My other hobbies.

[Sadoun]

OK, several of you have other electronic / electrical / mechanical (DIY) hobbies other than FTA television.

What other hobbies you have?
How did that lead you to discover FTA television?

 

[walrus1957]

Other than being an Electronic Engineer and a master at Carpentry, I love to fish. So much so that I leased a lot along the Elkhorn river. The lot came with a cabin that I purchased relatively cheap and then built another cabin and storage shed on the property.

The river lot is positioned below the bluff and there is no OTA TV or cell phone reception there. I got involved in FTA satellite just to get TV reception at the cabin. Had a great dish farm growing for awhile until I went motorized!

I loved FTA satellite so much that I cancelled my sub to DN at home and setup FTA at the house with two motorized 76cm dishes for KU linear and a 1.2 meter dish for C-band.

 

[AcWxRadar]

Although FTA has somehow taken the driver's seat for the past few years, I have many other hobbies and interests.

I have always been interested in electronics and gadgeteering. Home theater and music please me. I have been working on setting up a small scale "drive-in" theater for my river resort friends, that's a fun project.

I like boating, but basically anything revolving around "water" is highly interesting and enjoyable to me. I have pondered designs for a hover craft or a jet boat for use in shallow waterways. Designing such is a great deal of fun and I used to visit other forums which were specifically devoted to their construction (jet-on-a-jon).

I like fishing a great deal, probably my biggest hobby. Designing electronic gadgets to accompany this hobby to make it easier or more fun is a great challenge and a lot of fun.

Automated equipment (such as what I program and maintain at work) is a neat hobby. I could apply such equipment for home use, like home survelience and automated control of certain household operations. One item I have always wanted to incorporate is a bait tank for fishing out in the garage that I could set up with a PLC and I/O modules to control the water level, purity and temperature all via a PLC.

Computer networking is becoming an important part of my life with my FTA hobby, so I would consider computers and programming them as becoming a high point of interest.

Building a cabin has long been a goal of mine, something more elaborate than just an RV like I have now.

Tying electronics into enjoying the great outdoors is a major interest. Even astronomy and telescopes would be fanciful for me.

Chemistry and Physics are great! Fabricating my own fireworks or home brewing beer are cool things to do. I would really like to build some rockets (remember the Estes rockets?) to deliver a payload to the sky and provide a fabulous report with a beautiful aerial display.

Mushroom hunting with my girlfriend is great fun in the spring and fall. I use GPS units to mark our finds from year to year.

I guess these are my most commonly excercised or pondered hobbies.

RADAR

PS Walrus and I spend a great deal of time together, we share many of the same interests, went to the same schools and colleges and worked at the same aviation company for ten years or so. His cabin is a few doors away from mine and just down the hill from one of my houses (the one that I live in now). We need to set up some sort of extended WiFi network to connect my cabin and his to my satellite internet up here on the top of the bluff. So, there is another project of interest for he and I.

 

[Bill_KY]

I got a small place away from here at another location in the boonies go camping there 4 wheeling...etc.... in the country, no internet there or DBS. I like listening to the alternative talk radio networks on the internet. Since no internet there, 97W Ku Band (the radio side) was the answer. That was my main reason....at first.

There I get three TV markets, Louisville, Lexington and Cincinnati, and since I already had a C-band dish there that came with the place, so I kind of branched out FTA there to compliment the OTA stations.

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

I love radio DXing (HD Radio has killed a lot of it though) and no I never have kept logs or sent in for QSL reports. I just like hearing far away stations that I should never be able to pick up.

I also love listening to Shortwave radio. Even today its still amazing whats out there to listen to.

 

[Anole]

mostly electronics

I have been a ham for a loooong time, and enjoyed communications both as a hobby and in the Signal Corps.

I've built a number of silly one-of-a-kind devices over the years.
One was a microprocessor repeater controller, with voice feedback.
Not so unusual today, but it certainly was when I did it. -

One of the more amusing, was an automatic garage door closer.
After installing the door mechanism, I'd come home and then leave the door open.
First design was to rely on the ambient light level; looking out the door and down the street, I could see the setting sun.
Revised design used CMOS parts, and was powered directly from the minimal juice that went to the remote "close" button.
It has a dip-switch settable timer, for 10, 20, 40, 80 minutes.

