2016 New England QSO Party – Operating Mobile HF

June 5, 2016 by AB1OC

Several members of the Nashua Area Radio Club operated as N1FD/M (our club callsign) in the New England QSO Party this year as a Multi-Op Mobile Entry. Operators included Wayne Wagner, AG1A and Jamey Finchum, KC1ENX, and myself. We began our operations on Saturday afternoon on the Massachusetts – New Hampshire State line where we activated two counties and two states.

N1FD/M NEQP Multi-Op Team

We entered the 2016 NEQP Contest in the High Power Multi-Op Mobile Category. We operated using SSB phone mode using mostly on the 20m and 40m bands. We took turns operating, driving and navigating. We used Fred’s, AB1OC’s mobile HF station in his truck.

CQ NEQP from N1FD/M

We operated Saturday and Sunday for nearly the entire contest period. We spent most of our time calling CQ and we had several nice pileups to work.

Counties Activated by N1FD/m in the 2016 NEQP

The map above shows the counties in Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Vermont that we activated during the contest. Anita, AB1QB helped us to create a route of counties to activate which included some of the more rare counties in Vermont and New Hampshire.

Operating on a County Line in Vermont

We tried to focus on activations where we could be in two counties as once. These activations produced some nice pileups for us to work.

Operating on a County Line in NH

We parked on county lines with 2 wheels of N1FD/M in one county and 2 wheels in another. This gave us two QSO points (one for each county) for each contact that we made.

NPOTA Activation – Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller NHP in Vermont

We also activated two National Parks along our route as part of ARRL’s NPOTA program. We activated Saint-Gaudens NHS (NS60) in New Hampshire and Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller NHP (HP26) in Vermont. The HP26 activation produced the best response – we made about 50 contacts while we were there.

Solar Weather for NEQP 2016

We had a few challenges along the way. We had some antenna-related problems to deal with. Fortunately, we had spare parts with us and we adjusted our operating style to overcome these problems. We also had to operate through a major solar event on Sunday. This made contacts very difficult but we still logged over 235 QSOs on Sunday in spite of the conditions.

Wayne, AG1A Operating in NEQP 2016

We used a PC running the N1MM+ logger connected directly to the Icom IC-7000 radio which is mounted on the passenger side lower interior panel in our truck. This made if very easy for whoever was operating to keep up with the logging when our QSO rates were high.

All in all, we had a great time in the contest. We logged a total of 631 QSOs and we worked 58 Multipliers. Our final claimed score was 36,598 – not bad given that this was our first entry as a mobile and our first time in NEQP. We worked 43 of 50 states and we had quite a few stations from Canada and Europe call in to answer our CQs. All in all, it was a lot of fun operating from our Mobile HF station in the NEQP contest!

There was some discussion on the way home about the Maine and New Hampshire QSO parties which will be held later this year. We hope to be N1FD/M again in one or more of those as well.

The N1FD/M Multi-op Team,

Fred, AB1OC
Wayne, AG1A
Jamey, KC1ENX
Anita, AB1QB

Dayton Hamvention 2016

June 1, 2016 by AB1QB

Anita Preseting in Contest Forum Fred, AB1OC, and I just returned from the 2016 Hamvention in Dayton, OH.

Our first day in Dayton was spent at Contest University – this was our 5th year in attendance but each year we learn more from the contesting experts. This year, we attended two presentations from Frank Donovan, W3LPL on operating techniques for the declining solar cycle and on 80m and 160m antennas. We also heard a talk from Val NV9L from Ham Nation on Log Analysis tools and another session on SO2R (Single Operator 2 Radio) Operating.

Slide from W3LPL Contest University Presentation

Friday was the first day of the Hamvention, and we spent most of the day visiting all of the vendor exhibits. We visited the Icom booth and looked at the new Icom 7851. It has an incredible display as well as one of the best receivers on the market.

Icom IC-7851 Display on a Large Screen TV

We also saw the new KX2 Transceiver at the Elecraft booth. It is even smaller than the KX3 and is perfect for SOTA and other portable operations. I would expect to hear some NPOTA activations using this radio.

Elecraft Kx2 on the Right, next to a KX3

Friday evening was the Top Band dinner, where we learned all about “Top Band Disease” from Larry “Tree” Tyree N6TR. Hams with this disease are nocturnal, and love the bottom of the sunspot cycle. They are constantly improving their 160m antennas – when you upgrade your receive antenna, there are people who can’t hear you, so you need to improve your transmit antenna – and the cycle continues…

2016 ARRL Rookie Roundup SSB

May 31, 2016 by AB1QB

ARRL Rookie Roundup Ops

A team of newly licensed members of our club, the Nashua Area Radio Club, came together to enter the 2016 ARRL Rookie Round SSB Contest, using our club callsign, N1FD. We held a training session at our QTH the weekend before the contest to allow our operators to learn about contesting and to become familiar with our station. We put together a training package to introduce the operator team to contesting in general and to the ARRL Rookie Roundup. You can view the training package here..

