Tuesday, January 3, 2012

Kids day 2012

Twice a year the ARRL promote Kids day where they encourage your kids or grand kids to Try Ham Radio for themselves and hopefully they will take up the hobby i the future. January 8 and June 16.
The Suggested Frequencies are
80 meters 3.740 Mhz to 3.940 Mhz
40 meters 7.270 Mhz to 7.290 Mhz
20 meters 14.270 Mhz to 14.300 Mhz
17 meters 18.140 Mhz to 18.145 Mhz
15 meters 21.360 Mhz to 21.400 Mhz
12 meters 24.960 Mhz to 24.980 Mhz
10 meters 28.350 Mhz to 28.400 Mhz

When calling call CQ Kids day.
Kids need to give
Name Age Location Favorite and Color.
This should be a great day for kids. I have a four year old and i know she wants to use the radio as she spends a lot of time with daddy when his on the air. She love phone but hates CW( have to work on the :) ).
I think this is a great idea as i remember when i was a kid and saw my first ham. This was way back in 1976 and was just amazed when i was on a tour with the sea cadet corps i was with at the time . We was on a tour   on a naval ship HMS Belfast on the river Thames. It was not until we got onto the bridge wireless room That i never forget seeing all these old radios and then saw this man talking on a radio (Never heard of ham radio back in those days (i was 12 at the time)) he was talking to someone. The other station was in the Indian Ocean. I got so interested that i joined the radio communications  with the Sea cadets and leaned Morse but with never had a key except we then sent Morse light with one of the ships old Morse signal lamp. Later when i was a member of the RNARS (Royal Naval Amateur Radio Society) that i went to the bridge wireless office got talking to one of the hams and found out that he was the guy talking on the radio that got me very much interested in radio and that it was his QSO that it got me my ticket many years later. He was amazed about this.
I hope that kids will also be amazed when they see a radio in use. Yes today we have skype and other ways to talk via the internet and cell phones but to have nothing but a radio and an antenna there is nothing more magic then hearing a voice from another country over the air.
Good luck on these days and hope your kids or Grand kids get the bug and become future Hams

More details about Kids day please visit Arrl.org or click on this link.

http://www.arrl.org/kids-day




Sunday, January 1, 2012

Twit on Roku

Today i went to my local fry's Electronics store to buy a Roku. Mainly for Netflix as we had Netflix tired up to my daughters WII and i had seen the Roku in use round my mother in laws house and was very surprised by how this little box works, Anyway after hooking mine up to our TV i was playing with it when i see that you can add more channels on it. One of the channels was Twit TV. If your have not heard of this Channel its a neat Geek channel that has all kind of stuff and of course the home for Ham Nation with Bob Heil K9EID. Ham Nation is now into its 29th Episode that started back on May 25th. The 1st Episode had Joe Walsh WB6ACU as guest.
Ham Nation airs live on Twit TV on Tuesdays 9pm est or via the web at http://live.twit.tv/ or later via You tube. This is great as anyone that has a busy scheduled like me can now watch this via Roku at your own time and the comfort of your comfy chair.
Here is a review from Tom Samacicio KB4HQA (Thanks Tom for the Link) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2BQnvvGLoWY