The First 100 Years Are The Hardest

 The ARRL International DX Contest was help over the weekend of February 19th - 20th.  I was able to run an hour on from my Dallas QTH on Saturday, and a few more hours on Sunday from the lakehouse.   Saturday I worked 40 and 20M while Sunday mostly 15M and 10M.   Propagation was good for CW.  In Dallas this was the first contest running with the new G5RV antenna.   Lakehouse used the trusty old Carolina Windom. The goal of the contest is for US stations to work as many DX stations in as many DXCC entities as possible.  For DX stations to work as many W/VE (US and Canada) stations in as many of the 48 contiguous states and provinces as possible. W/VE stations send a signal report and their state or province.  DX stations send a signal report and power as a number or abbreviation.  I programmed my FlexControl to send WX7V, and WX7V 5nn TX.  The contest was fun and propagation worked well for CW despite the solar conditions ...

I’m restoring a 10 year old DX Engineering Hexbeam antenna that I bought from a local ham.  The sales price included about 25” of galvanized pipe used as a mast. The fiberglass spreaders were sunburned and deteriorating.  Handing required thick leather gloves.  I marked the elements with electrical tape for easier reassembly.   First step was to clean and degrease with hot soapy water and a pot scrubber.  I used a cap of Windex and 16oz of hot water.    Once dried, I sprayed with primer and sealer - two coats.  Final step was to spray paint the elements flat black.  All using material I had on hand leftover from previous projects.   Will get it mounted in the spring. When it’s done it will look something like this-  new!

Follow up post from 3 years ago.   This weekend I needed to get some MiniDV videos transferred to my PC.  I have 25+ MiniDV tapes from the past 20 years so its important to keep the firewire interface working!   I'm using my old Sony Handycam DCR-TRV18 that I bought off eBay which is identical to the one stolen during a ski trip to Santa Fe several years ago.   I have a PCIe Firewire card (VIA chipset) in my PC similar to this cheap one from Amazon .   The legacy 1394 OHCI firewire drivers are required Windows 10.   Finally, I used a six pin firewire cable to connect the camcorder to the PC. Windows 10 support is more straight forward than Linux.   But I did have to spend some time fiddling with drivers and cables.   Google search shows a lot of solutions but the guide from this site worked best for me.    After you have the legacy drivers installed (1394-ohci_legacydriver.msi) manually update the driv...

I had fun in the National QSO Party SSB contest yesterday.  I used the old Yasesu FTdx-3000 since my Flex is back in Austin for repairs (operator error - tuned up into a dead short, and vaporized R24 on Ant Input 1, but that is another story).    Setup was quick thanks to the excellent Rig integration provided by Scott's N3FJP Contest Logger.  http://www.n3fjp.com/help/righelp.html Operated off and on for about 3 hours while we got ready to host the after party for Ava's Sadie Hawkins Highlights dance.    Worked 4 HF bands - 15, 20, 40 and 80M from EM12ub.   Made 89 Contacts with 66 multipliers including Hawaii,  Belize, the US Virgin Island and 4 provinces in Canada (BC, SK, MB, ON) resulting in 5874 QSO points for my claimed score.    From the NAQP Website: "The North American QSO Parties are favorites of beginners and seasoned operators alike. The NAQPs are low-power only (no amplifiers allowed) which makes for a lot mo...

I had fun on Sunday activating K-3007 Fairfield Lake State Park, Texas. My new HAMRS “Every Day is Field Day” hoodie kept me nice and warm! First activation of the new year with a goal of getting 15M going. Sadly I only logged 7 contacts in the first hour but was able to QSY and get a few three more contacts on 17m, then for fun a added a few P2P on 20 and 40M before calling it a day. Thank you for those who hunted and tried to hunt me. 15M was definitely tough today! Yaesu 991a, 100 watts into Chameleon Tactical Delta Loop. I got very good signal reports for those who could here me on 15M then worked a few more parks from on 15 when I got home. Next time I work 15M I’ll try my wolf river coil vertical. 73, Chris de WX7V

I really enjoyed the North American QSO Party this past weekend.  QSO parties are great for low power  (100W) operators like me, and the 12 hour format ensures I have time to do other things on the weekend.   I used Flexradio 6400, N3FJP NAQP Contest Log, and CW Skimmer to help with decodes.   All CW was sent from the PC using the Flexradio CAT Winkeyer emulation in ACLOG.   The first QSOs were made via CWX.   I then switched to FRrig which  works well for CWT.  But I found my rhythm by sending CW directly from the contest logger.   F1 set up to send WX7V, and F2 to send WX7V Chris TX.   I also configured additional function  keys to individually send Name, State and Tu 73 to resend specific elements of the exchange when necessary. The exchange is easy - listen for CQ,  toss out your call sign, then respond with Call sign, operator name and station location SPC (state, province or country),...

