ka3jjz
Wiki Admin Emeritus
Here's something a bit different, from the SWLPost website;
VKS-737 Australian HF Communications services for travellers
Mike
VKS-737 Australian HF Communications services for travellers
Mike
Australian HF service for travelers
- Thread starter ka3jjz
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There are a few of those HF networks here. I'm a member of two, the Australian HF Touring Club and VKS-737.
Australian HF Radio Network – HF Radio Club
SWLD - Shortwave Listeners Delight - Australian Remote Area (4WD) HF Radio Network Frequencies (VKs-737, VKE-237, VMS-469)
Australian HF Radio Network – HF Radio Club
SWLD - Shortwave Listeners Delight - Australian Remote Area (4WD) HF Radio Network Frequencies (VKs-737, VKE-237, VMS-469)
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What a group of interesting networks and clubs. I have known about them, but only very vaguely. Thanks for the site(s) info 
.....................And what a list of frequencies !
I am impressed (and jealous )
Lauri
.....................And what a list of frequencies !
I am impressed (and jealous
)Lauri
majoco
Stirrer
We have a similar service here...
http://www.wmrs.org.nz/wmrsfaq.htm
..... not quite so extensive of course. You hire the small transceivers from various outlets for a small fee - nets are held twice a day and there are various monitoring sites around both islands so a call made will always be picked up.
http://www.wmrs.org.nz/wmrsfaq.htm
..... not quite so extensive of course. You hire the small transceivers from various outlets for a small fee - nets are held twice a day and there are various monitoring sites around both islands so a call made will always be picked up.
Here I'd say about 90% of users would have their own 4WD installations, and the others like me, use portable gear.
Pix of my unit below. The mike is a spare I picked up on ebay - I particularly liked the sticker
http://u.radioreference.com/shack/684752/Codan2110.JPG
Pix of my unit below. The mike is a spare I picked up on ebay - I particularly liked the sticker
http://u.radioreference.com/shack/684752/Codan2110.JPG
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majoco
Stirrer
Oh yes, I can understand that - distances are far greater in Oz and you can go most places in a 4WD and have a good amount of power to play with. Most of our tracks are walking tracks with vehicle access only to "the end of the road" then it's carry all your gear and food for your 4 day trek - I wouldn't want to carry a Codan and a car battery any distance at all really! The little rigs are designed just to be put in your pack and when you get to a DoC hut or a good campsite, string out the antenna and wait to be called on the net and pass your messages - you can call base stations in the day but everyone else has their antennas rolled up in their packs!
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As I said, I'm jealous .
In The United States there is nothing that approach's these HF services in Australia and NZ.
In the "Lower (continental) 48" US probably the best approximation is simply Ham Radio. There are somethings that are close, like in Alaska- like my favorite, 5167.5 MHz, and our Alaskan Part 80 .... but not much else.
I think its due to the population density in the US- There just isn't any need for an HF traveler's service in a land of 'cel phones. It would probably quickly evolve into a mess like our CB.
Ah ! but we still have this obscure radio service:
§ 90.20 (x) Persons or organizations maintaining establishment in isolated areas where public communications facilities are not available and where the use of radio is the only feasible means of establishing communication with a center of population, or other point from which emergency assistance might be obtained if needed.
I, and some other friends own an old mining claim high above the tundra at +12,000 feet, in a Colorado mountain cirque- closed off to the world by 14,000 foot peaks. Nothing 'cellular reach's our cabin, no 'Net---but we have this awesome woodstove and the night skies are absolutely unbelievable !
So--
We have an Isolated Area Part 90 license to link us back to my place, about 20 - airline miles away--- And its on HF.... 2 and 4 MHz channels, 150 Watts, SSB.
The funny thing is, we use CB radios so effectively that this HF circuit is hardly ever used-- but I keep the license current.
.......... Its a (my) ego thing.
Lauri
.In The United States there is nothing that approach's these HF services in Australia and NZ.
