HRN 286: Contact Sport

/

Author Jim George (JK George) N3BB talked to Gary about his (relatively) new book Contact Sport at the 2016 Dayton Hamvention®. The book takes you deep into the world of the participants of the 2014 WRTC (World RadioSport Team Championship), perhaps the most elite contest in Amateur Radio. Jim was embedded with one of the teams, but got lots of additional detail through interviews (and spies?). As a former WRTC competitor and referee, he knew what to look for. And as a writer, he knew how to tell the story.

LINKS:

HRN 285, EmComm Extra #5: A Very Good Day

/

Emcomm Extra co-host David Goldenberg W0DHG reviews a hospital Emcomm drill that he participated in a few weeks ago.

Then Army MARS Program Manager Paul English WD8DBY/AAA6B introduces us to Air Force MARS Chief Dave Stapchuk KD9DXM/AGA5C, and they review the MARS/Ham Radio Interop Exercise A Very Bad Day.

HRN 285 EmComm 5 Really Good Day POSTER SQUARE.jpg

HRN 284: Hi-Def Digital ATV in YOUR Hamshack

/

Mel Whitten K0PFX leads this double-length session to show how practical High Definition Digital Amateur Television is for you, today. Great picture, lower bandwidth, and affordable equipment available now.

Download a PDF of KN4AQ's VHF/UHF Band Chart: PDF

HRN 283: A Ham's Night Before Christmas — 20th Anniversary LIVE version

/

Gary wrote A Ham's Night Before Christmas back in 1996, and performed it live at several radio club meetings that December, and over the next few years. Then it found new life on the web as text, audio, and finally video. In this episode, Gary recreates the live performance, blended with the classic QST December covers and ads from the original video.

And here's a link to some background and the TEXT.

Here's a version with just Gary's voice - no music. You can play this over the air, on repeaters, etc.:

One more thing… Gary has produced four slightly different video versions of A Ham’s Night Before Christmas. The ‘original’ in 4x3 ‘Standard Definition’, an ‘ARRL’ version of that (replacing the ‘Wayne Green’ line), the High-Def ‘Special Edition’, and finally this ‘live’ version. He’s collected them all in this YouTube Playlist… for those who can’t get enough.

HRN 282, EmComm Extra #4 - SKYWARN Recognition Day 2016

/

Tampa Bay NWS Warning Coordination Meteorologist Dan Noah WX4DAN joins Dan and Gary to talk about SKYWARN Recognition Day. The Special Event will see 24 hours of ham operation from dozens of National Weather Service offices from 7 PM Friday December 2, to 7 PM Saturday (Eastern Time). 

SKYWARN is well known, but needs lots more participation from hams, especially in rural areas.

HRN 281: Your Repeater; Your Rules (FCC's Laura Smith at Pacificon)

/

We haven't heard a lot from FCC Special Counsel Laura Smith lately, but she spoke at Pacificon, a large ham conference in the San Francisco area, last October. Her talk was recorded by Bob Miller WB6KWT and his son Robert KA7JKP, and Bob gave us permission to use the talk for HamRadioNow.

Gary adds a long intro, with a summary of the talk's highlights and a few comments, along with a status report on the Amateur Radio Parity Act, before we play Laura's talk in full. 

The title is a bit of click bait. Laura does actually talk about repeaters and uses that phrase, but she talks about a lot of other things, too. The headline should probably be about the plan to have ARRL Official Observers work closer with the FCC on initial investigations of complaints. We've put time-links to each of Laura's topics in the YouTube description so you can zero in on those if you want to.

HRN 280: P25 Network eXchange Repeater Linking (from the 2016 DCC)

/
HRN 280 - P25 Linking POSTER square.jpg

There is life left in P25, perhaps the first somewhat popular digital voice mode on Amateur Radio VHF/UHF. The life comes from a linking system that David Krauss NX4Y introduces at the 2016 DCC. He calls it P25NX - Network Exchange.