Station Setup for the Contest

We entered the ARRL Rookie Roundup in the Multi-Op, Single Transmitter category using the club’s N1FD call sign. This gave everyone a chance to operate in the contest and contribute to the team’s final score. Fred, AB1OC spent some time setting up and checking out our station ahead of time. Our operators used the N1MM+ logger and operated using 100w of power on the 20m and 40m bands.

We had a total of 13 Nashua Area Radio Club members who attended the preparation session and/or operated in the contest. Folks worked as teams during the contest with one person operating while another person logged. Our operators had nice pileups to work for a good portion of the contest. All of our Operators did really well.

As you can see from the video above, we definitely have some future contest stars in our club!

2016 RR SSB Score

The table above shows the results of our operations during the 6-hour contest period. Our team did really well! Of particular note is that they were able to work 45 of the 70 available multipliers. It will take some time for the ARRL to put together the results for everyone in the contest but we believe that our team did very well.

Abby and her Dad Jamey Operating in the ARRL Rookie Roundup SSB

The results are in and N1FD took first place in the recent ARRL Rookie Roundup SSB in the Multi-op Category. The N1FD team was also #1 in area one and #5 overall in the contest. Congratulations to all of our operators – they did a great job operating in the contest. You can find all of the scores for the contest here.

2016-ARRL-RR-N1FD

We are planning to host recently licensed club members again for the ARRL Rookie Roundup RTTY and the ARRL Rookie Roundup CW contests later this year. We hope to see many of our operators back again for these contests.

Do you have a contest station? If so, we’d like to encourage you to host and Elmer some new hams and challenge us in the ARRL Rookie Roundup RTTY on August 21.

Anita, AB1QB

Becoming A Great Mentor

February 26, 2016 by AB1OC

Teaching Amateur Radio License Classes

There is much being said and written these days about the importance of bringing new people, especially young people, into our Hobby. There are many obvious reasons for this. As we all get older or get busy with other aspects of our lives, some will leave the hobby. Also, we have the use of many commercially valuable portions of the RF spectrum and there is always pressure to reallocate bands or segments of bands that are not fully utilized. In my mind, the most important reason to bring new HAMs into our hobby has to do with the energy and new ideas that these folks bring to Amateur Radio. Amateur Radio has always been a learning hobby and new folks help us to keep this important part of what makes our hobby so fun and vibrant.

Anita (AB1QB) and I try to put a lot of time and energy into getting folks started in Amateur Radio and helping them to build their skills and progress. Our Amateur Radio License Classes and the youth outreach work that we’ve been doing are two good examples of this. To make these efforts as successful as they can be, it’s also very important to provide good opportunities for folks who are new to various aspects of Amateur Radio to learn and gain experience. This means becoming an “Elmer” or a HAM Radio mentor to people who are less experienced in some part of the hobby than you are.

Perhaps the most challenging part of Amateur Radio for many new HAMs is making the transition from getting their initial license or a license upgrade, to getting on the air with their new privileges. I think that this is equally true for newly licensed folks and for folks who have upgraded to a higher license class and are looking to get onto the HF bands. It’s impossible to teach everything that one needs to get the most from their Amateur License in classes alone.

Help A Young Person Learn To Operate From Your Shack

So what does effective Mentoring look like? I think that the answer is different for every HAM. For a new Tech, it may be as simple as helping the person to pick their first radio and antenna along with some help getting it programmed for the local repeaters. For a person upgrading their license to gain HF privileges, it is often about helping to get a first HF antenna up along with helping them to select equipment for and assemble a first HF station. All of these folks will also benefit from help getting on the air and learning to operate. Most of all, a great m is someone who is willing to give their time to help a person who is new to an aspect of Amateur Radio learn and get started doing what they want to do.

I have personally found being a Mentor to be one of the most rewarding and enjoyable aspects of Amateur Radio. Every time that I help someone get on the air for the first time or help someone to build their first HF antenna or station, I get the same enjoyment as when I did these things for the first time in my Amateur Radio experience.

Mentoring is also a great opportunity for a “Mentor” to learn new things. Newer or less experienced folks will have different things that they want to try or learn about than those things that we “Mentors” consider our “tried and true” Amateur Radio activities. A great Mentor will help the less experienced HAM take on these projects and learn along with them. This gives the less experienced person the confidence and support that they need to try more difficult projects with confidence. The learning experience associated with being an Elmer has often been the best part of the experience for me.

So how does one get started with Mentoring? You could open your station to newer HAMs and offer them a chance to get on the air and learn to operate. There is always someone looking to put up a new antenna or repair an existing one. These are all great opportunities for Mentoring. Also, you could consider creating a presentation that you can deliver at your local radio club meetings as a way to share specialized knowledge or experience that you may have. If you are newly licensed, perhaps you could help someone who is studying for their license exam with some of the areas that they are finding difficult. Also, new folks tend to have experience with computers and the Internet which many of the folks who have been in the hobby for a while can benefit from. This can be a 2-way Mentoring opportunity.

I hope that all of our readers will consider becoming a Mentor in some way. Your efforts to help someone new or less experienced can provide you with the satisfaction that you helped to make Amateur Radio a better hobby for everyone.

