Ok… after the 2012 Field Day, I got my digital edge back on. After taking a 6 month break and operating the digital station at FD, I decided to fire up the digital home station. Most of my digital operations previously has been Hellschreiber (FeldHell) which is a really fun mode. Mainly because it’s different from any other mode. Instead of seeing text on the screen such as RTTY or PSK31, FH is “painted” on the screen almost looking like a horizontal fax document. Check out the FeldHell Club for more info

My new love is JT65-HF by Joe Large, W6CQZ. A good resource with documentation and software links for this mode is IZ4CZL’s site. This is not a QSO mode but a structured mode. Each transmission last about 48 seconds, followed by 12 seconds allowed for decoding. A typical QSO with the structured exchanges last 7 minutes. An accurate clock is a must (actually required) since you have to be able to decode within the alloted time and then reply at the top of the next minute. A drift in the PC clock greater than 2 seconds will render the QSO useless. I’ve had good luck with Dimension4 NTP software.

I usually hang out on 30 Meters (10.138) or 17 meters (18.102). When conditions are permitting, you will find those two frequencies really active. Big solar flair yesterday caused most of the HF bands to die!

(Courtesy of US National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration
at http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/rt_plots/xray_5m.html )

My primary digital station is an ICOM 756 Pro III and a SignaLink USB sound card interface. It’s a little pricey but in this case, you get what you pay for. Customer Service is A+! as well. Currently running a random wire dipole fed up 65 feet on the tower with an ICOM AH-4 remote tuner. That puppy works like a charm… a little pricey as well but worth it.

Enough updating for now… fire up JT65-HF and meet me on the bands!

…DOUG
KD4MOJ