Ben’s Blog

A couple of weeks ago the ATS-3B I posted about a while back became available again, and for the last time. Mine arrived in the mail today. I’m very excited about it. It really is the coolest little kit going right now. I count 19 toroids to wind. Yikes. One on the main board and three on each of the six band modules. Maybe it’s time to invest in an L/C Meter?

While I’m very excited about the ATS-3B, I’m going to force myself to leave it alone until I finish my Softrock Lite II 30m software defined receiver and my Small Wonder Labs SW-40+ 40m CW transceiver.

I’m not sure I’ve even mentioned my Softrock Lite II on the blog before. I’ll have to do a proper post on it soon. I have mentioned it over on Twitter. It is done, as in all the parts are installed. However, I’m not able to receive any signals. The helpful guys on the mailing list tell me it needs a proper 50-ohm antenna. I was trying to use a small piece of wire as an antenna for testing purposes.

I have ordered and received everything I need to build a 30m dipole antenna that will be installed in my attic, at least for now. I’ve even cut the wire to length. I just need to solder everything and put it in the attic. I’ll probably borrow an SWR meter from one of the local hams to ensure it’s resonant on the 30m band. Hopefully the Softrock Lite will just work once it has a proper antenna. If not, I’m confident I can troubleshoot it with the help of the guys on the mailing list.

The SW-40+ is mostly done. All the components are installed on the board. However, I still need to align it, integrate the K12 keyer, and put it in the enclosure. I’ll also need to learn Morse Code before I can get much use out of it. I’ve been practicing occasionally, but I’ll have to put a lot more time into learning it before I’m good enough to try an on-air contact.

I’ve also been tinkering with AVR microcontrollers, but that’s a long-term project, so I’m content to let that sit while I build the ATS-3B.

I hope to get up a post about the backpacking trip soon. Two things are holding it up. Mostly, I’ve been insanely busy since I got back. Secondly, the memory card that has the pictures from the trip on it seems to be corrupted. I’ve ordered a card reader so I can attempt to recover them.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 4th, 2009 at 12:59 am and is filed under Amateur Radio, Backpacking, Electronics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.