– Fred, AB1OC

A New Project – Digital Fast Scan Amateur Television

February 19, 2016 by AB1OC

Digital Amateur Television (ATV) CQ Call

Skip, K1NKR a local friend and VHF/UHF expert and I began talking about the idea of building a Fast Scan Amateur Television (ATV) System some time ago. Our early research and the antenna equipment which we had in place at our stations led us to plan our ATV project around the 70 cm band. The 70 cm band plan in the United States has allocations for Fast Scan ATV transmissions with a bandwidth of up to 6 MHz. Our research led us to Jim Andrews, KH6HTV’s excellent website where we discovered that it was possible to build a Digital ATV station using reasonably priced commercially available DVB-T format Modulators and Demodulators. Jim’s site has a wealth of great Applications Notes on Digital ATV and it’s a great place to start learning about this technology. A combination of a DVB-T Modulator and Demodulator from Hi-Des was chosen as the heart of our Digital ATV System. We also worked with Jim to secure the needed Wideband Linear Power Amplifiers for the 70 cm band. We began receiving the equipment to build our Digital ATV Stations late last year. We’ve done quite a bit of testing on the air and some custom development work which has resulted in a pair of excellent-performing Digital ATV stations. The picture above shows a Digital ATV “CQ” that I sent to initiate one of our early QSOs.

Digital ATV Transceiver

Here’s a picture of Skip receiving my “CQ” at his end. The picture quality produced by the equipment that we’re using and the DVB-T format is phenomenal. The Hi-Des Modulator which we are using has a large number of parameters that can be set to determine the format and bandwidth of the signals we generate. After some experimentation, we have settled on using QPSK modulation and a 6 MHz signal bandwidth. This combination delivers excellent picture quality with more than adequate motion performance. We see very few if any picture artifacts using our current format. We’ve also done some experimentation with QPSK and a 4 MHz signal bandwidth. I plan to share more on signal formats in a future article on our blog.

Digital ATV System User Interface

We are both using HD Digital Camcorders as our primary video signal sources and 1080p monitors to display our received signals. I opted to include an HDMI Video Switch from Gefen in my setup which also allows me to send video and graphics from a variety of different sources including my PC over the air. The monitor in the picture above on the right is a touchscreen display that I use to control my ATV Transceiver system.

AB1OC Digital ATV Transceiver

Early on, I decided to build a Transceiver-like setup. I wanted to create a unit that was simple to use just like the HF Transceivers that are available today. Some of the key capabilities that I wanted to create include:

Real-time selection and switching between multiple HD video sources
Transmission of PC sourced Video and Graphics over the air
Preview and cueing of the next video transmission while receiving
Simultaneous display of both receive and pending transmit video
Built-in Transmit/Receive (T/R) switching with termination and protection of the Tx power stage
Sequencing of T/R stages including my tower-mounted pre-amplifier system
Power and SWR monitoring with an automatic trip on high SWR
An internal low-noise RF preamplifier to provide additional receive signal gain if needed
Touchscreen graphical interface for configuration and operating the station
Recording of both sides of on-air video QSOs to an attached PC

To achieve these goals, I decided to build a Raspberry Pi 2-based Linux controller for my ATV Transceiver and to package all of the ATV components and video switching/conversion gear needed in a small rack mount enclosure. Many of the components in the system communicate with each other over an Ethernet LAN and the transceiver is networked to computers and other devices via an external Ethernet connection. More on the details of the Transceiver design to come in a future article.

Skip and I recently produced a short video to demonstrate how Fast Scan Digital ATV works and to show the quality that these systems are capable of producing. Our project is still a work in progress and I expect that we will continue to learn as we perform more tests and continue the development of our systems. I plan to post additional articles here to share the details of our designs and learnings from our on-air testing as we proceed.

– Fred, AB1OC

Software Defined Radio – The Future of Amateur Radio?

February 19, 2016 by AB1OC

Modern SDR Example - FlexRadio 6000 Series

Modern Software-Defined Radio (SDR) Example – FlexRadio 6000 Series

Computers and Digital Signal Processing already play a big role in recent Amateur Radio transceivers. Many HAMs understand these features well and regularly use them for all manner of filtering, noise reduction, and signal processing tasks while on the air. We’ve also seen more and more radios with Spectrum Scopes, making it easier to visualize what is on a given band in real time. These capabilities are common- even on entry-level HF transceivers- thanks to increasing volumes in color displays, Digital Signal Processor (DSP) applications, and low-cost processors.

Software Defined Radios (SDRs) are the next logical step in this evolution. SDRs are not new; they have been around for some time now. SDR technology has continued to improve as the cost and performance of Analog to Digital Converters, Programmable Logic Devices, and other processors that make up the hardware side of SDRs have improved. We are now to the point where it is possible to build an SDR for Amateur Radio applications that can directly sample RF at frequencies as high as 150 MHz.

Direct Sampling SDR receiver designs have advantages over the conventional single conversion and super-heterodyne receivers (i.e., multiple conversion). These include:

Higher dynamic range
Low phase noise
Ability to cover multiple bands simultaneously with multiple receivers
Very high-quality spectrum displays
Flexible, high-performance filters
The ability to add new modulation schemes and other features via software updates

The first two items above (dynamic range and phase noise) are particularly important as they result in receiver performance that is significantly better than that which can be achieved with the best direct and superhet designs. Take, for example, a busy contest environment when a band is very crowded (ex., 40m at night in a worldwide DX phone contest). There are many strong signals crowded closely together on the band. Even the best conventional design receivers will have trouble hearing moderate and weak signals in this environment. The problem is that the strong signals tend to overload the analog circuitry in the conversion stages of conventional radios, producing many Intermodulation Distortion Design products. Phase noise also compounds this problem.

