WA5RR Adventures in Ham Radio

      Since COVID-19 reared its ugly head around March of 2020, it has been a year of uncertainty. My job as a project manager let me work from home for most of the year. With my work laptop set up next to my shack computer, I had FT8 going almost constantly. The sporadic-E season let me earn 6-meter Worked All States and I kept going on HF after the conditions shifted.     I achieved the Digital Mixed Worked All States award from the ARRL a few weeks ago! The certificate finally arrived today.     My next goal is to earn my Digital 5BWAS (5-band WAS) before the end of the year! 73, Korey--WA5RR

       While I made significant improvements in equipment for the rover since the June VHF contest, this years ARRL January VHF finds me needing to stay close to home. My wife had a serious medical issue that required emergency surgery on 1 January 2020 (great way to start of a year) and she's recovering. So, I have everything set to go as a Single Operator Low Power (SOLP) station this year. Here's the equipment rundown: 6-meters     Yaesu FTDX-3000 running 100 watts SSB/CW and 50 watts digital into a homebrewed 6m Moxon antenna. 2-meters    Icom IC-706MkIIG into an RF Concepts 170-watt amplifier into a 4-element 'Cheap Yagi' 1.25-meters  The Icom IC706-MkIIG provides the 10-meter IF for a Ukrainian 220 transverter with 6 watts output into a 6-element 220MHz 'Cheap Yagi'. 70 cm  The Yaesu FT-857D runs 20 watts into an 11-element 'Cheap Yagi'. My 6-meter station runs an instance of N1MM logger and it's networked with the 2/70 station. I ...

      Always on the lookout for modes and techniques to improve my VHF+ rover, I ran across information on the use of inexpensive modules used to communicate over long distances with a protocol called LoRa (Long Range). This technology sends packets of information in 'chirps' across spread spectrum frequencies. Although typically used for ISM purposes, an amateur radio operator can use frequencies and higher power levels with these modules.     I started my experiments with some inexpensive Ebyte E32 433-MHz modules ordered off Ebay for $7 each. These radios will output 100-milliwatts and interface nicely with an Arduino Uno which I had on hand. Any other Arduino or even a Raspberry Pi will work with it. The initial tests were based on some proof-of-concept code which demonstrated the ability to send and receive.          The 1-watt modules cost around $36 apiece but I found the HamShield LoRa Edition board which is set up for ham r...