In the "Lower (continental) 48" US probably the best approximation is simply Ham Radio. There are somethings that are close, like in Alaska- like my favorite, 5167.5 MHz, and our Alaskan Part 80 .... but not much else.
I think its due to the population density in the US- There just isn't any need for an HF traveler's service in a land of 'cel phones. It would probably quickly evolve into a mess like our CB.
Ah ! but we still have this obscure radio service:
§ 90.20 (x) Persons or organizations maintaining establishment in isolated areas where public communications facilities are not available and where the use of radio is the only feasible means of establishing communication with a center of population, or other point from which emergency assistance might be obtained if needed.
I, and some other friends own an old mining claim high above the tundra at +12,000 feet, in a Colorado mountain cirque- closed off to the world by 14,000 foot peaks. Nothing 'cellular reach's our cabin, no 'Net---but we have this awesome woodstove and the night skies are absolutely unbelievable
!So--
We have an Isolated Area Part 90 license to link us back to my place, about 20 - airline miles away--- And its on HF.... 2 and 4 MHz channels, 150 Watts, SSB.
The funny thing is, we use CB radios so effectively that this HF circuit is hardly ever used-- but I keep the license current.
.......... Its a (my) ego thing.
Lauri
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majoco
Stirrer
A cabin at 12,000ft? Don't you find the oxygen masks inhibit the consumption of the antifreeze! The only cabin I've been in above 9,000ft has been pressurised!
Completely OT. Two of us, one mec Matt and me the sparky, we were called out late one night after commercial flights were finished, to go to one of our aircraft that had landed with a prop de-ice fault at an airport about 75 minutes flight time away. We chartered a light twin from the aero club complete with a couple of drivers. Once we settled down to unpressurised cruising about 9,000ft the copilot put his head around the corner and said he had a flask of coffee if we'd like some - we both declined but later he came to the back and opened the Thermos of coffee - all of a sudden there was scalding coffee everywhere. Matt, renowned for his dour humour, said "Boyle's and Charles' Law still works then."
Other gas laws - Boyle's Law and Charles' Law
(Roughly summed up, due to the reduced pressure, the coffee came back very violently to the boil!)
Completely OT. Two of us, one mec Matt and me the sparky, we were called out late one night after commercial flights were finished, to go to one of our aircraft that had landed with a prop de-ice fault at an airport about 75 minutes flight time away. We chartered a light twin from the aero club complete with a couple of drivers. Once we settled down to unpressurised cruising about 9,000ft the copilot put his head around the corner and said he had a flask of coffee if we'd like some - we both declined but later he came to the back and opened the Thermos of coffee - all of a sudden there was scalding coffee everywhere. Matt, renowned for his dour humour, said "Boyle's and Charles' Law still works then."
Other gas laws - Boyle's Law and Charles' Law
(Roughly summed up, due to the reduced pressure, the coffee came back very violently to the boil!)
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Yes, it is quite a high location; the cabin itself is at 11,620 feet, to be more precise.
But my home is over 9000 feet, so once aclimatized it isn't too big a change. No one can go to that mine straight from sea level without risking mountain sickness, however.
High altitude plays quite a few little tricks, No ?
Exploding bags of potato chips are quite common- water boiling at <190 F, carbon monoxide levels increase in a closed cabin due to lower combustion with propane mantle lamps, ---and when asleep, the most lurid dreams imaginable......
But my all time favorite came from a Japanese take-out restaurant. We had bought Bento box lunches with sushi to eat at that cabin. They came with small packets of wasabi horse radish- like the kinds filled with mustard or ketsup in burger places.
At +11,000 feet they were very swollen. A friend, not thinking, decided to use her teeth to open one of those packets. Instantly the pressure sent the contents straight up her nose.
I'll never let her live that one down.
