Ham Radio/Ham Radio CD-ROM (Emerald Software) (1995).ISO/news/inham01/755

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INFO-HAMS Digest            Wed, 11 Oct 89       Volume 89 : Issue 755

Today's Topics:
                                 ARRL
                    ARRL NR 71: OSCAR 13 PROBLEMS
                            ARRL PFB NR 41
                      Heathkit SG-8 Info wanted
                         Help! SWL in Africa
             How to avoid breaking tuning slugs in coils?
                         OMEGA enlarger info
                  Sony Hi-Band opinions/info wanted
                             Water Power
                            WEFAX (2 msgs)
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: 10 Oct 89 13:47:42 GMT
From: cvman![e-mail]  (Gary Delong)
Subject: ARRL

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Tad Cook) writes:
[... deleted ...]
> If you quit the league over this, how can you influence league policy
> in the future to further your interests in microwaves?

> Tad Cook

They have proven to me that they don't care what Amateur Radio operators
within and without their orginization think.

When I was first licensed (many moons ago) I joined the ARRL primaraly
as a source of technical information on the state of the art and secondly
to try to support the advancement of amateur radio.

When I discovered that the only technical data I could get from them
was obsolete and that the ARRL was not interested in the advancement
of the state of the art, but only in holding the status quo I decided
to save my money.

I have yet to see ARRL support any advance in the state of the art.  They
only get involved in new technology when it's so old your best source of
supply is flea markets.  Witness how long it took them to "bless" SSB,
VHF, FM, UHF, SHF, PACKET, and on and on.

If it had been left to the ARRL, we'd be limited to AM & CW at 20 meters
and below.  (with no provisions above 20 mtrs) Witness "Incentive Licensing"
where the primary benifit is larger CW bands.

When I think of the ARRL, I think of CW/CBers.     8-^

While there is some exaggeration in the above, I feel the ARRL does not
represent Amateur Radio operators in the US, they only represent a fraction
of their own membership.  Why should I, or anyone else, support a group
that does not support us?

73, Gary

--
  _____
 /  \    /   Gary A. Delong, N1BIP   "I am the NRA."  [e-mail]
 |   \  /    COMPUTERVISION Division                  {sun|linus}!cvbnet!gdelong
 \____\/     Prime Computer, Inc.                     [phone] x 261

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

Date: 11 Oct 89 11:46:53 GMT
From: n8emr![e-mail]  (Gary Sanders)
Subject: ARRL NR 71: OSCAR 13 PROBLEMS

==============================================================
|         Relayed from packet radio via                |
| N8EMR's Ham BBS, 614-457-4227 (1200/2400/19.2 telebit,8N1) |
==============================================================


ARRL BULLETIN NR 71  ARLB071
OCTOBER 10, 1989

ON OCTOBER 9, THE OSCAR 13 ONBOARD COMPUTER CRASHED AND SWITCHED THE
TRANSPONDER TO MODE L BEACON MODE. CURRENT SQUINT ANGLES MAKE IT
DIFFICULT TO UPLOAD THE IHU SOFTWARE. HOPEFULLY TRANSPONDER
OPERATIONS CAN RESUME THIS WEEKEND. NO TRANSPONDER OPERATION IS
ALLOWED UNTIL SPACECRAFT OPERATIONS ARE FULLY RESTORED.

STAY TUNED FOR ADDITIONAL BULLETINS FROM AMSAT DL AND W1AW FOR FURTHER
INFORMATION
--
Gary W. Sanders (gws@n8emr or ...!osu-cis!n8emr!gws), 72277,1325
N8EMR @ W8CQK (ip addr) 44.70.0.1 [Ohio AMPR address coordinator]
HAM/SWL/SCANNER BBS (1200/2400/PEP) 614-457-4227

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

Date: 11 Oct 89 11:45:53 GMT
From: n8emr![e-mail]  (Gary Sanders)
Subject: ARRL PFB NR 41

==============================================================
|         Relayed from packet radio via                |
| N8EMR's Ham BBS, 614-457-4227 (1200/2400/19.2 telebit,8N1) |
==============================================================


ARRL PFB NR 41 (ARLP041) 10/10/89

THROUGH THE LAST HALF OF SEPTEMBER AND THE FIRST WEEK OF OCTOBER THE
SOLAR FLUX WAS RUNNING MOSTLY LOWER THAN IT HAD BEEN IN EARLY
SEPTEMBER.  THIS DID NOT AFFECT PROPAGATION BADLY, AS WE ARE NOW
JUST ENTERING THE BEST PART OF THE YEAR FOR DX WORK FROM OUR PART OF
THE WORLD.

