tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-266756832024-03-13T15:55:28.733+00:00g0hww.blogA blog by a radio ham and beardy computer geek.g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.comBlogger67125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-41965147393831324402022-01-17T21:29:00.007+00:002022-01-18T14:34:32.853+00:00Calculating the circumference of the earth using timing analysis of the blast waves from the Tonga eruption arriving in Coventry, UK.<h1 style="text-align: left;"></h1><p>Whilst watching a youtube video containing satellite imagery of the Tonga eruption, I wondered if our weather station had detected the blast wave. It had, with a transient occurring at around 18:44UTC. I mentioned this to EI7IG. He confirmed seeing the same thing, but also pointed out that there was a 2nd transient at around 01:44UTC the next day.</p><p>I did some quick spreadsheeting in Libre Offic Calc and managed to calculate the circumference of the earth to be 39427 km, within 1.53% of the average nominal value of 40041 km.</p><p>I ended up using a value for the speed of sound of 303.1 m/s, which is good for 30,000ft (9144m) aMSL. I thought that if airliners like to fly at that sort of altitude, then air might like to do the same thing.<br /></p><p></p><p>You can see the data from my weather station on <a href="https://www.wunderground.com/dashboard/pws/ICOVEN51/graph/2022-01-15/2022-01-15/daily" target="_blank">wunderground</a>.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhxu24uMwoP1t_Zz6TxPqWsEQ1S9AbIKEzXdojqgC5_howO6xz6zwFNJS6sO1S4oMS1D5HBkAKZ9-iNBoF3B_YQL_G34f-hJHoRyaXMHEy-hBa07OJGff9sgOmWnIysTjvZPCa9iiSu7VB7DJ_x3E2tWjLZUFzMB5pT1_IOuSQUahfyMbp5VQ=s749" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="603" data-original-width="749" height="258" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhxu24uMwoP1t_Zz6TxPqWsEQ1S9AbIKEzXdojqgC5_howO6xz6zwFNJS6sO1S4oMS1D5HBkAKZ9-iNBoF3B_YQL_G34f-hJHoRyaXMHEy-hBa07OJGff9sgOmWnIysTjvZPCa9iiSu7VB7DJ_x3E2tWjLZUFzMB5pT1_IOuSQUahfyMbp5VQ=s320" width="320" /></a></div><br /><p>Updated, as I initially based my calcs on a t2 of 02:00 UTC on the 16th Jan, but it really does look more like 01:44 UTC as the beginning of the transient. I also changed the title from "TDOA analysis" to "timing analysis" as TDOA implies multilateration to determine the location of the source, and we already know that.<br /></p>g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-4215181927946912042015-04-20T22:33:00.003+01:002015-05-01T17:34:23.342+01:00FSQCall on 60m<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I've been playing around a little with <a href="http://www.qsl.net/zl1bpu/MFSK/FSQweb.htm" target="_blank">FSQCall</a> on Linux. It runs fine under wine, although I've never tried using the CAT control as I used vox via a G4ZLP soundcard interface with my KX3.<br />
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The only real issue I faced was a problem with the display of the RTF formatted help text on the Rules and Syntax pages, which showed the raw RTF markup.<br />
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I thought winetricks might provide a solution and I was right. Rather than fiddling around I went straight for the scattergun approach and installed all of the packages that mentioned RichEdit, as shown in the picture below.<br />
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This fixed the issue. The only other UI quirk is the brightness slider, which is apparently falling back to a basic widget rather than one that matches the rest of the UI. There might be a winetricks solution for this too, but I've not bothered looking for that yet. Another minor oddity is that two audio sinks and sources show up in pavucontrol for each running instance of FSQCall. I set them both to the same device (or null sink). This is a minor irritation as I have so many sound devices that having pointless ones in the lists marginally complicates the chore of manually assigning audio inputs and outputs.<br />
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I've worked a few european stations on 30m (10.144MHz dial) and 40m (7.044MHz dial), but have gravitated towards operation on 60m, where the de facto spot seems to be a dial frequency of 5.3675MHz. The nice thing about this spot is that the main spot for Olivia, 5.3680MHz, fits in the receiver passband below the FSQ waveform, as long as the Olivia users aren't running wider than 500Hz.<br />
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There are presently two variants of FSQCall. The US version is the one I
find most interesting, as it offers features for message relaying, and
has slightly more right-click context menu entries. The ZL version provides an image transmission scheme. The picture below was my first attempt at receiving an image from GW8ARR.<br />
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Some have noted on 60m that FSQCall isn't as robust as Olivia, and I would tend to agree. Perhaps a little FEC would cut down some the errors. I don't really think of FSQCall as a QSO mode though. It seems more like an IRC for HF, suitable for chatting.<br />
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There are presently two variants of FSQCall. The US version is the one I
find most interesting, as it offers features for message relaying, and
has slightly more right-click context menu entries. The ZL version provides an image transmission scheme.<br />
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I have 2 pieces of advice for new FSQCalll users:<br />
<ol>
<li>Always enter your callsign in lower case. The modem is optimised for this, and the SELCAL is case-sensitive, so other users will know that you didn't RTFM before trying it, even after you subsequently edit your callsign, as they will see both versions in their heard list. </li>
<li>If you adjust your receivers pass-band filter, you will notice that the SNR meter varies. With a pass-band width of 500Hz, it will show about 0dB SNR on background noise. You need to click in the SNR meter to set the squelch level just above the background noise level, for two reasons. Firstly, to squelch the modem and supress spurious characters and secondly, to let the CSMA-like channel access mechanism do its job properly in SELCAL mode. If you don't set the squelch threshold appropriately, you will find that you cannot transmit.</li>
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<br />I've not been on 60m for a few days now, as there has been a new addition to the shack, in the form of an ANAN-100D. It's arrival has been highly disruptive and has caused a significant refactoring of the distributed shack architecture here. More on that subject to follow. First impressions are however, very positive, even without resorting to running Windows software.<br />
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<br />g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-26281076254518319692015-03-10T23:30:00.000+00:002015-03-11T00:12:59.818+00:00First contact on 60m and the meaning of QSW?<span style="font-family: inherit;">I have just made my first JT-65 contact on 60m with <a href="http://www.qrz.com/db/LZ2FP">Alexandar, LZ2FP</a> and there was some panic here when I realised where the UK band segment edge actually was. Alex was calling CQ with the low edge of his signal on 5.358097MHz and that UK band segment is from 5.354MHz to 5.358MHz.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">It pays to remember these things! If you forget, the latest band plans are <a href="https://thersgb.org/services/bandplans/html/rsgb_band_plan_jan_2015.htm">here</a>.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">After a little while (spent facepalming at my ineptitude) I managed to coax Alex down to 5.357800MHz by sending "WORK SPLIT?" and we made the contact.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Whilst sending "WORK SPLIT" via JT-65 I had more than enough to time to visit <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Q_code">wikipedia</a> and discover that sending "QSW?" would have probably been more conventional:</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;">QSW? -
