VK3SMB

2m_dipole

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-15T12:10:23+00:00

New Antenna for VK3RWO Ever since the VK3RWO repeater was installed it has had a VHF High band antenna for the 2M radio. The Antenna was centred on 160Mhz. While this had an exceptable VSWR on 147Mhz, I have always accepted that the radiation pattern has not been that great. At 147Mhz there would have been lobes shooting into the sky.

6_meter_cavities

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-15T13:17:53+00:00

Start of the 6M VK2RWD Build The time has come to start thinking really hard about the 6M repeater the club has a licence for. We have a licence for 53.5/52.5Mhz. There is much discussion around the internet on how to make Cavities for 6M. Some of the examples are:

6_meter_conversion_tait_t2020

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2021-03-04T13:03:08+00:00

Preface While this conversion is easier than the 6 Metre Conversion (PRM80), the same principals apply. There is still Software mods, VCO mods (maybe), Filter changes, Receiver changes and in particular TX filter mods. Programming Download , unzip it and load it into the 2020 Programming software. You need version 2.54 or higher. After loading the file, program it to the radio, however,

6_meter_conversion_unliab_kl70

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-14T13:20:57+00:00

6M UNILAB KL 70 modification

6_metre_conversion_prm80

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-14T12:37:03+00:00

E Band 6 Metre Conversion An earlier version of this Article is in the July 2011 Amateur Radio Magazine. The Phillips/Simoco prm80 radio has proven itself to be a great performer on the 2M and 70cm amateur bands, particularly when dealing with pager interference, and there is quite a few being used as

10_meter_conversion_unilab_kl70

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-21T15:15:06+00:00

10M conversion UniLab KL 70

23cm_prm80

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-14T12:49:02+00:00

23CM PRM80 Coming..... The Phillips/Simoco prm80 radio has proven itself to be a great performer on the 2M and 70cm amateur bands, particularly when dealing with pager interference, and there is quite a few being used as “High Power” UHF CB's. They have up to 160 channels, software programmable, and too many options to list. There is an E Band version of this radio that has finally been converted to 6 metres and there is an AM Aircraft Band modification for them as well.

adc_switches

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2021-02-14T11:11:44+00:00

ADC Switchs There are times when you need several switches, all pressed at different times, and you dont want to use several inputs to achieve this. I have made 2 varients, a switch panel (with eight switches) and a 2 way switch (joystick axis for example).

airband_prm80

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2020-06-13T14:06:25+00:00

PRM80 Airband The Phillips/Simoco prm80 radio has proven itself to be a great performer on the 2M and 70cm amateur bands, particularly when dealing with pager interference, and there is quite a few being used as “High Power” UHF CB's. They have up to 160 channels, software programmable, and too many options to list. There is also an E Band version of this radio that has finally been converted to 6 metres.

automatic_news_broadcast_by_vk7db

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-13T14:22:32+00:00

Raspberry Pi automatic broadcast machine Here is what I did, to get started.. * Take one Raspberry Pi model B, one 8gb SD card, one EDUP wifi adaptor and one 8gb USB flash drive. * Install latest Rasbian image to SD Card. A google search will find instructions for the various ways to do this if you don't know how.

chinese_rtl.sdr_fix

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2020-02-20T13:06:48+00:00

Chinese RTL.SDR Fix Some time ago I bought some cheap RTL-SDR dongles from ebay. They were supposedly 1ppm with a TXCO built in. They turned up and I plugged them in, and using Gqrx tuned them to a local P25 beacon that I know. surprise, surprise, the SDR dongle was a mile (12 odd khz) off frequency.

cleaning_up_the_pi

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-13T14:29:19+00:00

Free up more resources and tweaks Remove some GUI items that we are not going to use: sudo apt-get remove dbus x11-common midori lxde python3 python3-minimal lxde-common lxde-icon-theme omxplayer raspi-config sudo apt-get remove `sudo dpkg --get-selections | grep -v "deinstall" | grep x11 | sed s/install//`

codan_ideas

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-14T12:52:12+00:00

Programming the Codan 9313 without the codan software As Codan have not released the software to the public to program the codan 9313 I had to think about it in a different way. For the record I did contact them asking to buy it (the software) and the reply was it is no longer available.

