur Radio Klub (LARK) Howell, Michigan February 2019 Who 8 Darrell’s Spicy Bacon W8DSB Good morning all LARK members! Let's talk about the hotspots which many members built. Now that all our hotspots are up and running, there are a few things to make them work a little better. First, backup the configuration in case something goes sideways. The SD cards in the hot spots are 16GB. The image by default is only using 4GB of it. You can expand the working space by going into the Configuration | Expert | SSH Access then run “SUDO pistar-expand” then “SUDO reboot”. Once it reboots, the system will have more memory to use, therefore making it faster. The SD card provided to you is a “Class 10” rated card, which mean a minimum guaranteed read / write of 10 mb/s. If you replace the card with a faster card the speed it takes to boot up and cache data will be faster. See the chart below: I used a program named “CheckFlash” to test 17 SD cards. Two (2) cards (Samsung and PNY) failed to hold minimum speed. Most of the cards passed all about the same between 17mb/s and 18mb/s. No matter what brand or what markings Class 10 and/or U1 all the cards passed using a smart pattern written to and read from the cards. In order to see a noticeable speed difference in your hotspot, we found that using the best grade of a U1 or any U3 SD cards decreases your boot time from ~3 minutes to ~35 seconds. Another upgrade can be done by adjusting the BER so that your HT and your hotspot are on the same frequency. It’s not enough to type in 434.300 on the hotspot and 434.300 on the radio. When you look at the two on a scope you will see they are not on the same frequency. Adjust the offset - Configuration | Expert | MMVDMHost RXOffset and TXOffset (should be the same) until the BER is at its lowest when operating on DMR. This is fine tuning the frequency of the hotspot to match the radio more closely, allowing for more efficient operations. -3000 to 3000 is an allowable range. Yes, you are matching one radio to one hotspot. If you have more than one radio sometimes you have to find middle ground so you have a low BER on two or more radios. Hope you having fun with your Hotspot. Darrell, W8DSB Editorial Last month's LED prompted a comment by Rod KI8A about my article about working a 5Z4 cross mode when I was a novice. He mentioned that he could relate to the article since he had the same experiences working DX while being “rock bound” as a novice, meaning having to use crystal control when transmitting. Back then, working any DX was really a thrill. I replied to Rod that I had difficulty relating to those hams who have never owned an HF rig, and therefore could never understand just how much fun it was working DX under novice conditions. Many of those guys and gals just had their walkie talkies and that was it. Having given it some thought, I think that I must explain a bit more. Ham radio is a hobby with dozens of facets. What is pleasurable to me is not necessarily going to be pleasurable to those hams who take immense pride in being able to work moonbounce, or are able to design and build state of the art receivers, or who work microwave using portable gear on top of big hills or mountains. I don't pass traffic, but I know others do, and devote much time and effort every day in organized, structured traffic nets. Thanks to Darrell, W8DSB, I am now getting pretty eager to explore my DMR walkie talkie and hotspot, while he runs rings around the digital community using all sorts of modes. I do miss driving to work and yakking with the same group on the local repeater every morning (I do NOT miss the work part), and I know there are hams who only talk on the local repeater. In fact, there are hams who only own a walkie talkie and live in an apartment building or condo, and talking on their local repeater is the only way they enjoy the hobby. I would love to work through satellites. I would like to get a bit more experience in digital modes. I would like to go on another DXpedition (maybe just a simple one--I like air conditioning). I would really enjoy taking classes in electronics. I wish I knew just how DMR and associated modes really worked (although I am trying to). For that matter I would really like to know how computers really worked, but I fear that is beyond my humble abilities. I envy guys who can diagnose and fix radios. My point is that ham radio casts a wide net. Folks have interests in the ham kingdom that I don't have and don't have any interest in working DX like I do. But when I talk about working DX as a novice, I think that relates to a lot of guys who came up in the hobby during the same era, and can appreciate our common experiences, like burning up transmitters, melting coax, dropping and breaking tubes, soldering across a bridge or two, or the ultimate fun (?) of turning on something you think you have fixed and hearing the POP and sizzle and smelling the smoke. But I definitely recognize the guys and gals who are going to inherit this culture and who don't give a hoot about chatting with someone in the Ukraine on CW. I hope that they get as much fun out of whatever aspect of the hobby they like as I have. I don't think that any of us ought to sit around and stagnate, however. Getting a license is easier today than it ever has been. But a first license just means that you have a ticket to get into the arena. Once you walk through that door, anything goes, but don't just sit in your seat, get out there and start the ball rolling in some direction! Some of you may be more on the “operating” side and others will be leaning towards the “geeky” side. Either way, keep learning and trying stuff. Use the hobby to develop your own interests, and keep at it. Tom Auth KT8Y, LED editor Lafayette Explor-Air KT-135 Many hams of my era will remember the Lafayette Radio Electronics Corporation, which sold electronic gear, including some ham gear, from 1952-1981. My dad took me to a Lafayette Radio store in the Washington, DC suburbs a couple of times, when I was just beginning to get into shortwave radio, and I thought the store was great. I had a Lafayette Radio catalog which I paged through much more frequently then any other reading material I owned. My dad also bought me an Explor-Air model KT-135 when I must have been about 13 years old. I recall that I was never able to get the damn thing to work, but putting it together was my first foray into soldering, and no doubt my inexperience was the reason. I don't know what became of my original KT-135, (it disappeared from my home after I left for law school) but I am now the proud owner of a couple of these radios bought on Ebay, which I plan to restore. I ran across a website of a guy who went all-out to restore one of these regenerative receivers, and his final version looks great. See the photo above. His name is Mike Simpson, his novice callsign was WN3QQE, and his website is www.analogdial.com, and I encourage anyone interested in how to do a restoration of old equipment to visit his unique site. All photos in this article are taken from it. Ham shack of WN3QQE in 1971 with a KT-135 The KT-135 was a regenerative receiver and unbeknownst to me it had a “hot” chassis which would knock you over or worse if you didn't watch out. Edwin Armstrong invented the regenerative receiver in 1912. See the diagram above, reprinted with permission; January 2002 QST; copyright ARRL Prior to that invention, amateurs used Lee De Forest's Audion circuit, which today would be a grid leak detector. Armstrong modified that circuit as shown above. The Explor-Air was going for $22.95 as a kit in 1968. I have seen Ebay prices over $100 for KT-135's today. The fact that I couldn't get my KT-135 to work discouraged me for awhile, but I finally faced up to the fact that my soldering stunk, so I wound up buying a Hallicrafters S-120 shortwave receiver, and that started me in my SWL and ham radio career. More on that later. In the meantime, my soldering has improved. If any LARK member has an interest in building a small regenerative receiver, take a look at the article in the September 2000 ,QST, page 61, entitled A Simple Regen Radio for Beginners, by Charles Kitchin, N1TEV. I have built that radio and it worked! See me if you need any information on getting it assembled. Submitted by Tom KT8Y DMR Radio in the LARK As most of you probably have heard, the LARK has invested in a Digital Repeater which is in the process of getting its final elements to put it in full use.