Will you send on this frequency?</span></span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">My KXPA100 has arrived
and is working nicely. I needed a few more watts of grunt to
compensate for my somewhat short transmitting antenna. Happy days!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">I've only just noticed that it took nearly half an hour to make that QSO! Still, I find it best not to rush things.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Update: <a href="https://g0isw.wordpress.com/2014/02/05/jt65-data-mode-activity-within-uk-5-mhz-band/"><span style="font-family: inherit;"></span></a></span></span><a href="https://g0isw.wordpress.com/2014/02/05/jt65-data-mode-activity-within-uk-5-mhz-band/">Philip, G0ISW, has a nice article about doing this the right way.</a><a href="https://www.blogger.com/null"> </a><br />
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g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-63173033142327399922015-02-17T21:05:00.001+00:002015-02-17T21:13:06.487+00:00Rx antenna switching with the KX3, Wellbrook Loop and a modified MFJ-1707My new Wellbrook ALA1530PE receiving loop has been performing very nicely, feeding my KX3 and FCD-Pro+ though a combiner, but so far I have been carefully avoiding any transmitting in order to avoid destroying the loop amp and SDR dongle.<br />
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I procured an MFJ-1707 thinking that this might be a reasonable solution, as it is mentioned in the RadCom article on the Wellbrook loop.<br />
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I decided to try it out with a dummy load connected as the receiving aerial, and my wire antenna as the transmitting aerial and see what happened.<br />
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With power not applied to the 1707, the KX3 was hearing through the wire antenna, as expected. With power applied to the 1707, the rig went deaf, using the dummy load for an antenna. So far so good. My plan was to use the KX3's keyline output as a control line to the 1707.<br />
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I had also purchased an Elecraft KX3-PCKT cable set for the KX3, so I had the ACC2 module which allowed me to use a mono phono cable to hook up the KX3's keyline output to the 1707 directly.<br />
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However, when I connected it to the powered 1707, the relay in the 1707 de-energised immediately, switching back to the transmit antenna despite the fact that the KX3 was not transmitting. I puzzled over this for a bit, and then got out my DVM. Sure enough, the centre of the phono socket on the ACC2 module measured 0V with respect to the 13.8VDC supply line whether the KX3 was transmitting or not. This had me confused.<br />
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I started to wonder about writing to the Elecraft list to ask about this, but then I began to fiddle with the ACC2 IO setting in the menu. I wondered if I could set up a physical transmitter inhibit interlock. I quickly bodged together a 3.5 mm mono jack plug wired as a short and confirmed that it would enable the transmitter inhibit function. I went back to check the status of the Keyline output of the KX3 with the transmitter inhibit enabled, and was surprised to note that it seemed to be operating normally now, pulling down to 0V when the KX3 attempted to transmit and back to floating with the KX3 in receive mode. More interestingly it now did this whether the transmitter inhibit was active or not.<br />
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Swiftly forgetting about the anomaly with the formerly always asserted keyline output of the KX3 I wondered about the prospect of a closed-loop solution, using the auxiliary contact closure output on the 1707 to manipulate the KX3's Tx inhibit line via the ACC2 IO.<br />
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With the MFJ-1707 un-powered, the Tx antenna is selected and the Aux output is left floating. When the 1707 is powered, the relay selects the Rx antenna and grounds the Aux output. When the keyline control from the KX3 asserts, the relay switches back to the Tx antenna and lets the Aux output float.<br />
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By connecting the Aux output to the KX3 and configuring the ACC2 IO menu option to "LO = Inh", the KX3's trnamsitter is inhibited whenever the receive antenna is active and the trasnmitter becomes dis-inhibited when the transmit antenna is selected.<br />
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On the face of it, this looked like a great solution, but something troubled me. I realised that if the ACC2 stereo 3.5mm plug was pulled out of the KX3, the keyline wouldn't switch the 1707's relay and the ACC2 IO input would float hi,, dis-inhibiting the transmitter and probably blowing up the Wellbrook loop's amp during transmission.<br />
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I didn't like that at all. The stereo 2.5mm plug for the I/Q output on the KX3 had come adrift enough times during rats-nest manipulation to make me consider the alternative solutions.<br />
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I mulled over the notion of bodging in an open collector stage between the aux contact on the relay and it's phono socket, as it would invert the aux-output logic for the Tx inhibit function and it seemed safer than the other alternative I'd imagined which involved strapping the other side of the aux contact to 12V instead of 0V.<br />
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A 2N2222A was handy. It's emitter was strapped to ground and the base pulled up to 12V with a 10k resistor. The base was also connected to the pad where the aux phono plug's centre had previously been connected. The aux phono plug's centre was now connected to the collector of the transistor.<br />
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It looked like this:<br />
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Now with the KX3's ACC2 IO set to "HI = Inh", whenever the KX3's keyline out asserts, the 1707's relay switches to the Tx antenna, Aux output pulls the ACC2 IO input down and the KX3's transmitter is dis-inhibited. If the ACC2 stereo plug falls out of the KX3, or the keyline<b></b> and/or Aux/Tx-Inhibit cables become disconnected at either end, or their conductors fail, the KX3's transmitter remains inhibited. I liked this.<br />
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The only unexpected result of the mod was that without power applied to the 1707, the KX3's transmitter was dis-inhibited. I hadn't expected this, but I suppose there's enough leakage to pull down the ACC2 GPIO line. I like this also. Without power applied to the 1707, the transmit antenna was selected so there was no need for the KX3's transmitter to be inhibited.<br />
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I've tested it thoroughly with a dummy load in place of the Wellbrook loop, and it seems good. I'm pretty happy with this solution.<br />
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Now, the biggest risk seems to be the idiot wearing the headphones. If I somehow modify the ACC2 IO menu option, I could blow up the Wellbrook loop. I think I'll ask Wayne at Elecraft if he would consider modifying the ACC2 IO option to make it locked, requiring a long press of the RATE button on the KX3 to unlock it. Then I'd feel really safe.<br />
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Now this is all done, I suppose I should get on and make some QSOs. It has been a while. <br />
