Episode 252 - David Reed - W5SV Transcript
Eric, 4Z1UG:
QSO today, episode 252 David Reed W5SV. This episode of QSO today is sponsored by Icom America, makers of the finest HF/VHF and UHF transceivers for the radio amateur, that are ready to enhance your contest season beginning with ALL field day in June and by QRP labs, Hans Summer's, G0UPL, QRP kit radio company. Hans has an amazing catalog of radio kits and parts for every budget. I want to thank both Icom and QRP labs for sponsoring the QSO today podcast. Welcome to the QSO today podcast I'm Eric Guth 4Z1UG your host. If you're a longtime listener, you may know that I have an alter ego where I am a stage musical performer for an English language theater company in Jerusalem.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
We've been in rehearsals for months and are now in the theater this week and next week in our production of Pirates of Penzance. I play one of the pirates and later one of the Cornish policemen sent to duty and slaughter at the hands of the pirates. Of course Gilbert and Sullivan, the authors of this 19th century musical would not let heroes go and die. Happy endings rule the day. I shared this with you because I know that many of you have other interests including performance outside of amateur radio and while it leads to a hectic schedule and a lot of late nights like Jello, there's always room for Ham radio. David Reed W5SV was on a visit to Israel when he contacted me to find out more information about our country as an amateur radio operator.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Usually the Hams that contact me are in such tight schedules that we often do not get to meet in person. However, Dave's story intrigued me, so I asked him to spend an hour with me between his appointments over the phone. Dave may have been the youngest new licensee in Mexico when he first got on the air. His story proceeds from there with some unexpected twists and turns that make this QSO today interesting and unique. W5SV, this is Eric 4Z1U, are you there Dave?
Dave, W5SV:
I certainly am, Eric. How are you doing?
Eric, 4Z1UG:
I'm great, Dave. Thanks for joining me on the QSO today podcast. I should let the audience know that you're in Israel visiting right now and you reached out to me. When you told me a little bit about your story I thought that you should be on the QSO today podcast, so I welcome you at the QSO today podcast but let's start at the beginning of your Ham radio story. When and how did it start for you?
Dave, W5SV:
Well, it started when I was six years old. I got interested in broadcast band radio and I liked to listen to it when stations went off the air locally, and you could hear the first clear channel stations on. I was living in Mexico City at the time and we couldn't afford to buy me a radio and my father didn't want me staying up late at night doing this nonsense, right? So a friend of his said, "Well look why don't we just build them a radio, we'll buy junk TV chassis and scrounge parts and build them a little radio and you'll build it, so he'll learn something out of it right?."
Dave, W5SV:
This was Andres, XE1LA and the first set I built was a little crystal set and of course it had rather limited range and we had to scrounge some earphones somewhere, but while they are [inaudible 00:03:31] on a round box and built a crystal detector out of a chunk of crystals literally and a cat’s whisker, thinking a little wire probing it and through a wire up to the top of the apartment building, or actually load one down from the top and in the window and connected to a cold water pipe to the ground. And lo and behold, there I was picking up stations, which I loved, but it was inadequate. Then I built a one tube radio again under Andres, XE1LA, under his guidance and I was up and running.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Can I ask you, you're an American citizen?
Dave, W5SV:
Yes.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Can I ask why you were living in Mexico City at age six? Was your father a diplomat?
Dave, W5SV:
My father was a Mexican citizen and he had been a foreign volunteer into the army Air Corp and when he was discharged in San Antonio, he tried making a living in the states, but it didn't work out real well. He married my mother there. She was of German extraction and they moved to Mexico City.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
That explains the Mexican call sign?
Dave, W5SV:
Yes.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Okay. Let's keep going on in your Ham radio story then. Sounds like you have a great mentor XE1LA who helped you build your first tube radio. How did it go after that?
Dave, W5SV:
Well, it's kind of simple. I got in trouble for staying up late doing this broadcast band DXing. My dad was talking to him about this problem and he said, "Well that's easy, let's build them a shortwave radio so he can listen to shortwave stations during the day and get as a DXing fixed during the day, he'll get to sleep at night." We built a receiver that basically was aimed at 40 meters and it was a simple a super regenerative receiver. Excuse me. And I enjoyed it, but lo and behold, I heard these guys talking to each other because back then in the fifties, nobody had single side band yet. At least I think in the mid fifties, late fifties, they didn't, maybe towards the very end a few people were experimenting with it. But I could hear these guys talking and I said, man that's like way more cool than just listening. I was hooked at that, at that point.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
You're listening to 40 meter AM probably and where were you hearing these conversations around Mexico or actually hearing a 40 meters from the states?