THE SOLAR FLUX RANGE OVER THE PAST FEW WEEKS HAS BEEN ABOUT RIGHT
FOR GOOD PROPAGATION ON ALL HF BANDS UP THROUGH 21 MHZ.  IF THE SUN
BEHAVES AS EXPECTED, 21 MHZ AND HIGHER BANDS, INCLUDING 50 MHZ, WILL
IMPROVE THE MOST THIS FALL.  SKIP WILL SHORTEN MARKEDLY ON THE LOWER
FREQUENCIES, A CONDITION THAT HAS MADE CONVENTIONAL HF TRAFFIC
HANDLING DIFFICULT IN THE HIGH YEARS OF PREVIOUS SOLAR CYCLES.

THE THOUSANDS OF NEWCOMERS WHO HAVE FILLED THE 282 TO 285 MHZ
PORTION OF THE 10 METER BAND RECENTLY WILL FIND IT OPEN TO ALMOST
EVERY CORNER OF THE WORLD, PARTICULARLY IN NOVEMBER AND EARLY
DECEMBER.  FOR QUITE RELIABLE INFORMATION ON WHAT FREQUENCY RANGES
TO USE FOR VARIOUS PATHS AND TIMES OF DAY, USE THE PROPAGATION
CHARTS THAT APPEAR IN EVERY EDITION OF QST.

AMERICAN SUNSPOT NUMBERS FOR SEPTEMBER 28 THROUGH NOVEMBER 4 WERE
BETWEEN 131 AND 206 WITH A MEAN OF 174.6  AR

--
Gary W. Sanders (gws@n8emr or ...!osu-cis!n8emr!gws), 72277,1325
N8EMR @ W8CQK (ip addr) 44.70.0.1 [Ohio AMPR address coordinator]
HAM/SWL/SCANNER BBS (1200/2400/PEP) 614-457-4227

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

Date: Wed, 11 Oct 89 09:51:36 EST
From: "Mike Jordan  G4ASQ" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Heathkit SG-8 Info wanted

About 6 months ago I got a Heath SG-8 rf sig. gen. from a hamfest.
When I tried it out at home, I found it didn't oscillate on the low
frequency end of the top  3 bands.  I presumed this was a low-gain
problem ( High C with the same L implies low Q &  low gain ).  The
tube was a 12AU7 twin triode.  Last week I got a replacement from
another Hamfest.  It turned out to be a 12AU7A.  Works fine on all
but the highest freq. band, where it doesn't work at all...
   Do any of you old-timers out there still have a handbook with
receiving tube data & can tell me what the difference between the
various 'flavours' of 12AU7 are?  I would also really like to get my
hands on a photocopy of the manual, or the schematic at least - so
I can see what Heath originally recommended.  Anyone willing to supply
copies pse E-mail direct - I will of course pay the costs.
Maybe I should just reduce the supply voltage & replace the triodes
with FETs - a winter project maybe...

Thanks & 73s

Mike      < JORDAN at LL.LL.MIT.EDU >

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

Date: 11 Oct 89 05:21:06 GMT
From: portal!cup.portal.com![e-mail]
Subject: Help! SWL in Africa

  Hi,
    I would like to say I'm sorry ahead of time if I am posting in the
 wrong place....

  I have a cousin who will be doing graduate studies in a rather primitive
area of Africa for 6 months starting in January.

  She is very interested in a small short-wave radio that can be used to
pick up the VOA and the BBC.  She doesn't want to DX at all, just hear
some sounds from home.
  I offered my GE World Monitor for her use, she laughed.  It is much to larg
and takes 6 "D-Size" batteries.

  What she is looking for is a small radio that will work well with Nicads
and a small solar-recharger that will allow her to listen to the VOA or
BBC every other day.

  She is willing to spend up to $250.  Can it be done?

  Many thanks,
    Steve


 .......................................................................
/  UUCP:  ucbvax!sun!portal!cup.portal.com!j_stephen_hall
/            ARPANET and INTERNET domains please use:
/            portal!j_stephen_hall%cupertino.pcc@suncom
/SYSOP: The 19th Hole (Fido 1:137/208) [phone], Sarasota, Florida
 .......................................................................