Struggling back to topic-
............Our Rural Radio system works the best on 2 MHz. That frequency has just the right, true groundwave to crawl out of the mountain amphitheatre. At 20-30 miles the signal is 57-9 all the time, while 4 MHz is barely audible. At that cabin we use a 17 foot Shakespeare marine band vertical with an Icom autotuner against several lengths of old tram rails, welded to configure in a star about the base-- the rails were left from the mine.
Lauri
.
.
But my home is over 9000 feet, so once aclimatized it isn't too big a change. No one can go to that mine straight from sea level without risking mountain sickness, however.
High altitude plays quite a few little tricks, No ?
Exploding bags of potato chips are quite common- water boiling at <190 F, carbon monoxide levels increase in a closed cabin due to lower combustion with propane mantle lamps, ---and when asleep, the most lurid dreams imaginable......
But my all time favorite came from a Japanese take-out restaurant. We had bought Bento box lunches with sushi to eat at that cabin. They came with small packets of wasabi horse radish- like the kinds filled with mustard or ketsup in burger places.
At +11,000 feet they were very swollen. A friend, not thinking, decided to use her teeth to open one of those packets. Instantly the pressure sent the contents straight up her nose.
I'll never let her live that one down.
Struggling back to topic-
............Our Rural Radio system works the best on 2 MHz. That frequency has just the right, true groundwave to crawl out of the mountain amphitheatre. At 20-30 miles the signal is 57-9 all the time, while 4 MHz is barely audible. At that cabin we use a 17 foot Shakespeare marine band vertical with an Icom autotuner against several lengths of old tram rails, welded to configure in a star about the base-- the rails were left from the mine.
Lauri
.
.
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No, this mining property has not been molested with pick, shovel or explosives since the 1940's. We have own'd it for many years when it was purchased at a tax sale,-- but it never came with a name. In the western US every mine has a name, however our's was lost to time- so we renamed unofficially The Nasty Beast.
There is creepy adit entrance right at 12,000 feet, that leads back into the mine workings --it goes back into the mountain side for a long (!) ways, with many side drifts and stopes. There they mined a carbonate ore, rich in lead and silver. Some reports say the ore assayed to more than $500 (US) a tonne in the 1940's- but its all 'played out' now.
I have never been further than ~20 feet inside it.... it is in hardrock with no apparent need for stabilization- but I'm not going further in there! We have had people explore it tho- up until the Colorado Department of Mine Reclaimation came out and gated it for us, gratis. Now I have a key, but I don't allow anyone in there.
Oppps- off on a tangent again.
I will say that as far as radio is concern'd the mine truly lives up to its name. There is no nastier location for radio- virtually nothing escapes that deep cirque. I have tried any number of bands, antennas and so on, but only 2 MHz seems to escape. Forget NVIS, forget any Ham radio. I would imagine this is a similar case with the mountainous out back regions of New Zealand.
The equipment is an old Icom M600, with a solar array to charge a deep cycle marine battery. The site is inaccessible from late September until some time in late spring- except by snow machine (mobile.) We do use CB radios quite a bit to talk vehicle to vehicle, and surprisingly there are certain 'sweet spots' where those little 5 watt radios get thru and down into the valley's just like the big 150 Watt 2 Meg signal.
Curious-- all making for interesting observations.
Lauri
_______________________________________________________________________
The mine road at 11,000 feet
There is creepy adit entrance right at 12,000 feet, that leads back into the mine workings --it goes back into the mountain side for a long (!) ways, with many side drifts and stopes. There they mined a carbonate ore, rich in lead and silver. Some reports say the ore assayed to more than $500 (US) a tonne in the 1940's- but its all 'played out' now.
I have never been further than ~20 feet inside it.... it is in hardrock with no apparent need for stabilization- but I'm not going further in there! We have had people explore it tho- up until the Colorado Department of Mine Reclaimation came out and gated it for us, gratis. Now I have a key, but I don't allow anyone in there.
Oppps- off on a tangent again.
