New Year, New Ideas (or not!)

I don't think I am capable of "Original Thought".

Every time I think I have discovered something new, I realise that I am re-inventing the wheel.

Please don't think I am bitter about this, if I have a philosophy in life it would be a misquote (no blasphemy intended!) of one of the "Ten Commandments" (or to be more specific the Tenth Commandment) in that I do not (or at least try very hard not to) covet what another has.

Wives, possessions, original ideas, it's all the same thing to me!  Coveting like resistance (misquoting the Borg this time) is futile.

A couple of weeks ago, a professional colleague who works at our Head Office, unlike me who works "out in the field" mentioned something called an "Arduino" to me, and I had to confess that I'd never heard of it.

Anyway, to cut a long story short I looked "Arduino" up on the web, got very excited (!) at what I saw, bought one, faffed about with it and began asking friends and other colleagues if they knew about this wonderful piece of gadgetry, and it seems that I was the only one who thought it was something "new"!

Largely thanks to my friend and mentor, Ron Taylor (G4GXO) of Cumbria Designs, I had been introduced to the world of microcontrollers some little time ago, in connection with the "Eden 9" project.  For those who don't know, the Arduino is essentially a "mini microcontroller development board" based around an Atmel microcontroller, and as such could be described as a "microcontroller on steroids".

Further research, and reading of other bloggers' output revealed that Arduino isn't the only contender in this market place, Julian,  G4ILO has blogged about the "Gadget Gangster Propeller USB" platform, which seems, at least to the casual observer to be more or less the same thing but done with different hardware.

The unfortunate thing for me is that I now have ANOTHER interest to compete for my limited free time with QRSS, meteor observations, Digimodes, Classic Rigs, etc etc.   If only I could afford to retire from the Day Job and play with all these new toys!

Radio Meteors - Ostrava R1 Gone?

Sorry it has been a while since my last post, lots of stuff going on, not much of it worth blogging about!

However, I am moved once again to note the possible loss of my present (up until now, at any rate) source of Radio Metor Reflections, the TV Transmitter serving Ostrava in the Czech Republic on channel R1. (49.76MHz).

I tried to tune in over the weekend to pick up any Orionid meteors, only to be met with wall-to-wall white noise.

It's an even greater pity, as this is (or was) the last broadcast TV source I could receive on Band I.

I had reported previously that this transmitter was due to close in November, but either this has happened early, or the transmitter is off due to a fault or maintenance.   If I were in charge of a transmitter which is just about to close down, I don't think I'd spend too much effort on maintenance, but you never know!

As of the time of writing this entry, I haven't been able to verify what has happened, all I know is, I have no Orionid trails on my PC!

Interestingly I found a web site by Czech radio amateur Ivan OK2BMU who is waiting patiently for that same transmitter to close down so that he can get cracking on the amateur 6m (50MHz) band!  Every cloud has a silver lining, as they say ...

First Es (Sporadic-E) Opening of the Season

My radio friends know that I spend a lot of energy (mental and electrical) monitoring distant Band I TV stations looking for and recording the effects of meteors on the propagation of signals between that remote transmitter and myself.

A side effect of this is that when Sporadic-E (Es) propagation occurs at the critical point along that path, the effect is obvious.

I was only commenting to two local friends two days ago that this year's Sporadic-E season seems to be late in starting, and my friends were in agreement with that statement.

This morning's events though took an interesting turn at 0906 GMT when the path from Ostrava in the Czech Republic was suddenly enhanced by a burst of Es which lasted for around ten minutes.

The frequency used by the Ostrava TV transmitter is 49.76MHz, just below the amateur "six metre" allocation.

(above) R_Meteor Trace of first Es Opening

SpectrumLab Trace of Es Opening (note +/- 25Hz Sidebands)

By a bizarre coincidence, as I type this entry, I have just heard a Spanish station EA3FER calling CQ in CW on 50.092MHz and shortly after another Spanish station, this time an EA6 call from the Balearics, so it appears that the 6-metre Es season has finally started!

Band I TV and Radio Meteors - the End is Nigh!

I have blogged a couple of times already about the disappearance of VHF analogue TV in Band I, today I came across a little more information about the demise of the few remaining sources available to we "Meteor Reflection Enthusiasts".

It seems the Ostrava (Czech Republic) transmitter on channel R1 (49.76MHz) will close on 30th November 2011, and the Lousa (Portugal) transmitter on channel E3 (55.25MHz) will close on 26th April 2012, in almost exactly a year's time.

Spectrum Lab Capture of Metor Burst

Quite what, if any signals will be found for displaying meteor reflections once these disappear, I know not, but in the meantime I have resolved to make some audio recordings so that the use of the audio software I use (R_Meteor, SpectrumLaboratory, etc) can be demonstrated should anyone show any interest!

R_Meteor Capture of above SpecLab event

Amateur signals such as beacons are too low in power to fill the gap.   Maybe some QRO beacons are required?   Not very "green", though!