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

Date: 11 Oct 89 12:49:41 GMT
From: [e-mail]  (Brian Kantor)
Subject: How to avoid breaking tuning slugs in coils?

Back in the old days (AHHHG! OLD FART ALERT) when I was tuning up
Motorola T44 on 450 MHZ, I used to break about 1 tuning slug in 5 - I
remember being told that Moto's reconditioning program included
sloshing the radio with some sort of solvent that caused the coil form
wax to harden after a few months, locking the slug in place.  These
also were the kind of slugs that had a bronze springwire lengthwise to
ensure that they didn't vibrate out of adjustment when the radio was
shaken to death by being installed on the firewall of a concrete
mixer.

Anyway, removing the coil can (when possible) and blasting the coil
with a hair dryer to soften the wax would often loosen the slug enough
that you could get it out, then dip it into talcum powder to lubricate
it, and return it to the coil form and tweak it up.

When the slug DID break, you ran an electric drill down the center hole
of the slug, which turned it into crunchy little bits that were easy to
shake out by banging the radio on the concrete floor.

Of course, this was back in the days of real radios, before rice
rockets and the day the ARRL invented FM.  Modern ham-market stuff is a
bit less well-engineered and would probably shatter into a thousand
bits if you banged it on the garage floor.  I sure wouldn't try it with
my Kenwierd.  But then you could drive a car over a Motorola radio
without hurting it.  And they cleaned up real nice when you ran them
through the dishwasher.

The hair dryer trick works great on rice rocket radios too, but since
the Japanese manufacturers often use gobbets of wax to hold components
onto the board, you have to fit the blower with a small snout (off an
oil can, for example) to avoid total radiophonic meltdown when you're
loosening a slug to twiddle it.

Another trick is to just stick your soldering iron tip into the coil
slug for a few seconds to heat it up.

But the real trick is to use the right tuning tool.  If your
diddlestick fits the slot or hex in the slug just firmly, and doesn't
slop around, you run a much better chance of turning the slug instead
of breaking it.  I have a quiver of about 20 diddlesticks and I still
occasionally run into slugs that I don't have the right one for.  Most
hams are cheapshitbastards, but spending $10-$20 on an assortment of
good quality diddlesticks is one of those investments you'll always
regret not having made.

Assuming you're not afraid to take the covers off and work on your own
equipment, of course.  I wonder how many hams have even LOOKED inside
their radios?
    - Brian

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

Date: 10 Oct 89 15:16:56 GMT
From: rti!tijc02![e-mail]  (John Leroy )
Subject: OMEGA enlarger info

My wife and I have obtained a used OMEGA enlarger at a swapfest,
she to make black and white prints, myself to make contact prints
of circuit board layouts. But the thing is partially disassembled,
and there's no manual. It's a model B-22 enlarger, s/n 848815.
It says SIMON OMEGA, Woodside, NY 11377 on the nameplate, but a
call to directory assistance yields no number. Anyone out there
have a manual or know where I can obtain one? Thanks!

John
...mcnc!rti!tijc02!jkl141

--

        -John LeRoy

Packet Radio:     WA4VLV @ WX4S
Compuserve: 74136,401
UUCP:   rti!tijc02!jkl141
Phone: [phone]

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

Date: Wed, 11 Oct 89 08:09:42 MDT
From: [e-mail] (Jim Kirkpatrick)
Subject: Sony Hi-Band opinions/info wanted

A friend was recently in a store where he saw a Sony Hi-Band, S/W AM/FM
hand-held receiver.  I tried looking through all of 1989's Info-HAMS to
no avail, so unless this is in fact also known by some other designation,
I'd like to solicit any opinions and/or info on this unit.  E-mail to me
and I'll summarize later.  Thanks in advance.

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

Date: Wed, 11 Oct 89 08:45:15 EST
From: bill gunshannon <[e-mail]>
Subject: Water Power

Back in my youth I got interested in water power after reading an article
in Popular Science (remember when that was a high tech rag).
They explained the whole thing from start to finish including giving the
addresses of companies that sold smal Hydro-Electric generators.
It wasn't till much later that I learned why no one does it.  It seems that
there is not enough flow or control in a free running stream, hence the
reason for things like Boulder Dam.  And that of course brings up the major
stumbling block.
It seems there is this real estate law called riparian (sp) rights which
says you can't block or impede the flow of any stream or body of water that
flows thru your property.  Kind of puts the skids to any kind of private
hydro generating station.  I have had it explained to me by local authorities
that even putting a water wheel into the streem can be construed as "impeding
the flow".  That may vary from locallity-to-locallity but at least here, I
probably could not legally generate my own electricity using water.

