Pennsylvania Utility Cites Unfavorable Economics in Ending BPL Trial
PPL Broadband announced this week that it's terminating its broadband over power line (BPL) experiment in
Pennsylvania's Lehigh Valley. According to media reports, the company is citing the high cost of a full-scale
BPL rollout and competition from cable and DSL service in the region as the reason for the shutdown.
Approximately 300 households participating in the trial were said to be paying $40 a month for the high-speed
Internet service. Although interference was reported by Amateur Radio stations in some of PPL Broadband's BPL
service area, PPL did not cite the interference problems as one of the reasons it dropped out of the BPL race.
Transpacific reception of Canadian amateur LF signals confirmed
Low frequency enthusiast Steve McDonald, VA7SL, reports the first confirmed
transpacific reception of Canadian Amateur Radio LF (137 kHz/2200 meters)
signals occurred October 4. "The slow-speed (QRSS) CW signals of VA7LF (see
photo of antennas) were confirmed heard near Wellington, New Zealand, at the
Wellington Amateur Radio Club station at Quartz Hill," McDonald told ARRL.
"Signals from the ZM2E club station were heard in Canada as well, but
propagation was not of sufficient duration to enable a QSO to be completed."
Located on South Pender Island, British Columbia, VA7LF was operated by
McDonald, Lorne Tilley, VE7TIL, and Martin MacGregor, VE7MM. At the helm of the
Quartz Hill station were Bob Vernall, ZL2CA, and Mike McAlevey, ZL4OL. Both
stations operated on 137 kHz using dual-frequency CW QRSS120, in which elements
are two minutes long. VA7LF was running approximately 1 W ERP, while ZM2E was at
the 5W ERP level. "Propagation conditions were generally poor during the
three-night test period," McDonald said. The next scheduled transpacific tests
will be next spring. ZM2E and UA0LE hold the current Amateur Radio two-way LF
world record at a distance of 10,311 km. The distance between VA7LF and ZM2E is
approximately 11,700 km.
TWO METER MADNESS
This July has seen some amazing 2 sporadic E openings on two meters. One such phenomena was
witnessed by your reporter 4X1MK around 6 PM on the 4th ... LZ1ZX was heard making an FM contact
with a mobile station on the Tel-Aviv repeater ... yet the Bulgarian station was operating SIMPLEX on the
output frequency of the R7 machine, and the mobiles were hearing his signal directly! I QSYed with him
to a simplex frequency where he implored me to come on 144.300 MHz SSB and CW, even tho’ I had
only a miniscule 5 watts on those modes ... and we established initial contact there while I was still on
half a watt, albeit it with a good 16 element array. Further contacts were made with many Bulgarian
stations, a Romanian and a Hungarian station was heard. I would have continued, yet the supper call
came on this end.Shalom 4X1UN, also operating 5 watts on 2 meters has reported many interesting
sporadic E DX VHF contacts ... great fun! As usual in the summer we are enjoying the great VHF and
UHF tropo ducting working all over the eastern Mediterranean including 500 Km contacts up to the
new R5 repeater near Adana, Turkey
Amateur Radio Operators Copy MRO at 14 Million Kilometers Distance
The Mars Reconnaisance Orbiter, presently enroute to Mars in an interplanetary orbit 14 million kilometers
from Earth, activated its Electra UHF Relay system operating at 437.1 MHz on September 21 and
September 22. Andy, N9AB successfully detected this weak signal using his amateur radio station and DSP
software to perform FFT analysis. Andy has written a very nice report on his detection of MRO which can be
found on-line at:
http://members.verizon.net/~km1p/N9AB_MRO_Report.pdf
Viktor, OE1VKW reports his
success at receiving the MRO at:
http://cacofonix.nt.tuwien.ac.at/~oe1vkw/MRO/rcv22905.htm
[ANS thanks Andy, N9AB, Joe, KM1P, and Viktor, OE1VKW for the above information]
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