After a not so successful operation from Russell Island in 2018, I decided to go back this year and have another go. I booked the same place from Thursday 19^th to Tuesday the 24^th November.

This time I brought two different antennas and some spare coax, some wire and a 8m squid pole, just in case.

I had the trusted multiband vertical (Hustler 6BTV) and an end-fed half wave (MyAntennas EFHW 8010).

Last time I had my vertical antenna in the middle of the backyard, about 5m from the water, but this time I decided to go to the edge, fully knowing that the ocean tide will affect the SWR.

Read More

Yaesu FT-DX10 is a new 100W HF transceiver with a hybrid SDR receiver. It is expected to be available in December 2020.

The FT-DX10 size (266x91x263 mm) is almost identical to Kenwood TS590SG and slightly larger than FT991A (229x80x253 mm) and weights 5.9 kg, compared to 4.3kg FT991A.

Considering its rumoured price of $2,000 (USD), this radio doesn’t look like a direct competition to Icom’s IC-7300 ($1,000) but rather a replacement for the Yaesu’s own FT-DX1200, albeit in a smaller body.

Features of the FT-DX10

• HF/50 MHz Transceiver (incl. 60m)
• Hybrid SDR receiver – Downconverter 9 MHz ZF + direct sampling SDR
• 250 MHz HRDDS Synthesizer
• 500 Hz 3 kHz and 15 kHz Roofing Filters (300 Hz optional)
• 15 separate bandpass filters
• Adjustable Shift & Width, Notch, Contour Filter Audio Peak Filter and more
• Push-Pull MOSFET PA 5 – 100W transmit power (5 – 25W AM)
• 5″ Touch Display with 3D Spectrum Stream display
• Quick Memory Bank
• Decoder for CW, RTTY and PSK-31
• SD memory card slot
• Remote operation with Yaesu SCU-10LAN

Some interesting sun activity in the middle of COVID-19 isolation, unfortunately not “that” activity. Nevertheless, it was a beautiful sunset here in Brisbane.

17m diamond loop

Six band trap vertical – Hustler 6BTV