Local Ham on July DXpedition

Yuri Shushkin N3QQ of Bellingham, member of the Sudden Valley ARC,  will jointhree other Amateurs on a DXpedition to Chuginadak Island (KL7) from July 21 to July 27. Their website includes details on their trip and planned operations.  Good luck Yuri!

Surrey BC Flea Market Sunday May 25

From their club web site:

The Surrey Amateur Radio Club

Is holding it’s first flea market in 13 years, this is an AFTERNOON flea market held at the Kennedy Hall located at 87th and Scott road in Surrey on May 25th, the door open at 1:00pm for sellers and 2:00pm for buyers. There will be a Kenwood TS-930 HF radio raffled as main prize along with door prizes an a 50/50 draw.
Prices are $15 for one seller which includes a donut and coffee,
and $5.00 for buyers which includes a coffee.
For reservation call Mike VE7AT at (604) 595 3598.
Thank You!

Sudden Valley Exam Results

Thank you Ron W7RE, Stan N7OC, Rodger KK7LKand Perry W7CDC for helping me with my first ARRL-VEC exam session Saturday May 10th at the Sudden Valley fire station.  It is a challenge to keep all of the paper work straight and I very much appreciate your help.  Thanks also to SVARC and to Whatcom Fire Dist 2 for their accommodation.

We had eight people take ten exams, resulting in five new Technician licensees and one General class upgrade.

Sudden Valley Tech Class Cancelled

The Technician Class scheduled for May 3 and 10 at Sudden Valley have been cancelled.  There will likely be another class scheduled at a future date which will be announced here.  The volunteer exam scheduled for 1530 on the 10th at the Sudden Valley fire station WILL BE HELD AS PLANNED.

ICS 100/ NIMS 700 Training April 19 Pt. Roberts

This is short notice but I just received the info.  There are a few openings left for a ICS-100/700 class at Point Roberts Saturday April 19 from 9-5. The class is organized by the Medical Reserve Corps but is open to RACES/ARES members and there is no fee.  If you are interested, send me an email and I will forward the contact info for the coordinator.

Ham Classes and Exam Notices

I added a link to the banner called “CLASSES & EXAMS” that will bring up a list of upcoming Amateur Radio license classes and exams. I have taken on the job of being the Contact Person / Session Manager / Team Liaison for ARRL-VEC exams that we will be giving at the end of scheduled license classes.  These exams are not replacing the W5YI-VEC tests that are given in Ferndale every other month by W5NYT.  Due to space restrictions, some exams may require pre-registration and not allow “walk in” testers.  All of this information will be posted on the page. There will be a Tech class in Sudden Valley on May 3 and 10 with the exam given on the 10th at the end of class. Details on the class & Exam page.

If you have a VE testing team in the region or are holding your own classes and would like to have the information posted on this site, please send me an email with the details.

-KNØN

MBARC to Host Open House

The next monthly meeting of the Mount Baker Amateur Radio Club will be a special “Open House” for all area Amateurs. The MBARC website has a map to the “Tillicum House” at Pioneer Park in Ferndale, WA where the open house will begin at 7pm on Tuesday April 8th.  The program that night will be a presentation on HF aircraft communications by Bill Day, KI7BW.  Refreshments will be served and door prizes given.  Please plan on attending.

First Impressions: iCOM-2200H / UT-118 D-Star Rig

My Foray into D-Star

After month of hearing just how cool this new D-Star thing is from the other folks in the area that have been using the mode, I finally took the plunge.  I decided to go with the iCOM IC-2200H 2 meter single band FM radio with the UT-118 digital D-Star board option.  Cost delivered from HRO was $349.94 before a $20 rebate from iCOM. I do not intend this in any way to be a complete review of the 2200H.  I have not even made an FM contact with this radio, and may never use it in that mode.

Why the IC-2200H?  I ruled out the handhelds because I wanted the power and rugged build. The 2820 is the current flagship VHF/UHF D-Star rig but it has a price tag to match and while it is a true duplex dual-bander, it can only encode/decode a single D-Star data stream.  For example, you could simultaneously monitor a QSO on VHF and a QSO on UHF in FM, but only a single D-Star QSO.  The ID-800 is dual band but in my eyes, adding UHF capability was not worth a near doubling in price over the 2200H/UT118.

Going the money saving, single band route also has a cost in somewhat less ease of use and limited memory for D-Star programming.  The display is a segmented type rather than the beautiful and informative matrix on the 2820.  Much of the information tagged to D-Star that adds to the “cool factor” can only be retrieved by digging down through menus.  In terms of D-Star voice and data RF communication however, this lower cost unit does everything its big brothers can do (on VHF only).  I will leave the technical details of D-Star to other resources, but I will clarify the limited memory issue on the 2200H/UT118.  There is memory storage for 207 channels, but these channels, when storing D-Star information, can contain one each of six “Your Call”, Repeater 1” , and “Repeater 2” call signs.  The 2820 has around 500 memories that can draw upon 60 each of the call groups.

So, there is a reason that this is a lower priced radio, but to me it is worth the trade-off.  I am technically oriented and not afraid to dig though the menus.  I also will probably eventually own a more capable D-Star radio, but after seeing the slow speed data application I knew that I would want a radio dedicated to that task and this 2200H will eventually take on that sole role.

iCOM does not sell the IC-2200H with the D-Star UT-118 module installed, but it is a very simple task.  I am going to show you in the following pictures.  Step one, remove the large selector knob (it is friction fit, just pull it off). Next remove the two screws on either side of the front panel with an Allen wrench (one was hidden behind the knob).  Gently pull the front away from the body of the radio a couple of inches.  Mind the ribbon cable mating the two pieces and do not unplug it.  The first picture is the IC-200H with the front panel removed.  The UT-118 board is wrapped in plastic next to the quarter for scale.

