Here’re my first sota trip reports. I made some mistakes and have lots to learn still, but they were great days out and I’m dead keen to do more. Most importantly, I’ve got better at radio in general - I’m much more comfortable on a microphone, I understand the flow and format of an HF contact far better. It’s very different from the datamodes I’ve been doing for years! One thing that I’ve noticed, and it probably deserves mentioning, is that the SOTA web infrastructure is some of the best I’ve seen in ham radio. Modern looking sites, coherent single sign on and services sharing data in a really clever way. I upload CSV format logs generated by my logging program, cqrlog, and the SOTA infrastructure handles them and shares them with services like sotamapping, to show me maps of my contacts. SOTA spots appear on APRS, and I can spot myself to sotwatch using APRS messages. I’m super impressed! …

I’ve been talking to Iain, MM0ROR a bit on the radio. After I persuaded him to build a 70cm version of the 1/4 wave vertical antenna I built earlier this year, I helped him test it on the radio tonight from my new /m setup. Initially I drove to the picturesque Aberdeen Beach, then the less pretty 57North Hacklab, and finally I took the long road to the very lovely Balmedie Beach, and for the bulk of the drive nattered away to Iain about nonsense and radios. …

This post is part of [tj]’s blog more in June challenge. You should join us and take part - just make 4 posts in June! As part of the general move to do more radio / do radio in a field, I’ve been doing radio in a field instead of preparing for it. This laptop was first set up and somewhat extensively tested at home, and then used in the field to prove it worked. …

This post is part of [tj]’s blog more in June challenge. You should join us and take part - just make 4 posts in June! As part of the general move to do more radio / do radio in a field, I’ve been doing radio in a field instead of preparing for it. Here’s a breakdown of the portable station, and what I’ve been doing with it. Radio My Radio is a Yaesu FT-891. …

This post is part of [tj]’s blog more in June challenge. You should join us and take part - just make 4 posts in June! As part of the general move to do more radio / do radio in a field, I’m configuring a raspberry pi to be a permanent companion to my radio. One challenge of the pi is the lack of any human interface equipment. In the past I’ve used 5" waveshare touchscreens and more fo amateur radio on a pi, but they just don’t cut it. …