Dave, W5SV:
I was hearing Mexico Central and South America and United States primarily. I went viewing very many Europeans.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
How did you get your first license? Did you take the test down there?
Dave, W5SV:
Yes, I did. And this was kind of funny thing because in Mexico you have to be, I think it's 16 years old it may have been 18, I don't remember, but I wasn't qualified age wise to take a test , but I have relatives in the Mexican government and they arranged to let me take the test. Anyway, they weren't going to just give me a license, right? And my father said, "No make him earn it." That's what happened. I had to take a code test and a little bit of theory and I got my license but of course I couldn't transmit yet because I didn't have a transmitter.
Dave, W5SV:
Again, my mentor helped me figure out how to build a beat frequency oscillator from my radio and a single tube transmitter. And he gave me a couple of crystals to be rocked bound like most novices in the states. Then work while I should say all novices back then where I got started on 40 meters CW.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And how old were you when you got your first license?
Dave, W5SV:
Just short of seven years old.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Wow. You could be one of the youngest Hams in Mexican history, maybe even in American history, I think there's another guy that may have you beat but.
Dave, W5SV:
I wouldn't be surprised if I was beat. I mean it's just a question of how badly do you want it, right?
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Yes.
Dave, W5SV:
Are you really willing to make the effort it takes?
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And what was your first call sign?
Dave, W5SV:
XE1YYK.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And do you remember what year that might be?
Dave, W5SV:
Might've been 57. No, I'm sorry. It would have been like late 57.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
You were entering a big sun spot cycle as well. What a great time to be a Ham.
Dave, W5SV:
Oh yeah. It was tremendous. I mean, I didn't understand about sunspot cycles or anything at the time and it was really amazing because when I started building more complicated receivers and more powerful transmitters I mean I was like working all over the world. And I guess there weren't a lot of Mexican Hams at the time that did CW and I became quite popular if you will, for providing CW contacts.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And how long did you operate your single tube transmitter and your super region receiver on 40 meters before you upgraded?
Dave, W5SV:
I would say a couple of years.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And what did you upgrade to?
Dave, W5SV:
Well, let me see. It seemed to me that it was a, I'm thinking I was going to jump skip a rig. I built a three tube receiver and I think the transmitter, I think it had a 6146 maybe.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Yeah, that makes sense.
Dave, W5SV:
Yeah. And it was a plate modulated I could do AM or CW. I used that for a few more years and then my grandfather bought me some Knight-kits from Allied Electronics.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
That would be like the AC1, something like that.
Dave, W5SV:
I seem to think it might've been a T60 and maybe NR100 or NR55, I don't remember right now. My memory's kind of fading.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Okay.
Dave, W5SV:
But there were early Knight kits maybe second or third generation I would say. That was fun.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Did you spend all of your childhood in Mexico?
Dave, W5SV:
No. I left home when I was 14 due to family problems. I came up to San Antonio, Texas by myself at the age of 14. I was distracted from the hobby for a few years, getting myself established here.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
The new QTH became San Antonio?
Dave, W5SV:
Yes.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Did Ham Radio play a part then in the choices that you made for your further education and career?
Dave, W5SV:
For education no for career, yes. Education wise, I got my bachelor's degree with three majors, philosophy, psychology and art. And it never occurred to me that I would require a technical degree to go into a technical field. I mean, I was just naive but, I mean, there's no other word for it. Is there? One of the students in one of my graduate philosophy classes was a woman whose husband was a Vice President of engineering, at a company called Computer Terminal Cooperation. And I just graduated from undergraduate school and was taking a couple of graduate courses and I was looking for a job and this woman, her name was Florence Poole P-O-O-R-E said, "Well, my husband Vic is hiring technicians and maybe you can get a job with him over Computer Terminal Cooperation."
Dave, W5SV:
I went and interviewed for a job and they gave me a job as a technician, but told me if I could help them sufficiently technically that the lack of a degree wouldn't hold me back, that they would promote me to an engineering position. Sure enough I did good. And although I didn't know a lot about digital electronics when I started I managed to learn enough and I think the RF background really helped because a lot of people that do digital design don't understand that they're dealing with RF and the higher the frequency of their digital circuits, the more of those RF characteristics have to be taken into account in the design of the circuit. Back then we were talking clock frequencies of one or two megahertz.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
In the HF band, right.
