Welcome to the blog. I’m Bill, WB3CQK — licensed back in 1976 at age 20, and now that I’m retired I’ve finally got the time to actually play with radio the way I always wanted to. This is where I’ll be writing up contacts, builds, and experiments — with a particular focus on two areas I think are some of the most interesting things happening in amateur radio right now: digital and emerging modes and emergency communications (EmComm).
I operate out of the eastern Montgomery/Bucks County area and I’m active with a few local groups worth knowing about if you’re in the area: the Warminster Amateur Radio Club (K3DN), the Phil-Mont Mobile Radio Club (W3QV), and the Jim Fisher Memorial Digital Network Association (JFMDNA), which is building out the regional AREDN mesh network. I’ll be writing about all three as I go.
What to expect
- FT8, FT4, JS8Call, VarAC and other weak-signal / keyboard-to-keyboard digital modes
- Satellite and ISS contacts
- Mesh networking (AREDN, Meshtastic) and the JFMDNA regional mesh buildout specifically
- Winlink and message handling for served agencies
- SDR experiments and software-defined approaches to old problems
- Nets, meetings, and EmComm drills from WARC and Phil-Mont
- Antenna and go-kit builds aimed at portable / field operation
- The occasional ragchew and DX chase, because the traditional stuff is still the fun stuff
73 de WB3CQK