Milestones as SSTV Ham
- 1970 licensed as Class B and 1971 as Class A in a very
high age of 41 years HI !
- 1971 SM0BUO (now SM7BUO and F5VJB) became my SSTV
teacher. 1968 he had become the first one to transmit a
picture across the Atlantic to VE3EGO. I was and I am
still very proud of him.
- 1972 my home brew SSTV gear, a (WB8DQT) Flying Spot
Scanner (FSS) and a P7 phosphor tube monitor (W6MXV) was
ready for the SSTV world. With this 8s B/W FSS all our
continents were worked in SSTV. My first DX was WA2VTR
- 1975 I got my first commercial SSTV gear as a used Robot
70 monitor (P7 tube) and a sampling SSTV camera Robot 80.
At this time I was the only SSTV operator in Sweden and I
was so during the coming 20 years !
- 1976 June 19th was The Royal Wedding Day
between King Carl XVI Gustaf and Miss Silvia Sommerlath.
By my request HRH Secretary´s Office of Sweden sent me a
nice picture of the bridal couple. I used this photo in
my 70 qsos at that day, 19 were DX.
- 1977 my 1st Fast to Slow / Slow to Fast
(FS/SF) converter B/W 8s DL2RZ / SC-420 came to my house.
Now a normal TV monitor and camera could be used for
SSTV.
- 1978 W0LMD SSTV keyboard was built and now I was able to
put text on the screen.
Not as overlay on the picture !
- 1980 my 2nd FS/SF converter B/W 8-16s DL2RZ /
SC-422 and keyboard KB-422 came to my house. Now was text
overlay on pictures possible.
- 1981 the first color mode came in my 3rd
FS/FS converter B/W 8-16s DL2RZ / SC-422A with the frame
sequential 24s SSTV color mode. R-G-B filters in
front of a B/W camera, color TV monitor gave me color
SSTV. My first DX in color was KB9LU.
- 1983 my 4th FS/SF converter B/W 8-16-32s DL2RZ
/ SC-1 now also with line sequential 24s SSTV color
mode.
- 1984 my SC-1 was modified for PAL color interface, PAL
color camera and RGB color monitor. We had the "SC-1
modes" in B/W = 8-16-32s and in color =
24-48-48q-96qs.
- Around 1986 we had two great SSTV systems - in Europe the
SC-1 system - in USA the Robot 1200C system. However no
DX between the two systems, they were NOT COMPATIBLE.
Martin, G3OQD solved the problem with his modification of
the 1200C and a new EPROM was installed. The "Martin
modes" were born. Also Ed, GM3SBC introduced
his modification of the 1200C and his EPROM. The "Scottie
modes" were born.
- 1987 I got my computer controlled SSTV converter Robot
1200C in original 8-12-24-36s B/W and 12-24-36-72s color.
These are the "Robot modes". 1200C has
built in video digitizer.
- 1988 - 1998 all kind of modifications are done to the
"King Of SSTV" or Robot 1200C. With Martin´s
latest EPROM I have abt 56 different modes in my Robot
1200C ! The most popular PC program to control the
Robot 1200C is designed N9AMR.
- After 1990 and until our days the PC based SSTV dominates
the mode. I have several PC based SSTV programs in my
computer. Most of these work well other not so good. We
do not know how this PC based SSTV ends. All our good
SSTV program makers WW give us in the future the answer.
SM5EEP following YOU ! Since 1998 I use Combitech SSTV
program Mscan SSTV, easy to install and operate.
- 2003 my first HD SSTV program came to my
house as DIGTRX folloved by others like EasyPal etc. I
was informed about HD SSTV several years earlier by my
friends Don W9NTP and his tests with John VK33LM.