Dave, W5SV:
Yes. Exactly. I mean now, you've gotten in the gigahertz ranges but back then in the early days, I mean, we're talking the integrated circuits were basically primarily RTL and TTL was just starting to come into play and it was very small scale, I mean, you might have a 14 pin package that had four gates in it.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Then what happened after that?
Dave, W5SV:
Understanding that kind of stuff really helped advance my career. And I was there, I designed the various boards that plugged into a computer and did well and I had an opportunity to go to Motorola to work in their microprocessor division working on processors that were for General Motors for engine control units. Let's see, from there I went to advanced micro devices.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
All in Texas now, this is.
Dave, W5SV:
Yes, all in Texas. I was at advanced micro devices at 16 years. I started as a quality assurance manager and then went into the design group doing functional verification and I headed up a functional verification group. And let's see, when I left there I went to the University of Texas as a research fellow. Not a professor, but a research fellow, I was doing research basically and I didn't like that it turns out academia wasn't for me I was a publisher, parish environment and well I shouldn't say too much about it because the prime contractor was the NSA, but you can imagine publication wasn't a good idea.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And now this message from ICOM America. With the Dayton Hamvention in the past, we are moving quickly to the ARRL field day and contest season. Take the ICOM IC-9700 along on your field day to work VHF/UHF modes, including single side band NCW and the digital modes. Why not demonstrate moon bounce or meteor scatter to your assembled club? The IC-9700 is ICOM's newest SDR transceiver that is fully operational in all modes on VHF/UHF and 1.2 gigahertz. This full featured rig includes color touchscreen, RF direct sampling on two meters in 70 centimeters and independent dual receivers capable of duplex operation on your favorite passing satellite.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Power output on two meters is 100 watts, 75 watts on UHF and 10 watts maximum on 1.2 gigahertz. Of course, this rate can be remote controlled over the internet with an optional Ethernet interface and software from ICOM. The ICOM IC-7610 is the SDR every Ham wants both in his shack and on his field day site. This high performance SDR has the ability to pick out the faintest signals even in the presence of stronger adjacent signals. The ICOM IC-7610 is a direct sampling software defined radio that will change the world's definition of a software SDR transceiver. This rig too has independent dual receivers allowing you to be ready to pounce on DX or contest stations in one band while working another.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Finally the ICOM IC-7300 has changed the definition of the entry level HF transceiver. This compact footprint that almost exactly matches the IC-9700 also includes RF direct sampling, 15 discreet band pass filters, a large 4.3 inch color touchscreen and real time spectrum scope of pan adapter. ICOM America has the rig for your field day tent or Ham radio shack that matches every Amateur radio operator’s, level, skill set and ability.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Be sure to visit your favorite Ham radio store to take a look at these fine rigs in action. Click the ICOM image on this week's show notes page to get to the ICOM America website. I want to thank ICOM for sponsoring the QSO today podcast. Remember when you buy your next ICOM rig, please be sure to tell them that you heard about it here on QSO today and now back to our QSO today.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Now, I was going to ask, it seems to be based on your age and your American citizenship that probably from your, you were born in the United States or you're born in Mexico?
Dave, W5SV:
I was born in the United States. My mother being German, didn't think the birthing rooms in Mexican hospitals with no screens on the windows and flies buzzing in and out and all that, they didn't meet her sanitation standards.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
That means that your age and the time that you were in the states that you would have been eligible for the draft to Vietnam, did you end up being drafted?
Dave, W5SV:
No, I joined when I was 17.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
In the middle of all of this, you joined the US armed forces at age 17?
Dave, W5SV:
Yes, sir. The Marine Corps. Yes sir.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Let's go there for a little while.
Dave, W5SV:
Sure.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
The education came after the Marine Corp.
Dave, W5SV:
Well, I would say that it came-
Eric, 4Z1UG:
A different education.
Dave, W5SV:
Yeah. I would say that my scholastic education, if you will, was partially in the Marine Corp and partially out of the Marine Corp.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
What did you end up doing in the Marine Corp?
Dave, W5SV:
Sure. My MOS for military operations specialty was a dual explosive ordinance disposal. Basically aside from being on patrol as a rifleman as you know everybody in the Marine Corp don't care if they're a cook or anything else, everybody's a rifleman. But when we'd come across booby traps, that was my job to deactivate them. And basically that was it. I did get wounded while I was in Vietnam. I was there 13 months I got wounded, not a big deal, but I got my first purple heart there and I got sent back. But basically they let me get a little more education, keeping time and grade and they put me through OCS and then pilot training and shipped me back to Vietnam flying A-4 hawks.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
They sent you back to Vietnam flying A-4 Skyhawks.