 

Lay the front piece display down and you will see a cream colored connector on the circuit board that is the receptacle for the UT-118.  If you are not wearing a grounding strap, be sure to touch a grounded object to discharge any static before you handle the circuit boards.

 

Plug the UT-118 board in to the receptacle.

 

Replace the front panel, minding that the ribbon connectors are tucked between the devices and not pinched.  Replace the screws and knob.  Done!  There are no jumpers or menu settings; D-Star is now ready to go.  The IC-2200H is pictured on top of my Yaesu FT-8900.

 

I was able make the required entries and have a D-Star QSO on the first try; despite the complexity of the manual and the menu system (the manual is 92 pages by the way, only about 30 pages shy of the 2820’s).  I had built a cable before my radio arrived for use with the slow speed data.  The required cable is three conductors; Rx data, Tx data and ground with a female 9 pin “D” serial plug on one end and a 2.5 mm “micro” three pole (stereo) plug on the other.  The radio speaks RS-232 levels, so no circuitry is needed to match.  Just plug it in to your PC serial port and start communicating with D-Chat or D-Rats.  I had one revelation in using the low speed text capability.  It is effortless to go from typing short messages into the data system to picking up the microphone and talking.  The radio will queue the data and send it during pauses in the voice activity.  If there is not heavy message traffic (sending files) one frequency is very usable for both voice and data.  Very neat.

When you get your D-Star radio, look on 145.100 (Simplex) for the local activity.  I am using a discone antenna at 20 feet and I can make the Surrey BC D-Star repeater easily with 10 watts from Silver Beach.  I forgot to mention that the IC-2200H can deliver 65 Watts, switchable to 25, 10, or 5 watts and the case is fanless with a lot of heat sink fins designed into the case.  The unit did get fairly hot during my use, even at 25 watts.

A note on audio quality: I did not comment on the audio in my first draft because I was already familiar with it from past use of the mode.  The audio from a digital voice signal is decidedly “digital”.  It has a kind of mechanical quality that is a result of changing the human voice into a 2400 bps data stream and back again (no small task by the way).  Voices are very recognizable in terms of knowing who you are talking to, and are”bright”, clear and readable.  It is not as pleasant to listen to as FM, to be sure, but it absolutely gets the message across.  Although the difference is not as pronounced as that between AM and SSB, that will give an idea of the trade-off in audio quality for narrower bandwidth albeit a sharper more readable signal at marginal strengths.

-KNØN

Delta ARC Hosts Whatcom Co Amateurs

Wednesday February 13, 2008 – Surrey, B.C.  Whatcom County Radio Amateurs Perry W7CDC, Yuri N3QQ, Mike W7SSO and myself KNØN paid a visit to our friends north of the border today.  Our hosts were Gord VE7FKY, president of the Delta Amateur Radio Club; Bill VE7IKX, vice-president of the Delta Amateur Radio club, and Ed VE7AFC (too many titles, but active in Delta ARC, Provincial volunteer emergency services, and all around technical guru). That’s Ed in the first photo showing off the hardware.

After a stop for coffee and introductions, we were off to the 22 story condominium that is used to hold the Surrey D-Star repeater system aloft.  VE7AFC is the caretaker of the equipment, and the retired 35 year RCMP communications specialist knows his stuff.  We were treated to a hands on examination of the gear which includes a full stack of four Icom D-Star repeaters, UHF, VHF, 1.2Ghz Voice, and 1.2Ghz data; and even got a peek out the roof hatch (photo below) at the antennas and impressive visual coverage afforded by the site.  All of these fellows were very forthcoming with information and pledges of support to help us in getting our own D-Star repeaters operational.  We are going to slice a lot of the learning curve off by learning from these folks what they have done over the past two years as they have operated the first D-Star repeater installation in Canada.

 

Before making our return to the U.S. Ed arranged for us to visit and tour the Icom Canada facility (Ed does part time technical work for them, I told you he had more titles than I could remember).  Mario VA7MJF (Tech Sales) led the tour and we also met with VP & GM Jim VE7JMB, and Paul VE7PVL, as well as a number of other employees.  We felt very welcome and received open offers of support to answer any questions we had.  Personal note- I am pretty jaded when it comes to this type of encounter, but I thought these people were genuine and not making a pitch in any way.  What pleasant surprise when we wrapped up our visit and each of us was given a brand new IC-92AD D-Star handheld!

OK, I made a typing error on that last line.  Each of us got to HOLD a new IC-92AD  D-Star handheld.  Heh.. I wonder if anyone threw their monitor at the wall before going on to this paragraph.  All kidding aside, it was a good visit.  I think we made some new friends and they will be very good company on our digital adventure.

-Brian  KNØN

D-Star from your PC

(Sorry… the picture link is busted.. go to HamRadio.com to see the DV Dongle)

D-Star is coming to your computer, no radio required.  Rumor has it that the device pictured above will be available from HRO shortly for $200.  The “DV Dongle” is a hardware voice CoDec with a USB interface and software support for Windows, Apple OS, and Linux.  The device will allow intrerfacing to a D-Star data stream via the internet.

Sources: Open Dstar.org,  Illinois Digital Ham Yahoo Group, DV Dongle Tech Reference