<b><br /></b>g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-38518642732186586492015-01-17T15:01:00.000+00:002015-01-18T14:25:11.121+00:00New Wellbrook loop reveals significantly more contesters.Here's a pic of the professionally installed new <a href="http://www.wellbrook.uk.com/Loop_Antennas/ALA1530PE-1">Wellbrook Loop</a> here.<br />
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I
nailed a spare mast post into the ground with a mallet and duct-taped
the loop to it. Some self-amalgamating tape applied to the coax
connector and it was good to go.<br />
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This pic shows some of the contesters on 40m, being received on the new loop.<br />
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The change in the waterfall shows what happens when I switch back to the Diamond BB6W wire antenna. The loop is mounted at ground level and is underneath the wire antenna.<br />
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The next screen shot shows the power spectrum with the BB6W feeding the SDR gubbins, which incidentally has my KX3 at the front end thanks to <a href="https://github.com/g0hww/ghpsdr3-kx3-server">ghpsdr3-kx3-server</a>.<br />
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The results are equally if not more impressive on other bands, but less significantly so on 15m and up.<br />
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I'm very impressed so far. It really is good!<br />
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More pics. Now of 60m. You can see an Olivia transmission with an RSID start up in the middle of the spectrum. This one shows the power spectrum from the loop.<br />
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This one shows it for the BB6W.<br />
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Note that the power spectrum is un-calibrated and that the waterfall adjusts its gain automatically. I tend to crank the gain up on the KX3 with the preamp to lift the noise base up above the artefacts of the sound card, so I don't get distracted by them in the waterfall.<br />
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The next shot is a different instance of QtRadio, coincidentally also on 60, but this one is using my FCD-Pro+, also fed from the Wellbrook loop and has an instance of fldigi decoding the Olivia.<br />
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Some more pics from 80m. This one is the power spectrum for the loop.<br />
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And the BB6W on 80m next.<br />
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<br />g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-19083894720673084772014-12-31T19:17:00.001+00:002014-12-31T19:56:20.408+00:00ghpsdr3-kx3-server available on githubHaving fiddled with <a href="https://github.com/bazuchan/ghpsdr3-fcdproplus-server">fcdpp-server.py</a> to add a ppm offset option before Xmas, I'd been wondering about bodging it to work with my KX3 as an I/Q source.<br />
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I had a go earlier this afternoon. It took all of 10 minutes of python hacking to get something that functioned. A few more minutes were spent adding command line options. Now ghpsdr3-kx3-server is available on <a href="http://ghpsdr3-kx3-server/" target="_blank">github</a>.<br />
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I hope someone finds it useful, although it is receive only.<br />
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Happy new year, everyone.<br />
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g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-38224030072486653692014-06-28T13:00:00.002+01:002014-07-01T02:18:34.752+01:00KX3 UHF EmissionsI've written his blog post primarily as a place to store my screen shots related to a topic that I initiated on the Elecraft mailing list about the UHF emissions I have noticed emanating from my KX3. The full topic thread can be seen <a href="http://elecraft.365791.n2.nabble.com/KX3-UHF-emissions-tt7590478.html" target="_blank">here</a>. <br />
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These screen-shots have been taken using <a href="http://sdr.osmocom.org/trac/wiki/GrOsmoSDR" target="_blank">osmocom_fft</a>, with my USRP-B100 and WBX daughterboard connected the discone antenna in my loft. My preamp is set for 0dB gain, the USRP gain is set to a total of 43dB which is about as high as I tend to set it in order to avoid intermod.<br />
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The first few pictures are with my KX3 in its normal position with its normal cable connections, in its normal configuration, set to 7.080Mhz. The cables are smothered in #61 ferrite.<br />
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Firstly a 8Mhz spectrum capture (below) shows a fairly high noise floor due to the bandwidth and a faint trace of the sproggy (in the centre), but some other signals towards the upper end of the spectrum, probably TETRA stuff or similar.<br />
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Next, the same scenario, but with 125kHz sample-rate/bandwidth to drop the noise floor.<br />
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Note that averaging is enabled in all of these plots. The next one had peak hold enabled so that we can see the effect of sweeping the VFO on the KX3.<br />
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Just a quick recap, the above pics shows the results of my attempts so far to suppress the UHF emissions externally. Perhaps I could do better.<br />
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The next picture is with the KX3 disconnected from everything, but sat in the same location.<br />
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The next picture is with the KX3 relocated to the kitchen, about 30 ft away from it's operating position. Both of these locations are roughly equidistant from the discone antenna in the loft, which is about 30ft away.<br />
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This one is with the KX3 relocated upstairs, to within 8ft of the discone antenna. There are still no cables attached.<br />
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I then moved the KX3 back to its normal operating position, the same scenario as the 4th picture.<br />
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I then insert the right angled 2.5mm to in-line 3.5mm stereo adapter cable, which is about 6 inches in length when straight.<br />
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This time, I have two turns (they just fit) of the 2.5mm to 3.5mm adapter cable around the mix #61 ferrite toroid. The peak hold is left from the last shot, so we can see the improvement.<br />
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Finally, the KX3 is restored to its normal state of connectivity, with antenna, power, CAT via Acc1, I/Q, audio out and in cables attached. I have 3 toroidal chokes with various numbers of turns on the I/Q cable, and a bunch of snap-ons with a couple of turns and the remaining toroidal chokes smothering the other cables. This time, the sample-rate is increased to 1MHz, and I have enabled the 8kHz Rx Shift, which moves the sprog down 55*8kHz, to the left hand end of the spectrum. An unrelated signal appears to the right of the relocated sprog and a peak trace of another unrelated signal appears near the right hand edge.<br />
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<h3>
Update:</h3>
<div wrap="">
So far, I've found spurs on (some of) the 10th, 20th, 40th, 55th, 75th and 100th harmonics
of various VFO frequencies.
With my VFO on 21.25Mhz, I'm getting an S-band spur on the 100th harmonic at
2.125GHz.</div>
