ChrisSmolinski

I'm 99 44/100 % convinced this bot script was the cause of the problem I was experiencing with several receivers not being available for use (since that problem went away when I started to block them).

I am not sure if this is related, but the radio related website https://www.hfunderground.com/board/ which I run was getting overrun with bots a few days ago. You get three chances to guess from where, and the first two don't count. Hundreds at a time, at one point I saw over 500. They have stopped, for now anyway, but I am seriously looking into figuring out how to geoblock China if it happens again. It's an ugly solution which I don't want to have to implement, but it's potentially an even uglier problem.

This is why we can't have nice things.

I also have my GPS antenna inside, facing a south window. I found that placing it on a sheet of aluminum foil as a reflector helped quite a bit. Also the placement of the antenna is critical, moving it just an inch appears to cause a significant change in the number of satellites tracked. Unfortunately with three cats in the house, it doesn't tend to stay put. I may need to duct tape it down.

Relocating it outside is a project for once winter is over, but for now it seems to work "good enough".

I've not been able to use my 670 ft sky loop antenna with the KiwiSDR, as it causes overloading at night. I was using a homebrew splitter to pass the signal to both the KiwiSDR and netSDR. So I thought about it, and decided to make another splitter, but without the same number of turns on the two secondaries. Yes, this means the output impedance isn't correct for proper matching, but who cares, I have more than enough signal.

This splitter is wound on a binocular core, with 5 turns on the primary and one of the secondaries, and only 1 turn on the other secondary, which feeds the KiwiSDR. It seems to have solved the problem. I didn't notice any overloading early this morning on the KiwwSDR (just before sunrise when it is usually worst) and the netSDR still gets lots of signal.

It is built on the underside of a pint size paint can lid, which is then placed on the can for shielding.

There's a post about it here, with some photos: https://www.hfunderground.com/board/index.php/topic,49920.0.html

I've not been able to use my 670 ft sky loop antenna with the KiwiSDR, as it causes overloading at night. I was using a homebrew splitter to pass the signal to both the KiwiSDR and netSDR. So I thought about it, and decided to make another splitter, but without the same number of turns on the two secondaries. Yes, this means the output impedance isn't correct for proper matching, but who cares, I have more than enough signal.

This splitter is wound on a binocular core, with 5 turns on the primary and one of the secondaries, and only 1 turn on the other secondary, which feeds the KiwiSDR. It seems to have solved the problem. I didn't notice any overloading early this morning on the KiwwSDR (just before sunrise when it is usually worst) and the netSDR still gets lots of signal.

It is built on the underside of a pint size paint can lid, which is then placed on the can for shielding.

There's a post about it here, with some photos: https://www.hfunderground.com/board/index.php/topic,49920.0.html

Very handy, thanks for the tip!