The box dropped yesterday, Hurrah I hear you all cry LOL. Sadly I've been too busy with other things to do anything with it other than check the contents. If the weather holds I'll be hiking and camping in the Yorkshire Dales tomorrow/Sunday. Got the Boafeng T1's and GT-3TP charged, and ready to go just in case we nee to 'Get to the Chopper'.

uBITX has been shipped. Now the nail biting begins.

Last one

Pah......Photobucket want to start charging me to link my photos to other sites.

Still waiting for my uBITX to be shipped.  :'( :'( :'(

I finally got my QRPGuys CW paddle assembled this weekend just gone. The paddle screws supplied were way too short for the task, but I managed to scrounge something suitable out of my parts bin. I've emailed them about it so they are aware.

I've started my intermediate license training and also started to re-learn morse  and did some training with one of the club 'elmers' achieving 80% copy rate at 20wpm for exercises 1 and 2 in the morse book. I also had a go at sending earlier (12wpm) this week but I found out that I was in the wrong mode for the frequency i had dialled in. Pity they don't tell you that you need a morse oscillator to send slow morse over 145.250 and use FM.
Any how - lesson learned. Here's some pics of full rig using a borrowed FT817.

 

Nice work there Gil.

Yeah,

Quite a few of the guys at my local club have them already. It may take me a while to get one as I need to equip the shack for HF ops first. I can use the local repeater GB7SR until then.

OK I got through to the Lille repeater on TG 20859 but it was in use. My French is very rusty and certainly not up to holding a conversation, so I didn't break in.

Calling now.....

Hi Gil,

I'm just trying to figure out how to add the Lille TG to my radio, and understand how it all hangs together.

Hi folks

I just got my MD-380 so apologies for the thread necromancy.

One thing that hasn't been raised yet is that of DMR hot spots. So, what's a hot spot?  Essentially its a small DMR transceiver that relays via the internet. Typically you can use either a PC or more widely used over here, a Raspberry Pi or ATMega device to interface the radio to the 'Net'.

Hot Spots have a limited range, having only 10 mW output power but this should be enough to run a couple of radios over a small area. We have one in the club house so folks can make calls if they wish.

One of the guys uses his mobile phone with his hot spot (via wifi) so he can take the digital network with him wherever he goes. Powered off a USB power bank recharged via a solar panel.

My MD-380 (non GPS Variant) arrived today via the slow boat from China. Ordered and dispatched on 19th January.

First impressions.

It's built pretty solid, although I don't care for the belt clip being mounted to the battery pack so much. If I buy another battery, I'll need to buy another belt clip also, so I'm not swapping them over all the time and wearing out the screw threads.

I've loaded the KD4Z MD-380 tools (firmware) to enhance the GUI and applied a code plug developed by one of my club members.

I've tested access to my local digital (DMR) and analogue repeaters and all seems to be in order. Good clear n crisp audio, and good reports into the analogue repeater front end (via the guy that hosts the unit).  These repeaters are co-located about 10 miles away on the other side of the city. Signal in the house on the hand held is poor unless I go and sit on the other side of the house to where my shack is. I could plug the HT into my X50 col-linear but I don't want to mess about unplugging my Leixen vv-898S. 

I may invest in a hot spot at some point to improve coverage in the house.

One of my club mates demo'd his hot spot the other night. His hot spot runs off a USB power bank with a solar panel attached and uses the data connection on his phone. The phone links to the hotspot via wifi. All in all a nice little set up and it uses very little data from his allocated tariff.

If any of you overseas chaps fancy a chat at some point let me know and we can arrange something. I'm still learning about Zones,  time slots and colour codes, so please be patient.

Thanks for the heads up Gil. I've also sent for a CW Keyer and beacon kit from Ukraine. The pixie should be here by the end of the week, the Keyer, who knows.

Quote from: cockpitbob on February 13, 2018, 02:16:18 AM
If you are into putting makeup on a pig (kind of fun actually),

I found this phrase funny, it reminds me of a phrase we have here.

You can't polish a turd, but you 'can' roll it in glitter.

YMMV.

I just sent for a Pixie - The £8 version from an english supplier complete with clear acrylic case, whilst I wait for my uBITX to arrive from India. I'll be using this kit for my Intermediate/2E1*** license practical submission. I still need to build my QRPGuys Iambic key, and come up with a straight key to go with the Pixie. Oh and learn morse so I can use the thing.