D-STAR

WooHoo, I got onto D-STAR finally! about time. Had the pleasure of meeting up with VE3SST and he set up my 2820 within minutes and now I am on the AIR on D-STAR.

D-STAR is brilliant. The biggest thing I like about it is the fact that all "nodes" are always connected. No more dialling a node using DTMF. I spoke to people in the US, in Scotland and ofcourse local people from Toronto in just an hour of getting on.

This is getting exciting :)

Installation in my Audi

I did not want to drill any holes in the Audi nor did I want to put up any mounts for the Radio head so I chose a small form factor radio, the IC-208H and used a CAT5E to extend the microphone and wired it by dropping the back seats and then pulling it under the mat below the floor and up to the centre console where it fits nicely with my iphone :)

Here are some pictures:

Projects on the Go

Here are the projects that I currently have on my list. Some are in progress, others are on the list:

- Get the Kenwood working in the basement with an antenna inside or outside but low profile
- Fine tune the G5RV
- Fix the Dual Band to be more sturdy in the wind
- Get APRS going with the 2820 using OpenTracker
- Figure out D-STAR

Antenna woes

STILL trying to get ANY antenna to work from my basement by defying all laws of propogation. Currently losing the battle

Picture of my mini shack

Setup

Today I finished setting up my shack in the basement right next to my railway set and its looking good. Downloaded a program to decode CW (I know thats cheating) but hey, it works.

Thanks to LLL for all his help with getting my G5RV better tuned so I can enjoy 80m!