Busy Time of Year

Busy day for me today and yesterday.
Yesterday I was hoping to work some DX and spend to time doing everything Ham Related.
Well, that did not happen.
Today was spent Christmas shopping. Got it all done, except for me.
I just wrote a short review on the FT-897-D this afternoon on the Radio Reference web.site.
I also joined the North American QRP CW Club last week, I'm NAQCC # 5102.

I'm hoping to get some radio time this weekend. Hope to hear you on the bands.
Remember, you can follow me on twitter.

My Week So Far

Wow, the week is flying by. We got about 4 inches of snow today. I was hoping to spend time working DX and time on the computer. Neither has happen. I got my Vibroplex Iambic Deluxe today. I have not done anything with it other than look at it and show the wife and kids.
I imagine that I will make the adjustments and get it on the air tomorrow.

Stay tuned for updates and photos.

Sunday Football

A guy took his blond girlfriend to her first football game. They had great seats right behind their team's bench. After the game, he asked her how she liked the experience.

'Oh, I really liked it,' she replied, 'especially the tight pants and all the big muscles, but I just couldn't understand why they were killing each other over 25 cents.'

Dumbfounded, her date asked, 'What do you mean?'

'Well, they flipped a coin, one team got it and then for the rest of the game, all they kept screaming was: 'Get the quarterback! Get the quarterback!' I'm like...Helloooooo? It's only 25 cents!!!!

New Toy ordered

I ordered a Vibroplex Iambic Deluxe today.
I am hoping to see it before December third.
Here are some of the e-Ham reviews I read. click here
I also talked to several hams before my purchase. What do I have to loose? I am new to CW.

Thanksgiving 2010

As we sit down with family and friends this Thanksgiving, I pray that we all remember those less fortunate and include them in our prayers and well wishes.

BETA ANGLE

I was on a net and we were talking about Satellites, ISS and the Space Shuttle. The topic came up about the Beta Angle Cutout. Here is some info.
The beta angle is a value that is used most notably in spaceflight. The beta angle determines the percentage of time an object such as a spacecraft in low Earth orbit (LEO) spends in direct sunlight, absorbing solar energy. Beta angle is defined as the angle between the orbit plane and the vector from the sun (which direction the sun is shining from).The beta angle is the smaller angle (there are two angles) between the sun vector (where the sun is shining from in the sky) and the plane of the object's orbit. Note that the beta angle does not define a unique orbit plane; all satellites in orbit with a given beta angle at a given altitude have the same exposure to the sun, even though they may be orbiting in completely different planes around the Earth.The beta angle varies between +90° and -90°, and the direction the satellite revolves around the body it orbits determines whether the beta angle sign is positive or negative. An imaginary observer standing on the sun defines a beta angle as positive if the satellite in question orbits in a counter clockwise direction and negative if it revolves clockwise. The maximum amount of time that a satellite in a normal low Earth orbit mission can spend in the Earth's shadow occurs at a beta angle of zero. In such an orbit, the satellite is in sunlight no less than 59% of the time.

Launch window is a term used in spaceflight to describe a time period in which a particular launch vehicle (rocket, Space Shuttle, etc.) must be launched. If the rocket does not launch within the "window", it has to wait for the next window.^[1]

For trips into largely arbitrary Earth orbits, almost any time will do. But if the spacecraft intends to rendezvous with a space station (such as the International Space Station) or another vehicle already in an orbit, the launch must be carefully timed to occur around the times that the target vehicle's orbital plane intersects the launch site.

For launches above low Earth orbit (LEO), the actual launch time can be somewhat flexible if a parking orbit is used, because the inclination and time the spacecraft initially spends in the parking orbit can be varied. See the launch window used by the Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft to the planet Mars at [1].

To go to another planet using the simple low-energy Hohmann transfer orbit, if eccentricity of orbits is not a factor, launch windows are periodic according to the synodic period; for example, in the case of Mars the period is 2.135 years, i.e. 780 days. In more complex cases, including the use of gravitational slingshots, launch windows are irregular. Sometimes rare opportunities arise such as when Voyager 2 took advantage of 175 year planetary alignment (launch window) to visit Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. When such an opportunity is missed, another target may be selected. For example, the Rosetta mission of ESA was originally intended for comet 46P/Wirtanen, but a launcher problem delayed it and a new target had to be selected (comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko).

Launch windows are often calculated from porkchop plots that show the delta-v needed to achieve the mission, plotted against the launch time.

