Radios at the Indiana State Fair

I'm always looking for radio technology in museums and antique malls.

At the Indiana State Fair this year, I wandered through the antiques entries. Among the assortment of All American Fives and an impressive group of early transistor radios I found this beauty.

It appears to be a crystal radio set, with a Bakelite front panel and wooden case.

Another Ghost

Atwater Kent's Wissahickon Avenue Plant in Philadelphia


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You can still make out part of the name "Atwater" over this entrance:


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This plant, the South Plant, was once connected to the North Plant via an overhead walkway (conveyor? maybe someone can comment.) over Abbotsford Avenue. All that remains of the North Plant is the powerhouse.


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The walkway came out of the South Plant, near the smokestack...Just about where this square structure is attached. I assume this was an anchor for the walkway.


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See also
Uncle Alberts has a view to the west, showing both plants (and the walkway).

Atwater Kent Manufacturing Company, North Plant, 5000 Wissahickon Avenue, Philadelphia, Philadelphia County, PA of the Library of Congress Historic American Buildings Survey/Historic American Engineering
Record/Historic American Landscapes Survey has many views of the plants, including interiors.

You can see the entire My Places map or download a KML file.

Living in the Past

Some of the ghosts of radio manufacturers still haunt Google Maps.

I started trying to map out the original streets from New York's Radio Row -- Cortlandt, Dey, Liberty, etc. I ended up finding a lot of buildings around the country that used to house radio manufacturers. I created a Google MyMaps page to hold them all. You can find a KMZ at

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/4459841/Radio%20Row.kmz

You'll find Hallicrafters, ElectroVoice, Heathkit, and more. I threw in some lines for Radio Row for good measure.

Thanks to Street Cities - Free Mapping and Street View Tools for the street view control.

Lead Acid Batteries

One of my coworkers came in to work yesterday with a four-inch gash in his forhead.

He had charged up his lawn mower's battery, and when he turned the key, it exploded, sending shrapnel and acid all over his garage. He thinks he was hit by a filler cap as it flew by. Acid was sprayed all over the garage ceiling. He got lucky.

ARRL Field Day is coming up on the 26th and 27th of June. Our club uses batteries for some things even though we have a generator for most of the operating positions.

When a battery is charging, it will release hydrogen gas, and a spark from an ignition system, or even a bad internal connection is all that it takes to set it off.

My high-school chemistry teacher said that of all of his senses, the last one he would want to lose is his sight. I have decided that I will never again work on lead-acid batteries without safety glasses. I will be buying a set for each vehicle, to keep with the jumper cables.

2009 Disney Trip

We got back from a trip to Orlando and Disney World last Saturday. It was a pretty fun trip although I am still fighting bronchitis that doesn't want to go away.

Nothing really ham radio related here, although I understand that there are two repeaters on the Contemporary resort where we stayed, and Disney has a club open to cast members only.
For some reason, the Toy Story Mania wait was only 20 minutes that evening, so we decided to go for it. We had a great time, and resolved to ask Santa for the Wii game.

The Osborne Family Christmas lights were amazing again, and we wandered through them muching popcorn.

On Wednesday evening, we went to EPCOT to see Turtle talk with Crush. This is the hot ticket here, but to fully get the magic, you need a very outgoing kid. My daugther is a "watcher", and fully analyzes new situations before she joins in. Consequently, she didn't get a chance to interact with Crush as we hoped she would be able to, and EPCOT's hot new attraction didn't really do much for her.

Dinner was at the Germany Beer Garden, spaetzle, rouladen, sausages and sauerkraut. Lennie got a liter of Spaten, and I got a Franziskaner. They give you to-go glasses so you can stroll along the world showcase with your beer after you leave.

Thursday morning saw us back at DHS, and the first thing we did was get fast passes for Toy Story Mania. The regular line was already 70 minutes. We went to Disney Kid's show and had lunch. Then we did Honey I Shrunk the Kids. It's true what the guide books say, you will never see your children again. Not good. The thing is a labyrinth of (for adults) hand and knees crawls and blind alleys, all covered with playground rubber, which absorbs the sound of your calls for your kids. After about 40 minutes of not seeing her (panic: did she leave the play area?) Elisabeth popped out somehwere and we went to play TSM again.

Lennie got us tickets to the Very Merry Christmas party on Thursday night, which ended up being great fun. When we went two years ago, I almost came to blows with another dad as we were jockeying for position to watch the parade. This year, we lined up way ahead of time, and I remembered something from the last time -- NO LINES!!! Between 7 PM and parade time, people are lining the parade route, and the rides are virtually empty!

So, we blew off the parade. The Buzz Lightyear shooting gallery was fun, and we did not have to wait at all. Same for all the other rides. No lines. There were dance parties and shows, strolling carolers and characters to meet. We saw Peter Pan's flight after about a ten minute wait, and that was the longest. I think we really enjoyed it this time.

