Packet Radio

Some of you may remeber the 80's when packet radio was all the rage. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Packet_radio Times changed and the use of the Internet all but killed it off apart from APRS Recently, and expecially with 'Off grid' thinking it has begun to grow again. I've been playing for a while with my TMD-700, but recent changes have shown it's restrictions. Over the weekend I built a new TNC and through the local club have a dedicated raio and the system is working very well using WhatsPac This has moved things into the 21st century and now with speeds of 9600 it's becoming a robust way to comunicate. Below is the TNC and radio.

Dual 10m and 6m Dipole

With the nice weather I have been experimenting with dipoles. I don't have enough space for beams but recently put a 6m dipole up which works very well. Came across some info on fan dipoles and noticed some use two or more dipoles sepearted with spacers. So I deceided to give it a go and results are pretty good. Not the best photo but hopefully shows enough. The spacers were made using a 3d printer. I have added the VNA plot.

FT8 Setup

I've finally got my FT8 setup the way I want it. Took a while and a bit of reseach, but I can now switch between radios easily and the logging, including LOTW, which is a black art of its own. There is loads of information avaiable so I wont repeat it. My final scrren layout is shown below. What I did find was that if I just closed the PC down the gridtracker display didn't save. What I have to do is close gridtracker with the close button before shutting down.