NASA's Humanoid Robot Gets Ready for Launch

NASA: ISS Beta Angle

International Space Station

Low Earth Orbit

Collision avoidance

Delta-v budget

Interplanetary travel

Oberth effect

Monday, Nov. 22

I went to a survivalist seminar this last weekend. Wow, did I learn a bunch, everything from food storage, food preparation, clothing, hunting, how to survive in hot and cold climates, how to do and survive just about everything.
Out of the 75 of those in attendance I was the only armature radio operator.
Other than that I am studying for my Extra Class License and also teaching myself Morse code.
I knew it once and due to the lack of using it I lost it.
I am using the G4FON Morse Code Trainer.
Doing pretty good so far, my goal is to get my upgrade before spring 2011 and make some quality CW contacts by the same date.

National Bible Week

This week is National Bible Week, National Bible Week has been celebrated the week of Thanksgiving every year since 1941.

http://www.nationalbible.org/

Week Ahead

Look at all the contest this week. I might try the Worldwide DX. Then again I rather just log contacts in the book.

ARRL Sweepstakes Contest, SSB	Nov 20-22
NA Collegiate ARC Championship, SSB	Nov 20-22
Run for the Bacon QRP Contest	Nov 22
SKCC Sprint	Nov 24
QRP Fox Hunt	Nov 24
RSGB 80m Club Sprint, CW	Nov 24
QRP Fox Hunt	Nov 26
NCCC Sprint	Nov 26
CQ Worldwide DX Contest, CW	Nov 27-28

Morse Code Music.

This is pretty cool.I'm sure many of you have seen this already. I did a few years ago.
Enjoy; Beethoven Morse Code

Water Antenna

Looks like another weekend project to play with.

KD8BIG

Wow, what a fast 2 weeks since my last post. I have been gone due to illness. I hope to be back into the swing of things very soon. Thanks for stopping by.

UHFSDR Kit

Here it is. Another winter project. This was e-mailed to me by a few anonymous readers. So I had to do some tracking to find the source. Credit to Andrew Sparky and WB6DHW

The UHFSDR is a Software Defined Transceiver covering the 1.75 MHz to 700 MHz frequency range. A Si570 is used for frequency control. Two LVPECL 4 GHz max.flip flops produce I and Q LO signals at 1/2 the Si570 frequency. A pair of 1-1000MHz Double Balanced Mixers are used to convert signals to and from base band.

A receiver pre-amp (2dB noise figure) and a transmit pre-amp(50mW max output) are provided as well as antennal switching plus provision for separate receive and transmit connections.

For additional information, download the Assembly Manual.
The BOM, schematic, and board layout are Here.
A HiRes(3.7MByte.) picture of the completed board is Here

Link to WD6DHW’s Website

Marshall Headphones

Not Ham related, but cool indeed. Having been a guitar player for 35 years I think this is pretty cool. I know many hams who also have battles with the six string axe.

----------------------------------------------------

Everyone knows that you can't really get that full live rock and roll experience without shoving your head against the amp. That said, sometimes it's hard to find a nearby Marshall stack--like, say, when you're at the office or on the subway.

These new Marhsall-branded headphones may be the next thing. At the very least, they sort of look like a pair of amps strapped to the sides of your head.

"These headphones are conceived from Marshall's time-tested fundamentals of performance and endurance, designed to thrive on daily use and to render music the way it was meant to sound, no matter what your flavor is," the company writes in a press release. "The greatest of effort has also been put into the aesthetics, making the headphones ooze of that iconic Marshall look."

If you don't mind a little oozing next to your ears, these things look downright snazzy. Well, at least wall two inches of what we've seen thus far.

350,000 km Twister

Earlier today (Oct. 28th) a twisted filament of magnetism on the sun suddenly untwisted. The result was a spectacular eruption recorded in full-disk detail by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory.

Movie formats: 8 MB gif, 3 MB gif, 1.7 MB iPad, 0.7 MB iPhone

At its peak, the twister--or rather, untwister--towered more than 350,000 km above the stellar surface. It appears to have hurled a fragment of itself into space, but not toward Earth; the blast was not geoeffective.

Now that the filament has relaxed, it is unlikely to erupt again. The next blast is more likely to come from big sunspot 1117, which NOAA forecasters say could produce an M-class solar flare.

DEAD SPACECRAFT WALKING: Two NASA spacecraft that were supposed to be dead a year ago are instead flying to the Moon for a breakthrough mission in lunar orbit. The research they conduct could lead to important advances in space weather forecasting. For more information, read "Dead Spacecraft Walking" from Science@NASA.

source

I recommend SpaceWeather.com to everyone. I obtain much of my info from there site which I also have in my side bar Space Links and Sites list.