It may be an affliction found mostly in recently licensed hams, but I like to tinker. The idea of opening a box, lifting out a radio adorned with a couple of dozen little buttons, plugging in a computer, and then getting on the air doesn’t really appeal to me. Ham radio means, to me anyway, the capacity to improvise, tinker, adjust, and tune. It might stem from my background.

When World War II ended, my father returned home from Europe ready to take advantage of the GI Bill. He enrolled in an electronics course which in due time enabled him to start his own business as a radio and television repairman. I came along and by the late fifties I was tinkering in his shop. What things I learned there came mostly by improvising, tinkering, adjusting, and tuning. I learned to solder and desolder, to restring dial cords, check and change vacuum tubes, and cannibalize obsolete sets for parts.

Studying for my license exams, I became determined to invest in the hobby in things that I found appealing. I equipped my first station with vintage gear and searched the internet for like-minded operators. In the quest for information I came across a podcast called Soldersmoke, a semimonthly exploration of homebrew amateur radio. Bill Meara, the host and podcaster, enthusiastically spoke of QRSS and his 200 milliwatt beacon transmitting from a makeshift wire antenna strung out his second story window and up onto the roof of his apartment in Rome.

I knew nothing of this anemic form of transmission, but it sounded interesting. Plug your transmitter into an amp and push out 1500 watts and you can be heard just about anywhere. But being received a continent away off a 200 milliwatt signal, how can this be? I learned that there are hams out there with grabbers who pull the QRP transmissions out of the air and post the signal quality on the internet. Instant gratification!

Then Bill spoke of QRSS, very slow speed CW transmissions that occupy very tiny segments of bandwidth, as little as 100 hertz. 100 hertz! Well this sounds like fun to me. Plus, there is an upside given my posting to a job in East Africa.

Power in Uganda is quite unreliable. It is often off, sometimes for days at a time. But I have a transmitter kit I found on-line (HSC Electronics) I will assemble when I get to Uganda that fits on the top of a 9 volt battery, the same battery that is its power supply. So we have QRP transmission from a transmitter the size of a matchbox, costing just $10. I have wire to string out the window of the planned shack. But what about always on transmitting so the grabber can grab?

That calls for a beacon. There are a number of ways to keep a beacon on the air all the time, keeping in mind the need to respect the duty cycle of the transmitter. But with ultra low power, there is little danger of taxing the circuitry. Some guys set up their computers to key in the beacon’s message, programming sufficient off-the-air time so that the transmitter doesn’t suffer. Other guys use old answering machines with the continuous loop tape to transmit. But those devices require continuous power from the line to work. Not even a laptop will function for more than a few hours without power.

So I went again to the net and found a company in Tampa, Florida, called Expanded Spectrum Systems. Rich Kennedy, the owner – N4ESS, makes a product called the Freakin Beacon. It is a microchip based controller that you can program from the serial port of a computer using the computer’s terminal mode. You type in a character string which will activate the PTT for your homebrew 9v-powered transmitter, key a message at a rate you decide (even QRSS if you want), quit PTT, and repeat. The Freakin Beacon need 9 to 15 vdc to work, again a simple and easily available 9v battery will work. If I had reliable line power, I could rig up a power supply for both. I am looking in to solar cells that will supply enough voltage for daytime operation. (Did I mention Uganda straddles the equator so daylight there is 12 hours a day, every day, all year?)

I have these items already packed and will assemble them both in Uganda. Stand by for a notice in this blog when they’ll be on the air. I’ll also post the grabber(s) wed address(es) if you want to take a look at the signal.