The P25 mode started in Public Safety radio in the mid '80's. After about 10 years, those guys say their radios are due for replacement. Hams bought the trade-ins and put them on the ham bands. But the repeaters were isolated islands. D-STAR became more popular because repeaters were linked, bringing in traffic from around the country or world. P-25 is about to have even more cheap equipment on the market as they migrate to Phase 2, and David's link system could make P25 a competitive mode in ham radio again.

HRN 279: AREDN Emergency Digital Network - from the 2016 DCC

/

AREDN Project Manager Andre Hansen K6AH details this mesh based data network that's up and running in the San Diego CA area. It uses the 2.4, 3.4 and 5.9 GHz ham bands to haul data across the region, and then distribute it to local users, with a primary EmComm goal.

Andre gave this talk at the ARRL & TAPR Digital Communications Conference in St. Petersburg FL in September 2016. 

HRN 278: Remote Base (from the 2016 DCC)

/

From the ARRL & TAPR Digital Communications Conference in St. Petersburg FL, September, 2016. Lou Romero W4LT has been doing the remote for a long time - before it became the popular thing it is today. He'll tell his story, review the options for private and public remotes, club-based remotes, Off the Shelf and DIY.

This is not super-technical talk. It's more 'what the pieces are and how they go together.' Lou will demo his club's system at the end of the talk, and there's some good Q&A.

HRN 277: WSPR on the Pi

/

Scotty Cowling WA2DFI details a new TAPR kit that turns a Raspberry Pi into a 20 meter WSPR beacon - cheap and easy. From the 2016 ARRL/TAPR DCC.

HRN 276: Ham Radio 8.0 - the Sunday Seminar from the 2016 DCC

/
the original title....

the original title....

The Sunday Seminar is the annual deep dive in to a single subject at the ARRL and TAPR Digital Communications Conference. It runs from 8 AM to noon on Sunday as the wrap-up to the three-day event.

In 2016, Michelle Thompson W5NYV and Dr. Bob McGwier N4HY teamed up to paint a picture of what the Future of Amateur Radio (and pretty much all radio) will look like. It starts with smart radios that figure out how to share spectrum with one another, and goes from there. The Ham Radio 8.0 idea comes from HamRadioNow host Gary Pearce KN4AQ, not Michelle or Bob, but he thinks they might agree. Gary makes his case in his introduction to Part One.

We're presenting Michelle and Bob's talk in three parts (three videos/audios), mostly to keep the video file size and compression reasonable. We take our break when they did at the conference. It's a lot to watch, so it's also available in audio that you can listen to on your phone when you're on the go. Here's how to subscribe to the HamRadioNow podcast.

HamRadioNow's video of the DCC is made possible by our KICKSTARTER backers. Thanks to 75 hams who ponied up over $6000 to cover the cost of shooting, editing and producing the 20 videos that make up the conference. 

Part ONE 

Michelle Thompson W5NYV talks spectrum and cognitive radio. She expects technology to really disrupt the radio art in the near future. Just how that happens is for Parts TWO and THREE

In the intro, Gary mentions a pair of TV shows that have a significant ham radio component:

Part TWO

Bob McGwier N4HY begins his portion of the Sunday Seminar. 

Bob reviews a lot of history as he lays the groundwork for his prediction of a major shakeup in communications (and Ham Radio) that he'll detail in Part Three.

Part THREE

Bob McGwier N4HY makes his case for The Future of Amateur Radio... and why we need it.

Agree? Disagree? The discussion starts now, but like it or not, the technology is right around the corner.

Links:

HRN 275: EmComm Extra #3: MARS Attacks (MARS Interop Test)

/

Yeah, the MARS Attacks title is just click bait. But really, MARS, the Military Auxiliary Radio Service, will be sort of invading the ham bands in a new kind of interoperability test. If you're quick, you'll catch it - it starts at 11 PM Eastern on Sunday, October 30, 2016 on 60 meters. Even if you miss it live, this show will give you some good background. Co-Host David W0DHG and Gary talk with Army MARS Program Manager Paul English WD8DBY, and go in depth (this is HamRadioNow) on the test and the MARS system today.

