Ramblings: Christmas week

‘Tis the season…to feel busy! We will have a very quiet Christmas this year. I plan to roast a chicken, make mashed potatoes and stuffing, and also make my favorite accoutrement: cranberry sauce from fresh berries. Usually, I use the cranberry sauce with turkey, but I’ve found it also works just fine as an accent to roasted chicken.

This week, I got precious little radio work done. Between family and solving computer issues, about the only thing I did on the radio was listen to conversations while I worked on other tasks. I used my radio-less node 588412 for AllStar QSOs and my Yaesu FTM-300DR in the vehicle on C4FM and analog FM repeaters.

Broke my home network

I broke my network by playing with a Tailscale exit node on my Proxmox server. I had set up Tailscale in an LXC container and then configured it to serve as an exit node, which it did, for the entire home network. When I ran a network scan from my laptop, the only machine I could see was the laptop. Oopsie. That took me a few hours to back out of. Eventually, I rebooted everything, including the four nodes in the mesh network.

Ham friends and family

One of my ham friends manages a store in town and I look for him each time I go shopping. We always have the best conversations — sometimes about amateur radio and repeaters, but also about life in general. He is a deeper well than most people realize. His counsel and concern have been helpful, and I appreciate him as an excellent radio operator and a fine human being. I was lucky to have two great in-person conversations with him this week. (Thank you, Brian!)

While I am feeling busy, my work life is shoved to the back of my mind this week. It’s a slow work week and that allows me to focus more on caring for my spouse and thinking about amateur radio.

Restored an AllStar node

The microSD card in one of my Raspberry Pi-based AllStar nodes stopped working correctly, right after a windstorm caused the power to flicker several times. I had saved a backup copy of the card, using Win32 Imager to make an .iso image file. I discovered that the Raspberry Pi Imager wouldn’t burn the image to my 32-Gb microSD card, saying it needed at least 31.9 Gb of room on the card. Then I tried balenaEtcher and it burned the ISO file to the microSD card just fine. A few minutes later, my node was up and running again.

While listening to a net on the newly restored ASL node, the person transmitting timed out the remote repeater. As that happened, my reception ended, and I realized I had not adjusted the timeout timer on my node. In /etc/asterisk/rpt.conf, find the totime = 180000 line, and make the number bigger. I simply doubled the setting to 360000 = 6 minutes. And then don’t forget to restart asterisk:

sudo astres.sh

By the way, if you haven’t tried AllStar yet, here are factors that make it a great mode:

• Can be inexpensive
• High quality audio
• Worldwide reach, even with a Technician license or equivalent
• Works in many ways, from connected to a radio or repeater to radio-less systems
• Ready-to-use systems are commercially available or you can build your own node
• Because there are so many ways to connect with AllStar nodes, this can be an excellent choice for people in situations that discourage or disallow traditional radio

C. Crane earbuds

As I type this, I’m listening to the W6EK repeater on AllStar node 51018 over my battery-operated ASL node 588412, but instead of using the K-1 speaker-microphone, I’m using a C. Crane earbud. The audio interface for node 588412 is an AllScan UCI90 USB Communications Inteface, with a K-1 connector on the front panel and a speaker-out port on the back. I have the earbud plugged into the speaker-out port. This monaural earbud feels very comfortable in my ear. Using the earbud to listen means I can listen in without disturbing my spouse. It also seems to draw less current than the K-1 speaker-mic so I get more “up” time on my battery-operated ASL node when I use the earbud.

The mono earbuds are still a “buy 2 get 1 free” deal direct from C. Crane. That’s the deal I got a few months ago. I’ll use one of the earbuds with a portable HF rig and I’m happy it works well with my ASL node. It also works with some e-readers that have a headphone jack. Here’s the link to the deal at C. Crane: https://ccrane.com/cc-buds-solo-in-ear-single-earbud-for-radio-audio-books-and-podcasts/

You can also request (or simply download) their current catalog, at: https://ccrane.com/catalog-request

You can buy some C. Crane products on Amazon, and I could provide my Amazon Affiliates link, but the deals are often better buying directly from C. Crane. (I just ordered a buy-2-get-1-free deal on their Pro earbuds with inline mic. I can use these with my e-readers, and since my laptop and big iMac have 3.5mm headphone plugs, I can use them with my computers, too.)

In general, I prefer wired earbuds and headphones because audio latency bothers me. Bluetooth devices seem to always have some level of latency that becomes particularly evident when both sides of a cell phone conversation are using BT headsets or speakers. Give me low-latency wired audio devices every time.

Best wishes, always and all ways

From the KJ7T QTH to you, we send our very best wishes this holiday season. No matter what holiday you celebrate (or don’t celebrate), we hope the new year brings you joy and peace throughout the year.

73,