@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

W6KME

@W6KME@mastodon.radio

Ham Radio and emcomms, musician, tinkerer. CVARC, VCARC, VCARS, Instructor, ARRL VE and ARES/ACS. Ventura County BORED Net and µField Day Administrator. Dedicated to helping hams (including me!) get on the air as often as possible.

Also @w6kme, @w6kme, @w6kme, @w6kme

http://theborednet.net
https://www.patreon.com/W6KME

#hamradio #amateurradio #discworld

I'm searchable via tootfinder. #fedi22

GNU STP. De chelonian mobile.

This profile is from a federated server and may be incomplete. Browse more on the original instance.

ai6yr, to delhi

Massive traffic accident on the 101E (south) in Calabasas, multiple cars involved, at least one vehicle on its roof, other vehicles off the side. (no doubt as a result of the intense rain band moving through).

W6KME,
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

@ai6yr I know you agree with this, so I'm not nit-picking...the rain didn't cause this. It fell on my car all night in the driveway and my car didn't flip over, not even a little bit. It was drivers, not rain that caused the crash.

Maybe I'm just old and grumpy, but it does feel like the percentage of drivers who do not modify their driving to suit conditions has risen over the years. Modern cars are so good that they tend to get away with it until they don't, in more dramatic fashion.

W6KME, to random
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

Talked my wife, who has resisted getting her own ham license for years (in spite of being a solo backcountry hiker) into trying a practice test for the Technician license. She beat 50%, which is double what a random distribution of answers would be. She needed 8 more correct answers to pass. This is someone who has refused to study or even look at the material.

I'll keep up the fight, but EVERYONE who ventures further than their own neighborhood should get a license and carry a cheap radio.

ai6yr, to random

Figured out how the disaster remediation contractor hired by my insurance firm makes their margin. They spent a lot of time getting estimates for carpet to match the existing carpet quality ($$) approved by the insurance company, but the carpet they ended up installing is Home Depot contractor grade (yes... I knew this would be the case). This is why a lot of the folks I talked to who took the money from insurance to do their own remodel are in litigation.

W6KME,
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

@ai6yr Andy they will get away with it nearly always. Even when the homeowner is savvy enough to see what's happening, few have the resources to fight it.

ai6yr, (edited ) to hamradio

Hmm, random thriller movie borrowed from the library, "I.S.S.', with a radio tuned to 14.060.00 or thereabouts. (Update: Icom IC-705)

W6KME,
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

@ai6yr I sure love mine. The band switch clacking is glorious.

ai6yr, to random

That accelerated quickly...

W6KME,
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

@ai6yr My wife was at a garden party in Porter Ranch. They went inside 😂

We were unable to connect via cell phone or text for about an hour as well. It takes that little to saturate capacity.

W6KME,
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

@ai6yr You know how I'm always haranguing people at club meetings to get their SO's a technician license? You'd think I could convince my own spouse, but no.

W6KME, to random
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

One of my clubs (CVARC, the one in Conejo Valley) Has a Morse Code Group. Last month we wrote Morse-themed Haikus. This month we played Morse Bingo. I love how entertaining the goofiest stuff can be.

douglasvb, to random
@douglasvb@mastodon.social avatar

Massive line at my local REI. I've got a few returns so I guess I'll wait.

It's interesting to see how REI has slowly drifted from its roots. My parents have a very low digit membership number from the early 70s in the greater Seattle area. I grew up in REI sleeping bags and tents.

They still have good outdoor gear but there's an awful lot of lifestyle stuff in the store now. And some of the good deals don't exist anymore.

W6KME,
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

@douglasvb My local REI has a giant mural of several sea kayakers. They don't carry any true sea kayaking gear any longer, and certainly not in the store. As you say, it's mostly lifestyle items, with enough "hardcore" outdoor sport gear scattered around to make shoppers feel like they're one of the cool kids while buying their $40 coffee cups.

I get it; you have to make money. But it's no longer a true co-op of people combining their buying power to get the stuff Big 5 won't carry.

ai6yr, to windows

Replaced a single pane, 1978-79 window with a very, very expensive modern equivalent. Why? Heatwaves. Lots of them in the future. Don't know how much it will help... but better than what was there before.

U factor of 0.26, SHGC 0.16

W6KME,
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

@ai6yr Can Confirm that modern windows are DRAMATICALLY better than the old stuff. All the insulation in the world can't keep up with a few dozen square feet of single pane glass.

ai6yr, to random

Safety violation, LOL.

W6KME,
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

@ai6yr I bet it'll still load up around 10GHz

stfn, to hamradio
@stfn@fosstodon.org avatar

OK people, can you ELI5 (explain me like I'm 5) the topic of SWR? Most of all, is SWR important only when transmitting, or both transmitting and receiving?

W6KME,
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

@stfn 1 of 2 The very short answer is that SWR is an indicator of how well an antenna works at turning electricity in radio and vice versa. A poorly matched antenna won't convert the output of the radio into radio waves, and that leftover power has to go somewhere-usually back into the radio. Modern radios keep lowering the power when this happens, until you're putting out little or nothing. In the old days, the radio broke.

