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Current Feature Articles   Dec 01 Youth@HamRadio.Fun: 'Tis the Season, Ham Style!   Dec 01 It Seems to Us: Our Next Spectrum Challenges   Nov 28 Surfin': QSLing Those Radio Memories   Nov 27 Amateur Radio Quiz: Watts In a Name?   Nov 21 Surfin': Revisiting Radio Monitoring Memories   Nov 17 The Amateur Amateur: Radiomobile   Nov 17 Handy Reference   Nov 14 Surfin': Tying Ham Radio Together with Twine   Nov 07 Surfin': How We Got Here   Nov 03 Amateur Radio Quiz: A Spare Hour's Entertainment ARRL Products: Contesting (More) The ARRL DXCC Handbook -- Worldwide ham radio operating and the ARRL DXCC Award! 5-Band Worked All States Pin -- Out-of-Stock! -- Colorful design. 1-inch diameter pin with self-locking "tack" backing. Worked All States Pin -- You won the award...now show off your accomplishment! 2009 ARRL Amateur Radio Calendar -- Now Shipping! -- Deluxe 13 month calendar, featuring the vintage radio photography of Joe Veras, K9OCO. Includes important ham radio dates: contests, operating events and more! A-1 Operator Club Pin -- Show off your achievement for being among those operators that meet the highest operating standards.

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Folks still like to build stuff, so this week, we visit more Web sites that facilitate the homebrewers.

Fox Delta Amateur Radio Projects & Kits documents the various homebrew projects of VU2FD.

In response to the previous installment of Surfin', I received additional information about Web sites related to homebrewing that I will share with you this week.

Dinesh Gajjar, VU2FD, wrote, "Recent news on the ARRL Web site regarding `homebrewing is back' is very interesting. I am a homebrewer and have made many projects and give PCBs and kits to amateurs worldwide. Kindly visit my homebrewing Web site, Fox Delta Amateur Radio Projects & Kits."

I visited Dinesh's Web site and found a wide variety of projects, from an LCD RF power meter based on a PIC to a crystal radio built by Dinesh's daughter, Nina. Each project is well documented with schematics, parts lists, PCB layouts, downloadable software and such.

Paul Laing, VK2YIL, e-mailed, "I was looking for free PCB making software and found, to my surprise, two very good looking General Public License (GPL) versions: FreePCB and Kicad." Add Paul's finds to the PCB software I wrote about here in 2004, specifically on August 27, September 10 and September 24.

Dan Brown, N8YSZ, wrote, "This isn't directly ham radio related, but seems very much in the spirit of homebrewing: Instructables: step-by-step collaboration. Surely the ham radio community has plenty of projects which could be added!"

Instructables is brought to you by squid-labs.com, which makes a lot of stuff for business and pleasure. For a long time they looked for a convenient system for documenting their how-to projects and the things they make, but it didn't exist. So, they developed their own system and the Instructables Web site is the result of their work.

Until next time, keep on surfin'.

Editor's note: Stan Horzepa, WA1LOU, dedicates this installment of Surfin' to his mother, Loris E. Horzepa, the person most responsible for getting him into the writing business. To communicate with Stan, send e-mail or add comments to his blog.

Previous: The Amateur Radio Crossword Puzzler

Next: The K7RA Solar Update