In their most recent newsletter, the Ohio Section of the ARRL features a nice article by faculty advisor David Kazdan (see page 4) on this past semester’s farm surveying project by the Civil Engineering Department at CWRU.
Author: w8edu
American Geophysical Union Fall Meeting (Bonus Visit to KPH/KSM)
Kristina KD8OXT and David AD8Y traveled with Laura N8NFE to San Francisco this past week to attend the Fall Meeting of the American Geophysical Union and present a poster on our current research.
It was an excellent chance to confer with our colleagues from HamSCI, learn more about the state of the art in ionospheric science, and check out what’s going on in all facets of geoscience right now. AGU is vast, with attendance on the order of 25,000 people in fields ranging from volcanology and seismology to space physics. The presence of so many disciplines in one place offers opportunities for participants to network across them, putting together collaborations that might otherwise never occur.
On our last day in town, we made time for a visit to KPH/KSM, the last commercial ship-to-shore radio station operating in Morse Code, which is maintained by the Maritime Radio Historical Society. AD8Y picked up his RADAR endorsement, we enjoyed pastries with the crew (on vintage RCA china) and we sent out a CW radiogram to all ships at sea:
We thank our coauthors for their contributions and the NSF for facilitating our attendance, and we hope to present at more AGU meetings in the future.
Survey of Squire Valleevue Farm with Civil Engineering Dept.
Every year, we enjoy holding Field Day at the CWRU Farm in Hunting Valley, OH. Recently, club member Rachel Zable KE8HWA worked with Prof. Katie Wheaton to organize a class exercise: civil engineering students made a survey of the area where we set up our antennas, and composed a report to help us plan their placement in the future. We thank Rachel and Prof. Wheaton for organizing the activity, the students for their excellent work, the Observer for their excellent coverage, and the Farm staff for hosting us.
Case Amateur Radio Club partners with Department of Civil Engineering to prepare for disaster
Video by Ben KB3VSC.
Collegiate WSPR Network Collaboration with W8UM
Several college amateur radio stations have been working this semester to create a network of colleges with WSPR stations.
WSPR, the Weak Signal Propagation Reporter, is protocol written by Princeton physicist Joe Taylor to measure radio propagation via low power transmissions. WSPR stations are inexpensive and easy to set up with existing amateur radio equipment or kits made for the purpose. WSPR users can upload their data to WSPRnet, which makes the data publicly available for scientific use. WSPR is built in to WSJT-X, the popular software used for FT8.
Over the last several weeks, W8EDU has been working with the University of Michigan Amateur Radio Club, W8UM to establish WSPR contact between the two schools. Just as they did in 1916, the two clubs set up and troubleshooted equipment and propagation conditions. The first WSPR contact between the two stations was made in mid November. W8UM’s efforts are being documented on their website.
December 1916 saw the Case Wireless Club (not yet W8EDU, or even W8URD) installing a new aerial antenna, and testing communications with the University of Michigan. We look forward to learning more about the historical predecessors of our two clubs, and including them alongside our findings from our WSPR experiments.
Future work for the Collegiate WPSR Network includes making contact with more schools and planning projects around the data collected. Consider giving WSPR a try yourself, and look for W8EDU, W8UM, and others on the air!
Sweepstakes!
16 November 2019, 4:00 PM EST: W8EDU is working the November Sweepstakes, SSB.
This is the oldest contest in amateur radio and tests a station’s ability to get a formal written radiogram to all parts of the US and Canada within one day. It’s a difficult contest in having a long exchange, based on the header of a radiogram, and permitting contacts with each station only once in the contest. The summer Field Day contest has a simpler exchange and each station may be worked once per band per mode (radiotelephone, digital modes, and Morse code (CW)).
Join us! Call the hamshack phone at 216-368-3579 to make sure we’re here but we likely will be…until Sunday 17 November, 10:00 PM EST. It’s fun! Remember that we said that…
The Frequency Measuring Test for Fall 2019: Results Are In!
Despite minimal preparation, our new Icom and Jim Berilla’s rubidium standard didn’t do half bad: https://fmt.arrl.org/fmtcurresults.php
The Frequency Measuring Test is competition of an acquired taste. The task is to measure, within two minutes, the frequency of an amateur radio signal being sent from K5CM, Connie Marshall’s home version of the NIST in Muskogee, OK. This is why we like amateur radio so much, everybody has his, her, or their own version of it. Some chat on walkie-talkies. Some lovingly maintain caesium clocks. Connie does the clocks.