The reverse is true also; a poorly matched antenna doesn't hear well.

W6KME,
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

@stfn 2 of 2 The catch is that SWR isn't a perfect way to measure efficiency-the old saying is that dummy loads have perfect SWR. Instead of reflecting energy back into your radio, they dissipate it. SWR tells you how much power is reflected back, not lost some other way. It's just an indicator or clue. Hams tend to fetishize it.

Learn how to measure it, but don't become its slave.

cookiesinheaven, to random
@cookiesinheaven@m.ai6yr.org avatar

Lots of traffic issues in due to the rain.

Be careful out there...if you need to be out there

W6KME,
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

@cookiesinheaven Heard a report on a net earlier this evening that it was coming down pretty good in the Goleta area.

ai6yr, to random

Still offline for most of today, teaching Wilderness First Aid. Have a great Sunday!

W6KME,
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

@BakerRL75 @sciencewrighter @ai6yr Don't forget the jeans

ai6yr, to random

Replaced half my ancient 1970's track lighting this evening, but ran out of hours in the day (had to rush, so no photos). Found out there was (still) a thin layer of popcorn ceiling on the other side of the track lighting. What a mess. In theory that, at least, was non-asbestos (or so that was supposedly the case when they removed it everywhere else 25 years ago... though given my recent contractor experience, YMMV).

W6KME,
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

@ai6yr Hard, heavy and brittle-asbestos based. Lightweight and crumbly-recycled newspaper based. By about 1970 a lot of ceilings were being done with paper.

W6KME,
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

@ai6yr I've heard many stories of people with the paper stuff being reamed for the cost of removing asbestos, too. The asbestos removal trade has always been borderline criminal.

ai6yr, to earthquake

Hmm, was that an earthquake? (Update: USGS says it was)

W6KME,
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

@ai6yr Looks like it. Didn't feel it here though.

ci40671680 for people filling out DYFI forms. Don't forget that it's valuable data if you didn't feel it also.

W6KME, to random
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

A Long Covid story

I've met so many people since I had covid, most of my ham radio friends in fact. And most of them don't see me as disabled or sick or struggling. I recovered enough to do some wonderful things.

What they don't know is what I was before. That guy is gone. I was a world-class jazz trombonist. Now I'm maybe average, and the phone no longer rings. Now I carry piles of notebooks to record every thought in hopes of retrieving it later. The mental fight is all day.

W6KME,
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

I don't know how much of my memory was lost to the strokes, because all I can see are the holes. They're always there in my field of mental view. Just empty. I've cried a lot over the things I know must be in those holes.

I lost the ability to read music. I forgot morse code. I lost years of my past in chunks.

I'm very good at compensating, so people don't see all of this. I've learned how to produce events on a small scale. I have a lot of fun, and I love my life and the people in it.

W6KME,
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

My point is this-I am an incredibly lucky person. INCREDIBLY. Over a million Americans got as sick as I was and did not survive. I am surrounded by friends and family and world-class health care and research (mostly because I'm a valuable data point now, but they do try and help.) I am not complaining.

But this was not the flu.

W6KME,
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

Where is this going? People are thinking it's over. "We lost a lot of people, but you adapt and move on." That million families that lost a loved one...they'll "get over it" (bullshit.) But for everyone who died, how many are like me? How many will fight-forever-with the effects? What happens when these people get tired of being swept under the rug by half the people in the country? Or more often are called liars by those people?

How much is this going to cost our civilization in the long run?

bud_t, to random
@bud_t@m.ai6yr.org avatar

Isn't "Overlanding" just car camping?

W6KME,
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

@douglasvb @bud_t @ai6yr @wa7iut All I know is that when I was shopping for a Subaru, one dealer insisted I look at the car-top tent they offer. All I could see was the price tag. It was Elecraft 4 kinda money. And it was really hard to get in and out of it, which is how you know it's good.

I decided to keep using a tent on the ground like some sort of normal person.

ai6yr, to random

If you are feeling lots of protons today, you are not alone. 😂

W6KME,
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

@AE4WX @ai6yr I had SOTA plans today, but someone wants to come along who isn't in hiking condition, so we're playing POTA instead. At my latitude, I'd expect this storm to give some pretty sweet propagation until the noise climbs. A little while ago I was talking to someone on 10m SSB in Missouri from Cali, and someone joined the conversation from France.

I never plan radio time around solar weather reports. I usually check them after I'm done to see how they correlated with what I heard.

BakerRL75, to random
@BakerRL75@m.ai6yr.org avatar

@ai6yr For the files…

https://www.aol.com/alabama-station-disbelief-200-foot-171925469.html

W6KME,
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

@BakerRL75 @ai6yr My gut feeling is that said radio station may not have been entirely current on their bills, and the tower and gear were removed by debtors. I'm not sure I buy the story that the station was unaware either. Interesting that the FCC denied their request to reflect their broadcast onto their other transmitter.

W6KME,
@W6KME@mastodon.radio avatar

@ai6yr @Geojoek @BakerRL75 Thieves don't take the tower and leave the cables...

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