Some more off-road pictures

Hmmm.....

Here are some more pictures of my Isuzu Bighorn in all it's glory and mud!

ha...ha.. Enjoy!

 

My radio pictures

 

 

 

 

 

 

My other passion.

Well, I've shared my current passion for cycling (MTB mountain bike) and also my previous passion 4 wheel drive off-road.

This time I'll share another of my current hobby, amateur radio. I'm a licenced ham radio operator Class B with privileges on the 2 metre VHF (very high frequency 144-148Mhz) band, 70 cm UHF (ultra high frequency 430-440Mhz) band, 6 metre 50-54Mhz and HF 28-29.7 Mhz.

At the present moment I do not have full privileges on all HF bands which will allow me to talk to like minded hams all over the world as my licence is not a Class A. To upgrade to Class A licence, I will have to sit for the CW morse code test of which I have totally no interest at all. Hopefully by 2007, the Malaysian government will abolish the morse code requirement. Then, I can get myself an all-band radio and talk to the world! As for the Class B, I had to sit for the RAE exam conducted by MCMC, a federal government department. I got my licence is 2002.

I'm mainly active on the 2 metre VHF band and rag-chew/QSO while mobile in the car. Basically, I can now talk to hams as far as Brunei and whole of Sabah with some blind spots here and there.

Attached are some pictures of the radios that I used to own/still own. There's also a picture showing my base antenna at home which is a Diamond F23 mounted approximately 50 feet above ground.

It's actually quite fun talking to fellow hams whom you do not know. You get to make new friends and when one has full HF privileges, you can then talk to the world anytime anywhere.

So, I'm actually waiting for the government to abolish the morse code requirement like other countries in the world who have done so.

Whenever you fly on board a plane, look at the plane's body and tail, you will see a call sign. Example, all Malaysia Airlines and Air Asia planes carry the call sign 9M???. The 9M indicates it's from Malaysia and the other suffixes indicates it's individual call sign. So, mine is 9W6VX. The 9W indicates I'm from Malaysia, the 6 indicates I'm from Sabah and VX is my invidual call sign.

Other examples are Singapore 9V, Australia VK, Brunei V8, Thailand HS, New Zealand ZL etc. etc.. Each country has a individual prefix designated by the ITU (International Telecommunications Union) based in Switzerland.

Renewal of friendship Part 2.3

Dav came back to KK last week for a few days to clear up his condo as he's going to rent it out. Unfortunately, Lily did not make it as Dav said that the kids are back at school in Singapore unlike my children's school which gave them a week off.

We met up and I helped Dav to move his personal effects to his parents place. His Japanese tenant was quite picky but everthing worked out at the end. I did however manage to practice my horribly broken Japanese...........

Dav left his Kona Blast MTB bike at my place and I am now officially the guardian for his baby. He even left his pair of dirty clipless MTB shoes at my place. Hmmm..... his shoes were really dirty and being the guy that I am, I washed his shoes and they are now clean........ Dav, I will have to charge you for cleaning your dirty Louis Garneau shoes!!!! ha..ha... By the way, I also pumped up the tyres of the poor Kona as she was deflated.

Not to worry my man, your Kona and shoes are safe in my home. We'll go riding together anytime you are back here. I'll give her some loving and I'm sure she'll be happy to stay with me until you come back to ride her! yeeha....!!!

Lily, looks like we will have to take another raincheque for our dinner! Not to worry, I look forward to meet you again and renew our friendship....... when there's a will, there's a way..... REAL friendship has no time limits and I only wish that we had met up earlier before you and family moved to Singapore. I'm sure that your two lovely daughters would have got along fine with Amanda who will turn 9 by June.

So, Dav, when is our next "ngiew chap (beef noodles)" session at Menggatal?

I did not realize that Dav almost became my neighbour as he was interested in the house just behind mine. Somebody else beat him to it before he could purchase it. Now, it would be great if Dav was my neighbour as I would not have to tolerate the idiot who purchased the house but were so stingy that there have no fencing lighting at all and totally screwed up my garden which was initially planted with carpet grass but is now sundal grass due to them planting all kinds of fruit trees and not cutting the grass regularly..............!!!!!! Alas, the grass in my garden is all shit now..... sigh.......oh well........

Cheerio.