Author: dick

Almost Field Day …

Tomorrow, Field Day gets under way. I had hoped to participate with the club, but it’s not looking too likely. Got lots  going on this weekend … family, church, etc. I’ll try to make an appearance at the site, but probably won’t operate there.

I’ve been fighting a killer summer cold this week, so I’ve gotten behind on a lot of stuff. It was the whole array of symptoms too … cough, runny nose, achy body and headache.  I was off work for two days. My wife called a couple of hours ago, and it sounds like she and my daughter are coming down with it now.

Even if I can’t operate any significant time with the club station, I’ll try and get some operating time in from home. I just can’t totally miss operating during field day. Maybe there’ll be some nice six meter openings!

73 and enjoy Field Day if you’re participating de Dick N4BC

IC-7300 USB Driver Update

I see that ICOM has posted a new USB driver update on their website. Don’t know if it cures the error message when you power up the rig or not. I’ll load it tonight and see. The message is just a nuisance … works fine anyway. Click on the link to download the new driver.

Just saw this post on the IC-7300 .io Group:

“This driver has caused problems with the N1MM software program,
If you are using this program then DO NOT INSTALL!. …
Bruce  N7XGR”
Maybe we should let the dust settle before jumping in with both feet?

 

73 de Dick N4BC

Mixed Blessings …

I flipped on the radio when I got home from work yesterday afternoon, and had to check and see if the antenna  was connected (as a matter of fact, it wasn’t … I had disconnected it the night before during some violent thunderstorms). So, I reconnected it … didn’t make a lot of difference … reception still sucked! Switch to OFF!

Later in the evening, I returned to the rig and was pleasantly surprised to hear something besides QRN. Eighty through 12 meters were showing SOME signs of life … especially on FT8. I worked about a half dozen contacts on most of those bands (primarily eighty meters). There was quite a bit of CW activity on 40, and I would have liked to sample that, but alas, I was needed elsewhere.

Charlie, WB4PVT, posted a video on the local email group about how “TUBS” are made. Every week, he posts a video of interest to hams. A couple of weeks before, he had posted one on how vacuum tubes are made, but had made a typo in the title … TUBS instead of TUBES. I kidded him about it the next time I saw him. He got me back by posting one last week about how tubs … BATHTUBS … are made. Got me!

Field day is fast approaching. Hopefully I’ll have time to participate with the club. Actually, we have several clubs combining for the event, as we do every year. The club I’m a member of just cant’t muster enough bodies to put together a team, so we make it a group effort and have a great time!

It was a good evening, after all.

73 de Dick N4BC
(from the bottom of the cycle … which ain’t so bad anyway!)