A direct sampling SDR converts the incoming RF signals with high dynamic range Analog to Digital conversion and then performs all of the filtering and demodulation of the incoming signals in software. This approach limits the potential for Intermodulation Distortion with an end result that all of the signals on the band (including the weaker ones) are much clearer. This approach also allows very high-order filtering to be applied in the RF domain, resulting in greatly improved selectivity and rejection of closely spaced adjacent signals with minimal distortion.

By now, some may think that this all sounds great, but I don’t want to use my computer to make QSOs. There is good news on this front as well. We are beginning to see the major transceiver manufacturers introduce direct sampling SDR technology in radios with conventional “buttons and knobs” interfaces.

Icom IC-7300 (Pending US Release)

New designs like the Icom IC-7300 can provide a way to gain the performance and feature advantages of an SDR in a radio which has a more conventional interface. The entry of the major manufacturers into the direct sampling space and the resulting competition should help to lower prices for all types of SDRs.

RTL-SDR Dongle

Want to give SDR technology a try without spending a lot of $? Several very good SDR Dongles are available along with SDR software at a minimal cost. Dongles are typically receive-only, but some can also transmit at very lower power. The use of this technology in digital TV receivers and set-top boxes has made the cost of SDR Dongles very low, and there is some very good SDR software available for free on the web. Dongles are generally broad coverage receivers and can also be used to listen to signals outside the Amateur Bands.

It is interesting to follow the rapid evolution of SDR technology. We recently integrated a FlexRadio-6700 SDR into our station to enable us to operate remotely via the Internet. You can read more about this project on our blog.

– Fred, AB1OC

Software Defined Radio/Remote Operating Gateway Part 3 – On The Air Remote!

November 29, 2015 by AB1OC

Remote Operating Setup In Our Home Office

In the previous articles in this series, we explained how we integrated a FlexRadio-6700 Software Defined Radio (SDR) into our station and how we used it as a platform to build the Remote Operating Gateway for our station. The project has turned out to be somewhat involved so we will be providing a series of articles to explain what we did:

With all of the hardware and software installed and the integration steps complete, we will show some examples of using our remote operating setup on the air in this article. The first set of operating examples was made using the Remote Operating Client PC in our Home Office. This system is shown in the picture above.

Working The VK9WA DXpedition – Left Monitor

We were able to make several contacts with the VK9WA DXpedition to Willis Island using our remote operating setup. The picture above provides a closer look at how we set up our Remote Client PC to work VK9WA (you can click on the pictures here to see a larger view). We just completed a CW contact with the VK9WA DXpedition on 40m and you can see that we have the QSO logged in DXLab’s DXKeeper. We used CW Skimmer to help determine where the operator was listening (more on this in a bit). We also used our Elecraft KPA500 Amplifier to make it a little easier to break through the pileup.

Working The VK9WA DXpedition – Right Monitor

The picture above shows a better view of the second monitor on our Remote Client PC. SmartSDR is running to control our FlexRadio-6700 SDR and it is set up for split operation in CW mode on the 40m band. We also have DXLab’s DXView running and we used it to point our antennas to the short path heading for the VK9WA DXpedition. Finally, we used DXLab’s WinWarbler to remotely key the Winkeyer connected to our SDR in the shack to make the actual contact.

VK9WA DXpedition 30m Pileup Viewed From CW Skimmer

The video above shows the VK9WA DXpedition operating split in CW mode on the 30m band. Note how CW Skimmer allows us to see exactly where the operator is listening (the VK9WA operator’s signal is the green bar at the bottom and the stations being worked can be seen sending a “599” near the top). You can see many of the folks trying to work the VK9WA DXpedition move near the last station that is worked in the pileup video.

VK9WA DXpedition 30m Pileup Viewed From SmartSDR

The next video shows the VK9WA pileup in the SmartSDR application which controls the radio. This video provides a closer look at how SmartSDR is set up for split operation. Can you find the station that the VK9WA operator worked? It is not quite in Slice Receiver B’s passband.

Laptop Remote Operating Client

We also configured our Laptop PC to be a Remote Operating Client for our station. Our Bose SoundLink Bluetooth Headset is used as both a wireless microphone and headphones with this system. Our Laptop Client PC can be used from any location on our property via the WiFi Wireless extension of our Home Network.

Window Arrangement For remote Operating From Laptop

Since our Laptop PC has limited screen space, we created a configuration of overlapping windows to provide access to SmartSDR, key elements of the DXLab Suite, and the applications which control/monitor our KPA500 Amplifier and Antennas. Each window is arranged so that a portion of it is always visible so that we can click on any required window to bring it forward when we need to use it.