g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-58942416948156644062014-05-03T10:25:00.001+01:002014-05-03T10:25:56.067+01:00qtrfiqI've just added <a href="https://github.com/g0hww/qtrfiq" target="_blank">qtrfiq</a> to github. It is a simple gnuradio-companion flowgraph that provides a QT fosphor display fed from an audio IQ input (such as that from the Elecraft KX3 transceiver) that determines the radio's frequency by using hamlib's rigctl.<br />
<br />
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<br />g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-14550829597720277302014-03-18T20:33:00.001+00:002014-03-18T20:50:44.625+00:00Decoding pocorgtfo03.pdf with multimon-ngHaving had a read of pocorgtfo03.pdf (you can get it from <a href="http://openwall.info/wiki/people/solar/pocorgtfo" target="_blank">here</a>) and learning of its chameleon-like properties, I resolved to investigate the claim that "Treated as single-channel raw audio, 16-bit signed little-endian integer, at a sample rate of 22,050 Hz, it contains a 2400 baud AFSK transmission".<br />
<br />
I'd already confirmed that the pdf looked like a JPG using the file command:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="color: lime;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;"><br /></span></span></span>
<span style="color: lime;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;">$ file Downloads/pocorgtfo03.pdf <br />Downloads/pocorgtfo03.pdf: JPEG image data, JFIF standard 1.01, comment: ""</span></span></span></blockquote>
I had a look at the file with baudline:<br />
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgG66NdoAWURpjrnLJ-6tw1n7svD5H1i4K2DYCne-QacTICnNmS9NMEPAYy170YR0OGFE2PBXZ4apTZybCeLVIzQygcIAyT-wPMfv97g_dFrdswsWMakufv6yaQ_wPdEIm6y4F-/s1600/Screenshot+from+2014-03-18+20:49:10.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgG66NdoAWURpjrnLJ-6tw1n7svD5H1i4K2DYCne-QacTICnNmS9NMEPAYy170YR0OGFE2PBXZ4apTZybCeLVIzQygcIAyT-wPMfv97g_dFrdswsWMakufv6yaQ_wPdEIm6y4F-/s1600/Screenshot+from+2014-03-18+20:49:10.png" height="383" width="400" /></a></div>
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</div>
Sure enough the file seemed to show a modem signal at around 6 seconds in. I remembered that multimon-hg could decode AFSK2400 and had a stab at decoding the tones with that:<br />
<span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;"><span style="color: lime;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></span></span>
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;"><span style="color: lime;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">$ multimon-ng -t raw -a AFSK2400 Downloads/pocorgtfo03.pdf -q</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;"><span style="color: lime;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"> POCSAG512 POCSAG1200 POCSAG2400 EAS UFSK1200 CLIPFSK AFSK1200 AFSK2400 AFSK2400_2 AFSK2400_3 HAPN4800 FSK9600 DTMF ZVEI1 ZVEI2 ZVEI3 DZVEI PZVEI EEA EIA CCIR MORSE_CW DUMPCSV SCOPE</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;"><span style="color: lime;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">AFSK2400: fm PASTOR-0 to APRS-0 via WIDE1-1,WIDE2-1 UI pid=F0</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;"><span style="color: lime;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">:EMAIL :pastor@phrack.org I have POC to share.</span></span></span></blockquote>
<br />
Nice!g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-77501868585944257382014-03-12T20:30:00.002+00:002014-03-12T20:54:35.068+00:00Psychedelic SSTV on 255.560MHzI was having a rummage around in the UHF Satcom band when I noticed an unusual signal on the 255.550MHz transponder downlink.<br />
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIPdvHLJ_crofcdWqZKBiuODV5h4XnpycGVx-_QH3M8EiSbNlG1oD8DZWCsjAalyjz_UTp46CfXYXc2ofkeJTU1kj-7I8Q3nOV4y0NKu5ugt_Iw3PYKxQjo0BIJD_USxAbRWwB/s1600/Screenshot+from+2014-03-12+20:20:28.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIPdvHLJ_crofcdWqZKBiuODV5h4XnpycGVx-_QH3M8EiSbNlG1oD8DZWCsjAalyjz_UTp46CfXYXc2ofkeJTU1kj-7I8Q3nOV4y0NKu5ugt_Iw3PYKxQjo0BIJD_USxAbRWwB/s1600/Screenshot+from+2014-03-12+20:20:28.png" height="303" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
It turned out to be analogue SSTV, Robot 36 mode, over FM centred on 255.560MHz.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWqIVGsow-ltgNfHLmkK3WME7uGlBmsHFXiz4ecyQf8ZKKAYsyxkzKKNdEpbmhJS4nepQx8Cq-ztioY3GGe3oR2Exmw1h4iNMKTz4gztgrkrVnOPbNXWCE38Fg2y7Ikvsfablv/s1600/Screenshot+from+2014-03-12+20:37:06.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWqIVGsow-ltgNfHLmkK3WME7uGlBmsHFXiz4ecyQf8ZKKAYsyxkzKKNdEpbmhJS4nepQx8Cq-ztioY3GGe3oR2Exmw1h4iNMKTz4gztgrkrVnOPbNXWCE38Fg2y7Ikvsfablv/s1600/Screenshot+from+2014-03-12+20:37:06.png" height="225" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
It seems to repeat the same image for quite a while. So far it has sent these pictures, received with <a href="http://users.telenet.be/on4qz/qsstv/" target="_blank">QSSTV</a>:<br />
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLPcb2W12plyTsFzkwFPV_ZIUwRFmQYlWWAOia582PzVi11XXEFUw1TriSAIj-5JnEGvU2q0BYzVLfcNbZ0hnhGr-VjhLIcI4GTw5QAMQANxQdcg5q41pDB4JE-2wZtEAeZ3xH/s1600/R36_20140312_200406.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLPcb2W12plyTsFzkwFPV_ZIUwRFmQYlWWAOia582PzVi11XXEFUw1TriSAIj-5JnEGvU2q0BYzVLfcNbZ0hnhGr-VjhLIcI4GTw5QAMQANxQdcg5q41pDB4JE-2wZtEAeZ3xH/s1600/R36_20140312_200406.png" height="300" width="400" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLCM10tOlqn4i8mCu-zi8nH1NbsB2F4tHIXS54I6-UGrqK8A_2komW57uvQLyizxUoN5-V8P9k5BVkY1YXK1xtIhoT7aQF9uVqO9_xAYa6j-OC9ff1-cr386JbHuLy1H3OBQWz/s1600/R36_20140312_202327.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLCM10tOlqn4i8mCu-zi8nH1NbsB2F4tHIXS54I6-UGrqK8A_2komW57uvQLyizxUoN5-V8P9k5BVkY1YXK1xtIhoT7aQF9uVqO9_xAYa6j-OC9ff1-cr386JbHuLy1H3OBQWz/s1600/R36_20140312_202327.png" height="300" width="400" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJ9a6eSd-Q8fFllRg45F_Lthwel_S8t4ptr8n8X6LnhvWE8mrgvdsfr6_eygcHq9AWJBAA1UYqUMOQxq5YMN78gzOUJe6gPXg1KzeRU9YaJwwtbe3szq7QMubzxf5GwmKe2E_y/s1600/R36_20140312_205312.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJ9a6eSd-Q8fFllRg45F_Lthwel_S8t4ptr8n8X6LnhvWE8mrgvdsfr6_eygcHq9AWJBAA1UYqUMOQxq5YMN78gzOUJe6gPXg1KzeRU9YaJwwtbe3szq7QMubzxf5GwmKe2E_y/s1600/R36_20140312_205312.png" height="300" width="400" /></a></div>
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<br />
The colour looks worse than NTSC :P I'm not sure why it is so bad. Similar reports have been noted <a href="http://forums.radioreference.com/satcom-space-satellite-monitoring-forum/280717-sstv-252-150mhz.html#post2094650" target="_blank">here</a> and <a href="http://forums.radioreference.com/satcom-space-satellite-monitoring-forum/282228-255-550-sstv.html" target="_blank">here</a> (forums.radioreference.com) and on youtube <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LGr4psLszuc&feature=youtu.be" target="_blank">here</a>.g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-85021743333330669822014-03-02T18:21:00.003+00:002015-03-16T21:38:10.130+00:00QSSTV with hampal digital SSTVI've been trying out the new version of QSSTV, 8.2.4, listening on on 40m. It has support for the DRM-based digital modes now.<br />
<br />
You can get the new version <a href="http://users.telenet.be/on4qz/qsstv/" target="_blank">here</a>. Here are some screenshots:<br />
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g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-86676056378063902712014-02-23T21:10:00.001+00:002014-02-25T18:48:34.649+00:00Oddness with Apple iCloud SMTP with TLS - MITM?Last Thursday, the 20th February, there was a planned migration of my ADSL service to another LLU provider. Things went smoothly, but I noticed that my line sync rates were a little on the low-side, so I planned to email my ISP about it the following day, if the connection hadn't improved.<br />
<br />
