Scroll down for some AMAZING info on APRS.
N7OVT Reports - FRIDAY December 3rd, 2010 - 5PM TO SAT 5PM Skywarn Recognition Day - PSK HF ECHOLINK PACKET - The NOAA weather station in Salt Lake City is located at 2200 West North Temple. VHF-449.425 (IRLP) and HF PSK on 14700
Rascal-II does do packet. The BuxCom sale is over. N7OVT bought the Rascall-II and reports that the construction is horrible and shoddy. He says it is worth the extra 20 or 30 bucks to get the Signalink unit.
The 6 PIN DIN Data connector on Icom, Kenwood, Yeasu radios is wired the same - one data cable for three brands of radios on packet/APRS/digital modes!
If you have an older radio, you may find that it looses its memory settings when powered off. There is a keep-alive battery inside and it has finally gone dead. These are usually button batteries about the size of a quarter with solder leads. Replacements are available on eBay and from other sources. You may be able to use Google to find out which keep alive battery your radio needs before you take it apart.
NOTE: Newer radios (last 5 years or so) do NOT have keep-alive batteries, they use NVRAM which does not require a keep-alive battery. [Thanks to Dave, KD7UM for this info]
There are battery eliminator devices for most handy talkies. They snap on in place of your regular battery and have a cord that plugs into your car cigarette lighter socket or other similar 12 volt source. In most cases they boost the power rating of your radio and are very handy in an emergency. These are available in many cases for radios that are 30+ years old right up through the most modern models. Check Ebay and Google for your radio model number and the word "eliminator" or "battery eliminator".
Be careful when buying after market chargers for your handy talkies. They are VERY handy and will NEVER overcharge your battery. Many HT batteries only have contacts where they connect to the radio. However, many of the after market chargers have contacts meant to mate with contact on the back, side, or bottom of the battery so that it can be charged while attached to the radio. Be sure you specify which one you need when ordering units like the Universal chargers with drop in replaceable charging cups.
NOTE: It is nice to have aftermarket chargers that can charge your HT battery OFF the radio, then you can have one battery on the radio and be using the radio while the other battery is charging.
APRS - APRS - APRS - http://www.aprs.org/ - APRS - APRS - APRS
The above web site has TONS of info on APRS. If you think APRS is only for tracking mobile radios as they drive around, you are in for a surprise. APRS is being used to announce ham radio events, weather warnings, hazardous info on roads with date, time and GPS coordinates, and lots, lots more. Check the APRS web site for even more info.
Dave, KD7UM has done lots with APRS and reports the following. You can get a used Garmin GPS5 for around $40.00 and it will connect to your APRS capable radios for APRS. Some good APRS programs are UView32 and APRS Point. If using a USB to Serial cable with a GPS, be careful, Dave only gets cables based on the FTDI chipset to work with GPS units.
Lots of USB things on USBGear.com.
Here is an interesting and very useful set up for APRS. If set up properly, your radio can "page" you when you are within simplex range of another APRS radio and you can then communicate (voice) with that station while continuing to monitor APRS data. This info (and TONS more) is from the APRS.ORG web page listed above.
The national simplex frequency for APRS is 144.39 and HF APRS is on 10.151 MHz LSB.
Anyone who has a mobile radio that can do APRS who is not using APRS is really missing out big time on some fascinating and VERY useful ham radio experiences. Of course, Packet, APRS and EchoLink will be very prominent in any actual emergency. If you plan to operate from home in an emergency you NEED to have one or more of those modes available.
That's all for now. -N7OZH-
No comments:
Post a Comment