Operating From Our Remote Laptop Client – A 20m SSB QSO

The video above shows a QSO that we made with AD0PY, David, and his friend Daniel in Missouri, USA. We used the FlexRadio-6700 SDR/SmartSDR combination in VOX mode to make transmit keying simpler. At the beginning of the QSO, we turned our antennas to point to AD0PY. Also, note the operation of the KPA500 Amplifier when we transmit in the video. The QSO is logged in DXLab’s DXKeeper at the end of the contact in the usual way. It’s fun to make casual contacts this way!

As you can see from this post, there is very little difference when we operate our station remotely or from our shack. This was an important goal that shaped the design of our Remote Operating Gateway and Client PC setup. Future posts will provide some details on how we set up the CW Skimmer and Digital Mode (RTTY, PSK, and JT65/JT9) software to work on our Remote PC Clients.

– Fred, AB1OC

Software Defined Radio/Remote Operating Gateway Part 2 – Client/Server Setup And Software

November 29, 2015 by AB1OC

Remote Operating Gateway Client/Server Architecture

The next step in our Software Defined Radio/Remote Operating Project was to build a Remote Operating Gateway System in our shack and set up Client PCs to operate our station remotely. In a previous article, we explained how we integrated a FlexRadio 6700 Software Defined Radio (SDR) into our station to create a platform to build our remote operating project around. This project has turned out to be somewhat involved, so we will be providing a series of articles to explain what we did:

Part 1 – System Design and Hardware Installation
Part 2 – Client/Server Setup and Software (Shack Equipment, Computers, and Software Enabling Remote Operation – this post)
Part 3 – On The Air Remote!
Part 4 – Remote Operating Enhancements
Satellite Station 4.0 Part 7 – Flex SDR Satellite Transceiver to Enable Remote Satellite Operation
PTT Switch for Remote Operation

In this article, we will explain the additional hardware and software we used to enable remote operating and some other equipment we added to our Client PCs that we use to run our station remotely. The reader may want to refer to the picture above as you browse this article to better understand how the parts in our remote operating setup fit together. You can click on any of the pictures on our blog to see a larger, easier-to-read version.

SmartSDR Software Operating With A FlexRadio 6700 SDR

FlexRadio’s SmartSDR Software handles operating the SDR remotely. At the present state of maturity, SmartSDR can operate over a wired or wireless Ethernet LAN connection. SmartSDR and the FlexRadio-6xxx hardware must function properly on the same sub-network. FlexRadio has indicated they plan to enable SmartSDR operation over wide-area broadband internet connections. The design we chose for our Remote Operating Gateway and Client PCs will allow the operation of our entire station over the internet when SmartSDR can fully support this. SmartSDR handles remoting of audio (microphone and speakers/headphones), CW keying over our Home Network (more on this later), and control of the radio. With these essential functions taken care of, we also need to remotely control the following functions of our station to fully support remote operation:

Control of the power to all of the remote equipment (FlexRadio-6700 SDR, microHAM Station Master Deluxe, W2 Wattmeter, and other Accessories)
Selection and control of our antennas and rotators via a microHAM Station Master Deluxe Antenna Controller
Monitoring and control of our Elecraft KPA500 Amplifier, KAT500 Auto-tuner, and W2 Power/SWR Meter

Remote control of equipment power is particularly important to provide a means to reset/restart equipment remotely and shut down the Transmitter remotely.

Remote GW Control Stack - Antenna, Power and Monitoring

Remote Gateway Control Stack – Antenna, Power, and Monitoring

Remote control of power for the components in our Remote Operating Setup is handled by a RIGRunner 4005i power control device. This unit provides remote power control over a network for up to 5 separate groups of devices. It also provides voltage/current monitoring and solid-state over-current protection.

RIGRunner Remote Power Control Setup

The figure above shows how we set up our RIGRunner 4005i. The device is controlled over our Home Network via a standard Web Browser. As you can see from the picture above, this device lets us remotely control power to all of the devices in our Remote Operating Setup.

Remote Control Relay Unit

The FlexRadio-6700 SDR requires some additional power control handling. Simply removing and applying power to the FlexRadio-6700 SDR will reset the radio and leave it in a power-off state. The FlexRadio-6700 SDR does have a remote power control input which can be controlled via a relay closure. We used a microbit Webswitch 1216H device to provide a remotely controlled relay closure to control the power off/on for the FlexRadio-6700 SDR.

Flex-6700 On/Off Control Via microbit Webswitch

The microbit Webswitch 1216H relay unit is also controlled over our Home Network via a standard Web Browser.

SmartSDR Setup - Tx Keying, Tx Interlock and Remote Power Control

SmartSDR Setup – Remote On/Off Control

The FlexRadio-6700 SDR is configured for remote on/off operation via the Radio Setup dialog in SmartSDR, as shown above. A cable is run between the remote power on/off port on the FlexRadio-6700 SDR and the microbit Webswitch 1216H relay unit to complete this part of our Remote Control System.

Beams On Our Tower

It is also important to have full remote control of our Antennas and Rotators to effectively use our station outside our shack. Control of our Rotators is accomplished by software that remotes serial COM ports over our Home Network.