Measuring radio frequency is not by itself that difficult a problem. Cleveland’s WCCR is 1260 kilohertz on your AM dial, right where WIXY-1260 once lived. My sister was a WIXY Pixy circa 1965, she could find it. W8EDU’s measurement of K5CM differ in being over a long distance, and therefore affected by solar weather and the ever-changing state of the ionosphere–and that they are to 10 significant digits. Competitors have reason to grin broadly and drink Chianti from paper cups if their measurements are within one Hertz (at 7 MHz). Entries are considered very good if within 0.1 Hz. W8EDU achieved one entered measurement off by 0.05 Hz, and another at 0.02 (the referee’s official measurements this trip were 3,599,172.15 and 7,064,240.62 Hz; W8EDU’s were 3,599,172.20 and 7,064,240.64. That put us in top quintile of 115 entries.
The contest requires well-calibrated receiving equipment and knowledge to operate it–along with quite a bit of advance preparation. We used a transceiver compatible with our existing time standard; a computer analysis of the frequency and further computerized analysis of the results from the two minute run completed our entry.
What we didn’t do was spend a few hours before the competition characterizing the ionospheric Doppler shift, which might have given us a winning entry. Next time! For now, the Club members increased their skill in handling radio equipment and performing a statistical analysis of collected data. This all feathers nicely with Nerdstock, the WWV centennial celebrations in Colorado.
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We note that CARC Technical Advisor John Gibbons, N8OBJ, entered from his home station and was nearly as high up the ranks as we were.
Special Event Station W8M
We look forward to seeing our alumni this weekend and operating with us as W8M for homecoming/alumni weekend. Listen for us on air or come visit us at our station from 2 pm to 6 pm. Check our Contact page for directions to the radio shack.
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Postcards From Nerdstock: WWV100
The Case Amateur Radio Club is in the midst of the WWV centennial–read all about it on wwv100.com!
The station has so far made about 4300 contacts all over the world. These include radiotelephone, radiotelegraph (Morse code), and “the digital modes”: computer to computer connections via radio. Contacts have been made near and far, by ionospheric skip and direct, by amateur radio satellites and by reflections of signals off meteors’ ion trails.
Yes, it’s Nerdstock. The rainbow is shining brightly on us. We will post the URL for the Tuesday ceremonies and speeches. Meanwhile, if you’re an amateur radio operator, contact us on the air; if not, send a signal report to WWV on 2.5, 5, 10, 15, 20, or 25 MHz and receive an acknowledgement card. A special card will be sent for signal reports on the centennial day, 1 October 2019.
We Made the Cover of “Rolling Stone!” Read all about it on the Shortwave Radiogram this weekend
Rolling Stone, well, maybe not really. But HamSCI/CWRU’s Festival of Frequency Measurement, 1 October 2019 UTC (beginning the evening of 30 September in the Americas) is the feature article of the American Radio Relay League’s web site, CQ magazine’s podcast, Ham Talk Live’s podcast #181, and, incredibly enough, The Shortwave Radiogram. That last deserves some comment.
Dr. Kim Elliot’s Shortwave Radiogram began as a program on Voice of America. It provides print journalism for people who have a basic shortwave radio and a computer with a sound card, but no internet access. As the program was defunded by VOA, Dr. Elliot took it to commercial shortwave broadcasters such as WRMI Radio Miami International . To read the material and see the pictures transmitted, set your shortwave radio for AM, tune the station at the appointed time, and run the audio to as computer running the free-download software fldigi.
Set fldigi for opmode MFSK-32 and the center frequency cursor to 1500 Hertz. Click the upper right box marked RSID so that any mode changes will happen automatically.
You should get a slow screenful of articles with associated pictures.
With that same shortwave radio, listen to WWV on 1 October and send in a reception report. The engineering staff there will send back the special acknowledgement card printed for the centennial. The address there is
wwv@nist.gov, or sent via postal mail to:
National Institute of Standards and Technology
Radio Station WWV
2000 E. County Rd. 58
Fort Collins, CO 80524
In the custom of shortwave radio, they will post your signal report QSL card, so mail one in.
If you are a licensed amateur radio operator, contact WW0WWV 28 September through 2 October from the Fort Collins site of WWV.
Or check it out here.
Shortwave Radiogram: Festival of Frequency Measurement
Many thanks to Dr. Elliott for the shoutout on this week’s Shortwave Radiogram: https://swradiogram.net/post/187932644597/shortwave-radiogram-26-29-september-and-3-6