This is the 11 PM 60 Meter Broadcast, with commentary

HRN 274: EmComm Extra #2 - AfterMatth(ew)

/

Gary KN4AQ and new Co-Host David Goldenberg W0DHG launch the HamRadioNow EmComm Extra with Episode 2, because Episode 1 was a rush job during the onset of Hurricane Matthew. 

This time they talk to two hams who participated directly in ARES activity as Matthew roared by. Scott Roberts KK4ECR is an Assistant EC and PIO for Clay County ARES, just outside Jacksonville FL. Linda Selleck KJ4EVV is the EC for Berkeley County ARES, next to Charleston SC. 

Before the interviews, David and Gary talk about what they'd like the EmComm Extra to be. We're not going to hold them to it, but it'll give you a clue.

HRN 273: FEMA - Go BIG (from the 2016 DCC)

/
HRN 273 FEMA Go Big POSTER SQUARE 250.jpg

FEMA Chief Technology Officer Ted Okada K4HNL addresses the 2016 ARRL & TAPR Digital Communications Conference. Unlike most DCC talks, this is not highly technical, but Ted does conclude with a challenge to develop digital tools to advance the art of preparing for and responding to disasters.

KIDS These Days (Un-numbered non-episode)

/

This isn't an 'Epsisode' - at least it doesn't have a number. It's Gary's pitch to get ideas for attracting young people to replace us old farts who are aging out (dying) of the service. Blame the anonymous $500 contributor to the DCC video KICKSTARTER who wanted us to promote 'giving a kid a book' to spur their interest. 

The YouTube comments (and Facebook Group comments) are remarkably high quality on this topic.

HRN 272: A GeoSync Ham Satellite for the Americas (from the DCC)

/

We've been hearing about a Geosynchronous satellite for the Western Hemisphere for a while now, but not many details. In this episode from the DCC, project leader Bob McGwire N4HY fills in a lot of blanks. There's no launch date yet, and maybe not quite enough info to start building your ground station (a 'Five & Dime' setup - 5 GHz up, 10 GHz down), but you can start thinking about it.

HRN 271: Welcome to the DCC

/

This... well, the second half of it, is TAPR President Steve Bible N7HPR's welcome to the hams assembled in St. Petersburg FL for the 2016 DCC. The first half is Gary talking about the video production. So nothing critical here - just an orientation to give you an idea of what the DCC is like if you attend in person.

HRN 270: Emcomm Extra #1 - Hurricane Matthew Edition

/

Gary welcomes David Goldenberg W0DHG to the HamRadioNow hosting crew. David will be a regular co-host for the Emcomm Extra episodes, planned for about once a month (keep in mind that this is a HamRadioNow  plan, and what could possibly go wrong? Anyway, we want to do regular Emcomm shows). And Ham Media gadfly Marty Sullaway KC1CWF just happened to be hanging around Gary's Facebook feed and got dragged in for the ride... not as the 'youth' representative, just as a pretty smart ham. Gary admits that he tried to get some ARRL/ARES leaders from the Southeast coast sections, but all were busy preparing for an actual hurricane.

HRN 269: Bull in a China Shop

/

We don't do unboxings and reviews, but this time we did both. Gary wanted to learn more about the 'cheap Chinese radios' everybody loves, so he picked up a BaoFeng UV-5x3 tri-band HT (144-220-440), which he unboxed, programmed and compared to the Kenwood TH-F6A tri-band HT. The Kenwood beat the BaoFeng by a mile in everything but price. For about $80, he found the BaoFeng 'good enough'.

HRN 268: Even MORE On the Road (to the 2016 DCC)

/

Gary's on the road (again), through the Carolinas, Georgia and Florida to the ARRL/TAPR DCC. D-STAR, DMR, Special Event Stations, DX, Public Service... all somehow squeezed into a mere two hours and change.