{"id":5516,"date":"2009-12-22T05:12:00","date_gmt":"2009-12-21T18:12:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/2009\/12\/22\/a-report-from-south-africa\/"},"modified":"2025-07-21T19:10:05","modified_gmt":"2025-07-21T09:10:05","slug":"a-report-from-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/2009\/12\/22\/a-report-from-south-africa\/","title":{"rendered":"A Report from South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Hi Bill<\/span><\/p>\n

Africa<\/span> “field QRP station”<\/b>
Thanks for another great episode of your experiences – I’m tuning in from Africa while on my vacation Each December I make the trek from <\/span>San Diego<\/span> to <\/span>Cape Town<\/span>. <\/span>
Then, my Dad (zs1xd) and I take the family out to a remote<\/span>
location – and setup a field station. Around the camp-fire, under the Milky Way and no rf-pollution is a great way to hunt some dx and spend vacation time. This year <\/span>
we selected a cabin located in a beautiful mountainous region about 100 miles north of Cape Town. 2 wheel vehicle will get you there and “just in case” , we<\/span>
also took a capable 4×4 with.<\/span>
I posted some pics and QRP HF operating notes here: <\/span>http:\/\/k6wh.blogspot.com\/<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

“SMT”<\/b>
I’m following your Softrock SMT construction comments with keen interest and am glad you’re finding the challenge – well – “not so much of a challenge”<\/span>
I think it’s so great that you’re encouraging hams to jump into SMT.<\/span>
I chuckled at your comment about “desoldering smt’s” – Try de-soldering the Si570 SMT chip. I had the good fortune of measuring messing up the <\/span>
“measure 10 x then cut once” when soldering this IC on the rxtx kit. Well – we know a mistake will happen, and when it happens, murphy’s law will ensure <\/span>
that it involves the most sensitive and tricky smt component on the board – hi.<\/span><\/p>\n

It’s a real trick, due to the contacts being under the chip (no pins like the other smts)<\/span>
Well – try de-soldering that piece. And of course one realizes the mistake, only once the last solder joint has dried. Determined to correct the mistake there and then, <\/span>
at 9pm while busy with the kit, I rushed off to the nearest <\/span>radio shack<\/span> to get some de-solder wick. Took me about 1 hr of patience, and careful “wicking” to suck<\/span>
up all the solder underneath the chip – one contact at a time, (each desolder attempt, hoping the chip pops loose) – no easy task. I don’t know of another easy way <\/span>
than lots of patience, and a good magnifying glass.<\/span><\/p>\n

I agree there is no greater reward than “homebrew” and with the advances in SDR tech, we’re surely living in a wonderful age.<\/span><\/p>\n

Once you get the SDR on-air, I’m sure you’ll be blown away by the reception quality – sensitivity and especially the almost non-existent noise-floor.<\/span>
(I’m not sure which model you’re building, but I think all of Tony’s designs are utilize the same Tayloe detector design which is very quiet)<\/span><\/p>\n

I still can’t believe the performance I get with the Softrock’s kit – It’s now become an antenna measuring instrument – While having fun with PSK QSO’s and WSPR.<\/span>
Of course, with the SDR one can adjust the output (via soundcard drive) to basically uW levels.<\/span><\/p>\n

As we know, at these levels, each little bit of antenna optimization helps, and SDR+WSPR\/PSK has become my “far field <\/span>antenna measurement tool<\/span>” of choice.<\/span><\/p>\n

WSPR from Africa<\/span>
<\/b>Not too many stations active on WSPR on the African continent – Now that I’ve setup my Dad on DSL, I assisted him in activating his WSPR station in<\/span>
Cape Town (ZS1XD). His antenna is a 20m homebrew 2 el yagi. I’m pointing it north during the evenings to see if n2cqr pops up in the log. Nothing yet, but I’m sure <\/span>
one of these days, you may just be surprised. Keep watching for the Africa report \ud83d\ude42<\/span><\/p>\n

thank you again for such a great entertaining and educational program …<\/span>
73 – best wishes to you and the family from the tip of Africa.<\/span>
de deon (k6wh)\/zs<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hi Bill Africa “field QRP station”Thanks for another great episode of your experiences – I’m tuning in from Africa while on my vacation Each December I make the trek from San Diego to Cape Town. Then, my Dad (zs1xd) and I take the family out to a remotelocation – and setup a field station. Around … Continue reading “A Report from South Africa”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[207,40,145,26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5516","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-africa","category-sdr","category-surface-mount","category-wspr"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5516","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5516"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5516\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5518,"href":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5516\/revisions\/5518"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5516"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5516"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.homebrewradio.us\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5516"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}