Technical Mentoring & Elmering Net
Technical Topics and Advice for New Hams
Thursdays from 8:00 to 9:00 PM on the SBARC Hub linked repeaters.
The Technical Mentoring and Elmering Net is dedicated to teaching. We discuss technical topics related to ham radio at ALL levels of expertise, with very special emphasis on helping any new ham any way we can. Remember you are an expert in your field of endeavor, so its no shame if you are just a beginner in ham radio. In fact, a great question for the net is “ WHAT are you guys talking about?”
There is no “lecture topic”, meaning that we are completely question-based, so its great if you have a list of questions ready. We take check-ins at the beginning, and throughout the net, so you can join (and leave) anytime you want to. Usually we discuss some technical topic for awhile, then leave breaks for people to jump in with a different question. Often several very expert hams are on, with possibly some listening ready to help with something they know, or to answer up to net control asking “who wants to answer that question?” The net is very informal and friendly, and also helps any new ham with even non-technical ham radio questions, like correct operating procedure, etc.
You’ll find recordings of the net in the SBARC Audio Archives.
Net controllers, see the TM&E Net preamble and script wiki.
The time stamps below are best followed by downloading the Mp3 file for the appropriate date here and listening with Windows Media Player.
Tonight’s net had 8 check-ins plus net control (K6HWN) and 8 chat room participants. Subjects included:
- 09:05 – How the club station radio room has changed over the years since we moved into the Red Cross building over 30 years ago, how many radios and what bands are available to experiment with there, how one can be trained at COMMCOM (Communications Command), and a little history.
- 18:35 – Continuation of the discussion on heterodyning.
- 34:30 – Aspects of 220 MHz – Pros and cons, commonality, and usage in the Santa Barbara area.
- 58:00 – Issues on 40 meters over 50 watts causing a stuffed dog to bark and RF chokes.
Tune in to the SBARC Technical Mentoring and Elmering Net next Thursday at 8:00 PM or 2000 Hrs and see what interesting questions will arise or ask some of your own! All club members and visitors are encouraged to check in to the net each week and join in with questions and /or answers to and contribute the knowledge of new and seasoned amateur radio operators alike.
The time stamps below are best followed by downloading the Mp3 file for the appropriate date here and listening with Windows Media Player.
Tonight’s net was informative as usual with 7 check-ins plus “Shackmaster” Dave (K6HWN) as net control and 8 chat room participants. Questions included:
00:11:40 – Dave (K6HWN) “Shackmaster” started things off with discussion about the white papers written by EYV (full call unknown at this time). They are currently on loan to the club station and can be read there and they will also be available on SBARC.org soon. Some of the material covered in the papers and Dave’ s discussion tonight involves “mixing”. In ordinary free space everything is linear which means that everything is proportional, if you double X you’ll double the consequences and everything can exist simultaneously. All electromagnetic waves like radio waves of all frequencies just exist simultaneously and their electric fields may add at the moment if they’re near each other, but there’s absolutely no interference or “mixing”. It’s just the slightest bit of non-linearity (things don’t always double) then you get the very important properties of mixing, heterodyning and so on. This is a fascinating discussion, please take the time to listen to the recording for 7/30/2015 here.
00:25:22 – Brian (K6BPM) talks about helping the community at Rancho Santa Barbara (a mobile home park) and it’s 300 some residences there to have emergency communications using the GMRS (General Mobile Radio System) repeater at the K6TZ site on La Vigia. Brian was testing the site for the best reception areas with different antennas on radios in the 460 MHz range. Discussion also includes general information about the GMRS system. Listen to the recording for 7/30/2015 here.
00:54:40 Brian (K6BPM) related the SBARC chat room discussion going on related to a bug found in the Signalink and certain Kenwood and ICOM radios. When operating digital modes such as JT65 it was found that a certain chip used was clipping the received signal thereby reducing the number of decodes on might receive. There is a fix for this bug and you can learn about it by listening to the recording for 7/30/2015 here.
Tune in to the SBARC Technical Mentoring and Elmering Net next Thursday at 8:00 PM or 2000 Hrs and see what interesting questions will arise or ask some of your own! All club members and visitors are encouraged to check in to the Technical Mentoring and Elmering net each week and join in with questions and /or answers to and contribute the knowledge of new and seasoned amateur radio operators alike.
Tonight’s net was informative as usual with 13 check-ins plus “Shackmaster” Dave (K6HWN) as net control and 6 chat room participants. Questions included:
Casey (KK6VIF) had a little difficulty being heard and Dennis (WB6OBB) mentioned that he may have pressed his WIRES button, the one that looks like an atomic symbol. Indeed he had and said he didn’t remember doing it and doesn’t even know what it is or does and wondered of Dennis could shed some light. Dennis not being familiar with Casey’s rig handed off to Brian (K6BPM). Brian explained that the atomic button connects the radio to the WIRES (Wide-coverage Internet Repeater Enhancement System). If your radio has WIRES capability you can connect to a WIRES Digital Node Station which connects your communications to the internet enabling you worldwide communications with other Hams. You can read more about it here https://www.yaesu.com/jp/en/wires-x/index.php.
Garrett (AG6RQ) asked about the new ham bands opening on 136 kHz and 400 kHz. Steve (KI6HGH) answered partially and Tom (KA6FOX?) took it further explaining the allocations, specifications and capabilities. You can listen to the topic here.
Shackmaster Dave (K6HWN) talked a little about antennas and grounds.
Casey (KK6VIF) asked what shack radio he could use on all bands. It was explained that some radio cover HF, 6 meters , 2 meters and 70 cm but rarely cover ALL ham bands. Dennis (WB6OBB) also brought up the point that if you had all bands on one radio and it went down everything would be down. It’s a practical idea to have some back up radios, maybe handy talkies in case of something like that.
Tune in to the SBARC Technical Mentoring and Elmering Net next Thursday at 8:00 PM or 2000 Hrs and see what interesting questions will arise or ask some of your own! All club members and visitors are encouraged to check in to the Technical Mentoring and Elmering net each week and join in with questions and /or answers to and contribute the knowledge of new and seasoned amateur radio operators alike.
The timestamps below are best followed by downloading the Mp3 file here and listening with Windows Media Player.
Tonight’s net was as informative and interesting as usual with 12 check-ins plus “Shackmaster” Dave (K6HWN) as net control and 5 chat room participants. Questions included:
13:07 Garrett (AG6RQ) asked about how RFI from his ham rig was getting into some of his audio equipment and how to arrest it. The equipment affected are an audio mixer and some speakers. RF chokes are discussed as well as other devices and methods.
1:04:21 I (K6FLD) gave an update about my continuing issue with hum within the walls of my house when transmitting on certain HF frequencies on my end-fed antenna.
Tune in to the SBARC Technical Mentoring and Elmering Net next Thursday at 8:00 PM or 2000 Hrs and see what interesting questions will arise or ask some of your own! All club members and visitors are encouraged to check in to the Technical Mentoring and Elmering net each week and join in with questions and /or answers to and contribute the knowledge of new and seasoned amateur radio operators alike.
The timestamps below are best followed by downloading the Mp3 file here and listening with Windows Media Player.
The Technical Mentoring and Elmering net on Thursday, July 9th had 9 check-ins plus net control “Shackmaster” Dave (K6HWN) plus 8 in the chat room at sbarc.org. Questions included:
10:15 – Jim (KK6SXB) asked about how to tell how much current is being drawn by a transceiver when there are no manufacturer specifications available.
16:55 – Garrett (AG6RQ) asked about the AllStar Link system and how to use it.
35:40 – General discussion regarding marine and other batteries (Gel, AGM, etc.) and which might be best to power your rigs in the shack especially when commercial power goes down i.e. which batteries would provide the longest run time without damaging the battery, maintenance considerations, etc.
Tune in to the SBARC Technical Mentoring and Elmering Net next Thursday at 8:00 PM or 2000 Hrs and see what interesting questions will arise or ask some of your own! All club members and visitors are encouraged to check in to the Technical Mentoring and Elmering net each week and join in with questions and /or answers to and contribute the knowledge of new and seasoned amateur radio operators alike.
Tonight’s net yielded 11 check-ins plus net control (K6HWN) and 6 chat room members on SBARC.org. Shackmaster Dave had question of Eric (K6HMD) regarding last weeks net discussions of circulators. I (K6FLD) had a question about power supplies for my shack and if 30 amps would be sufficient to power all of my equipment. An Alinco DM-330MV was suggested by Brian (K6BPM) and we also talked about the differences between Linear and Switching power supplies. Please listen to the lively discussion here and enjoy.
Tune in to the SBARC Technical Mentoring and Elmering Net next Thursday at 8:00 PM or 2000 Hrs and see what interesting questions will arise or ask some of your own! All club members and visitors are encouraged to check in to the Technical Mentoring and Elmering net each week and join in with questions and /or answers to and contribute the knowledge of new and seasoned amateur radio operators alike.
The timestamps below are best followed by downloading the Mp3 file here and listening with Windows Media Player.
The Technical Mentoring and Elmering net on Thursday, June 25th had 10 check-ins plus net control Dave (K6HWN). There were no questions waiting this evening so Shackmaster Dave kicked in his professional net control skills and brought up a discussion regarding circulators which are deployed in repeater systems. In loosely explained terms a circulator keeps unwanted signals from being transmitted over the repeater and are routed to a dummy load where they are dissipated. Please listen here to a very interesting discussion here starting at 12:20 on the Windows Media Player time stamp.
Tune in to the SBARC Technical Mentoring and Elmering Net next Thursday at 8:00 PM or 2000 Hrs and see what interesting questions will arise or ask some of your own! All club members and visitors are encouraged to check in to the Technical Mentoring and Elmering net each week and join in with questions and /or answers to and contribute the knowledge of new and seasoned amateur radio operators alike.
