u/CaptainSpez

I'm trying to tune a 20m hamstick with a mag mount on the roof of my SUV. I'm finding that if I touch the SMA connector body on the NanoVNA, the SWR dip shifts down about 400khz. I'm planning to run off of a standalone battery, not the car battery. If I touch the connector body to a bare metal point on the car it drops as well. It seems like I should probably bond the grounds together and tune based on the lower resonance? If so, does it matter where I bond to the car chassis? Near the antenna? Or at the battery or floorpan?

These will primary be used for casual use, phone calls, YouTube, etc, not critical listening. My daily drivers are Sony MDR-7506s, which are 25 years old and still amazing and in perfect condition. I had been using a pair of Stax (Edifier) Bluetooth headphones, which sounded "meh", but were better than the average Bluetooth headset. The software on them kinda sucked, multipoint was buggy, and the plastic all turned brittle and they kept cracking.

So I'm looking for something approaching the build quality of the Sony MDRs, something I can throw in my bag and not worry about them being in multiple pieces when I pull them out. Sound quality is high on my list, but as long as they don't sound like Beats, I'll be happy.

I've bought Soundcore Q30s for my wife, and some people at work, and they are probably "good enough" for my needs, but if there is something else better out there without being too far over $100 offering noise cancellation, are comfortable, are sturdy and not creaky, and have a good Bluetooth stack, I'd be all over it.

Just purchased a new to me Rigol spectrum analyzer, and as is the way of the world, despite being a piece of hardware, certain features are locked behind paywalls. Rigol does include trial licenses for these features, and there is a hardware hack that can be done to short two pins internally so that the trial time is reset at every power on.

There also appeared to be keygens out there, but there was some feedback that they don't work on newer firmware versions. I was running v00.01.07, used the keygens, licensed the features I needed, and then upgraded to the latest version V00.01.19.00.05. All of my permanent licenses remained installed and active.

Hopefully this helps anyone who was considering buying one of these. The DSA815-TG, along with the Owon XSA815-TG (different products, derivative naming) seem to be the top two budget options if you want something that isn't a boat anchor to move around. The DSA is older, but I found a reasonable deal on a secondhand unit, and went for it.

Should I put the hamstick dead center in the roof, which is quite close to the sunroof opening? Or put it further back centered between the sunroof opening and the rear glass? Or am I splitting hairs here?

The pack in my 2012 is starting to fail. Dealer quoted $7k for the battery, it looks like they run about $3k in the US + shipping from third parties. I also have some quotes from China for $1000-$2000 plus shipping. These are supposedly new cells. There appear to be companies offering new prismatic cells. Is there any advantage/disadvantage to prismatic vs cylindrical?

I've tried it a few times, and like it, but it seems like it is constantly getting flagged as malware. Different things each time. Is it safe to use? False positives happen, its just seems like this package in particular is always getting flagged.

Hear me out. I live in a condo building, so no chance of putting a beam up at home. I currently run an EFHW fed from my back patio and suspended up in a tall tree. I do have some property that is accessible by vehicle, and has good elevation. I'm brainstorming options to build or buy a fold up two or three element beam that I could assemble in the field, and tilt upright. Are there any popular options? Maybe a Mini-BuddiHEX?

Will did another side by side with a number of brands. I figured on the heels of my rant about Bioenno and their out of control pricing this would be interesting. It seems that you probably can't go wrong with Ecoworthy, Wattcycle, or LiTime.

I'm looking to put a solid mobile radio in my car, and use it as a cross band repeater to my HT. So far it seems that ICOM models will do this, but don't re-generate the CTCSS tone, which produce some unpredictable results. Kenwood and Yaesu do support subtones, but the price jumps substantially. The TYT TH-7800 and TH-9800 look like they might be budget contenders, but I've read not so great things about their reliability.

So what else is out there? We don't have anything digital on the air, so no concerns there. I also don't mind using a commercial LMR radio, if there is one with cross band repeat. The ability to program in new repeaters on the fly or tune to an arbitrary frequency isn't high on my list. I only need to be able to switch between VHF simplex, a 2m repeater, and enable cross band repeat (Ideally cross band repeat functionality is available at the same time as the ability to grab the mic and key up)

We're trying to generate interest in our club's Field Day this year. I've reached out to a few schools with strong science departments, a few specialized STEM schools, our local college and technical schools. Also reached out to the Red Cross, and our national emergency management agency.

Are there any other groups that are likely interested in this sort of thing? From a technology or ecomm point of view.