Dave, W5SV:
Yes, sir.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Amazing. What was your tour of duty there?
Dave, W5SV:
Well, like I said 13 months the first time as a ground troop and then I did several tours, one on the ground in Vietnam flying I should say ground base, flying out of a Marine Corp Air Station in Bien Hoa Vietnam and I did two cruises on aircraft carriers. The risk in the and the bone armory shard.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Now is it unusual for a marine ground troop to become a Marine Corp pilot?
Dave, W5SV:
Yes. It's unusual to become an officer, let alone a pilot. But they do have a program, at least they had it then, whereby basically they call these kinds of officers mustangs. They come up through the ranks if you will, as opposed to join after college, taking ROTC or something. And it was unusual, but not unheard of. They did have a program called MarCads which is like the navy a program NavCads or marine cadets, naval cadets, that were qualified for pilot training without college degrees. And they would put them through essentially the OCS and the pilot training as well. They had that program going.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And did you have to sign on for more time?
Dave, W5SV:
Well, yeah.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
You enlisted, you were already in for what, four years?
Dave, W5SV:
Yeah. I signed in for three at the time, but.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And in order to become a pilot you'd have to sign in for, or sign on for even more time?
Dave, W5SV:
Yes sir.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And how much more time did you sign on for.
Dave, W5SV:
Six more years.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And did they include college education as part of that whole project?
Dave, W5SV:
Yes sir.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
One of the most amazing deals of the United States army, isn't it?
Dave, W5SV:
Well, I have to tell you the Marine Corp was very good to me. I got out thinking that I wanted to make a lot of money and the Marine Corp obviously wasn't the way to do that, but in retrospect I probably would've stayed in the full 20 and retired out in Marine Corp because I really enjoyed the comradery and I guess being somewhat of an adrenaline junkie at the time, I kind of liked that too.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
It's my understanding at least maybe from the popular culture that people who are marines are a tight culture into themselves. What would you think is the greatest lesson that you learned by being a US Marine?
Dave, W5SV:
Teamwork. Absolutely, teamwork. You're a little gear, a little cog, if you will, in the machinery of what's going on and that it takes a team to make it work and learning that really helped me in terms of working in industry more successfully and even in my later career in law enforcement.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
That's a great, that's an interesting transition point here. You left the marines, you went through college, you got your liberal arts degrees, I might say I have a liberal arts degree as well and never thought I couldn't work in electronics without a BSEE. I learned differently, but over time I still worked in electronics. But then you also made a transition from industry and technology to law enforcement. What happened there?
Dave, W5SV:
I was at UT as a research fellow, and I found it to not be very satisfying at all. I didn't have the same comradery that I had in the Marine Corp. I didn't have the same sense of accomplishment that I had in the electronics industry and I decided, well, I'll take a step back and figure out what I want to do. And I got bored pretty quickly. I live a rural part of Travis County, which Austin is located in. And I thought, well, who does our law enforcement around here? Obviously the Travis County sheriff's office.
Dave, W5SV:
I thought I'd find out more about it. I went and enlisted in their citizens academy so that you can get educated to do ride alongs and et cetera. And I did that and I thought I can do this, I might be getting a little long in it too, but I could do this. I went and got an Associate's degree in Criminal Justice and went through the basic piece officer course and got licensed by the state of Texas as a peace officer. And then Travis County sheriff's office picked up my commission and they put me to work as a deputy sheriff. But in the process, they have what's called the board interview. It's a board of like six people that interview at the same time. They take questions and get, take turns getting under your skin and instead of it to see how you react under stress and et cetera. It's a useful interview technique, but it's very uncomfortable for the interviewee.
Dave, W5SV:
And on my interview board, there was a major, a captain, two lieutenants and two sergeants. I felt like it was kind of top heavy and I mean, because I'm coming in at the very bottom and the major asked me what my aspirations were and I told them I want it to be in investigations. And he kind of chuckled and said, well we usually take a lot of years on the street before you get to be a detective and so on and so forth. And I said, "Well, you asked me what my aspirations were, not what I'd settle for now." To make the long story short they took me on in the reserves. With the education I was having trouble getting hired on as a regular employee anywhere because of my age, most police departments, maximum ages they're going to hire you in at 45 for a starting position.
