Collaborate Disseminate
Last year, as my Corona Hobby™, I took up RC plane flying. I started out with discus-launched gliders, and honestly that’s still my main love, but there’s only so much …read more Continue reading You Can’t Fix What You Can’t Measure
What do you do with floral wire and balloons from Dollar Tree? If you are [Ham Radio Crash Course], you make a ham radio antenna. Floral wire is conductive, and …read more Continue reading Balloon Antenna Doesn’t Need a Tower
In a world of always-connected devices and 24/7 access to email and various social media and messaging platforms, it’s sometimes a good idea to take a step away from the …read more Continue reading Send Old-Fashioned Pager Messages with New-Fashioned Hardware
The amateur radio community has exploded with activity lately especially in the software-defined radio (SDR) area since it was found that a small inexpensive TV tuner could be wrangled to do what only expensive equipment was able to do before. …read more
Continue reading Monitor SpaceX Rocket Launches With Software-Defined Radio
The perfect antenna is the holy grail of amateur radio. But antenna tuning is a game of inches, and since the optimum length of an antenna depends on the frequency it’s used on, the mere act of spinning the dial …read more
Continue reading Capstan Winch Central to This All-Band Adjustable Dipole Antenna
Building antennas is a time-honored ham radio tradition. Shortwave antennas tend to be bulky but at VHF frequencies the antenna sizes are pretty manageable. [Fjkaan’s] 2 meter quadrifilar helicoidal antenna is a good example and the structure for it can …read more
You don’t normally think of a 3D printer as a necessity for an antenna project. However, if you are interested in making a handy portable antenna, you might want to melt some plastic. [N2MXX] has an end fed antenna winder …read more
nRF24L01+ module fixed about as well as it can be, by adding an appropriate capacitor on the PCB antenna, and a 1.0 uF capacitor across the power pins for good measure.
Good old nRF24L01+ wireless modules are inexpensive and effective. …read more
Continue reading Fixing nRF24L01+ Modules Without Going (Too) Insane
So far in the $50 Ham series, I’ve concentrated mainly on the VHF and UHF bands. The reason for this has to do mainly with FCC rules, which largely restrict Technician-level licensees to those bands. But there’s a financial component …read more
Continue reading The $50 Ham: A Cheap Antenna for the HF Bands
When [Kenneth Keiter] took apart his Starlink dish back in November, he did his best to explain the high-level functionality of the incredibly complex device in a video posted to his YouTube channel. It was a fascinating look at the equipment, but by his own admission, he wasn’t the right …read more
Continue reading Starlink Satellite Dish X-Rayed to Unlock RF Magic Inside