cp2012

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-14T13:00:38+00:00

CP2102 USB-TTL Interfacing With so many people trying to program the PRM80 and such with a new computer with no legacy serial ports, time to look into it. The PRM80 FPP will refuse to read or write to the radio unless the Legacy Control pins, DSR and CTS are pulled high on the interface. Hence why Pins 4 and 6 are bridged and pins 7 and 8 are bridged on the Programming interface diagram that is floating around the internet.

darkweb_service

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-15T14:32:42+00:00

Setting up your dark web server This example is based on the raspberry pi and rasbian jessie (hence pi-star) as this is where most of the ham uses will be. Log into your pi as root in a shell (log in and type sudo su) Update the repository and install tor and nginx (nginx is already installed on pistar):

deviation_meter

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-14T11:50:36+00:00

Poor Mans Deviation Meter Here is a deviation meter using the discriminator output of a scanner (any cheap scanner you want to hack into.....). If you search the internet for Discriminator taps you will find listings for nearly every available scanner.

digital_decoding

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2021-03-04T13:24:13+00:00

Preface This is a work in progress Now that some of the emergency services here have moved to digital, the time has come to start listening..... Building an Ubuntu system to listen: DSD requires /dev/dsp to be installed. Ubuntu stopped supporting the

dosbox

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-13T12:37:10+00:00

It has come to light in the PRM80 yahoo group that having a computer with “real” dos is something that doesn't exist anymore. With this I set upon investigating and writing instructions to use old radio service software in DOSBox. Here is a “Quick Start

kl_mods_for_amateur_use_all

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-21T15:03:12+00:00

KL repeater mods for Amateur Radio While the KL series repeater are great out of the box. we can make them better. Get rid of the hungry controller

odroid_kernel_operations

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-13T14:54:46+00:00

Update the kernel Download the kernel update code from mdrfr and run the script: wget http://builder.mdrjr.net/tools/kernel-update.sh chmod +x kernel-update.sh sudo ./kernel-update.sh Reboot the Odroid: reboot Kernel Source get the kernel source from the github. You need to run the command straight after updating the kernel so the kernel and the source match:

odroid_projects

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-13T14:55:31+00:00

Note All the following information is completely out of date and is for reference only. Setting up the Odroid Odroid Kernel Operations Odroid Repeater Controller

odroid_repeater_controller

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-13T15:05:09+00:00

Intro I have not seen anyone compile asterisk app_rpt on an Odroid-U3. I believe this should have enough horsepower to do DSP. This is based on the Fedora Odroid remix as most of the packages that are needed are there. In this wiki I will start with a ready to go Fedora installation. If you don't know how to do this, goto

pi_kernel_operations

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-13T14:28:04+00:00

Note This information is WAY out of date and is kept for historical purposes only. Getting ready Go to and download the tarball of the kernel source to your home folder. Run the following after it has downloaded: tar -zxvf your_filename.tar.gz

portable_repeater

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-14T11:46:40+00:00

Portable Repeater I have built a small repeater into a briefcase for using as an emergency station or for field days. It was recently used in the Snowy Hydro challenge. It uses the frequencies of 438.575Mhz with a -5Mhz offset plus a VHF link which can be set at 146.550 or 147.500Mhz. The repeater has an EIRP of 5W and the link 2.5W. These power levels were chosen to conserve battery power.

prm80_dual_band_mod

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-14T13:18:22+00:00

Dual Band PRM80 Actually 1 head, 2 guts boxes! This mod again uses the AUX pin out of the microprocessor to change the radio boxes. Plus it uses an OR gate and flip-flop to swap control over. You need to disconnect the RX audio feed from the Microphone connector and connect the auxillary pin to this connector then use the following shematic to connect the radio's together.

prm80_firmware

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-14T13:08:27+00:00

PRM8030/25 Ham Firmware New Firmware for the PRM8030/8025 It has been done... Here is new firmware for the PRM80 that gives us full control of all the VHF/UHF Ham Bands In my previous article I showed how to convert an E band PRM80 radio to 6 metres, using nothing more than basic RF principals and some

prm80_ham_fpp

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-14T13:13:30+00:00

FPP for the HAM I have finally worked out all the HEX coding in the FPP program for the PRM80. This has allowed me to create a version of FPP that matches the firmware I modified several months ago. These changes are: The frequency you need for the modified firmware can now be directly entered:

prm80_wide_nar_dev_mod

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-14T13:17:04+00:00

PRM80 Wide-Narrow Deviation Mo This mod came about as I use a commercial narrow band frequency for work, and wish to have amateur frequencies to use as well. Program one of the function buttons to activate the AUX function in the RSS. Under the deviation adjustment pot on the control board there is 2 vacant pads which connect across the deviation adjustment. Make the circuit in the following link. Also see the photo which shows where to get the aux output from the microprocessor.