I will say that as far as radio is concern'd the mine truly lives up to its name. There is no nastier location for radio- virtually nothing escapes that deep cirque. I have tried any number of bands, antennas and so on, but only 2 MHz seems to escape. Forget NVIS, forget any Ham radio. I would imagine this is a similar case with the mountainous out back regions of New Zealand.
The equipment is an old Icom M600, with a solar array to charge a deep cycle marine battery. The site is inaccessible from late September until some time in late spring- except by snow machine (mobile.) We do use CB radios quite a bit to talk vehicle to vehicle, and surprisingly there are certain 'sweet spots' where those little 5 watt radios get thru and down into the valley's just like the big 150 Watt 2 Meg signal.
Curious-- all making for interesting observations.
Lauri
_______________________________________________________________________
The mine road at 11,000 feet
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Been there, done that, except for the wasabi up the nose and the higher CO from propane lanterns, since we don't use them as our light comes from either AC or batteries. We cook with propane, but our cabin is drafty enough that I've never worried about CO accumulations. High country dreams are always fun experiences, even without a nightcap
!Back on topic...I've never tried anything lower than 5 MHz up in the Inyos. We have a west-facing opening looking across the Owens Valley to the Sierras. As you noted, CB can work surprisingly well. This season I want to experiment more with VHF antennas. We need a simple beam antenna to bounce a signal off the Sierras in order to hit either of the 2-meter repeaters in the vicinity (read that to mean about 1000' higher and 20 to 60 miles north), but that gives a radiation angle too high for any hope of reaching down into the canyons.
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.
.
Hey Ladn
The use of 2 MHz gets quite a few quizzical looks from people when I explain that is our only reliable link to the "outside." In this day and age everyone expects we 'must be using 'cel, or maybe satellite phones-' (yeah, like Sat 'phones; ++$$'s)
"you mean you don't even have an internet connection up there?' - and so it goes.
When we first address'd this issues, there were plenty of suggestions. Foremost was one of mine--- why even bother ?
It was to be a place to enjoy the absolute solitudes of the high mountains- and being in an all-enclosing, cut-off-from-everything amphitheatre only enhanced it. A step back to the early 20th century.
Oh, of course I tried various radios- from beamed VHF (zip) to HF (pitiful at best)-- NVIS, etc... but these were only half attempts; after all, I wanted to get away from work sometimes.
Then early one fall we had an early snowfall- a blizzard actually. And I had invited a Girl Scout troop to use the cabin that weekend.
Fill in the blanks____________________.
When that group of Girl scouts did not return as expected, who but Lauri was one of the first to hear about it from concerned, worried parents. I mentioned snow machines in an earlier post? So out of a barn and into the teeth of a storm rode two of them * to the rescue.
Now I like snow mobiling, but not at night , nor into blizzards. The sun had set long ago and we had to pick our way up thru the swirling void by the powerful head lamps. After what seemed an eternity, there ahead, thru the blowing snow was the warm light of the cabin windows.
We roar'd up, stumbled across snow drifts and enter'd the cabin. There around a glowing stove sat the girls, their leaders drinking coffee from a huge pot bubbling on its top. The cabin was warm and dry and the girls were having the adventure of their lives (translated; they didn't want to go home.) Everyone was fine-- much better than fine- compared to the "rescuer's"; we were half frozen.
We would have waited to leave until morning, when hopefully the storm would have blown itself out- but there were those anxious parents.................
I and another 'drew the short straws'- tho actually nothing like that occur'd- we (me)-- were the responsible adults--- and back on a machine we went to tell the world all was well (remember, there was no outside comm's.)
When we got about two miles from of my place, the squelch on my ranch LMR broke. We passed the good news. The next day a rancher neighbor took his snow cat up and ferried the girls down.
"Its the Cowboy way, Ma'm" he explain to the grateful mothers.