After returning home from work on Friday 21st, I determined that the sync rates were still below par, and with oodles of margin, proceeded to knock out an email asking someone to fiddle with something. However, I was stumped by an unforeseen hurdle - Thunderbird (running on Linux) was unable to send an email through the configured SMTP server: smtp.mail.me.com, using TLS on port 587.<br />
<br />
I then experimented with my iPhone 4S, and found that it could send emails via the same SMTP server on either my 3G service or when connected via my domestic wifi through the ADSL service of my ISP. OK, I thought, it must be a Thunderbird configuration problem, but I found nothing wrong. I then dropped my LAN connection on my Linux box and established a wifi connection, using my iPhone 4S as a hotspot, and found that Thunderbird was able to send emails OK with the same configuration via the cellular network.<br />
<br />
I found this to be odd, something didn't make sense. I couldn't understand why using the cellular network for the SMTP connection would allow either the iOS or Thunderbird clients to work, but only the iOS client would succesfully send via SMTP with TLS over my ISPs network. At this point I raised the issue with my ISP.<br />
<br />
A shortwhile later, the ISP suggested that I should try and connect via SMTP on port 25. Not wanting to actually make a clear-text authenticated connection with my actual account credentials, I decided to connect with telnet on port 25.<br />
<br />
The results looked like this:<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;"><span style="color: lime;">$ telnet smtp.mail.me.com 25<br />
Trying 17.172.34.225...<br />
Connected to smtp.mail.me.com.<br />
Escape character is '^]'.<br />
220 st11p00mm-asmtp002.mac.com -- Server ESMTP (Oracle Communications<br />
Messaging Server 7u4-27.08(7.0.4.27.7) 64bit (built Aug 22 2013))</span></span></blockquote>
<br />
That seemed pretty normal, I vaguely recalled seeing that greeting before. I tried again on port 587. The results looked like this:<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="color: lime;"><span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;">$ telnet smtp.mail.me.com 587<br />
Trying 17.172.34.225...<br />
Connected to smtp.mail.me.com.<br />
Escape character is '^]'.</span></span>
<span style="color: lime;"><span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;"><br />
^]<br />
telnet> quit<br />
Connection closed.</span></span></blockquote>
<br />
This attempt was made using my ADSL connection for internet access. Nothing happened after the connection was made, so I dropped the telnet connection, switched to using
my iPhone's hotspot and tried the same thing. I got the same response on port 587 as I had previously on port 25:<br />
<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="color: lime;"><span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;">$ telnet smtp.mail.me.com 587<br />
Trying 17.172.34.225...<br />
Connected to smtp.mail.me.com.<br />
Escape character is '^]'.<br />
220 st11p00mm-asmtp001.mac.com -- Server ESMTP (Oracle Communications<br />
Messaging Server 7u4-27.08(7.0.4.27.7) 64bit (built Aug 22 2013))</span></span></blockquote>
<br />
Pretty strange huh? The IP address was the same so It wouldn't seem that there was any DNS buggeration involved.<br />
<br />
I made contact with my ISP again and reported my findings. Within 20 minutes they responded, stating that they too had attempted to telnet to port 587 but met with the expected Oracle greeting. By this time, I had verified that the server answering on port 587 had indeed started to behave in the manner expected.<br />
<br />
At this point I was a bit confused and slightly paranoid. I mentioned to the ISP that this was all very fishy and that some kind of explanation would be appropriate. It was at his point that I think they went home for the weekend, and I started to fiddle around with something else. It was Saturday afternoon before I heard about the Apple SSL goto fail bug being patched on Friday. The existence of that bug explains why my iPhone itself would have been happy sending email through my ADSL connection through a MITM to the STMP server on port 587, and why Thunderbird would not.<br />
<br />
So what does this all mean? Was there a MITM attack going on?<br />
<br />
<br />g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-28334574582620817162013-12-31T21:10:00.000+00:002014-01-01T09:10:29.399+00:00fcschedI've just cobbled together a rudimentary scheduler for triggering recording/post-processing of FUNcube-1 (AO-73) telemetry with the <a href="https://github.com/csete/fcdec" target="_blank">fcdec</a> utilities.<br />
<br />
It uses a predict server to provide pass predictions, is written in python, has a GPLV3 licence and is available on github <a href="https://github.com/g0hww/fcsched" target="_blank">here</a>. It is only a few hours old, and hasn't seen many passes, but it may well work :)<br />
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3mmSYFkdhE3sMh7x3BUoQTuoer02sGGUmaiqZi-SLvi8PadRk8oCqhFam2wDTjNRXZl7NeacYswHjxeodcEpzkjWzGkrFHlKt1fNQOOoRfqmjZU5bA9gJgeuqE7OtpFsmTfKy/s1600/Kazam_screenshot_00042.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="173" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3mmSYFkdhE3sMh7x3BUoQTuoer02sGGUmaiqZi-SLvi8PadRk8oCqhFam2wDTjNRXZl7NeacYswHjxeodcEpzkjWzGkrFHlKt1fNQOOoRfqmjZU5bA9gJgeuqE7OtpFsmTfKy/s400/Kazam_screenshot_00042.png" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
I found details of the predict server's command set <a href="https://github.com/koansys/predict/tree/master/clients/samples" target="_blank">here</a>.g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-56283686566268258732013-12-31T11:33:00.001+00:002014-01-02T12:05:52.548+00:00Using fcdec on Ubuntu 13.10After some time away from home over Xmas, I decided to have a go at using Alex's fcdec telemetry decoder for the Funcube satellite.<br />
<br />
The source is available on github <a href="https://github.com/csete/fcdec" target="_blank">here</a>. It is also necessary to get the source for fcdctl from <a href="https://github.com/csete/fcdctl" target="_blank">here</a>. I ran the makefiles in the decoder, fcdctl and filter directories. I then edited tools/submit.sh to reflect my credentials stored with the online data warehouse. I then edited the WORK_DIR and PROG_DIR macros in tools/fcd_sequencer.sh to reflect the paths in my home directory.<br />
<br />
I then created links in my ~/bin dir to the binaries I'd just built for decode, fcdctl and filter, and also for the tools/submit.sh and tools/fcd_sequencer.sh scripts.<br />
<br />
I discovered that I also needed to install the libsox-fmt-pulse package in order for pulse to work properly with sox and also needed to ensure that the fcd-pro was set to the "Analogue Stereo Input" profile in the configuration tab of pavucontrol.<br />
<br />
This let me run fcd_sequencer which then waited for a command on tcp port 12345 to start collecting data. This could be done using telnet. I used telnet to connect to localhost on port 12345 and then submitted the command "start +600" followed by hitting the enter key and then pressing Ctrl+] then entered "quit" to exit telnet and close the tcp connection. At that point, the fcd_sequencer script started to collect data. <br />
<br />
There was a pass at 1108z this morning (31st Dec 2013) and it seemed that I was able to decode 40 telemetry packets. This was with my original fcd-pro (not the pro-plus, for some reason I've not been able to get fcdctl to work with the pro-plus yet) and using my 2m turnstile-with-reflectors in the loft for the antenna.<br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: xx-small;"><span style="color: lime;"><span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;"><br /></span></span></span>
