Fwd: Tuesday Night Tech Net Topics

[Nan and Sandy Sanders]

>
>========================================================================
>TUES TECH NET  MEETS AT 8 PM on Tuesday night ON ECHOLINK AND AMRAD 
>81/21 REPEATER.
>  ========================================================================
>Hello and Welcome to Tuesday night Tech Net radio meet-up.
>Topic:  Our Upcoming VLF Experiment.
>
>0. At Taco last Saturday I chatted with Paul and Frank about
>next steps in the VLF Experiments and got some good ideas.
>They recommended that we begin building immediately and
>file the paperwork at the same time so when the license arrives
>we will be able to get on the air quickly,  Paul and Frank said that
>the last time around building took up a lot of the authorized
>license period leaving not much time for experimenting.
>So maybe we can kick this around a little to see what we all think.
>
>->Also make sure if you want to participate you are ready with your station's
>->latitude and longitude.   I will need this for the 
>application.  Amateur license
>class is not critical for participation.  E-mail Sandy for details.
>
>1.  I am in the process of acquiring the necessary FCC forms to
>apply for a Part 5  Experimental License.   Recall that this is
>a professional license and not a special temporary authority
>(STA) that is normally issued if experiments are conducted
>within the amateur radio frequencies by licensed amateur
>radio operators.   The 137Mhz (nicknamed the 2200 meter band)
>is not yet an official amateur band although it is in many parts
>of the world at this time.   We hope the FCC will initiate
>rulemaking soon to add these unusual frequencies for
>amateur experimentation.
>
>Question:  What do you see as the future of these frequencies?
>What contribution to the radio art can ham radio operators make
>to these wavelengths?    These frequencies are not far from audio
>so it should be  entirely possible to adopt many techniques that work well
>in that range to this problem.
>
>2. I will be talking to two ARRL people  this week to let the League
>know to expect our application and to get a better idea of where
>the FCC is at in their thinking about this band.
>
>3. Reading up on sub-hertz filtering,  a technology that requires disciplined
>oscillators.   I read that a disciplined oscillator  that is within 
>the price range
>of the average ham is a GPS and "ovenized" crystal.    While the GPS is
>accurate *over a long period* it is not accurate in the short term.  Also,
>the ovenized crystal still drifts a bit over the long term.  So, combining the
>strengths of each we have a ovenized crystal oscillator connected to the GPS
>to gain very good accuracy.
>
>Question:  with DSP techniques I assume it would not be difficult to
>integrate the output of the GPS  over a  reasonable time baseline and if this
>makes sense then it would allow us to eliminate the ovenized crystal 
>altogether.
>OK What am I missing here.
>
>Next:  Sandy WB5MMB suggested we see what the other experimental 
>groups are doing.
>This "getting smart" phase is going to be important although there's 
>no hard in duplicating
>what others have already done.   I think we also have to keep track of what
>is going on with the Europeans,  especially RSGB and the DL 
>folks.  It looks like
>we can learn a lot form their efforts.
>
>I wanted to say also that I looked at some web sites of amateurs 
>with uber time
>accuracy stations and they were able to see and track changing 
>Doppler shifts on   station carriers due to
>continuous movement  of the ionosphere.   I wonder if anyone can use that for
>direction finding??
>
>=======================================================================
>Tech Net Meets at 8:00 PM Tuesday Nights on the W4CIA Echolink 
>conferencing point
>and on the 81/21 2-meter repeater in the Tysons Corner area.  The 
>conference point
>coordinator is Sandy, WB5MMB.
>
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>Classification: UNCLASSIFIED