I tested SARTrack's software for APRS station tracking and APRS messaging.
2019 Field Day locations within Orange County, California.
I did a field test of PinPoint APRS tracking software.
This morning on my drive to work I was listening to a conversation on the PAPA system via PAPA 22 which is on Pleasant’s Peak. The PAPA system has many repeaters interlinked throughout California. A ham operator was hiking up to Strawberry Peak to do a SOTA activation (W6/CT-018). I don’t know which repeater he was using, but it probably wasn’t PAPA 22. I’m thinking maybe he was on PAPA 4. Anyway, when I got to work I thought I would see if he was tracking his location via APRS and found him as N6MKW-7. …
Recently I’ve been thinking about setting up a field kit for the Areden Mesh Network. I’ve seen plenty of people able to setup their nodes at their homes, so I know it’s possible. Setting something up for field use is my challenge.
A while back I purchased an Ed Fong dual band (2M/70CM) DBJ-2 antenna for field use. Roll up “slim jim” antennas are an excellent choice for your go bag. You can hang them from a tree branch in the field, but what do you do when there are no trees around?
Last weekend my wife (Julie, KN6AOC) and I tried transmitter hunting (also known as amateur radio direction finding or ARDF) and antenna building for the first time. The Fullerton Amateur Radio Club setup the event and had mentors available for us.
Yesterday I put APRS-IS to the test in the mountains on the San Juan Trail, located a few miles way from Ortega Highway 74. In this area there are no digipeaters close enough for RF transmissions, so I tested the SPRINT cellular network to see if I could be tracked in real time (KM6ZPO).
When I first heard about APRS, I had hoped I could use it to replace tracking I already get from my SPOT device. I began my learning curve by testing several APRS apps.
I finally did it! I captured this image from the International Space Station using a Yaesu FT-60 radio with a Diamond SRH77CA whip antenna. I used SSTV for iOS to decode and save the captured audio.