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="color: lime;"><span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;">20131231_110203: --------------------------------------------------------------<br />20131231_110204:<br />20131231_110204: Waiting for new command on port 12345<br />20131231_110713: Received start command: start<br />20131231_110713: Will capture IQ for 780 seconds<br />Freq set to 145.924000 MHz.<br />LNA gain set to 10 dB.<br /> nr USB path firmware frequency LNA gain audio device<br /> 0 0003:0014:02 18.10 145.924000 MHz 10 dB card6<br />20131231_110713: Using audio input: alsa_input.usb-Hanlincrest_Ltd._FUNcube_Dongle_V1.0-00-V10.analog-stereo<br />20131231_110713: Start capture to /home/darren/funcube-data/out/20131231_110713/fcd_iq_sc_20131231_110713_96_145924.raw<br />20131231_112013: Filter and decode (G=100) /home/darren/funcube-data/out/20131231_110713/fcd_iq_sc_20131231_110713_96_145924.raw:40<br />20131231_112022: Filter and decode (G=200) /home/darren/funcube-data/out/20131231_110713/fcd_iq_sc_20131231_110713_96_145924.raw:40<br />20131231_112030: G=100 gave 40 packets; G=200 gave 40 packets<br />20131231_112030: Submitting packets from /home/darren/funcube-data/out/20131231_110713/data-200.txt<br />20131231_112030:<br />20131231_112030: --------------------------------------------------------------</span></span></span><br />
<br />
<br />
Having a look at the raw file with a modified tools/fcd_replay.grc file, I observed the following with the fosphor display.<br />
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6EjKz_fuoCou-NTPNuxCS8-RGJhTNHdLkiAAW9WQfJEfYtf0fO0QysuL-ry-DXsNR_4ABn3Q5I5-EZopD9vAZOQT8q6Bjq_jozCSxPHiJseiHcOUhIJsw0qhzM5u-rXtCItfF/s1600/Kazam_screenshot_00040.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="202" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6EjKz_fuoCou-NTPNuxCS8-RGJhTNHdLkiAAW9WQfJEfYtf0fO0QysuL-ry-DXsNR_4ABn3Q5I5-EZopD9vAZOQT8q6Bjq_jozCSxPHiJseiHcOUhIJsw0qhzM5u-rXtCItfF/s400/Kazam_screenshot_00040.png" width="400" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4r9-4sTFc-rbeVXrAL6IBqVfN5NNVNmM4Aj2Ccw0VEbHkD0oARtY2e2yTh_HoNqFtnqP4-6D4p8KMQeTI8Pfpkv5eK8pnjDOvO45tXBzWnc_bmUOCVjqh_ZcH5mcnKdntz_Kb/s1600/Kazam_screenshot_00041.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="202" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4r9-4sTFc-rbeVXrAL6IBqVfN5NNVNmM4Aj2Ccw0VEbHkD0oARtY2e2yTh_HoNqFtnqP4-6D4p8KMQeTI8Pfpkv5eK8pnjDOvO45tXBzWnc_bmUOCVjqh_ZcH5mcnKdntz_Kb/s400/Kazam_screenshot_00041.png" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
In order to get this all working, I found it useful to temporarily instrument the fcd_sequencer.sh script by adding the -x option on the first line, as below:<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
#!/bin/bash -x</blockquote>
This let me determine exactly what was happening as the script ran. I did actually make a mistake when creating the symbolic link to submit.sh (missing the .sh extension on the link name). This caused the invocation of submit.sh by fcd_sequencer.sh to fail, but the use of the -x option in fcd_sequencer.sh allowed me to see the correct invocation of submit.sh and to manually invoke it once the symbolic link had been fixed, culminating in the appearance of a line in the upload rankings table <a href="https://warehouse.funcube.org.uk/ranking.html?satelliteId=2" target="_blank">here</a> crediting G0HWW with 40 packets.<br />
<br />
Update 1st Jan 2014: I've written <a href="http://www.g0hww.net/2013/12/fcsched.html" target="_blank">fcsched</a> to schedule fcdec according to passes reported by a predict server. g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-37425212592586158122013-11-21T23:47:00.000+00:002014-01-01T14:43:51.892+00:00gpredict trsp file for FUNCUBEAdd a file to the <span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;"><span style="color: lime;">~/.config/Gpredict/trsp</span></span> directory, with the following contents:<br />
<br />
<span style="color: lime;"><span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;">[FUNCUBE BPSK Telem]<br />DOWN_LOW=145935000</span></span><br />
<span style="color: lime;"><span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;">[FUNCUBE U/V]<br />UP_LOW=435150000<br />UP_HIGH=435130000<br />DOWN_LOW=145950000<br />DOWN_HIGH=145970000<br />INVERT=true</span></span><br />
<br />
<br />
Depending on where or when you got your keps, you may have a different Catalogue Number for FUNCUBE-1. Create a file called CAT_NUM.trsp. where CAT_NUM is the catalogue number for FUNCUBE-1. <strike>I have two trsp files, one called 39417.trsp and the other 312.trsp, as I have two sets of keps for FUNCUBE-1 right now.</strike> UPDATE 1st Jan 2014: The latest recommended keps (referenced <a href="http://funcube.org.uk/working-documents/latest-two-line-elements/" target="_blank">here</a>) are for catalogue number 39444. In gpredict, this is known as 2013-066AE.<br />
<br />
With the <a href="http://amsat-uk.org/funcube/funcube-cubesat/" target="_blank">keps</a> for FUNCUBE added to gpredict and with the really cool recently added support for hamlib compatible remote control of gqrx it's easy enough to find FUNCUBE with a Funcube Dongle Pro+ as a receiver. I'm using a homebrew 2m Turnstile-With-Reflectors in the loft as an antenna.<br />
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCNaJIfb2GE9VhF9cKGxHJvrj0m59f9olFLaPnOUAMZb7UCeGjDtjE086SzyssqyLXXeLYQxiy7ORCfrr8hfTQFfp0lMj9ZXXJ0-6HYRmu1LUaNm95jX9D3wamdNt5Q_4_NkjY/s1600/Kazam_screenshot_00018.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCNaJIfb2GE9VhF9cKGxHJvrj0m59f9olFLaPnOUAMZb7UCeGjDtjE086SzyssqyLXXeLYQxiy7ORCfrr8hfTQFfp0lMj9ZXXJ0-6HYRmu1LUaNm95jX9D3wamdNt5Q_4_NkjY/s400/Kazam_screenshot_00018.png" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
Update:<br />
I'm going to have a listen for <a href="http://cubesat.org/index.php/missions/upcoming-launches/135-ors3-launch-alert" target="_blank">ChargerSat-1</a> (<a href="http://space.uah.edu/chargersat1/" target="_blank">more</a>) too. The trsp file for that is called <span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;"><span style="color: lime;">99912.trsp</span></span> and has the following contents.<br />
<br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;"><span style="color: lime;">[ChargeSat-1 Telem]<br />DOWN_LOW=437405000</span></span><br />
<br />
Here are (or were) the <a href="http://mstl.atl.calpoly.edu/~bklofas/2013-11-19_ors3_tle.txt" target="_blank">keps</a>.g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-80883203685347705422013-11-17T09:18:00.002+00:002013-11-17T09:29:03.983+00:00Circled by a HAB whilst sleeping.It seems that the balloon, B-30, came to play last night whilst I was asleep. I started tracking B-30 earlier in the evening and the signal was getting stronger as it moved eastwards towards me when I fell asleep. It was quite surprising that I could still hear B-30's signal when I woke up this morning, but nowhere near as much of a surprise as when I realised that B-30 had flown right around me then changed to a northerly course.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjREVm39x8oSkzuG0jxrHQmfqNMjtDsz0vWu0wZV2rPvIntR2IOC7_Th474bq4gxUs1MWg3XH-p8NXLjLhJjOHM1hX5P-c6nUSVz_wpmKYVC1155LIDfOR1kj3khPH5I2hVnIEw/s1600/Kazam_screenshot_00015.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjREVm39x8oSkzuG0jxrHQmfqNMjtDsz0vWu0wZV2rPvIntR2IOC7_Th474bq4gxUs1MWg3XH-p8NXLjLhJjOHM1hX5P-c6nUSVz_wpmKYVC1155LIDfOR1kj3khPH5I2hVnIEw/s640/Kazam_screenshot_00015.png" width="563" /></a></div>
<br />g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-6697209001204933722013-11-03T11:01:00.000+00:002013-12-06T18:48:36.400+00:00Using null-sinks with pulseaudio<br />
I've been running multiple instances of gqrx recently. Up until now, I have used an unconnected soundcard output as a sink for a gqrx receiver audio that I've no interest in listening to myself, then selecting that same output's monitor channel in Pulse Audio Volume Controller as an input for fldigi or multimon-ng, for example.<br />
<br />