Dave, W5SV:
And I looked at it and I said, "Well how about a reserve position, it's the same licensing procedure, the same tests, the same requirements, everything's the same except you don't get paid." I figured, I have enough from my other jobs that I don't necessarily need a salary, I mean, look at that. I started it and pretty quickly I ended up working in personnel, doing background investigations. And because I'm bilingual, I started helping out translating jail calls, jail mail, conducting interviews with people over in the major crimes section. And they liked it. And I was getting bored over in HR doing background investigations.
Dave, W5SV:
We have a new law enforcement major and I went to him and I said, "Look you said we could break the chain of command to come to with problems as long as we offered solutions too, and I've got a problem on board and here's my solution. You don't have enough people working cold cases let me help out." And so he said, "Let me talk to some people about this and see what I can do." And within days they had me over there helping out. And pretty soon, I started helping on active cases because when at any police department, an immediate hot case gets more attention than cold cases.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
What is a cold case?
Dave, W5SV:
Well, cold case is something like from 1975 or 2002 or even 2016 maybe, that hadn't been solved. It's gotten nowhere and it's just kind of been on hold if you will.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And for you, it seems like it's a mystery to solve.
Dave, W5SV:
It's a mystery and somebody else who's already tried to crack it and it's very challenging. I thought, well they're not going to waste a normal person on that, normally must be a normal person on it, full time on it, but maybe somebody like me who's working 30 hours a week or something like that, they'll let me try it, there you go. That's how I got into a working cold cases and cold cases that we pursue we don't look for weed eaters that got stolen 10 years ago or long wars or cars that got stolen that long ago. They're all like basically murders, violent crimes, rapes, things like that.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
They don't have a statute of limitations.
Dave, W5SV:
Well, they might have a statute of limitations, but it hadn't run out yet. Or they may be like a murder. There is none.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Right. A cold case on a murder is still an opportunity for someone to find a solution.
Dave, W5SV:
Right. And because of the peculiarity of statutes and in Texas law, for example, the statute of limitations on a particular kind of an aggravated assault or that's sexual in nature, the statute of limitations might be 10 years. But it's not 10 years from the date of the crime. It's 10 years from when you've identified a suspect.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
It's not ice cold.
Dave, W5SV:
Right, exactly.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
That's fascinating. Let me take a quick break here to tell you about my favorite Amateur radio audio podcast, the Ham radio workbench podcast with George KG6VU and Jeremy KF7IJZ where they pursue topics, technology and projects on their Ham radio work benches every two weeks. George and Jeremy document their projects and make circuit boards available for sale to their listeners. They have interesting guests and go in deep. Even if you're a seasoned Ham radio builder or just getting started, be sure to join George and Jeremy for the Ham radio work bench podcast. Use the link on this week's show notes page by clicking on the image and now back to our QSO today.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
As a result of the demand for hot case solving and they're seeing that you have ability to investigate, did they move you into hot case investigation?
Dave, W5SV:
Well, they did at first but they decided that they were getting behind on cold cases. And so recently we've actually started up the cold case unit and I'm in it along with a couple of other people and we're making progress.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And is that, do you find that satisfying?
Dave, W5SV:
Very. It's very satisfying and very frustrating. Very frustrating comes when you really have identified say the killer, but it turns out he's a hit man for a gang known as Mara Salvatrucha or MS13. And nobody's going to testify against this guy and you don't have adequate DNA evidence or anything else to link on. Unknown murderer goes away. I mean he's free. And that's very frustrating, but on the plus side you sometimes get somebody on a rape that the BA is offering a 20 year plea bargain and he says no, because he's sure the jury is going to let them off and the jury gives him 50 years. And so that's a real win and you like that.
Dave, W5SV:
Same thing with turning up somebody's murderer after 30 years. They think they've gotten away with it and you get them into the system and the prosecution takes him to court and they get him jailed and it's a win. And once again, you're just a little gear in the cog that ranks out justice. This teamwork aspect goes all along with it.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Now the reason that we met is because one of your friends who listens to the QSO today podcast, and he advised you that when you come to Israel that you should be in contact with me and you're in Israel right now and I'm speaking to you, to your cell phone in Zichron Yaakov, which is a beautiful little community about mid span on the Mediterranean coast. Why are you here and what are you doing? And then it's my understanding based on earlier conversation that you actually have a history with Israel. And what does is history?