We discovered that we really liked the Tomorrowland Transportation Authority (tram) which provides a serene, sedate circle tour of tomorrowland, and Space Mountain. Space Mountain was shut down and light up, and we were able to see inside it. It basically looks like a wild mouse rollercoaster.

On Friday, it rained all day. We went to the Magic Kingdom and did Buzz Lightyear and TTA again, but quickly headed back to the Contemporary for lunch. We spent the afternoon of our last day shopping and playing in the resort arcade.

Except for the Christmas party, the crowds were bigger than two years ago. We remember the week after Thanksgiving as the one with the lightest attendance, but I think Disney put on a marketing push to get people in to the parks to help stay afloat during the recession. We got the free meal plan with our park passes, and found that we could not really get into any restaurants when we wanted. I think everyone else got them too.

We also came to the conclusion that if you want to enjoy your Disney vacation, you have to surrender to Disney's way of doing things. Eating, going to the parks, transportation, seeing shows, riding rides, arriving at the resort, all seem to be carefully planned and orchestrated. If you do something different, say wanting to eat lunch at 11 AM, you will be disappointed.
Five days became a little of a grind for us. We just had so much we wanted to do that we didn't get to last time, that we forgot that we should leave ourselves wanting more. Along about Thursday morning, we had visited all four parks, and began the "I don't know, what do you want to do?" game.

Hamvention

I went to the Dayton Hamvention last Friday. I ended up traveling by myslef, but it was a great time. With it being a one-day trip, I skipped the forums, and concentrated on what was going on in the exhibit halls.

My biggest purchase was a new Byonics TinyTrak4 and GPS. I told Byon that I didn't need a null modem, as I had one at home, and couldn't find it when I got back. I then realized that Walmart no longer carries any serial cables or other accessories. Same for many of the other department stores. I haven't had a chance to pop into my local electronics store.

I had one bum purchase...I bought a digital photo frame. I usually don't go for non-ham items at hamfests, but we've been wanting one, and these seemed like a good deal; new in box, great price. I got home and discovered that the fluorescent panel behind the LCD was not working. I ended up throwing it away. Yes, I could have messed with it...I have heard of people turning them into LCD projectors, other things, but I have plenty to keep me busy. I learned a lesson, and I won't buy open stock at a hamfest anymore. I sort of wish these guys would stop taking up space there.

SWR Indicator

I added the Hendricks QRP Kits SWR Indicator to the MFJ QRP Cub this week. I found room for it on the back panel of the little box.

This is a little return-loss bridge that was designed by Dan Tayloe, N7VE.

The kit went together fairly well, and the instructions were easy to understand, especially with all of the photos. The hardest part was how to get the signals in and out of the board. I settled on using short pieces of RG-174 running from the RCA plug to the board, and from the board to a new BNC bulkhead connector. Even with RG-174, it was hard getting the shield into the holes on the board. I eventually got it, but it looks a little ugly.

Pictures to follow as soon as I can take some

Start thinking about ARRL Field Day!

Popular Science and Popular Mechanics on Google Book Search!

Google Book Search announced today that it was posting scans of several magazines, including Popular Science and Popular Mechanics online.

I'm excited because it means that old radio articles in these magazines are available for viewing.

Try this: Go to http://books.google.com/advanced_book_search, and enter the words "crystal", "coil", and "condenser" in the search window. Check the "Full View Only" and "Magazines" buttons. It returns a bunch of magazine articles on crystal radio sets.

Now the next trick...To bookmark the article, you don't have to save that entire godawful URL it brings up. You can trim from the end of the URL to the "&pg=PAXXX" term. The rest is just for highlighting the search text in the article and stuff.

More Satellite Page Hacking

Writing bookmarklets can become addictive. Here is one similar to the AMSAT hack for Heavens-Above. Go to the Heavens-Above amateur satellites page (once you've registered,) and then paste the following code in the Address bar:

javascript:(function(){var%20minElev=Number(prompt("Enter%20minimum%20elevation.","30"));var%20table4=document.getElementsByTagName('table')[4];var%20row=2;while(row<table4.rows.length){if(table4.rows[row].cells[5].innerText<=minElev){table4.deleteRow(row);}else{row=row+1;}}})()

Outer Banks and Radio

I just came back from a vacation to the outer banks. While we were planning, Lennie found a ham radio connection there. It turns out that the Outer Banks is where Reginald Fessenden proved the viability of AM Radio during tests he made there in 1901-1902. The photo is from the marker at Weir Point. There is another marker just over the bridge to Pea Island. We passed it, but were pretty tired from our trip to Ocracoke and didn't feel like stopping. Besides, as Lennie said, "How many Fessendens does any one person need?" More info and a photo of the other marker are in a paper by VE2VC (PDF).

