Hello! Welcome to my qsl.net web page. Thank you for visiting!

I have been a licensed Amateur Radio Operator since 1992, originally receiving the Novice call KD4IZB. My first license arrived just weeks before the 1992 Novice Roundup, which I worked for the maximum hours, building enough CW speed to pass the General 13 wpm shortly thereafter. A month after that I passed the Advanced test, and then struggled for the next six months to reach 20 wpm for the Extra. By then, everyone knew my Advanced call, so I kept it when upgrading.

I recently retired from a career in Information Technology. I hold a Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering, and over the years have worked as a developer, designer and manager of IT solutions in many different industries. In my newly-found spare time I enjoy building electronic gadgets, playing guitar and serving as a Boy Scout leader.

I am a Director of the Boca Raton Amateur Radio Association and serve as sysop of our Echolink node, N4BRF-R.

I am also a member of Palm Beach District Amateur Radio Emergency Service (ARES), serving as a storm shelter communicator at West Boca Raton Community High School.

In addition, I currently serve as Section Youth Coordinator for the ARRL Southern Florida Section. Together, all of these activities help me further my personal ambition to bring more young people into the Amateur Radio hobby.

A while ago I obtained an X1M QRP transceiver and began working low-speed CW on 20m and 40m. I take this tiny rig with me when my scout troop goes camping. I have built several lightweight antennas, a miniature antenna tuner (see below) and an audio filter to round out my portable station. So far, results with the X1M have been good, although somewhat quirky. At least it's helping me get my CW back up to speed after doing mainly SSB for the past few years!

I recently acquired a new base rig - a Yaesu FTDX-3000. This radio is a giant leap forward from my good-but-ancient Kenwood TS-940, and I am enjoying learning the ins and outs of all the Yaesu's new features. The TS-940 will remain in my shack as a back-up, as it is still an excellent radio despite its lack of some of the newer bells and whistles.

Living here in the "Land of No" I can't do much in the antenna department - just dipoles in the attic, cut for 40, 20, 12 and 10 meters. When I want to get away from all the electrical noise my home generates, I go out to the BRARA club station. It's located in a county park, well away from any man-made noise makers. I have also recently purchased an Ultimax end-fed antenna, and am in the planning process of what will definitely be a "stealth" installation.

Most of my gadget building uses the Atmel AVR series of microcontrollers - the same processor family used on the Arduino family of prototyping boards. In addition to the Arduino toolset, there is an excellent freeware IDE for these chips called WinAVR, which supports the entire AVR series and provides some additional flexibility. I will add pages for some of my projects as time permits.

Watch this space for links to more of my projects:

Electronic Dice

Altoids Antenna Tuner

You can send me e-mail through this website.

73 for now

Bruce