Then I ran out of unused soundcard outputs to use, but fortunately discovered pulseaudio's null-sink facility. Now I can create a null sink specifically for each SDR receiver that I have and hook them all up to different modem programmes.<br />
<br />
To create a null sink with a meaningful name, use a command like this:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: lime;"><span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;">$ pactl load-module module-null-sink sink_name=fcdv1op \ sink_properties=device.description="fcdv1op"</span></span></span></blockquote>
<br />
To monitor the audio stream that is being routed to the null sink, create a loop-back: <br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: lime;"><span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;">$ pactl load-module module-loopback latency_msec=1</span></span></span></blockquote>
I let gqrx send audio to the default output in its configuration, then use Pulse Audio Volume Controller (pavucontrol) to reassign it to the null sink. I can then set, for example multimon-ng, to listen to the monitor of the null-sink (on the Recording tab of pavucontrol) and set up a loopback monitor to my default output (on the Playback tab of pavucontrol).<br />
<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguSNxYEou_vykLJQrNCjimw4ZO78BmZxmyew6XqbLbw4vN-cVRH3EBwLOj8nvK7AdAuuRFvGl_d81fHxqHpM5iNhrAbMCZXtL7tOZz7PQMwN6hm4nRQ-i8TldWOLHZqf-tFTlo/s1600/Kazam_screenshot_00024.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguSNxYEou_vykLJQrNCjimw4ZO78BmZxmyew6XqbLbw4vN-cVRH3EBwLOj8nvK7AdAuuRFvGl_d81fHxqHpM5iNhrAbMCZXtL7tOZz7PQMwN6hm4nRQ-i8TldWOLHZqf-tFTlo/s400/Kazam_screenshot_00024.png" width="387" /></a> <br />
<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkzgJlUlZ8ydLIrylCV1f0yZFBOsaJ39fnQTEw8SHrIHgFPydx0QwHSM2snTsAew39nQHMwKYVsnqgoC6Y7NtLvYJT8NEhJ-NqliYxdGNWV9x12foZaCJIbdET6FhQnrwmHakf/s1600/Kazam_screenshot_00025.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkzgJlUlZ8ydLIrylCV1f0yZFBOsaJ39fnQTEw8SHrIHgFPydx0QwHSM2snTsAew39nQHMwKYVsnqgoC6Y7NtLvYJT8NEhJ-NqliYxdGNWV9x12foZaCJIbdET6FhQnrwmHakf/s400/Kazam_screenshot_00025.png" width="387" /></a><br />
<br />
This lets me control the audio levels fed to each audio 'decoder' and the level coming out of my speakers independently. You can add a named null sink for each SDR device you have and a separate loopback device for each of them also, which you can mute and mix accordingly and route to different audio outputs if you so desire.<br />
<br />
Edit: If you are paying attention, you may notice that the null sink name in the screen-shots is different to the one used in the command line. Oh, well, let's call that a continuity error and move on :) g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-7604385041039467962013-10-13T22:54:00.000+01:002013-10-14T20:54:57.875+01:00QtRadio running on Ubuntu 13.04 with USRPAfter a day slaving over a hot compiler, I managed to get QtRadio working with my USRP B100 and BasicRx. I achieved this using code from the <a href="https://github.com/alexlee188/ghpsdr3-alex" target="_blank">ghpsdr3-alex</a> repo.<br />
<br />
It looks good on a 27 inch WQHD monitor with a 2560 by 1440 pixels screen. I have it resampling from the default 250kHz rate down to 192kHz. It does seem fairly CPU intensive though, hitting a load of 5.0 to 6.0 on my new Haswell I7 machine, with a modest bunch of other applications running that don't reach a load of 1.0 between them. I built using the alex-conf.sh script instead of using configure itself, so I've hopefully got an optimised build. I built QtRadio for release in QtCreator.<br />
<br />
Here's a screenshot of some 30m activity. <br />
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9CozxnJ_utyVz7YF0fA1M7TfvYG8jisdXKlAIdRjqT-1EYlrHQJNmO6yPDMfRAFLg6S8C1l_IEq1sfYuoiYlxpQT5pmNKya4wbp4cLvWhV5kV45BZcCSVFKYmxF0ua3CISvBF/s1600/Kazam_screenshot_00002.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="226" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9CozxnJ_utyVz7YF0fA1M7TfvYG8jisdXKlAIdRjqT-1EYlrHQJNmO6yPDMfRAFLg6S8C1l_IEq1sfYuoiYlxpQT5pmNKya4wbp4cLvWhV5kV45BZcCSVFKYmxF0ua3CISvBF/s400/Kazam_screenshot_00002.png" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
To get this working I had to bodge the usrp_server to detect my B100, which it didn't do initially. It turns out that it was hard-coded to expect a USRP1 device. The following patch shows the simple change required to make it work with the B100.<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="color: lime;"></span></span>
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="color: lime;"><span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;">diff --git a/trunk/src/usrp/usrp.c b/trunk/src/usrp/usrp.c<br />index a36e93c..c8e0f91 100644<br />--- a/trunk/src/usrp/usrp.c<br />+++ b/trunk/src/usrp/usrp.c<br />@@ -141,7 +141,7 @@ void setup_rx_queue(void) {<br /> bool usrp_init (const char *rx_subdev_par, const char *tx_subdev_par)<br /> {<br /> uhd::device_addr_t hint;<br />- hint["type"] = "usrp1";<br />+ hint["type"] = "b100"; // "usrp1";<br /><br /> //discover the usrps and print the results<br /> uhd::device_addrs_t device_addrs = uhd::device::find(hint);</span></span></span></blockquote>
<br />
Once I'd built everything, I had to run two server processes before launching QtRadio. I invoked them like so:<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="color: lime;"><span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;">$ usrp_server -r "A:A" --samplerate 192000 </span></span></blockquote>
and<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="color: lime;"><span style="font-family: "Courier New",Courier,monospace;">$ dspserver --lo 0</span></span> </blockquote>
g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-79179035604108711882013-08-26T20:43:00.002+01:002013-11-02T15:22:51.860+00:00OnSense - it's not nonsense!<a href="https://github.com/g0hww/onsense" target="_blank">I've just pushed the first version of OnSense up to github.</a> OnSense is a hacktastic hybrid spectrum sensing scanner, using a combination of SDR and analogue receivers. I've been using a HackRF Jawbreaker and an AOR-8600mk2 receiver.<br />
<br />
OnSense uses osmocom_spectrum_sense as a spectrum sensing front end, and tunes the conventional receiver using hamlib's rigctl.<br />
<br />
OnSense can scan the entire UHF military airband in less than a second (or the VHF air band). There are 7000 channels with 25kHz spacing between 225MHz and 400Mhz. When I assessed the scanning speed it was roughly 666ms, that's over 10k channels per second which isn't too shabby. OnSense is not a great piece of software yet, but its not nonsense.<br />
<br />
I'm hoping to improve OnSense with a QT GUI and an SQLite database.<br />
<br />
Here's a screenshot of some onsense action:<br />
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The green stuff in the terminal itself is OnSense. It spews forth notifications so you can tell at a glance what you're listening to. I like to keep an eye on things (bugs?) by keeping grig in view and having both OnSense and grig talking to the AOR receiver via rigctld.<br />
<br />g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-84759847495447272672013-07-21T13:21:00.000+01:002013-07-21T13:26:59.915+01:00MONTY HAB<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Getting a good strong signal from MONTY this morning.<br />
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And CHEAPO too. <br />