About ten years ago, I was experimenting with wi-fi, and seriously considered putting in a 3-mile direct link.
But, then I realized it was kinda pointless with all the other solutions available in suburbia (land line, cell phone, internet, fax, bicycle, carrier pigeon, etc), and moved on to satellite.
However, with a valid need, it'd sure be fun -

We need to set up some sort of extended WiFi network to connect my cabin and his to my satellite internet up here on the top of the bluff.

 

[Lak7]

Fishing!
But with a couple of young kids, FTA it is.

 

[ACRadio]

I've been a ham operator for nearly 20 years...wow...that means I don't lack too many years to be eligible for the Quarter Century Wireless Club...

I've been a musician almost all my life, and toured on the Southeast club circuit for many years in the 1980's (yea, I was a rocker ). I enjoy audio engineering and digital recording, and I build and repair computers for some extra cash.

 

[Mr Tony]

ice fishing
spending time at the cabin

 

[gremlin411]

Drag Racing was my hobby. Then I got married !!! Now with young kids TV is all I have and I am not getting to much of that.

 

[kirara386]

I kind of bounce between all the hobbies listed below, otherwise it can be kind of expensive to do them all at once.

FTA
Astronomy
Freshwater fishtanks
Home Theater
Computer building

 

[semco72057]

I waited until retirement from the military and the state to get into FTA, but I am a builder of computers and have built 11 towers so far and have many operating systems including: Windows, OS/2, Solaris, Linux, DOS (both PC and MS-Dos), and BeOS. Art was one of my hobbies for years, and hunting. I have a collection of firearms and fishing tackle and do go fishing some, but have given up on hunting unless we have another depression. FTA is my latest hobby and I am planning on getting a C band dish set to put up with the Ku dish, Hughes dish, and Directv dishes. It will look like a military installation around my house at the rate I am going.

 

[jbmiller]

i'm a amateur radio operator my call is ka6nei i also modified a scanner to display the weather polar satellites also use 2 meters to contact the mir, iss and the space shuttle . also contact the russian rs satellites via hf and 2 meters.good example of what the pictures look like (this is my favorite webpage) Weather Satellite Images from polar orbiting satellites
i got into c band because of christian tv no local christian tv in wisconsin
i live in an apartment now only have fta ku band

 

[jbmiller]

i almost fergot i love computers i had a vic 20 ibm286 back in the early 80's i used the computers fer ham use like rtty, packet radio i had a jnos (tcpip) node we use to connect to a internet wormhole and was able to connect to other hams around the country . and i just love slow scan tv on hf. sending pictures back and forth.
in the 90's i also did amateur tv too live tv. send and rx.
AMATEUR TELEVISION
john

 

[badmotorscooter]

My first hobby is my trade, I design loudspeakers for the consumer and commercial market for a very large speaker company. That flows into my other hobbies which include home theater, car audio, and pretty much anything electronics related. Other honorable mentions include...

motorcycles, on and off road
woodworking, and fabrication in general

I have way too many, and not enough time to get them all done.

 

[LoTech]

VIC 20... Those were the days. I had one of those. A TRS-80, Timex/Sinclair, and PC-JR too.

In addition to FTA, I build and repair computers. I also teach mathematics, physics, A+ computer maintenance, and Network+. With that background it was a natural leap to FTA. I'm just sorry I took so long to take the plunge. In my off time, my wife and I have a horse farm.

 

[dfergie]

Besides Electronics & Satellite,
Camping & Hunting (which I haven't gotten to do as much as I would like lately)
Watching Sprint Cars and Drag Racing...

 

[PopcornNMore]

Top hobbies include:
1) FTA Satellite
2) FTA Satellite
3) FTA Satellite

I also enjoy electronics, home theater and computer programming.

 

[Sadoun]

Some of my hobbies are:

• Flying an Ultralight and trying to get my sports pilot license.
• Hunting (with a crossbow or a shotgun)
• Reading
• Travel (for business and with family)
• Making olive oil

 

[bic]

It's been an interesting journey; and actually similar to others in this group. I have a background of chemistry sets and rocket building as a teenager. (I have a few scars from that experience.)
Have always been involved in furniture building and home crafts. Built a stereo receiver/amp from a kit (Heathkit) in the 70's.
Got involved in computers with an Apple 2C in the '80's. That just grew and now I put together my own and rebuild about every two years.
After the kids left home we got a TV (children and homework don't mix) and we sub with b3v. Hated it. Way to much money for little variety.
Then one day a friend that had a BUD told me about the free TV that was out there. I realized that there STILL IS FREE tv like I remeber from Southern Canada but now it has to be accessed via satellite.
Onward and Upward.