Category: Solar power

Clayton’s Cool Solar QRSS Rig, WA5DJJ, TESLA!

Clayton (who is NOT crazy) has put together a really neat solar-powered QRSS rig with the two wires for the dipole antenna sticking out the ends of the transmitter box. During the testing phase he went the extra mile by first freezing the circuit into a block of ice and then heating it up in an oven. I guess he really wanted a wide range of temperature data! Clayton’s web site on the project is very interesting and very well done. Check it out:
http://clayton.isnotcrazy.com/mept_v1

In other QRSS news, David, WA5DJJ, just back from vacation, fired up his QRSS rig only to discover that there are no grabbers on in North America. What’s up with that? Can someone out there help out OM DJJ?

Did you guys see that Google is today marking Tesla’s birthday. Clearly there are some Knack vicitms in the Google-plex.

Going Solar! Solar QRSS!

Bright sunny morning here in Rome. I was talking to Nigel, M0NDE, on Echolink and he mentioned his efforts to keep his new shack completely “off the grid.” That got us talking about the video I posted yesterday (scroll down) about making solar panels from donuts and tea, and the next thing you know, I’m connecting my Volkswagen solar panels (see above) to my QRSS beacon. No longer will my 50 milliwatt transmitter be contributing to the destruction of the planet! I feel better already.

Homebrew Solar Panels

I hate to tell you, but all you guys who are using STORE-BOUGHT solar panels are a bunch of APPLIANCE OPERATORS. Time to roll your own, and REALLY make your own electricity.
Woody, KF4TQJ, sent me this interesting link on how to make your own solar panel:
http://www.thesolarplan.com/articles/your-own-solar-panel-collector.html
Before you get carried away by homebrew enthusiasm, scroll down a bit on that page and check out the cost estimates for large scale application of this technology.

Over the Alps with 5 Milliwatts and Solar Power


Yesterday morning the lower portion of the 30 meter QRSS band was dominated by three Italian stations: Near the bottom of ON5EX’s grabber screen was the very clear and FB CW of Fabio, IK0IXI. Fabio runs about 50 milliwatts to a Windom and operates from Civitavecchia, a beautiful coastal town about 20 miles from Rome. Here you can take a look at his rig, and his schematic: http://www.geocities.com/ik0ixib/bcn.html A bit further up were the droopy dashes of yours truly, 200 mw (QRO!) to my all-purpose end-fed wire. And a bit further up from me was the very interesting signal of Paolo, IZ1KXQ. Paolo runs 5 milliwatts from a super-simple solar powered rig (see above) that resides on the roof of his house. It puts out a distinctive square wave sig.

IKoIXI’s crystal is in an oven and is temperature stabilized. He stays on the same freq all day. We’ve found that my signal seems to drift down in freq during the course of the day, as Rome heats up. It moves about 15 hz down from early morning to afternoon. IZ1KXQ’s rig is more exposed to the heat, and seems to move quite a bit more, and his sig moves UP in freq. I think this drifting adds to the QRSS fun.
FB Paolo! FB Fabio!

Here is IZ1KXQ’s schematic: