 DL2BQD on how to build a ham radio
You as a ham friend have obviously quickly recognised the morse code in the banner and the numbers on the car plate, haven’t you!?
UM indicating the county Uckermark in Brandenburg and cw 72 a commonly known abbreviation among qrp hams
Who am I writing for here ?
 You will find info on ham radio in this little booklet. Mind that it is written for US readers.
Anyway, this one could give you a first glimps on that matter.
I perhaps address the reader who has started the first steps on the radio way already and is going to go on a tad further.
The experienced may smile and skip it all or may contribute with some additional hints.
Any will be highly appreciated.
On home construction and kit building
My advice is to get into touch with an experienced ham, use the news groups of the IN, read a ham radio mag...Since I am no real designer and developer of circuitry and riglets I always preferred building well proved rigs with a good manual and all parts ‘on board’ - elecraft is what you may be looking for and a good part of the products of the QRP projects group.
You will find a lot of hints here on the NET. Start searching and you’ll get a bag of ideas on rigs, calculations, hints, pictures, ideas...The FORUM of the DL QRP AG is a good well and source of hints. Have a go! See LINKS down the page.
First Y41NE then Y41BE to DL2BQD
Strange enough it had been after my studies at the University mid 60s only when we started our living in Schwedt that I got contact with the local group here which had organised a cw -morse training course on the local repeater and I was able to listen due to the fact that my son at this time had already got his call Y41NE, now DL4NSE became DM4EA , and I could receive the cw transmissions on his rx.
So I became Y41BE after the exams in Frankfurt on the Oder. That’s the story.
So my thanks go to the hams of the local group who offered all help and assistance to me. Later I got the call DL2BQD.
The triggers to become a radio amateur
There were two books which strongly influenced my attitude towards ham radio:
Martin Selber “Mit Spulen, Draht und Morsetaste” (With coils, wire and key) and a documentary on the Nobile-Italia-Expedition in the 20s “Nine Men on The Ice “ where the radio operator of the group in The Red Tent during the catastrophic stay on the ice did a heroic act to repair the radio rig and bring it back into operation when then a Russian, Nikolaj Schmidt, heard its signals - he was a keen radio ham.
I wonder whether the book will be still available.
Morse Master & more
CW-morse- is my favourite mode. On the web you’ll find good
cw training programmes which favours a specieal teaching method. I prefer QRP-low power -up to five watts.
QSOs with 5 watts?
That is the power of a bicycle’s lamp indeed !!! I started building little QRP rigs and was able to achieve the QRP Master degree no128 of the GQRP club and the DXCC-QRP and some other awards as many other ham friends have done.
It’s a challenge:
With the power compared to a simple bulb in a bike lamp - contacts round the world. Wow!!
At the moment I help the GQRPclub a tad bit as kind of a representative of the DL members.
I like contests but am no real contester at all. One of my favourite logging programs during a ctest is SuperDuper.It’s very versatile, quick, uses templates and is actually supported daily by
Paul, EI5DI
I do need that since my “holey” brain will surely forget the first dupe after the 7th qso!
I am with eQSL and QRZ.com as well.
 .
Yaesu 2000 Flagship DL2BQD’s Elecraft K1 DL4NSE’s TX Oner
The difference? You can’t compare a Jaguar with a Mini, can you?
What do they have in common? They offer a great deal of joy
But building it yourself will give you the most of it!
l love elecraft
I have written a report while building my K1 a time ago, should be on the elecraft server in the archives and another one on the SW40+ and some reports on books which you will find on the GQRP DL homepage. You are also kindly invited to visit the DL QRP AG with its interesting discussions and the pic gallery.
I mostly operate from home with K1 or some other riglets - SST, OHR, SW40, DTR - , my trusty FT 890 is my QRO base station. Antenna is a 41 m doublet with 20 m 300 Ohm chicken ladder and 15 m up plus ZMatch in case neded;
so condx are not too bad here.
My experience with kit building
Especially if you have to use a kitchen table only you should have kind of plate or board to place all your parts and be able to leave them there for the next weekend.
or to be stored savely in one quiet corner of the flat where neither your cat nor the vacuum cleaner of your beloved wife may reach it.
 Buy some good tools - really not the cheapest ones; pair of flat pliers, sharp, small cutter made of quality steel, round, pointed one to bend wires...
For a long time I used a 40 watts iron where temps could be regulated with a simple bulb dimmer; if you want to go on rig building invest in a good iron,
i.e. temps control,
various little , fine tips, grounded, spare parts available by the firm...
A little electronic drill device will help to make the 0, 5 mm or so holes in the boards of home made designs...
DVM with extention to read capacitors small values is a good investment, later you will have an inductance meter for coil measurements - but not urgently needed at the moment.
Some of the excellent kit-rigs offer self-control with the internal parts of the circuitry - elecraft: great!- when building step by step.
If you squint on a good piece of test equipment it will be a Grid Dip Oscillator
Later, later then the Net Work Analyser together with your PC and an Oscilloscope will be a useful extension, but one has to understand how they work and how results have to be understood.
You should care for the colour codes of parts as well as for the
US and British wires diametres. There are a lot of tables on the net.
Organise a paper file where you store all these tables so you can quickly have a look at them
.
Make notes after each step you have finished with your work. If you cann afford try to finish a project without a longer break but don’t speed too much.
Control each step three times.
Home construction & special techniques
I will not say that this must be the very start of your thoughts. At the moment we do not speak of etching your boards yourself or using EAGLE or another program to compose your boards...Do you know that you can solder your parts on pins or nails put into a wooden board, strictly, simply following the design of the circuitry diagram from the left to the right?
You can scratch isles and stripes into the board. You can use connection blocks for wires used by electricians to connect parts of a simple circuit.
Or even stitch a little hole into thicker card paper, fiddle the legs of the parts in and solder at the back, or have a look to Google and search for Manhattan Style construction techniques. You can build a NORCAL TRX this way!!!.
The qrpp communityoffers a kind of activity - no real serious contest - where you can take part with a tiny, home built riglet with only a couple of parts, using small power and - and this is a big and - making really qso contacts with enthusiastic partners.
But then I think you have done a
DL2BQD’s TX DJ1ZB-design generator and SPRAT counter DJ3KK-design
Some useful books. It’s with full intention that I recommend few titles and net.links only.
If you start from the scratch ...
... please invest a bit into a good Antenna Book, that by the ARRL or if you like reading one in German that by the late Karl Rothammel. It is t h e book.
On antennas on The Net: I really want you to visit the late Cebik’s homepage,
which you will find to be a treasure box.
Later you can add issues by Moxon, Heys or others which will give you additional detailled and more info on antenna matters. In January 07 you can see more than
30 books on antennas on one page of a mag. Today we have already seven volumes of the ARRL Antenne Compendium!! Start with one , go on buying more later
 For the constructor I can only suggest to try getting the books by W1FB, Dough DeMaw.
Later some books from the GQRP club,
The QRP Scrap Book or others . What I strongly suggest is to buy SPRAT on CD where you will find a bunch of ideas on all radio topics. The SPRAT CD issue V3 will offer you the whole spectrum of the QRP Ham Radio world.
Think: issue 1 to 129!
Now you will become a member and get all issues from 130 on. How is that?
Books on measuring gadgets:
Start with a booklet by Tony and Graham, G4WIF and G3MFJ,
 Simple Test Equipment for the QRPer, buy others later
Content: simple signal generator, power supply, Spectrum wave meter, marker generator, noise bridge, noise generator, resistive SWR bridge, audio amplifiere, construction techniques, hand held pad cutter, RF probe, HF probe, switched attenuator, c.w. monitor, dummy loads, field strength meter, gate dip oscillator,
an improved noise generator,, crystal tester,..57 pages
Well, you now have a basic library at home for your purposes
together with some good tools - start working.
If you got tired and bored of using 100 watts only or if you want to have a real qrp tx/rx as the very first riglet but which you have built yourself - this one - a tx - could be worth a try.
How about breaking your own record - longest distance per watt reached?
If you really want to buy first there is a booklet issued by the
DL-FunkAmateur magazine
which offers info on rigs second hand , data and prices
.
QSL Card: Finally for your QSL card I should recommend elli print in the
Czech Republic which offers grand InterNet service. Have a look at their gallery,
find my QSL card and find out in which way it differs from others.
You have done a large step forward as a home constructor being on a new level now.
You see the TX, 2 watts, by Uwe, DL8UF used in the MAS qrpp-test, Manhattan Style construction
The thrill of QRP
Going on dealing with High Frequency you will see that a bit of theory will be needed to direct and control all these strange waves and radiations powers within your little rigs, you will start your first bigger project and...
...and at this very moment now you have sniffed the QRP virus. You yourself won’t believe it that you can come into touch with a friend who does not only live round the corner. With a lamp’s power.
That’s the thrill of qrp.
What a feeling and experience!
Forget that stupid slogan that life should be too short for qrp;
QRP simply is kind of another philosophy But not a simple one.
 G3RJV, George, uses a quotation
by William of Occum 1290 - 1350
It is vain to do with more
what can be done with less
Please, have a look at the www. GQRP site and the links offered there and the page here on the Rochdale Mini Convention
DL2BQD member 7739
...LINKS LINKS LINKS ...
I won’t offer you too many links.
Go to one interesting homepage and you’ll easily find further ones..
Have a try first with the site of the GQRP club to prove this.
It’s like life - everything is linked, isn’t it?!
In more than 20 chapters you will find the most intersting info on all fields of QRP - what it is, how to practice it, kit konstruction, antennas, commercial rigs,...a very practical and useful appendix on construction techniques in your qrp workshop, toroids, filters and inductors.
Furthermore there are special chapters on practical projects and accessoires both rx and tx sides.
What you will perhaps like especially are the lots of pics of well known hams with their calls who are really representants of the QRP Scene.
A personal tribute by George Dobbs dedicated to W1FB shows what important role radio hams played
in social life.
Highly recommended.
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