[OZAPRS] HF test

[Gordon Taylor]

A few of us up here on the Sunshine Coast of Qld run HF APRS on 30m when we
are away and also every few months just to check things are working, one of
our team is currently down in Naracoorte just west of the SA border and the
settings we use are providing a very good footprint of which winery Dave
VK4UN has been to. We have TT3 's and either a Yaesu FT-100, Kenwood TS-480
SAT or an Icom 706 MkIIg set up with very sedate smart beaconing.  At low
speeds we send a beacon every 15 mins and when  cruising it's a beacon every
5mins.  HF is not really to be used as an accurate corner pegging tracker
but more a "are they still moving and where are they system".  If there were
a lot of traffic on HF we could drop that rate back a bit.

 

I have just successfully set up AGWPE and UIView on an Asus Netbook that
will gate VHF to HF and will use this in the Pajero when I am in the sticks
to gate my VHF packets from my Kenwood TH-D72 handheld out to HF.  Of course
you have to be very careful that you are not receiving any other VHF traffic
in any quantities or it would saturate the HF side.

 

I am also running a VHF and HF Igate at home that is using AGWPE and UIview
with two modems (VHF and HF) to gate to the internet and also push any HF
traffic out on VHF.  The antenna is an 80m full wave loop with a remote
tuner to get it working ok on 30m.

 

I say use it or lose it.  This applies to many things but in this context
fill up the bands.

 

Regards

 

Gordo VK4VP

 

From: ozaprs-bounces at aprs.net.au [mailto:ozaprs-bounces at aprs.net.au] On
Behalf Of Phil Shields
Sent: Sunday, 2 March 2014 19:36
To: Phil Shields; Australian APRS Users
Subject: Re: [OZAPRS] HF test

 

I had to "force beacon" the Tiny Trak in the rough terrain by disconnecting
and reconnecting the power to it about 6 times.  This is because I became
unsure near the end as one track petered out, lucky I had VK2TRL Ron on 2 mx
tracking me on the APRS.fi map. 

 

 

On Sunday, 2 March 2014 8:26 PM, Phil Shields <shields_phil at yahoo.com.au>
wrote:

I tested HF APRS today on 30Mx around (a simple area of) the Vic high
country. I have a lifted 1992 Hylux fitted with a Hi-Q screwdriver antenna,
Icom IC702 and Tiny Trak3. It went well even in the roughest terrain. I
found my beacon timing was far too slow for 4WDing. I originally had it set
at 1600 sec on low and 900 sec on high speed. This was unsuitable because
most 4WDing is done at 10Km/hr in the high country (at least where I go
anyway) any faster and you wreck the machine. I found that low of 50 km/hr
at 600 sec and high of 70km/hr at 900 sec works fine. High could be even
faster because I know how to get there but once in i need low and slow. 

i worked fine in deep gulleys and heavy wooded areas. I would recommend this
tracking to 4WDing amateurs for sure.

Cheers Phil VK2CPR-9


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