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AB6MB Jeffery N. 'Jeff' Jones Newark, CA QCWA # 38236 |
Hello and thanks for dropping by! I had wanted to get my ham radio license ever since I was in high school back in 1972. I finally got my coded tech license in 1990 and then my extra in 1991 due to really getting into DXing. My main joys in amateur radio are FT8,DXing,PSK31,QRP, DMR, Dstar, JS8CALL and other digital modes along with some CW. Right now FT8 is my main mode. I also like to work Parks On The Air when I can. I have worked 200 plus parks so far and really enjoyed doing it. I have done a couple of pack activations which were a lot of fun. Think like Field Day fun. Please check out the POTA facebook page as it is very active and has a bunch of great people that hang out there. Website: parksontheair.com
My rig for FT8 is my IC-7300 running around 50 watts. It's a great SDR radio with just the right size screen and the right amount of buttons and knobs. Well worth the money. It has the most intuitive menu that I have ever seen!
The antenna I am using with it is a inverted L fed with a 9:1 unun and a 17 foot counterpoise. It is strung through the window screen from the second story bedroom over to a small tree and then down the tree trunk. Works surprisingly well. Ah the joys of living in a HOA.
I love DMR radio! I have a Anytone at-878uv, MD-380 and a tiny 2 watt DMR radio called by 2 different names. MD-430 and Radioddity GD-73A. The 2 watt radios are great and work really well. Plus they are cheap! Makes for a good second DMR radio to carry around in your pocket. I use it basically as a microphone for my OpenSpot 3 because it's so light.
My newest toy is a OpenSpot 3. It's software and hardware are very well designed. It allows you to transcode from one mode to another easily. To transcode from DMR to Dstar you click two buttons, choose a reflector and bang your done! It's that easy! It will also automatically update it's self! It just works great!
Another toy I have is a DVmega Cast IP radio. It looks just like radio except that is IP based. It has at the moment 3 modes, D-Star, DMR and Fusion. More will be coming along with other features like multiple memories. It works great with the Yaesu MH-48 microphone. However you will have to separately buy that microphone on their website. It can be used to add reflectors and rooms to the Cast. Most of it's buttons are used and is basically a puesdo keyboard. It actually works pretty well in that function. The IP radio uses a modified Raspberry Pi. I went back and forth on whether to get it. I had a DV dongle that more or less does the same thing. However I find I use the radio alot more and in fact a lot more more due to the ease of just grabbing the microphone and making a call. Great radio and well worth buying!
My first HF radio was a Swan 700CX that had about 500 watts output. Great radio though when I did CW the lights in our bedroom used to dim and brighten in time to the CW. Drove my wife nuts trying to read in bed when I transmitted. Great transmit audio. Soft and smooth!
The other radios I have had over the years have been a SGC 2020(loved that radio) w
buy for it which I sold to get a FT-100D and various QRP radios. The radios that I use for going portable POTA and Field Day are a Alinco DX-SR8T(great large screen) with a FT-897D as a backup. Antenna is usually a 33 pushup pole fed with 28 feet of vertical and a 17 foot counterpoise connected to a 9:1 unun at the base. LDG autotuner provides all the matching from 10 and on up to 40 meters. Of couse I have the usual standard ham's MFJ manual tuner for backup.
I have worked all 50 states 3 different times via FT8, CW and mixed modes. I also have my mixed modes DXCC. EQSL is what I use for QSLs.
QRPwise I have a Xiegu G90(SDR,20 watts),Xiegu G1M(SDR,5 watts),Icom 703(5 watts), and a 3 watt 20 meter QRPver SSB/CW/Digital radio.
The picture you see of me was taken during a CW QRP contest in my fellow QRPer KO6GF's volkswagon van at Brandon Island park in the Delta 60 plus miles due east of San Francisco. The radio I am using is a Index Labs QRP Plus powered by a 7 amp gel cell. The antenna we used was a 52 foot half size G5RV that we fed directly with ladder line via a manual tuner. The ladder line was laying on the ground in the rain. Surprisingly it still worked great. The contest we were working was Freeze Your Butt Off ie FYBO where you get a multiplier where the lower the temperature the bigger the mulitplier. I think the temp was around 55 some odd degrees that day. We were competing with stations with temp mulitpliers in the 20s. For some reason we never do very well mulitplier wise out here in California. 8-). I think we must have worked around 70 plus stations that day. Great fun!
Proud member of LARK aka Livermore Amateur Radio Klub.
Retired from ATT after 25 years and am now working as a Network Engineer at Cisco.
Grew up in the Seattle area and moved to SF bay area in 1981 for that job with ATT.
Feel free to email me if you want!
Wishing you much peace and kindness...
73!
Jeff
April 10, 2020