And of course, wind power is a whole new ball game.  You thought your
neighbors hated the sight of your antenna. :-) :-) :-)

bill gunshannon     KB3YV
[e-mail]

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

Date: 10 Oct 89 18:48:10 GMT
From: mintaka!oliveb!pyramid!infmx![e-mail]  (Marc Kenig)
Subject: WEFAX

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Bob Maccione) writes:
>I'm trying to get information on picking up weather maps on the HF band,
>what i'd like to do is either dump them to a printer or just store them
>in my computer....
>
>Thanks in advance for any help  --- ( no flames, i'm new at HAM )
>
Since this is an oft asked question I am posting my oft-sent answer
about the vritues of PC HF Facsimile from Software Systems Consulting.
I have no connection with this company, I'm just a satisfied customer.

PC HF FACSIMILE 4.0 is a $99.00 IBM-PC compatible hardware/software package.
For your money you get a demodulator (an RS232 hood with wires ending in a
mini-phone plug), a disk containing capture program, a manual, and a
tutorial cassette.

>From my experience it works very well. The Demodulator attaches and is
powered by the PC's serial port.  Installation involves plugging it into
the radio and the PC.  Dead simple (assuming you have a serial port).
The software must be customized for your PC.  You have to chose which
flavor graphics adaptor you have (CGA, EGA, VGA, etc).  You must also
define timing parameters depending on you PC's clocking - this is the
trickiest part I found.

The program allows color or B&W reception of 60/120/180/240 LPM fax.
It includes a rudimentary tuning scope display which allows you to
set Black and White signal levels.  You can zoom, pan, reverse video fax
images. You can save and load from disk, and there is an unattended mode
which allows you to specify a template file name to which subsequent
faxes will be sent (each has a version number appended to the root file
name).  The program supports Epson printers and HP laser jets for output,
and there is a conversion program included which allows you to change
stored faxes to some PC graphics file format or other.

The manual is quite good and has a reasonable listing of WEFAX freqs.
The tutorial cassette is OK if you don't know what a fax broadcast
sounds like, but you can't capture images off tape, so it's useless for
setup.

I use this package with my Sony 2010 & get good results, *suprise* (with
an active antenna).  I can get WEFAX from Pt. Reyes (shooting ducks in
a barrel), Hawaii and Virginia *acceptably*.  I do wish I had a better
radio and antenna, since you can't expect much from FAX DXing under the
best circumstances.  You need to shield the radio from the computer as
much as possible and connect them to a common ground to reduce noise
from the computer degrading transission.  I've logged Japanese newspapers
and even a NX wire pic (barely), using the other modes.

I don't expect this package will stand up against the like of a PK-232,
but hey, it's 1/3 the price and if you just want WX maps, it'll do.
For info contact:

   Software Systems Consulting, 1303 S. Ola Vista, San Clemente, CA 92672
   [phone]

Spend the money you save on getting a better radio :-) and an antenna tuner,
you'll really need it.

Marc Kenig
VMS Engineering Manager
Informix Software, Inc.
...!pyramid!infmx!marc
*beeeeeeeeeeeeep*
This has been a test of the Emergency Personal Opinion Broadcasting System.
By voluntary cooperation of Usenet machines in your area, this mindless drivel
has been propogated throughout the world.  Had you wanted an actual opinion,
you would have been advised to tune into the marketing hype of my employer.
We now resume normal drivel, already in progress.

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

Date: 11 Oct 89 13:29:57 GMT
From: att!cbnewsj![e-mail]  (john.ferro..jr)
Subject: WEFAX

You might want to try a fax package from a place in California called
Software Systems Consulting. I do not have their number or address at
present but it can be found in Popular Communications magazine. For about
$100.00 you get software, demodulator and instructions. The package will
run with IBM PC, XT, AT or truly IBM compatible machines.

                                             Have Fun,

                                            MTX5D!JJF

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

End of INFO-HAMS Digest V89 Issue #755
**************************************