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g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-25520783059787731372013-07-13T15:30:00.001+01:002013-07-13T15:30:03.338+01:00SOFA Activation<br><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-v0wSjioMoMTiqFZ80WaVRjn9S7vqxvWC1m2lUl77rXztdpbwCMLc3Gh7n9lt4HadHd5aVDS-esYALtwX5pdpehln2Kyb_YkAJX6symMEsmfqJxgRZzmidES2ynkRGw6BtAQn/s640/blogger-image--587998079.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-v0wSjioMoMTiqFZ80WaVRjn9S7vqxvWC1m2lUl77rXztdpbwCMLc3Gh7n9lt4HadHd5aVDS-esYALtwX5pdpehln2Kyb_YkAJX6symMEsmfqJxgRZzmidES2ynkRGw6BtAQn/s640/blogger-image--587998079.jpg"></a></div>g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-61195740548524770582013-07-06T11:14:00.003+01:002013-07-06T13:12:15.572+01:00PICO HAB on HackRF with GQRX and dl-fldigiI awoke this morning to <a href="http://spacenear.us/tracker/" target="_blank">find myself surrounded</a> by low flying High Altitude Balloons. NANU and PICO were up.<br />
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I plugged in my <a href="https://greatscottgadgets.com/hackrf/" target="_blank">HackRF</a> and fired up two instances of dl-fldigi. The first used an analogue path from the AOR-8600mk2 reciever and the second took an audio feed from gqrx. I found both signals in gqrx's waterfall and managed to decode both signals at the same time. NANU hit dirt before I got the digital path working, so I then tracked PICO with both receiver chains. I had to set the sampling rate for the HackRF to 10MS/s. Initially I tried 8MS/s but dl-fldigi wouldn't decode anything - I noted that the RTTY scope hung quite often until I increased the sample rate.<br />
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The HackRF seems to be better than the USRP B100 for narrow bandwidth modes as it doesn't suffer from the discrete stepping TCXO that the USRP B100 manifests.g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-37717173750923504532013-06-30T12:06:00.003+01:002013-06-30T12:07:47.947+01:00HABANEROToday I've been receiving the HABANERO balloon from Holland, with my AOR-8600mk2 and a discone antenna in the loft.<br />
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<br />g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-83773060426698890572013-06-29T19:04:00.000+01:002013-06-30T03:44:27.119+01:00Kingsley HABI've been seeing if I can decode the Kingsley HAB with the HackRF SDR and gqrx feeding fldigi-HAB.<br />
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The HackRF is connected to a AR-8600mk2 discone via a UHF bandpass filter and a preamp (at the wrong end of the coax). Both the HackRF and AOR-8600mk2 share this feed by means of a 2-way combiner.<br />
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I'm not getting any good decodes yet with the HackRF, but the AOR is doing OK.<br />
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<br />g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26675683.post-81622650651874909612013-06-28T15:34:00.001+01:002013-06-28T16:18:31.430+01:00HackRF hatchet jobThe HackRF Jawbreaker kindly sent to me by Michael Ossman arrived on my desk at work on Monday morning. I have been very lucky as there were only 500 beta boards made and I applied for one after he tweeted that there were some left over after the coupon codes he'd handed out at Toorcon had been redeemed.<br />
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Shortly before leaving work I remembered that I needed to disconnect the on-board 900MHz band PCB antenna enabling the use of an external antenna connected to the board mounted SMA socket. The procedure for doing this (described <a href="https://github.com/mossmann/hackrf/wiki/Jawbreaker" target="_blank">here</a>) involves cutting a PCB track, wisely marked on the board with an arrow.<br />
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It has been a long time since I attempted delicate surgery on a PCB, so long in fact that every has shrunk considerably and I could barely see the trace. I hoped to find some in the lab who had the skill to do the job for me, but I had no such luck. Most of the guys whom I would have asked have been laid off and those that remain had been dispatched to assist on other sites.<br />
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In the lab I found two microscopes that looked useful and a scalpel. After rummaging around looking for some anti-static straps I had a good look at the board with the microscope that seemed to provide the best illumination and view. Unfortunately, the scope didn't seem to provide enough clearance to work on the board, so I had to move to a different workstation in order to actually wield some tools. This other scope was much trickier to set up and I couldn't get a proper binocular view so I settled for just using my good eye. This gave me a somewhat oblique view of the target area but at least gave me access to work on the board.<br />
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I decided that I'd try and wick off the solder before going in for the kill with the scalpel. I was somewhat perturbed by the unsteadiness of the soldering iron tip and gave up almost immediately with that idea. Most of the solder remained on the trace but seemed to have balled up a bit at the ends, leaving me fairly confident that the track shouldn't take much cutting.<br />
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I spent a couple of minutes lightly scraping at the track with the scalpel before I caught a glimpse of some shiney copper in a place where I had not previously seen a reflection. I panicked at that point, as I wondered how many layers the PCB had, and if I'd dug all the way through to an internal trace and damaged that.<br />
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I moved the board back to the other work station, but found it impossible to judge whether I had:<br />
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1) Failed to cut the track<br />
2) Cut the trace and caused collateral damage to a mid-layer track<br />
3) Cut the track with surgical precision.<br />
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I took the board home figuring that I'd get it running and hope it worked. It did. I was able to receive broadcast FM stereo at around 104MHz (although those signals are so strong It's hard not receive them). To try out the sensitivity a little better I tuned into a military satcom transponder downlink on 255.55MHz and was able to faintly hear a spanish speaking south american pirate station on FM. This is one of the signals I routinely use to check that my SDR receivers are functioning well. With a good setup, I expect to be able to distinguish the increased noise floor of the transponder downlink when no signals are being relayed. The active stations meant that the transponder's receive gain was reduced and that the downlink noise floor was indistinguishable from the background noise, which seemed to be quite high. I had the hackrf sampling at 1MHz and this is a higher sampling rate than I would normally use for receiving weak signals. <br />
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It seemed that the board was working well enough for reception, but that didn't convince me that the hatchet job had worked out OK, so I decided that I wouldn't attempt to transmit at all until I'd confirmed that the track was properly cut. I figured I'd take the board back to work when I could get a second opinion from someone who was familiar with the inspection gear in the lab and more importantly, could perhaps sort out any mess I may have made.<br />
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I did that today and they confirmed that I'd pulled of the job with Ninja precision. The force must have been strong with me on Monday as it seemed to me to be like trying to circumcise a flea with a bulldozer.<br />
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The following photo was taken through the inspection scope and shows my handy-work.<br />
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Finally, here's an image of the Jawbreaker installed in its temporary home. This isn't the first radio of mine that has been housed in a cardboard box.<br />
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<br />g0hwwhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18274132625698139495noreply@blogger.com0