Network Serial Port Kit

We used Fabulatech’s Network Serial Port Kit package to remote the serial COM ports used to control the microHAM Station Master Deluxe Antenna Controller, the associated antenna Rotators, and the WinKeyer associated with our FlexRadio-6700 SDR. This software runs on both the local Server computer in our shack which hosts the Remote Operating Setup, and any Client PCs which are used to operate our station remotely.

microHAM Station Master Deluxe Antenna Control via Teamviewer and Development App

microHAM Station Master Deluxe Development Application Via TeamViewer

There is not currently a production software tool to enable remote control of the microHAM Station Master Deluxe Antenna Controllers we use in our shack. I plan to develop my own application to do this in the future. The folks at microHAM have been so kind as to provide me with the interface specifications needed to control the Station Master Deluxe Antenna Controller remotely along with a Developer Only test application (shown above) which can be used to understand the microHAM Device Protocol. In the interim, I have been using the microHAM Developer Only application along with the TeamViewer Remote Control Software to remotely control antenna selection and monitor the position of the currently selected rotators.

Shack Remote Operating Gateway Server PC Applications

The remaining software required for remote control of our station is provided by the Elecraft applications, which control the KPA500 Amplifier, KAT500 Auto-Tuner, and W2 Wattmeter, which are used in our Remote Operating Gateway setup. All of these applications, along with the microHAM Developer Only Application for Station Master Deluxe control and the DDUtil Program, which inter-works the FlexRadio-6700 SDR CAT interface with the Station Master Deluxe (see the previous article in this series) are shown above running on our Shack Server PC. This PC is on at all times and is protected by an Uninterruptible Power System (UPS) to ensure that it runs trouble-free.

Remote Operating PC Client Software Applications

In addition to FlexRadio SmartSDR, each server-side PC application has a corresponding Client Side application used on the Remote Operating Client PC. The three Elecraft Client applications for Amplifier, Auto-Tuner, and Wattmeter control and monitoring are shown above. The client-side Network Serial Port Kit application replicates the WinKeyer, microHAM Station Master Deluxe, and Rotator Control COM ports are also shown.

Heil Microphone And USBQ Adapter

The PC in our home office will be our station’s primary remote operating location. Audio quality is important to us, and we wanted to ensure that our audio quality was just as good operating remotely as it is when we operate from our Shack. To accomplish this, we installed a Heil PR781 Microphone, PL2T Boom, and USBQ Adapter/Pre-Amp on our home office PC. The Heil USBQ is a USB sound card and microphone pre-amplifier which connects directly to the PR781 microphone to create a high-quality phone audio source that can be used with the FlexRadio-6700 SDR when operating remotely.

Bose SoundLink Bluetooth Headset

The speakers on my home office PC are quite good, but sometimes a set of headphones is needed to hear weak signals. We choose a quality Bluetooth Headset from Bose for this purpose. The Bose SoundLink Headset is lightweight, wireless, has excellent fidelity, and includes a very good microphone which can be used as an alternative to the Heil PR781. This headset is also very useful when operating from our Laptop Client PC from noisy locations outside our home (more on this in a future article).

SmartSDR DAX Control Panel

The last pieces of the remote operating system are provided by two applications that are part of the SmartSDR software package. The SmartSDR’s DAX Control panel provides remote audio connections for Digital Mode Software and the CW Skimmer decoder. Audio is provided by software “audio cables” for each FlexRadio SDR’s Slice Receiver and the active Tx Slice. SmartSDR DAX Audio IQ interfaces are also provided for each of the SDR’s Panadapters which permits software like CW Skimmer to monitor and decode a wide range of frequencies simultaneously.

SmartSDR CAT

The SmartSDR CAT application provides CAT interfaces on both our Client and Server PCs for applications that need to control or monitor what the FlexRadio-6700 SDR is doing. Many loggers and other applications are beginning to implement direct IP interfaces to the CAT channel of the FlexRadio 6xxx Series SDRs. This approach simplifies interworking between the software and the radio and appears to be more reliable than virtual COM-based CAT interfaces.

Client PC Running SmartSDR And The DXLab Suite (Home Office)

With all of the above elements in place, any client PC that can access our Home Network can be used to operate our station. The picture above shows SmartSDR and the DXLab Suite running on our Home Office PC. The remote emulations of the Rotator, CAT, and Winkeyer interfaces are such that DXLab’s applications can fully operate our station as if they were running in our shack.

Client PC Running SmartSDR And The DXLab Suite – Right Monitor

The picture above shows a closer view of my Home Office PC’s Right monitor (click on the picture to enlarge it). SmartSDR is running the upper left corner, and I am listening to folks operate in the 2015 CQ WW DX CW Contest. The SDR is set on the 20m band, and I have the CW Keyer built into SmartSDR running. The DAX Control Panel is running on the lower right corner of the screen, and it’s set up for use with the CW Skimmer decoder. DXLab’s WinWarbler is running (top-center), enabling me to use the WinKeyer in the shack to send CW via the remote COM port associated with the WinKeyer. Below WinWarbler is the microHAM Developer Only application (accessed remotely via a TeamViewer connection to the Shack Server PC) which shows that I have both of our SteppIR DB36 Yagis selected as a stack and pointed towards Europe. DXLab’s DXView Rotator Control application is running in the center bottom of the screen so that we can turn our Yagis towards other parts of the world (rotators are controlled via another remote COM port). Finally, the client KPA500 Amplifier control application is running in the lower left corner to control the amplifier and to monitor the power out and SWR seen by the amplifier being used to operate remotely.