I got a chance to operate QRP from the beach this trip. My station consisted of an MFJ 40-meter QRP Cub transciever, an MFJ 30-meter 9030 transciever, and a Hendricks QRP Kits SL Tuner. For most of the trip, I used a 51-foot length of copperweld tied to the wooden handrail of the walkway leading out to the deck. I had a 16-foot length of copperweld dangling down to the sand for a counterpoise. I didn't have much luck on either 40 or 30 meters. Finally, on the last day, I got out my DJ9SQ mast and set it up with a "folded vertical" fed by the SLT. The 51-foot length of copperweld became another radial. This time I had better luck on 30 meters. I just need to brush up my code. Apologies to those I assaulted with it.

Update: Another great article on Fessenden and the Outer Banks is at coastalguide.com.

Why do hams hate proprietary codecs?

Recently, WinDRM took down its downloads because it used the MELP codec by default for encoding voice. It was restored to change the default to an open-source codec. Read about it at ARRL's web site

I have heard people telling me they won't use D-Star because it uses the proprietary AMBE 2020 codec. Never mind that the rest of the protocol is free for amateurs to use.

The normal way these codecs are used is to embed them in a chip, which, when you pay for it, goes to license the intellectual property inside.

Think of it this way. DeForest vigorously defended his patents. You could use his tubes in your radio, but if you tried to copy his tube and sell it as your own, you got sued.

It gets more complicated in the WinDRM case, and the analogy gets a little frayed. WinDRM used a freely-available copy of what is normally sold by TI and other companies. Back in 1915, no one would think of making a copy of an Audion tube and giving it away, but imagine someone did. Maybe they hated Dr. DeForest. Do you think that it would go unchallenged?

TI and the other rights holders are protecting their interests. They winked at hams for a while, but no more. If they don't protect their interest in this codec, which is used by the US Department of Defense and others, they will appear to have abandoned it and will no longer be able to sell it.

Either buy the chips, license the codec (in which case you'd have to start charging for WinDRM) or come up with your own. Amateur HF digital voice is begging for an open-source codec with a similar performance. How about a homebrew transciever in QST that uses AMBE-2020 chips?

More AMSAT Website Hacking

AMSAT has a page that predicts satellite passes. My problem with it is that it lists ALL of the passes, including ones that just graze the horizon. I generally tend to avoid them.

The following bookmarklet clears out all passes from the table of results that are less than 30 degrees above the horizon. Go to the AMSAT Prediction and get a list of passes for a satellite. Then paste the following code in your browser's address window and tell it to go. It should shorten the table.

***UPDATE - An error crept in when I posted this before...I had the row variable running to row <= table5.rows.length, and it ran over the end of the table, giving errors. The version below seems to work better.

***UPDATE - Added a prompt for the minimum elevation.

javascript:(function(){var minElev=Number(prompt("Minimum Elevation","30"));var table5=document.getElementsByTagName('table')[5];var row=2;while(row<table5.rows.length){if(table5.rows[row].cells[4].innerText<minElev){table5.deleteRow(row);}else{row=row+1;}}})()

It works in IE 6 and Firefox 2.0.0.15.

Hacking AMSAT's Website

AMSAT has a nice web site, full of information on amateur radio satellites, tools for tracking them, news, etc.
My gripe with the site has to do with the page style. The background image is something called "flannel", which is a bunch of fine black stripes on a white background. For me, it is too much white. To make matters worse, on some monitors, the stripes do some sort of flickering. Not Moire lines, but flickering, probably due to some video card setting I have wrong.
Rather than impose my tastes on others, I wrote a goofy little Greasemonkey script to change the background:

// ==UserScript==
// @name BlueAmsat
// @namespace http://userscripts.org/users/57521
// @description Change the AMSAT default background to blue
// @include http://www.amsat.org/*
// ==/UserScript==
document.body.style.backgroundImage = "none";
document.body.style.background = "darkblue";

You can install it directly here

Gas Prices and Hamfests

According to Gasbuddy, prices in my area today are averaging to $3.92 per gallon. My 300C gets about 24 mpg on the highway if I can believe the computer, so that makes my 320-mile round trip to Dayton cost $52.

Last year, a gallon cost $3.27, for a cost of $44. The 300C manual says to use mid-grade, but prices tend to track.

At any rate, I am not going to miss Hamvention for $8.

Another perspective is on Eham.net.

Thing's I can live without on AFV

I like America's Funniest Home Videos. I am a little annoyed that the Disney-controlled network's (ABC) show does some off color stuff, like play Big and Rich's "Save a Horse (Ride a Cowboy)" during rodeo/western/horse -themed clips, but in general it's family-watchable. However, there are a few things that I'd rather not see anymore

• Fake lottery tickets. One time was funny, more was annoying.
• Food coming out of noses.
• Dental work coming out of mouths.
• Pulling baby teeth in unique ways.
• Dogs and cats whining and yowling words.

People keep sending them and they keep playing them for some reason, but I fast-forward Tivo through them now.

Happy 20th Birthday, PERL

Larry Wall announced it in 1987 in a posting to comp.sources.misc newsgroup. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perl

The Republic

What if the democracy we thought we were serving no longer exists, and the Republic has become the very evil we have been fighting to destroy?

- Senator Amidala,
Star Wars, Revenge of the Sith