https://ve4kl.ca/A simple place to record my hobbies. 2026-02-22T21:15:56-06:00 Andrew VE4KL https://ve4kl.ca/ Jekyll © 2026 Andrew VE4KL /assets/img/favicons/favicon.ico /assets/img/favicons/favicon-96x96.png 2026-02-22T00:00:00-06:00 2026-02-22T00:00:00-06:00 https://ve4kl.ca/posts/connecting-teksavvy-fibre/ Andrew VE4KL

Background I started browsing TekSavvy while looking for alternative internet plan now that our BellMTS promo was finishing and they had no interest in continuing a reasonable price. I wasn’t generally interested because service would be through Rogers cable and my house currently doesn’t have a Rogers drop and I’m not interested in waiting years for them to trench in a temporary service. Howe...

2025-08-19T00:00:00-05:00 2025-08-19T00:00:00-05:00 https://ve4kl.ca/posts/adsb-receiver/ Andrew VE4KL

This is the build of my outdoor, Raspberry Pi based ADS-B receiver. I’ve wanted to build a project like this for a while, and this was my first attempt. The why I’m an aviation nerd who lives near a reasonably sized international airport. I’ve been in the hobby for about a decade now. I started with a RTL-SDR with the included antenna trimmed for 1090 MHz on a cookie can inside a window. When...

2025-05-26T00:00:00-05:00 2025-05-26T00:00:00-05:00 https://ve4kl.ca/posts/POTA-activation/ Andrew VE4KL

Last weekend, we managed to get a quick trip in to St. Malo Provincial Park south of Winnipeg, Manitoba. The weather was dry and not too hot. Antenna Setup This is now the second deployment of the homebrew End-Fed Half-Wave (EFHW) antenna. I extended the wire to around 20m to check performance on 40m. I scanned it with my RigExpert Stick Pro and got the results below. Not too bad, I would say...

2025-05-21T00:00:00-05:00 2025-05-21T00:00:00-05:00 https://ve4kl.ca/posts/OTA-television/ Andrew VE4KL

How I avoid paying for cable but still get local programming and live TV. I haven’t had a cable TV subscription since 2018. One of the ways I get television programming is through over-the-air (OTA) television. What is OTA Television Over-the-air television is a way to receive free TV broadcasts using an antenna. There are no subscription fees, and no cable or satellite plan is required. TV...

2025-05-19T00:00:00-05:00 2025-05-19T00:00:00-05:00 https://ve4kl.ca/posts/first-POTA-activation/ Andrew VE4KL

On the May long weekend, I completed my first Parks on the Air (POTA) activation at Hecla-Grindstone Provincial Park (CA-0546) in Manitoba. The weather when we arrived in the evening was cold and rainy. We woke up on day one (May 17) to overcast and temperatures near freezing. There were even some light flurries in the morning. My mid-day on day two (May 18), the overcast started to break up, w...