Must Be Amateur Radio

Paul Williamson, KB5MU

	AMSAT does some of the most exciting stuff in amateur radio today: amateur radio satellites. Yes, amateurs build their own spacecraft and put them in orbit. I've even helped with design, construction, and debug of several spacecraft myself. I'm one of the control operators for one of them (AO-16). I established AMSAT's original web pages (replaced by new pages in June 2004), and served as Vice President for Electronic Publication until AMSAT's reorganization of October 2004.
	The San Diego Packet Radio Association is dead now, but I was involved from start to finish.
	I'm currently serving as webmaster for the Palomar Amateur Radio Club, the biggest general-interest amateur radio club in San Diego County.
	I'm a member and supporter of ARRL, the national association for amateur radio. I hold an ARRL appointment as Technical Specialist.
	SANDARC, the San Diego County Amateur Radio Council (sort of an umbrella club of clubs in the area) acts as a Volunteer Examiner Coordinator to administer amateur radio license examinations, mainly in San Diego County. I serve several times a year as a volunteer examiner.

Software

See also my software page. Most of the software I've published is connected to amateur radio.

Milestones

Summer 1977	Novice license, WD5HFW
May 1978	Purchased my first rig, an Eico 753 (ugh), and put up a 40m dipole at my parents' house in Orange, TX
April 1979	Upgraded to General. Bought my first microphone (a beautiful Astatic D-104).
June 1979	Upgraded to Advanced.
July 1979	Received new callsign, KB5MU.
August 1979	Moved to Houston, TX for college.
June 1981	Purchased my first 2m FM rig, an ICOM IC-2AT handheld.
July 1982	Purchased my first decent HF rig, a Kenwood TS-830S.
January 1983	Upgraded to Extra (at the Houston FCC office)
July 1983	Started into digital communications with an AEA CP-1 computer interface for RTTY using a Commodore VIC-20 computer. I swore to myself that the computer was only for amateur radio. Oh yeah.
January 1984	Moved to San Diego, CA for work - apartment bound. Worked mostly 2m FM, including lots of traffic handling on the local net.
February 1985	Moved into a house (renting a room).
April 1985	Put up an HF antenna again, thanks to a cool landlord.
September 1986	Made my first satellite contact via RS-5.
March 1988	Made my first packet satellite contact on the FO-12 satellite BBS.
October 1990	Bought my first house. Room for antennas!
since then...	Filled up the house with toys.

Here's a picture of the antenna farm in San Diego before they all came down in 2004 for a house renovation project:

Visible, counterclockwise from the upper left:

TV antenna on a push-up mast
VHF/UHF discone
KLM 435-18C fixed-pointed at Mt. Otay for a 56kbps packet link
DSS dish
Cushcraft R5 HF vertical
40-m dipole (almost invisible, hanging from roof tower)
KLM 435-40CX 70cm circularly polarized cross-yagi
KLM 2M-22C 2m circularly polarized cross-yagi

Not visible is a chimney-mounted 2m/1.25m dual-band vertical.

As of May 2005, the DSS dish, R5, discone, wire dipole, and 2m/1.25m vertical have been re-installed, and the TV antenna replaced with a smaller UHF-only antenna system for HDTV. The satellite antennas are likely to go back up reasonably soon.

kb5mu@amsat.org