Radio, railways, stuff...

After some fiddling I now have a decent amount of signal coming down from QO100, but also questions. The azimuth was already correct and I had adjusted that to maximum signal strength on a TV channel with a GT Media V8 Finder. But the elevation is numerically wrong, or the markings on the dish are wrong, which is more likely. Fiddling with elevation got the strongest beacon signal at about 26db and 26 degrees marked, but the AMSAT info says it should be around 23 degrees at my QTH. Mind you, for all I know the garage wall is not perfectly vertical! All SSB signals look good now except for one or two that are difficult to hear. However, having got that far, no adjustment to the position of the POTY in the arm or its skew make any noticeable difference, so I've left that one. Also, when transmitting a tone from SDR Console it actually peaks higher than the beacon so I had to reduce the drive appropriately. An SSB signal test showed very poor audio and no adjustments in SDR Console got it to where it needed to be. Turning the mic gain up in Windows itself cured that and gives me a decent looking envelope when viewing the returned signal in SDR Console. I just need to force myself to take it all to bits again and sort out the GPSDO input to the Pluto...

Since I built the Minitiouner I've had nothing to test it with except a quick test on the Astra satellite to prove it actually worked. Not any more. I now have a Portsdown ATV transmitter setup thanks to a recent advert for one for sale (saved me having to get all the bits). No PA, no antennas or anything else here yet, but I did at least manage to send a test card from it to the Minitiouner over 23cm and at the grand distance of 6 inches. It all needs a nice case yet but it's a good start. This might even persuade me to bung my 23cm yagi on the chimney and see if I can actually receive GB3YT - it's not too far away but there is a house in the way.

Scary stuff. The RSGB announced (yesterday I think) that the full licence exam will be available to be booked online from today. I've booked for mid-november to give me time to actually learn this stuff... (yeah, I know... probably not that bad though because I have an electronics background so it's more a matter of making sure I don't miss anything daft).