_________________________________________________
All that prompted a more serious look at this communication thing. Since not everyone using the cabin would be hams, we took the Part 90 Isolated Site route. A new, serious look at the lowest frequency we could license- 2 MHz for its ground wave- high (150 Watts) power with a proper vertical and a half-a-chance ground plane did the trick.
Today I have semi entertain'd a mobile 150 metre snow machine mobile- entertained it - something like the Austalian mobiles in this Topic- but its not gone any further. I am intrigued by their mobile setups, especially the antennas.
Lauri
_________________________________________________
*In places and times like that we would never travel singly
.
Hey Ladn
The use of 2 MHz gets quite a few quizzical looks from people when I explain that is our only reliable link to the "outside." In this day and age everyone expects we 'must be using 'cel, or maybe satellite phones-' (yeah, like Sat 'phones; ++$$'s)
"you mean you don't even have an internet connection up there?' - and so it goes.
When we first address'd this issues, there were plenty of suggestions. Foremost was one of mine--- why even bother ?
It was to be a place to enjoy the absolute solitudes of the high mountains- and being in an all-enclosing, cut-off-from-everything amphitheatre only enhanced it. A step back to the early 20th century.
Oh, of course I tried various radios- from beamed VHF (zip) to HF (pitiful at best)-- NVIS, etc... but these were only half attempts; after all, I wanted to get away from work sometimes.
Then early one fall we had an early snowfall- a blizzard actually. And I had invited a Girl Scout troop to use the cabin that weekend.
Fill in the blanks____________________.
When that group of Girl scouts did not return as expected, who but Lauri was one of the first to hear about it from concerned, worried parents. I mentioned snow machines in an earlier post? So out of a barn and into the teeth of a storm rode two of them * to the rescue.
Now I like snow mobiling, but not at night , nor into blizzards. The sun had set long ago and we had to pick our way up thru the swirling void by the powerful head lamps. After what seemed an eternity, there ahead, thru the blowing snow was the warm light of the cabin windows.
We roar'd up, stumbled across snow drifts and enter'd the cabin. There around a glowing stove sat the girls, their leaders drinking coffee from a huge pot bubbling on its top. The cabin was warm and dry and the girls were having the adventure of their lives (translated; they didn't want to go home.) Everyone was fine-- much better than fine- compared to the "rescuer's"; we were half frozen.
We would have waited to leave until morning, when hopefully the storm would have blown itself out- but there were those anxious parents.................
I and another 'drew the short straws'- tho actually nothing like that occur'd- we (me)-- were the responsible adults--- and back on a machine we went to tell the world all was well (remember, there was no outside comm's.)
When we got about two miles from of my place, the squelch on my ranch LMR broke. We passed the good news. The next day a rancher neighbor took his snow cat up and ferried the girls down.
"Its the Cowboy way, Ma'm"
he explain to the grateful mothers._________________________________________________
All that prompted a more serious look at this communication thing. Since not everyone using the cabin would be hams, we took the Part 90 Isolated Site route. A new, serious look at the lowest frequency we could license- 2 MHz for its ground wave- high (150 Watts) power with a proper vertical and a half-a-chance ground plane did the trick.
Today I have semi entertain'd a mobile 150 metre snow machine mobile- entertained it - something like the Austalian mobiles in this Topic- but its not gone any further. I am intrigued by their mobile setups, especially the antennas.
Lauri
_________________________________________________
*In places and times like that we would never travel singly
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majoco
Stirrer
Seems like a very reasonable solution for peace of mind! How to you handle operating instructions and channel management on your M600 since (potentially) untrained operators could be using the equipment? And who's listening at the other end of the circuit? Is the channel (s) monitored in Colorado/IMW like 5167.5 kHz is in Alaska?
To keep things on-topic, and also out of curiosity, what do you do with the batteries in the winter? Snow would cover the solar array so they wouldn't get much (if any) charge, plus there's that freezing thing that happens in unoccupied cabins during cold weather.
