Welcome

If you’ve found your way here looking for the slides I presented at the 2017 RSGB Convention “Low Cost Remote Radio” talk, you can find them over here.

The rather sparse WordPress page you see before you is the new front-end of my personal web site. This is always a work in progress!

Mostly I write here about hobby projects I am working on or have completed, partly as an aide-memoire to myself and partly because sometimes the information is useful to others trying to do similar things.

The blog I wrote covering my time with British Antarctic Survey can be found here.

11 thoughts on “Welcome”

  1. Andy
    Have to replace the 5 way on my HH Godin LGXT (which was replaced by the good folks at the no defunct Fender Custom shop Nashville, with a strat style 5 way.) Want go back to OEM to get original configuration: 1= Neck 2= single coil (nearest to neck)3= both neck and bridge full pu
    4= bridge single coil (nearest bridge) 5= Full bridge pu The folks at Godin want to charge me $30 plus shipping for the import. Can I get the OEM configuration with the Strat 5way or is there a less expensive import alternative. The current wiring was a quess on the part of the folks at fender since at the time they nor I had a clue. Pls advise
    Mose

    1. Hi Mose, not sure to be honest. Looking at the default pickup selections you can’t get that without some clever switch trickery – I think your best bet is to throw yourself on the mercy of Godin!

      1. Thanks
        Going to leave it in the capable hands of Joe Glaser in Nashville seems there’s a Fender 5 way stacked switch that can handle the redo
        Til Later
        Mose

  2. I was looking at this article. It is very informative. I installed a set of Fishman Fluence Single width pickups (Strat pickups) in my Warmoth Strat recently and the only way that I could get them to work was to use a 5 way switch (I had mini toggles in the original setup) because the Fluence use both sides of the 5 way switch separately. I ended up using a push/pull pot to turn on the Bridge pickup to get additional pickup combinations, but I would like to use mini toggles again. Can you steer me in the right direction to use mini toggles and what type I would need to use? I’m thinking I would probably have to use DPDT to get the same wiring scheme as using the 5 way switch.

  3. Hi Andy,
    Nice work!
    Your attic looks the same as mine (without the skywave!). Ive got 20 and 40 working, not gone further yet.
    Found your RSGB talk (sorry I missed it). I am also working down the remote path. I started with the rig (IC7300) connected to a PC, and ran the N1MM software. I then used VPN from the office Mac to connect (the radio and PC are in a cabinet in the kitchen). This works very well. I can change frequencies, bands, etc from the MAC.
    For audio, I took a temporary approach with a long audio cable into the back of the MAC. Again this works well on receive. The problem is how to do audio and PTT on transmit.
    I thought I would start with a long mic cable. But I spoke to a guy who does large scale audio cabling (factories etc), and he told me this was a recipe for RFI . So the project is stalled.
    Could you please explain how you solved the audio issues. I think what you’re running is some kind of Unix servers, is that right??
    Many thanks

    Joe – MW1MWD

    1. Hi Joe, thanks for stopping by! I think things can be much simpler with the IC-7300… doesn’t it already include a USB sound interface within the radio? So if you connect via USB to your PC you have effectively a new extra soundcard available to the PC (the radio’s internal USB audio interface) and the audio in/out of that will be the audio from/to the IC-7300… I’m partially guessing because I don’t have the radio but I thought that was the way the modern rigs are going (finally!). Anyway, if that’s the case then your problem is mostly solved, you could combine that with VOX on the radio or look for a better way to control the PTT. I suggest you Google specifically for people setting up IC-7300 for remote operation because it probably has a host of features to make this easy. Your friend who warned against the long mic cable is right, definitely not a good idea, highly likely to pick up a lot of hum when the rig transmits (the loft antennas will be an aggravating factor!). HTH

    1. Hey Tomas, thanks for stopping by. I was just using a cheap RTL-SDR receiver with the SDR# (SDR Sharp) software.

  4. Hi Andy, I was reading your page about Ethernet EMI reduction. Really great stuff. Where did you find a linear 12V PSU for the switch? Anything you can recommend?

    Also what ferrite beads did you use for the power cords? Anything recommended for those? I’d like to do a similar project on my setup also. I think the switch (12V TP-Link in my case) is a real noise maker.

    Thx! — Casper

    1. Hey Casper, thanks for dropping me a line. I don’t have linear supplies for 12VDC in the setup here, only switched-mode PSUs that are relatively low-noise. Winradio used to sell a small 12V supply for their receivers and I have a couple of those but I see it’s not listed on their website anymore. I think if you search around looking for small 12V PSUs for radio use you may find something. I’ve seen a PSU appear marketed at Elecraft KX2/KX3 owners (https://www.nevadaradio.co.uk/amateur-radio/amateur-radio-power-supplies/pro-audio-kx-33) so that should be good but it’s expensive and supplies much more current than you probably need. Small, low noise, cheap PSUs are like the holy grail!

      Ferrite-wise I use the type sold by the RSGB on their webshop made from Fairrite 43 material: https://www.rsgbshop.org/acatalog/Online_Catalogue_EMC_Filters_41.html

      Hope that helps. Good luck!

  5. No mention or photo of a Peavey 5-way switch that is not like either common type you discuss. So a guy who thinks he will do the 7-way mod is out of luck since nobody even mentions those outdated production switches used in Peavey Raptors…

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