Author Archives: Bob Beatty

Something new to chase — VUCC-Sat

Posted on February 22, 2019 by Bob Beatty

The ARRL has had a VUCC (VHF UHF Century Club) Award for a long time.  Not being a VHF/UHF/SHF guy, it never caught my attention until I noticed that they had a specific award for Satellite contacts.  The requirement is … Continue reading →

Posted in ARRL, Awards, Satellite, VUCC | Leave a comment

So how many chances are there to work a satellite?

Posted on February 9, 2019 by Bob Beatty

Putting on “old man” voice … “Back in my day, you were lucky to work one station and had only a few minutes maybe three or four times a day to do so” Things are MUCH easier now, with more … Continue reading →

Posted in AMSAT, Satellite | Leave a comment

Having a Blast on Satellites

Posted on February 8, 2019 by Bob Beatty

There are so many aspects of Amateur Radio that capture my attention. Satellite operation is one of them.  There are more than a dozen satellites “birds” in orbit now and you can pretty much fill an entire day working through … Continue reading →

Posted in AMSAT, Gear, Satellite | Leave a comment

Psst — Secret Goal Completed!

Posted on January 31, 2019 by Bob Beatty

In addition to my yearly goals, I often have a few in my back pocket that I am working on.  One of those was working at least one station every day for a month (pretty easy), and having at least … Continue reading →

Posted in AMSAT, AO-92, Goals, Satellite | 1 Comment

112 Different Folks on Sat

Posted on January 29, 2019 by Bob Beatty

I was curious to see how many different people I’ve worked on the various satellites since getting back on the air in 2011.  In the past 8 years I’ve worked 112 different stations.  Some of the birds are no longer … Continue reading →

Posted in Satellite | Leave a comment

CW QSO via AO-7 Old Lady

Posted on January 28, 2019 by Bob Beatty

It is always exciting to make a contact through AO-7, a satellite that was launched in 1974.  It died due to battery failure about five years later (batteries shorted), exceeding its design goals. Amazingly, 21 years after its launch, in … Continue reading →

Posted in AO-7, Satellite | Leave a comment

Having fun DXing this January

Posted on January 18, 2019 by Bob Beatty

I spent far too much time hunting grids down in 2018.  I will say it upped my DXCC Challenge points (by about 85), but it wasn’t very fruitful for finding ATNOs. Thankfully, January has proven to be opportunity-rich.  I’ve worked … Continue reading →

Posted in 160-Meters, DX, From the OM | Leave a comment

Using a K1EL WKmini with HRD (And CW KY Cmd Fix)

Posted on January 10, 2019 by Bob Beatty

A while back, when I had my K3, I used a rig interface that had a WinKeyer built-in and it worked fabulously.  But when I changed over to a K3s, I was never able to get HRD to work in … Continue reading →

Posted in CW, HRD, K1EL, WinKeyer | 1 Comment

10,000 QSOs in the Log

Posted on December 21, 2018 by Bob Beatty

How appropriate, on the first day of winter, for a non-fan of cold weather, snow & ice, that I should reach QSO #10,000 in my logbook?  My small contribution to the one billion QSOs entered into LotW as of 12/19. … Continue reading →

Posted in From the OM, FT8, LotW, Operating | Leave a comment

WSJT-X Users MUST Upgrade to Version 2.0.0

Posted on December 14, 2018 by Bob Beatty

I had noticed that my waterfall was showing 20 or more signals that should be decoding, but only a few were.  Nevertheless I continued to work stations for this final month of the International Grid Chase.  I became concerned that … Continue reading →

Posted in FT8, WSJT-X | Leave a comment