Dave, W5SV:
Well, I'll start with the history. In 1973, I made my first trip to Israel. The defense department was looking for volunteers to fly some A-4 Skyhawks to Israel. Israel was using A-4s and they were losing them in the Yom Kippur War. And I thought, well, I don't know how to fly these things and I kind of like Israel, why not, I'll sign up for that. And I did. And we flew in and I ended up going to base called Nevatim, which is near Beer Sheva and made some friends there. And I've been coming to Israel ever since.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Wow. On regular basis?
Dave, W5SV:
Well, I'd call it an irregular basis, but yeah.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Okay. And why are you here now? Did you volunteer for a program?
Dave, W5SV:
I have three purposes to my current trip. The first purpose was volunteers for Israel. They hook you up with SAR-EL which is an Israeli agency that puts you on IDF base, IDF army base, and you get to do things to help free up soldiers for their normal work. For example, one of the things our group did was we reorganized some contents of some warehouses and et cetera and I got kitchen patrol, I got to prepare eggplant for several hundred people, somewhere close to a thousand and that sort of thing. It frees up the cook to go do his normal business.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And your eggplant recipes here are a lot different than what you do. What would you serve in Texas?
Dave, W5SV:
Actually no, because I was serving grilled eggplant, you slice the eggplant, these are the long fin eggplants rather than the kind of more pear shaped eggplant. And you slice them in half lengthwise and then you kind of score them on the inside a little bit and olive oil and salt and some spices and stuff and then grill them or put them in the oven to grill them depending on what you got access to. And I do that in Texas just as well.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Well, I don't think I've ever had as much eggplant as I do in Israel than I did in America. I think I'm in Israel we're the Middle East and there's 39 different ways to cook eggplant and you can buy 39 different kinds of eggplants in the store.
Dave, W5SV:
Absolutely. I was right at home with it.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Okay. Well that's terrific. And the other reason, do you want to mention the other reason that you're here or do you want to stop there?
Dave, W5SV:
Well, no. I'd love to mention the other reasons. The second reason was to visit some friends and the third one is to explore different cities in Israel. And in terms of possibly moving here, I'm considering making aliyah or the return to Israel as a Jew and I picked cities to look at, but I thought my wife would be more amenable to moving to get a better feel for them so that when I bring her here in the fall, we can kind of pick and choose more carefully than if I was trying to show her everything in a couple of weeks.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
It's a great idea to make a pilot trip before you come and move here.
Dave, W5SV:
Yeah. I selected Haifa as a city that I already know fairly well and have friends in and Nahariya as a slightly lower cost, kind of like back that has something of an Anglo community so that my wife wouldn't feel totally out of it. And my wife is from Taiwan, she's already dealing with English as a second language and has no Hebrew. Trying to find a community that would be easy for her to kind of slide into was one of my objectives. And the third place was Zichron Yaakov which it is more of a suburban community. A lot of the houses here actually have small yards and so on. They all have a slightly different flavor, but they're all very nice.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Right and Zichron Yaakov has a very interesting history to it. I'll put a note in the show notes page for Zichron Yaakov history and well that's great. I'm happy you're here. Now, we have a very active Amateur radio community in Israel. Are you in touch with the Israeli Ham radio community? Except for me. And have you operated Ham radio here.
Dave, W5SV:
I have been in touch on and off. And for the benefit of your listeners who may be considering a tourist trip to Israel, by all means bring a QRP league along and your license. You do have to bring a copy of your license along but you can operate in Israel with it. And it'd be fun. I didn't bring a rig this trip unfortunately, but I was packed pretty heavy to bring things, next trip I'll try to bring my KX2 to do a little QRP operation.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Which you can also do if you're coming, you can reach out to the Ham radio clubs here and I'll put the link to that. If you can't bring a rig, then you'll actually find somebody who'd be happy to host you and you can operate from their QTH or there's even a group of us that actually go out into the field with a QRP rigs.
Dave, W5SV:
Oh, that's great.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Almost on demand.
Dave, W5SV:
Yeah.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Okay. Let's talk about your current Ham radio activity, were you active through most of your adult life as a Ham radio operator.
Dave, W5SV:
Yeah. In Vietnam for example, I actually operated some of the MARS stations, we were doing phone patches for soldiers back home back in the pre cell phone, pre inexpensive long distance stays that was how we did it. And then after that, of course, I've started getting involved in HF from my own station when I got state side again. And I currently have a 70 foot tower with a three element quad on it that works 20 meters through six, four elements on six meters. I'm running a Elecraft K3 that's been upgraded almost to K3S status.