Majoco's squid pole link looks interesting! That might end up as a summer antenna project.
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I love that antenna name, "Squid Pole." I'm going to try and work it into my lexicon.
When it comes right down to it, there isn't much of a work-around with the physics of a short mobile antenna and a long wavelength like 160 metre's. I do like the design of the Squid Pole for its simplicity.
When I lived in the UK I was regaled with stories by "OC's *" about ham radio before and after the War. Of those sets of tales, one that really made an impression on me- were their accounts of the number of 160 metre mobiles that used to run about London and the environs operating on that band. They were restricted to 10 watts (input?) and they used AM. Little valve (tube) sets with fix'd crystal frequencies that they shared with Channel fishing trawlers and the like. But these old fellows also told me of covering remarkable miles with these little rigs- and their Squid antennas. I have never forgot their accounts and this probably was a factor in my revisiting 2 MHz for that isolated site.
Fast forward to today.
What do we do about the power source during the freeze'ins? Simple; when the road gets to that time of year when we officially decide to close the cabin, the battery is removed. It doesn't mean no one will visit the mine until the Spring thaw, but if they do it will be on snow machines. In a real pinch those machine's batteries can be used for a call out.
What's on the other end of this circuit ?... Just my place. There another Icom transceiver with a base loaded vertical out on a hillside (that hillside resembles a porcupine.) We have two 'designer' frequencies- ones not listed in the Part 90, and are only monitor'd when some one is up there- As far as I know, we are the only ones on them. My manger and his family are the principle operatos --and they say they have never heard another station.
As far as what we do about visitors using the mine's radio ? - that radio has a few 'idiot proofing' features, but there is a laminated sign telling how to use the it; and post'd above it-- this admonition
"........Please, don't monkey with any of the controls" -- its worked so far. Smiles
Lauri
________________________________________________________
* for those non-code types -- Old Chaps- kind'a like OM's.
I'm going to try and work it into my lexicon.When it comes right down to it, there isn't much of a work-around with the physics of a short mobile antenna and a long wavelength like 160 metre's. I do like the design of the Squid Pole for its simplicity.
When I lived in the UK I was regaled with stories by "OC's *" about ham radio before and after the War. Of those sets of tales, one that really made an impression on me- were their accounts of the number of 160 metre mobiles that used to run about London and the environs operating on that band. They were restricted to 10 watts (input?) and they used AM. Little valve (tube) sets with fix'd crystal frequencies that they shared with Channel fishing trawlers and the like. But these old fellows also told me of covering remarkable miles with these little rigs- and their Squid antennas. I have never forgot their accounts and this probably was a factor in my revisiting 2 MHz for that isolated site.
Fast forward to today.
What do we do about the power source during the freeze'ins? Simple; when the road gets to that time of year when we officially decide to close the cabin, the battery is removed. It doesn't mean no one will visit the mine until the Spring thaw, but if they do it will be on snow machines. In a real pinch those machine's batteries can be used for a call out.
What's on the other end of this circuit ?... Just my place. There another Icom transceiver with a base loaded vertical out on a hillside (that hillside resembles a porcupine.) We have two 'designer' frequencies- ones not listed in the Part 90, and are only monitor'd when some one is up there- As far as I know, we are the only ones on them. My manger and his family are the principle operatos --and they say they have never heard another station.
As far as what we do about visitors using the mine's radio ? - that radio has a few 'idiot proofing' features, but there is a laminated sign telling how to use the it; and post'd above it-- this admonition
"........Please, don't monkey with any of the controls" -- its worked so far. Smiles
Lauri
________________________________________________________
* for those non-code types -- Old Chaps- kind'a like OM's.
majoco
Stirrer
OC's? My late Dad told me that he a few other gentlemen of a similar age (75+) would cycle out a good few miles to a country pub, have lunch, then wobble their cycles home, sometimes interrupted by a short nap in the corner of a field somewhere. They were collectively known as the "Old Codgers"!
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