Committee members Graeme, VK3CDO and Peter, VK3TPM undertook a field trip to evaluate some options for a future field trip and possible camp out. First we headed to Monument Hill Reserve near Kilmore. There is a nice bluestone tower structure that could be good for VHF activity. Our Meshcore devices were pinging away during our stay as well. We had a VHF contact with Joe, VK3MAB, from the top of the tower. Next we hung an end fed wire from a tree branch over to a squid pole attach...

A great meeting in Woodend this month. Joe opened the meeting and accepted a generous gift from Pam McDiamid after the sale of gear from the late Graeme McDiamid, VK3NE. Pam said that throughout his life Graeme had greatly enjoyed the activities and fellowship of the club and she wanted to give back something in return. We are deeply grateful for the generous donation and are looking for ways to best invest it in the club. Barry, VK3BRT, represented the club at the recent Dayton Ha...

A varied meeting at Woodend today. There were some left-over items from the Graeme VK3NE SK auction and we welcomed new member Wally Fiedler who is on the way to getting his call. FreeDV version 2.3 was downloaded, installed and the initial configuration done before a live audience. The club has purchased some useful items of test equipment including a nanoVNA, a tinySA and a HackRF Portapack Mayhem. Peter VK3TPM went through the amazing range of capabilities of this device and de...

The club has acquired some useful test equipment recently for use in presentations and for short term loan to members. The HackRF Portapack Mayhem device is primarily to produce demonstration signals for showing off receivers in the meeting room. It has many features beyond this. The NanoVNA Ultra I thought I ordered turned out to be a spectrum analyser. I was tricked by the listing and ordered the wrong "colour". Very annoying. I've gone ahead and ordered the other colour. ...

A big meeting today at Woodend. First up, Jim, VK3KA, gave a detailed presentation of the state of the Starlink low earth orbit satellite internet service. Amazing technology stack and continues to improve in various ways. Did you know that satellites are designed for demisability? As well as serving homes, Starlink also provides fast internet to vehicles, ships and planes. Already short messages can use it from standard mobile phones and in the future it seems it will support voice a...