Author Archives: Paul

CloudLog Patreon #001

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I’ve know Peter 2M0SQL / MM3PHP for around 15 years. He’s now produces a self hosted logging application built on PHP and SQL that you run on own Web server space, or even on local network. Yes even a Raspberry Pi.

On a rare recent Skype call, I suggested he might try Patreon to support his making CloudLog. I have one he said, but never launched it.

I encouraged him and signed up quickly to support him. Currently only £5 a month, but with another 12 people (last time I checked) he’s earning a bit to support CloudLog.

Now that CloudLog supports multiple logbooks at some point I will move the logbooks back to thi site.

3D Printer

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In 2018 I got a small inheritance from a relative. One of the items I was going to invest in was a 3D printer to tinker with. I had a budget in mind of £300 – £400.

A few weeks ago a friend offered to a chat group I’m in his old printer to anyone who would pay £75 (available online for between £170-£230 at time of posting). I said was keen and we settled on £70, and a roll of filament was thrown in too.

Anet A6 Printer

I am now the owner of an Anet A6 3D printer. I went on Amazon and also purchased a new UltraBase heatbed and 2x Mosfets (for the Print head and Heat bed of the printer). I was advised the heatbed I’d either need a sheet of glass or something better, so went for the UltraBase option.

Also I have a Raspberry Pi 3 with 7″ touchscreen and installed OctoPrint ( https://octoprint.org ) to control the printing & whilst I was at it, I upgraded the Pi 3 from an 8Gb SD card to 64Gb.

I hope to be able to show some of my 3D Prints soon, but as of posting I’ve not actually printed anything.

I’ve a list of things I will 3D Print soon –
https://www.thingiverse.com/M0TZO/collections/things-to-make

I will make a collection on Thingiverse of things I’ve actually printed.

Caching

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At request of long term friend, I’ve re-enabled site caching with CloudFlare. Hopefully site should be faster loading for most users.

Radio 2019

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Was overdue for a post on this site. So here is a quick overview of current setup I use.

  • HF – Not currently setup for HF but hopefully later in year
  • VHF/UHF – FT-817 using Collinear dual 2m/70cm antenna in loft
  • D-Star / DMR – See Below
MMDVM PiStar Raspberry Pi Radio on 70cm.

The above MMDVM PiStar radio is used with the 2 radios and the Pager below.

Icom IC-E92D D-Star Radio
TYT MD-380 DMR Radio
Alphapoc 602R Pager

So short update, and yes mainly photos, but was about time and will try to update more regularly.

Raspberry Pi Updates

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I am going to upgrade my broadband with VirginMedia soon, and tonight I spent a few hours setting up using the SuperHub and retiring my old Fon 2.0n router.

This of course caused some issues on my network, but was to expected. Most was sorted by setting the Wifi SSID and Password the same as old router.

The more taxing issue was sorting my 3 Raspberry Pi (Original Pi B, Pi 2 and a Pi 3). They all have static IP address.

Basically I had to change the IP range the Superhub as using from default. Then as the SuperHub had a different DNS address, I decided after some research on how to update the Raspberry Pi to use OpenDNS on them.

Editing with “sudo nano /etc/dhcpcd.conf” the DNS line was amended as follows:

static domain_name_servers=208.67.222.222 208.67.220.220 208.67.222.220 208.67.220.222

I finished of the evening updating all 3 Raspberry Pis and wrote this short post.

On a side note, we’re paying around £80 for Phone & Broadband, plus whatever Sky costs. I’m going to use VirginMedia again for all 3 services and even with added movie channels will only be paying around £65 and increased Broadband speed (from about 20Mbps (tested speed) to 200Mbps hopefully on new contract. Sometimes it pays to shop around.