Client PC Running SmartSDR And The DXLab Suite – Left Monitor

The picture above shows a closer view of the left monitor. DXLab’s logger, DXKeeper, is running at the top/center of the screen. Below is DXLab’s SpotCollector application which monitors spots of the many CW stations worldwide operating in the contest. DXLab’s Commander applications are running in the lower-right corner of the screen and are monitoring the FlexRadio-6700 SDR’s slice Tx/Rx frequency and providing a control interface of the SDR to the rest of the DXLab Suite (via SmartSDR CAT). The Elecraft W2 Wattmeter client control application is just above commander. The W2 Wattmeter client application provides higher resolution power out and SWR monitoring for the remote setup. Bottom-center is DXLab’s Launcher application, and just to the left of that is the KAT500 Auto-Tuner Client Control application. Finally, CW Skimmer is running on the left side of the screen.

CW Skimmer Operating Remotely

As you can see, CW Skimmer decodes a wide range of frequencies in the 20m CW sub-band. It receives its audio in IQ format via the SmartSDR DAX application. It is great fun to operate CW this way, and I am finding myself making a lot more CW contacts now that I have the remote operating setup in my office.

The next post will provide some samples of remote operation in the form of videos. I will also share some information on setting up a Remote Operating Client on a laptop where screen space is more limited. We plan to take a trip outside our house to operate our station over the Internet and share information on how that is done. We will also provide future articles on how to set up CW Skimmer and Digital Modes (RTTY, PSK, and JT65/JT9) on the HF Bands and use them remotely.

For now, we are really enjoying the freedom to operate our station remotely!

Fred, AB1OC

Software Defined Radio/Remote Operating Gateway Part 1 – System Design And Hardware Installation

November 23, 2015 by AB1OC

Flex-6700 Software Defined Radio And Remote Operating Gateway

We’ve been planning to add a remote operating capability to our station for some time now. We also did some previous work with a FlexRadio Software Defined Radio (SDR) in our station, and we felt that an SDR would be a good platform to build a remote operating project around. We decided to combine our remote operating goals with a next-generation SDR upgrade (a FlexRadio-6700) for our station. This project has turned out to be somewhat involved, so we will be providing a series of articles to explain what we did:

Part 1 – System Design and Hardware Installation (this post)
Part 2 – Client/Server Setup and Software (Shack Equipment, Computers, and Software Enabling Remote Operation)
Part 3 – On The Air Remote!
Part 4 – Remote Operating Enhancements
Satellite Station 4.0 Part 7 – Flex SDR Satellite Transceiver to Enable Remote Satellite Operation
PTT Switch for Remote Operation
Operating FT8 Remote on the 6m band

We will tackle our goals of building a Remote Operating Gateway (GW) in two stages. Stage 1 will focus on operating our station from other rooms in our house (our Home Offices are prime locations for this). Stage 2 will involve operating our station “On The Go” from anywhere in the world that has sufficient Internet Access is available. We also want to enable full control of our station when operating remotely, including:

Use of our Amplifier
Antenna Selection
Rotator Control
Equipment Power Monitoring and Management

We also use a microHAM station control system and contesting equipment as part of our remote operating gateway, and we want to fully integrate our new Flex-6700 SDR with this gear. Our Flex-6700 uses a dedicated Microphone to avoid audio integration issues that we encountered between the Flex-6700 and the microHAM MK2R+ that we use in our station.

Flex-6700 SDR/Remote Operating Gateway Architecture

The first step in this project was to develop a system design (pictured above). We opted for an architecture that uses the Flex SDR as a third radio in Anita’s Operating Position. Her position is now an SO2R setup with a Yaesu FTdx5000 as the primary radio and a choice of an Icom IC-7600 or the Flex-6700 SDR as the second active radio.

Elecraft KPA500 Amplifier and KAT500 Auto Tuner

Elecraft W2 Watt Meter

FilterMax IV Automated Band Pass Filter

The Flex-6700 SDR has an associated Elecraft KPA-500W Amplifier/KAT500 Auto Tuner combination, an Elecraft W2 Wattmeter, an automated bandpass filtering via an Array Solutions FilterMax IV, and a dedicated microHAM Station Master Deluxe (SMD) Antenna Controller. The Elecraft components are good choices for our remote operating project because they all have applications that enable them to be controlled and monitored over a network (more on this later in this series of articles).

Out Station’s Antenna System

The additional microHAM SMD allows the Flex-6700 SDR to access and control our antenna system and associated rotators.

K1EL WinKeyer

Our setup also includes a K1EL WinKeyer to enable computer-controlled CW keying of the Flex-6700 SDR. This device is relatively inexpensive in kit form and was fun to put together. We have a Bencher Iambic Paddle connected to the WinKeyer for in-shack CW operation.

