Calendar Week 18/2026 · Read by Charlotte, your new OERadio voice (ElevenLabs Multilingual).
Welcome to the OERadio Weekly Digest, calendar week eighteen. New on the mic: Charlotte, your new OERadio voice. This week on oeradio.at: six new articles, including a comprehensive QRP guide, an SDR beginner’s guide, a LoRa mesh comparison, a love letter to a vintage transceiver, and Hansl’s latest satire. Plus the DX weather forecast.
Highlight of the Week: QRP — Around the World with 5 Watts
This week’s highlight is a comprehensive guide: QRP Operation: Around the World with 5 Watts. QRP means a maximum of 5W CW / 10W SSB — and the article demonstrates with a VOACAP analysis that the coverage difference between 1W and 99W is smaller than most operators expect. From the history of 1920s transatlantic QRP contacts to a comprehensive buyer’s guide of current transceivers across three price tiers: premium (Elecraft KX2/KX3, IC-705, Lab599 TX-500), mid-range (Xiegu X6200/X6100), and budget kits.
Technology and Practice
Three more tech articles this week — from SDR reception to LoRa mesh to vintage radio.
RTL-SDR for Beginners: Discover the World of Radio for 30 Euros — The RTL-SDR Blog V4 is the recommended entry point: 500 kHz to 1.7 GHz, built-in HF upconverter and TCXO. The Realtek R828D chip is no longer manufactured, making the V4 a limited edition. Receive everything from aviation to ADS-B, AIS ship tracking, weather satellites, and amateur radio bands.
MeshCom vs. Meshtastic: LoRa Mesh Networks for Radio Amateurs — A detailed comparison of the two LoRa mesh platforms. MeshCom (Austrian variant, 433 MHz) versus Meshtastic (international open-source, 868 MHz). The article covers three European LoRa bands, power limits, duty cycles, and regulatory differences.
Yaesu FT-290R: 2.5 Watts of Pure Addiction — A love letter to the portable all-mode 2m transceiver from the early 1980s. FM, USB, LSB and CW at 2.5 watts. The author converted the battery compartment to lithium cells with USB-C charging. The message: no firmware updates, no touchscreen, just a VFO knob and mechanical switches.
News from Hansl Hohlleiter
Our AI satire editor Hansl Hohlleiter struck again — in the Jammer – Satire on the Air column.
The Locator Denier — When Maidenhead Becomes a Culture War. Karl Grantner, OE0KGN, completely loses it during a routine 40m QSO when his contact gives a grid locator instead of a city name. Karl considers the Maidenhead system newfangled nonsense — despite it existing since 1980. What follows is an epic monologue about the good old days.
DX Weather CW 19/2026
The DX Weather forecast for CW 19 brings excellent news. Solar flux at 159 (highest in weeks), sunspot number at 133. The geomagnetic field settles to K-index 1–2. Band forecast: 20m and 17m rated very good, 10m and 12m showing regular F2 propagation. 17m is the band of the week — less crowded than 20m with excellent DX paths to Asia and Africa.
73 — your oeradio.at editorial team
Transparency Notice
This digest was written by the oeradio.at editorial team with support from AI (Claude, Anthropic) and read by Charlotte (ElevenLabs Multilingual v2). All content has been editorially reviewed. Feedback welcome at [email protected].
