Digital TV - really? QO-100 again!

Well,

Over the weekend I have been playing with the software KG-STV.

This is a kind of digital TV; its slow scan TV that's digitised on TX.

It took me a while to get the software to key the radio - eventually I figured out it doesnt seem to work if the selected COM port is > 9. Hey ho, as my PC Is COM port city, I had to shuffle some stuff about.

Here's two instances of the software running at the same time; the top one is my TX signal going up on 13cm and the bottom is my RX of the signal on 3cm.

And here is the same image as received by CT1BYM, Miguel:

and here some more images Migual has been kind enough to share. This is his RX setup:

How cool is that?

SSTV - though a Satellite?

Well,

Been playing some more with my Es'Hail-2 setup.

I noticed yesterday some SSTV signals on the band from Mauritius; I've not used SSTV before so I installed MMSSTV and have since had some QSOs.

I've annotated some images and created some templates in the software to enable reports and the like to be exchanged:

It's really quite fun!

es'hail-2 dish feed

Well,

Very much inspired by the fun back here, I figured it would be great to try and make a better single feed for the dish for both bands.

This seemed to be just the ticket.

Not this needs to be plumbing, not electronics!

I paid a visit to fellow ham and insane constructor Ian, G4EVK; who has some amazing model making equipment and a good plumbers blowtorch!

Here's some photos of the build:

I'm waiting for a "rocket" LNB that I hope will fit on the end of the waveguide (read 22mm pipe) using a compression fitting, I have also used the trick from here to check the 2.4GHz return loss - after a little bit of bending it's now looking spot on.

Yesterday I very nearly mowed the lawns, today we woke up to this:

Let it snow.....

** UPDATE **

I have used the lens from a "rocket" LNB on the front of the feed and removed the feedhorn from an Octagon LNB (with a hacksaw) and connected it all together with a 22mm compression pipe connector and some waterproofing with some silicone. I have also modified the LNB to take an external 25MHz signal (as above):

I've used the same trick I used back here to measure the return loss on 2.4 GHz and its around 20dB; I have also lashed up the receiver on the 10GHz downlink and that is working just fine.

Now, how on earth can I weather proof this?

Miss Maggie and Miss Pepper Cat seem to be economising by using the same bed? Bonkers.

Local conditions....