raspberry_pi_projects

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-13T14:30:09+00:00

Raspbian Repeater controller Pi Kernel Operations Cleaning up the Pi Automatic News Broadcast by VK7DB

raspbian_repeater_controller

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-13T14:43:46+00:00

Note This information is completely out of date. it is here as reference only. Intro The first effort at completing this with the Pidora Remix had failed. Here we are going to try and complete this with Raspbian as it is native to the Pi. First Steps

repeater_heights

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2019-10-06T12:39:27+00:00

Repeater Status's In North East Vic Here is a graph depicting the repeater heights and status's here in North East Victoria. The two repeaters on the left are ARV repeaters. Neither are operational. 3RNE has stopped in the last 6 months, it was crap before that, and 3RNU hasnt been here since the 2009 bushfires.

setting_up_a_kl_for_amateur_use

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-15T14:35:25+00:00

Setting up a KL for amateur use

setting_up_the_odroid

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-13T14:47:32+00:00

Initial Steps These steps are needed before attempting asterisk installation: * Set your Odroid up with a static IP address * set the ntpd to start and update the time * Set a Super User Password * Make a normal user * Make sure you can SSH into the Pi.

site_linking_planning

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2020-03-01T10:50:46+00:00

Site linking planning One of the things that perplexes most people when planning site linking, is relating what you see on a map to what you can see with your eyes. Yes those who do lots of it have some fancy GPS stuff to tell you what to do. what about a bit of old school mixed with some google earth pro school?

smd_cheat_sheet

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2020-07-20T13:16:08+00:00

SMD Cheatsheet I designed this up as a little tool to assist me in PCB manufacture. All the common parts I use, plus a few little reminders are on here. Feel free to download the Gerber files and get your own printed: footprint-sheet.zip

speech_compressor

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-13T13:48:54+00:00

A bit of interest in a 27 year old project. Ive re-drawn it using commonly available parts from jaycar. Here is a copy of the gerber files to send away to get a pcb made

start

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2021-02-14T10:29:19+00:00

The Projects General Articles VK3RWO BuildVK3RWO DamageRepeater HeightsVK3RWO Battery changeSite Linking planning Linking Projects VKLink Software Making your own DarkWeb ServiceDosboxRaspberry Pi ProjectsOdroid ProjectsCodan IdeasPRM80 Ham FirmwarePRM80 Ham FPP Hardware Radio Conversions Setting up a KL for amateur use6 Meter Conversion Tait T20206 Meter Conversion PRM80KL Mods for Amateur use (all)6 Meter conversion Unliab KL7010 Meter conversion Unilab KL70Airband PRM80VHF Hybrid Repeater f…

telemetry_controller

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-15T13:32:10+00:00

VK3RWO Telemetry unit As this article has several formulas in it, it has been added as a downloadable pdf

vhf_hybrid_repeater_from_junk

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-13T14:09:35+00:00

TAKE NOTE This design was thought up several years ago and was never implemented past the test bench stage. things have certainly moved a lot faster with better equipment.... Receiver The Idea Using Phil's idea, A PRM80/FM828 Hybrid VHF high bandreceiver has been made.

vk3rwo_battery_change

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2020-03-01T08:13:24+00:00

VK3RWO Battery change After more than 2 years of flawless service, the inevitable has happened and the 6 year old truck batteries at the site have finally given up the ghost. These batteries were removed from their original service due to them not being able to start the vehicle they were in. Then they were moved to the repeater site to power it.

vk3rwo_build

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-15T13:50:00+00:00

VK3RWO Build The Initial build of the VK3RWO repeater unit. The original article

vk3rwo_damage

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-15T13:43:55+00:00

VK3RWO forever surprising us. In a previous article I wrote about making a new antenna for the 2m repeater at VK3RWO. I set about doing this as over the last month, the signals were notably weaker at my QTH. I put this down to we just had a lot of rain and all the trees etc were now natural attenuators.

vklink

Anonymous (anonymous@undisclosed.example.com) — 2018-09-26T13:17:44+00:00

Information This project started off as a way to be able to link all the NEVARC's proposed repeaters at our site, at site level. The idea being, there would be a LAN inside the hut with all the repeaters linked in a way that could be controlled without using massive amounts of logic IC's.