Here’s a cheap & cheerful (or in the American vernacular, crappy) panorama that I just did with the open source Hugin software package. Yes, there are some obviously bad stitches, but it gives you an idea of what my newly updated shack looks like. I added the KADA 852D+ rework station, upgraded the shack PC,… Read More Shack Mk. II
Noah Milldrum Born August 2, 2010 9 lb 7 oz 21.5 in
I just heard on the Practical Amateur Radio Podcast that special event station K7G will be QRV this weekend from Astoria, Oregon to commemorate the 25th anniversary of The Goonies. Man, does this bring back some fond memories. The Goonies was one of those pop culture memes that really impacted me as a kid. Here… Read More Goonies Never Say Die!
Check out these incredible photos and videos of a coronal mass ejection taken by the newly commissioned Solar Dynamics Observatory. The clarity and resolution of the images are absolutely stunning. When the CME erupts, you can clearly see the spiraling of the magnetic field lines as they spring up out of the surface of the… Read More Amazing New Solar Movies
Over the last week or so, I’ve been coming home from work nearly every morning thinking about ways to tweak the Clackamas (FDIM 2010 QRP Challenge) rig. I’m sure that Jennifer is wondering if I have OCD at this point. This morning I was able to stamp out the last few bugs in project and… Read More Sweet Success!
Our favorite fashion hacker/ham, Diana Eng, KC2UHB, has posted a new article on the Make Magazine blog with instructions on how to build an End-Fed Half Wave antenna tuner and deploy it with an antenna. (BTW, did you see that she was recently named to the ARRL Public Relations Committee? An excellent choice the League.)… Read More EFHWA Revisited
When I was going through some files on my USB thumbdrive, I found a panorama of Hoover Dam that I made from some photos that I took on our honeymoon last August. There are some small blemishes in the rendering (some of the power lines have discontinuities and what not), but overall the results still… Read More Hoover Dam Panorama
I’m very pleased to report the first (to my knowledge) completed Willamette transceiver which was born in Europe. Vincenzo, IZ5GVP sent along to me a couple of photos of his very nicely constructed Willamette. He reports that it works well and that he’s considering modifying it to operate on the 30 meter band. Three cheers… Read More Willamette Goes To Europe
I got a bit of cash for my birthday last month and it was burning a hole in my pocket for a few weeks. I decided I needed a good set of CW paddles for my station, since the only keying devices that I have (that work) are all straight keys. It was a bit… Read More Begali Simplex Unboxing
I realize that this has very little to do with my normal blog content, but I hope that you will indulge me for a moment and check out this post. As many of you probably know, I work 3rd shift, which can get pretty lonely at times. In order to keep myself from going insane… Read More And Now For Something Completely Different