Dave, W5SV:
Every upgrade that I could get jammed in there without buying a K3S is it in there and I love the radio substantially. And let's see, a KPA 500, 500 Watt Ham and I operate some digital modes, I've experimented with them, whisper, FT-8, PSK31, PSK64 this sort of thing. Of course CW is still the original digital mode, if you will but I'm currently on a quest to get the DXCC on a roll on phone. And I'm at 302 countries confirmed, I've got ways to go. But that's my current quest.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
What's your favorite operating modules?
Dave, W5SV:
Side band. I have the rare, worked all states on 75 meter phone QRP.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
I saw that you're very active with the blind community and what capacity do you help blind Amateur radio operators.
Dave, W5SV:
Perhaps help isn't the right word, but I'll be glad to talk around it. One of the things I'll do if I have a couple of Ham friends that are blind and we get together every couple of weeks for breakfast and talk Ham radio and stuff like that and it's fun. And one of them is an author of some software for blind Hams that read control and the interface and like will give them a real readout of the frequency and so forth or activate the voice frequency read out a few radio has that capacity and so on.
Dave, W5SV:
And I've loaned them a K3 to work with on a software for a while and when you stand and I hope one of my other blind Ham friends a set up his amplifier and get it all working integrated into a station. That didn't require a site intervention to get things working. In that way, a little ways trying to help when I can with time helping people get their stations set up just simple things.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Based on this relationship, would you say that from your friends that Ham radio manufacturers are doing enough to make Ham radio gear compatible with blind Amateurs, is there more that the manufacturing community could do in order to make this equipment more friendly?
Dave, W5SV:
I would think they would be in the best position to answer that, but my gut feel is yes they could do more. For example, one of the accessories that I really enjoy using id a pan adapter, I can spot when DX is operating split, I can spot which stations he's coming back to and where he's listening based on the pan adapter display and they have no access to that. They just hear him saying up five and he might be listening seven or 10 up. And having some way, if someone could digitize the information from a pan adapter and put it down on a push up display that looked like say a bunch of pinheads, a matrix of pinheads so that you knew the scale and you could feel along over here and see, oh okay, here's this pip, it's up here so much.
Dave, W5SV:
Having the interface so the blind hand could feel would be very useful and I wouldn't expect the manufacturers to make the equipment, but if they made that interface so that someone else could make that specialized equipment and get that information out of it, it would be very useful.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
The interface is the most radios, new radios now have to computers. It seems to me that once you have that interface to the computer, then you could do all of that management on the computer with the peripherals that go around the computer. Is that what you're finding right now? I mean, I know that for example, CAT controls and the K2 and other rigs. Do you think that those computer interfaces make these rigs more friendly for blind Amateurs?
Dave, W5SV:
They absolutely do. I think they just fall short on things like the pan adapter display.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Well, there you go. Hopefully there's an entrepreneur listening who will come up with a touch display that touches back. Right?
Dave, W5SV:
Yeah. That would be great.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
What kind of impact does Amateur radio had on your family life?
Dave, W5SV:
Well, fortunately for me not much because all the time I was dating and et Cetera, Ham radio was part of my life. People either saw that and accepted it or they didn't, and it never went any further. I would say that really it hasn't had any impact on family life other than getting to share some of my excitements sometimes. Maybe it forced me to live in certain places that I wouldn't have otherwise. For example, I live on a little over nine acres of land so that I can put up beverage antennas and I have my tower and all that. I don't live in a community that say's, we can't put up an antenna. Maybe it's had a bad impact, in terms of places to live.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
What do you think is the greatest challenge facing Amateur radio now?
Dave, W5SV:
Keeping active population involved. I think with cell phones ready, communication is so handy that people don't think of the benefits of emergency capability, they don't think of the entertainment possibility of getting to meet people I've never met,; I wouldn't know and I wouldn't run into otherwise. I've made friends in countries all over the world and when I go traveling, I like to try to visit them, at least a few of them get an eyeball cured in which is usually very gratifying. I think the challenge of recruiting new adherence and retaining people is the biggest challenge. Some of the digital modes that have come up recently have done a good job of attracting people to come back into it.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Yeah. I think FT-8 seems to be the thing that we most discuss on the QSO today podcast as being something that's really a game changer for people especially in this part of the sunspot cycle that we're in now.
