Copasetic Flow

  FM modulation is so elegant it almost feels like a magic trick. After finally watching a 1940s U.S. Army Signal Corps training film, I realized just how simple frequency modulation really is—both on transmit and receive. Seeing the LC tank, limiter, and discriminator explained visually made everything click. Even better, that understanding immediately paid off in a modern, practical way: fixing an overly aggressive CW sidetone in my video QSLs using nothing more than an audio limiter. I finally understand FM modulation and it's so simple I'm amazed it wasn't developed first. I found an old US Army signal corp video that describes how both FM transmit and receive work. Audio Modulation I had not understood that modulating the transmit frequency was this simple. It all makes sense now that I see it, but I hadn't considered how simple this could be. The video demonstrates the use of an LC tank circuit to  generate the required RF. By placing a a condenser mic in p...

 I made a run to New Mexico a few weeks ago. I took the chance to attempt POTA activations from Ciblola National Forest, Lincoln National Forest, and a few other places I'll talk about later this week. My first activation in Cibloa National Forest the day I arrived in Albuquerque was by far my most successful in terms of raw QSO count. Having just arrived in town, I of course made my way to Blake's Lottaburger for a green chili cheeseburger. I've been trying to reduce my food intake a bit so I ordered an itsaburger as opposed to a lottaburger. (Seriously. It's an excellent naming scheme, no pun intended.) Next, I made my way out to Simms Park. The park is operated by the city of Albuquerque, but it's completely contained within the boundaries of Cibola National Forest, US-4514 , so voila. I taped the Project TouCan's vertical antenna on its carbon fiber support mast to a wooden railing post and got to work. I've found several references warning not to u...

 I wandered a bit down a rabbit hole this morning when I was innocently enough thinking about teaching trig to kids using a smartphone for building height measurement. Turns out there's all sorts of information about phones that can tell what angle they're at using a gyrscope. It also turns out that my phone, a Samsung S23+ uses an STMicroElectronics MEMs gyroscope. Anyway, here are the cool resources: STMicro gyroscopes page has a very nice chapterized video on how all this works. I could not find the same videos on YouTube. If you're looking for the physics reasoning behind the devices, this is the page. Here's the Mozilla API for accessing this kind of thing in your phone via JavaScript. Here's the Google specific API . Here's the STMicro intro video to MEMs from YouTube Expect to see more soon.

 I've been following the introduction of RSE wire on VE6LK's YourTube channel. It's pretty spiffy stuff. It has nickel coated carbon fibers as its core and a rope-like insulator. Basically, it's cable that behaves like a rope. It can also support up to 300 pounds without breaking. The tensile sttrength is what caught my attention. Could RSE be used as a dipole with Project TouCans? Remember, when TouCans is used with a dipole, all 22 ounces or so of the rig go up in the dipole as well. I haven't worked out how to actually connect the wire to the antenna terminals yet, but assuming I could, and I pulled the RSE taught over a couple of tree branches, could it hold up the rig? It's time to do some physics. I asked GPT-5.1 to do the physics for me. Here's my prompt: I'd like to do a physics problem with you. I'm doing this to find out  if we can hold a radio in the middle of a dipole. The wire has a breaking ension of 300 pounds. The radio weighs 2 po...

 I made my first QSO on the Project Toucans CW practice app last week and it was DX to Brazil with  PY2UIA , Henrique. He also commented here on the blog . Henrique suggested the iambic keyer would be easier to use if its keying speed was adjustable. That hadn't occured to me since I usually use the straight/cootie key version. And, now it is! On the iambic version of the practice app, the gap+/- size adjustment has been changed to wpm+/- buttons: The keys + and - reduce the dit time, (the standardized time all the other iambic times are based on), by 5 ms, or increase by 5 ms respectively. Give the new controls a try on the iambic app , make a few QSOs of your own, and tell us what other features you’d like to see in the comments.

 Learning Morse code is easier — and way more fun — when you can practice with real people anytime, anywhere. KO6BTY and I have been building a phone-based CW practice app that lets you send and receive code with other operators over the internet, no radio, antenna, or license required. This post walks through the waterfall display, keyer modes, histograms, and demo videos so you can jump right in and start making contacts from your phone. KO6BTY and I have been working on a two-way phone based CW (Morse code) practice app for a while. We'd really love for people try it out, and let us know what to improve, or what to implement next. We've finally got it in a state where people can start to test it. If you'd like to practice sending and receiving code with other people via your phone anyhere you can get on the internet, read on. App Components Project TouCans CW Practice app is a Morse code tranceiver that operates over your phone, so no ham license, (or antenna), is req...