SDR microHAM Integration

The diagram above shows the details of the device interconnections which make up the SDR Radio System. The microHAM SMD Antenna Controller requires a serial CAT interface to its host Flex-6700 SDR to determine what band and frequency the SDR is on. The Flex-6700 SDR does not provide such an interface directly but creates CAT control virtual ports on a host Personal Computer (PC).

DDUtil Setup – SDR Virtual CAT Access

DDUtil Setup – Bridging Physical Serial Port To SMD

To solve this problem, we used an application called DDUtil to bridge the derived CAT port associated with the SDR to a physical serial port on the PC. The PC’s physical port is then connected to the microHAM SMD associated with the Flex-6700 SDR. The pictures above show how DDUtil is set up to do this.

Station COM Port Configuration

The microHAM gear, WinKeyer, Rotators, Radio CAT Interfaces, Amplifier/Auto Tuner Interfaces, etc., all use serial or COM ports on a host PC for control. It’s also true that many loggers have trouble accessing serial ports above COM16. This requires a carefully developed COM port allocation plan for a complex station like ours. The figure above shows this part of our design.

A-B Switching Design For Radio Port 4

microHAM Bus Expansion and Antenna Switching Gear

The last part of the hardware puzzle required to integrate the SDR into our station was the installation of a second microHAM uLink Bus Hub, microHAM Relay 10 Control Box, and an A/B antenna switch controlled by the microHAM SMDs. This allows the 4th radio port on our antenna switching matrix to be shared between the Icom IC-7600 and the Flex-6700 SDR.

microHAM Configuration For SDR Station Master Deluxe

The last step in integrating the Flex-6700 SDR was configuring the microHAM system for the new equipment. This involves adding SMD #5 to the microHAM system and configuring it (and the rest of the system) to know about the Flex-6700 SDR, associated amplifier, and its interconnections to the rest of the system.

SmartSDR Software

The Flex-6700 SDR Hardware is controlled and operated over a network via FlexRadio’s SmartSDR Application. We have 1 Gbps wired and an 802.11 b/g/n Wireless Ethernet system in our home, and the SmartSDR/Flex-6700 SDR combination works well over either network. The software-based approach with most SDRs allows new features to be added to the radio via software upgrades.

SmartSDR Setup – Tx Keying And Interlock

It is very important to prevent the Flex-6700 SDR and the associated Amplifier from keying up when the antennas in our station are switched or tuned. The screenshot above shows the configuration of SmartSDR to enable the keying and interlock interfaces between the Flex-6700 SDR and its associated microHAM Station Master Deluxe Antenna Controller to implement these functions. This setup enables the Tx Keying and Tx Inhibit interfaces between the Flex-6700 SDR and the microHAM Station Master Deluxe to work properly to key all of the equipment in the setup (SDR, Amplifier, active Rx antennas, etc.) and to lock out keying when antennas are being switched or when one of our SteppIR antennas are tuning.

Flex-6700 SDR With CW Skimmer

We will cover additional software and integration steps to realize our Remote Operating goals. Check out the above video to see how the system performs. This video was recorded using our Flex-6700 SDR and CW Skimmer during the 2015 ARRL CW Sweepstakes Contest. We are really enjoying operating in CW mode with the new SDR setup!

Fred, AB1OC

A Milestone Contact – Working Mt. Athos (Last New One In Europe)

November 23, 2015 by AB1OC

Monk Apollo, SV2ASP/A on Mt. Athos

I have been working on completing contacts with all of the entities in Europe for some time. I have been fortunate to earn the DARC Worked All Europe Top Plaque, having successfully confirmed contacts with 72 or the 73 DX entities in Europe on a sufficient number of bands. For some time now, I have been trying to work the last entity in Europe – Mt. Athos. There is only one station in this location which is SV2ASP/A, operated by Monk Apollo. Last evening while looking at the spotting cluster, I noticed that Monk Apollo was operating 40 m CW. This was the first time I could hear him in over a year of listening for him! He had a pretty large pileup going and was working split. After some careful listening and some tuning, I was able to make the contact for number 73 of 73.

Recording of my QSO with Monk Apollo on 40m CW

As a bonus, Roman, DL3TU recorded my QSO, so I have a very nice memento from this important contact. After some looking at my log and where I currently stand on contacts to the rarer ones in Europe, I will set my sights on earning the DARC’s WAE Trophy Award. To date, no U.S. station has been able to complete the necessary contacts to reach this level. It requires contacting all 73 European entities on the DARC list on at least 5 bands.

– Fred, AB1OC

Our HAM Station

Notes on the construction and operation of a multi-op Amateur Radio Station

2016 New England QSO Party – Operating Mobile HF

Dayton Hamvention 2016

2016 ARRL Rookie Roundup SSB

Becoming A Great Mentor

A New Project – Digital Fast Scan Amateur Television

Software Defined Radio – The Future of Amateur Radio?

Software Defined Radio/Remote Operating Gateway Part 3 – On The Air Remote!

Software Defined Radio/Remote Operating Gateway Part 2 – Client/Server Setup And Software

Software Defined Radio/Remote Operating Gateway Part 1 – System Design And Hardware Installation

A Milestone Contact – Working Mt. Athos (Last New One In Europe)

Featured Articles