Dave, W5SV:
Right. Exactly.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
And now this message from QRP labs. QRP labs has shipped thousands of QCX QRP transceivers kits to date. The odds of working in other QCX user gets better every day. If you're looking for a satisfying kit experience or you end up with an amazing performing QRP transceiver for under5 $150, let me say that again for under $150 then you owe it to yourself to go to QRP labs. We have many home brewers who listened to the QSO today podcast. For you QRP labs also has parts, filters, enclosures and other handy devices to make your home brewing experience even better.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
You can use these parts to either enhance your QRP labs kits or to beef up your own home brew designs. Be sure to browse hands entire website. Use the link on this week's show notes page or the one in the sponsored section of the QSO today website to get the QRP labs to buy your QCX or any of the other fine QRP labs kits or parts. QRP labs is my Go To Ham radio kit company, it should be yours too. QRP labs. And now back to our QSO today.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
What excites you the most about what's happening in Amateur radio now?
Dave, W5SV:
Well, I think the prospect of new rigs, software developed defined radios, whether they're like the flex approach which uses a lot for a computer interface or like the Elecraft approach, which has a conventional looking rig, but it's very much a software defined radio. The progress there has been phenomenal. My little KX2 to a QRP transceiver has performance that I probably would have killed for in my youth, just really amazing receivers and selectivity and sensitivity that is just unparalleled. Wayne and Eric are really talented set of people and they operate a tremendous outfit and recruit good people there for sure.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
What advice would you give to new or returning Hams to their hobby.
Dave, W5SV:
Antennas. If you're going to spend money, buy a not state of the art brand new rig and get a slightly older rig and spend more money on antennas. Get Antennas up near where he'd do some good antennas will give you gain both ways, the amplifier only gives it to you in one way. Antennas, the antennas and antennas. It's a lesson I wish I could have implemented. I learned it fairly early, but I couldn't have implemented because I didn't have room or I'd already spent all my money on rigs.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Yeah. Now, I think that's great advice. Absolutely great advice because if you don't have it out there, you can't hear it.
Dave, W5SV:
Exactly.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Yeah. I had a very early QSO today conversation and I'll put a note in the show, a link in the show notes page to that conversation where as a DXer he was using, also from Texas, was using a very old and poor rig on the one hand, but he spent all his money on cubicle quads and he was a fantastic DXer because of the antenna. I agree with you. Antennas are really the way to be at the top of your game with any rig.
Dave, W5SV:
Yeah. Antennas quads a lot. Best antenna I've ever had was a quad. I've had large log periodics I've had Yaris, I've had [inaudible 00:49:50]. I've had loops, quads are my favorite. The only problem is they are higher maintenance then and the yagis or NLP. I guess as I age I'm less adept to climbing towers and earning less money to pay people to climb towers so I may have to get something more durable here in my future.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
Well Dave, you've been a great guest. I really appreciate your joining me on the QSO today podcast. You've got a great ham radio story and I'm looking forward to your being in Israel more and we'll get together for an eyeball contact as soon as that happens.
Dave, W5SV:
Well I look forward to it, Eric. Thank you.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
73.
Dave, W5SV:
73.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
That concludes this episode of QSO today. I hope that you enjoyed this QSO with David. Please be sure to check out the show notes that include links and information about the topics that we discussed. Go to www.qsotoday.com and put in W5SV in the search box at the top of the page. My thanks to both ICOM America and QRP labs for their support of the QSO today podcast. Please show your support of these fine sponsors by clicking on their links in the show notes pages or when you make your purchases that you say that you heard it here on QSO today. You may notice that some of the episodes are transcribed into written text. If you'd like to sponsor this or any of the other episodes into written text, please contact me. Support the QSO today podcast by first joining the QSO today email list by pressing the subscribe buttons on the show notes pages.
Eric, 4Z1UG:
I will not spam you or share your email address with anyone. Become a listener sponsor monthly or annually by clicking on the sponsor buttons on the show notes page. I am grateful for any way that you show appreciation and support. It makes a big difference. QSO today is now available on iHeartRadio, Spotify, Libsyn, and TuneIn as well as the iTunes store. If you own an Amazon Echo, you can say, "Alicia play the QSO today podcast from TuneIn." I still use Stitcher to listen to podcasts on my smartphone. The links to all of these services are on the show notes pages on the right side. Until next time, this is Eric 4Z1UG 73. The QSO today podcast is a product of KEG media Inc who is solely responsible for its content.