The 2022 winter contest season continued with the ARRL RTTY Round Up on first weekend of January of each year but never January 1st.   The goal of the contest is for Amateurs worldwide contact and exchange QSO information with other amateurs using RTTY (and other digital modes including PSK, FT8/FT) on 80, 40, 20, 15, and 10 meter bands.  I operated exclusively on RTTY.   Exchange:  RST + SPC (State / Province / Country), DX RST + S/N. Typically exchange when calling CQ: CQ CQ CQ CQ RU WX7V WX7V K ->Their Call Their Call R TU 599 599 TX TX  -> R WX7V 599 ( Their State ) Their Call TU DE WX7V QRZ? Typical exchange when answering: -They Call WX7V WX7V -> They Answer My Call R RPT Their State Their Call R TU 599 599 TX TX WX7V k -Their Answer 73 TU Their Call I had fun but only worked a few hours Sunday.   I used the N3FJP RU Contest log and the N7YG Digital Engine as the connected software for my flex radio. RTTY: 109 Qpts x 42 Mults ...

The hunters helped me finish 2021 strong with two new park activations: Lake Tawakoni State Park K-3031 and Tawakoni Wildlife Management Area K-6605.   Special thanks to NL7V for  North Pole Alaska!   97 Contacts all in, my logs submitted to K7 for processing and uploaded to LoTW for QSL confirmations. This was my first activation with the new Chameleon Tactical Delta Loop.  I've seen Bill Brown using it so effectively that I had to try it.  FB, and glad I did - much easier to set up than my WRC but requires a tuner which also allows faster band switching when conditions require.   This might be my new favorite antenna!  There were some shenanigans during the activations - people tuning up, humming and whistling.  I was able to fight thru it and get 41 contacts completed at K-3031 then 56 more at K-6605.  The WMA was off the beaten path - so off that the park sign was hard to find and not in the best repair! Map by  DL4MFM...

This weekend was the annual ARRL 10M contest for CW and SSB.   All contacts were limited to 10M (28MHz).   2 QSO points per SSB contact and 4 points for each CW contact.   Sunspot number was ZERO and the SF was about 78, making propagation a challenge.  So I operated 100% CW mode. Contest Summary I made 2 contacts right away Saturday morning, then the band closed until later Saturday evening where I went on a roll for 80 contacts.   Sunday was even more challenging - with very little activity all day.   I made an additional 10 contacts Sunday afternoon, the last few of which were questionable!   I operated the Flexradio 6400m at 75w fed into my OCF dipole.  Any higher power caused SWR to spike intermittently.   I did set up my wolf river coil vertical antenna on Sunday afternoon using ANT2 and operating at full 100W with no SWR issues.   I was able to set up and tune the WRC for 28M on the first tr...

I’m considering a Mosley Mini-32A for a “modest” contest antenna that I think is suitable for my QTH. I think they Mosley looks better than a Hexbeam, ways half as much, and has slightly better performance. A push mast is probably suitable for this mini beam. The W8IO 45LT rooftop tower is probably overkill and would be a challenge to install in my attic. The Glen Martin RT-424 is very popular but is not in production. eHAM reviews are mixed. The mini is a compromise over a full size yagi as it uses traps for automatic band switching with no need for a tuner in the ham shack. Based on the majority of the feedback I believe the performance will be great for daily POTA hunting and casual contesting. https://www.eham.net/reviews/view-product?id=1102 https://www.eham.net/reviews/view-product?id=10800 Mosley Product Specs http://www.mosley-electronics.com/mini.html https://www.w8io.com/io45lt.htm

For the ARRL November Sweepstakes I operated in the MULTI class, with the assistance of DX Spotting.  My strategy was to work all states, and as many sections as possible and I'm pretty happy with the results. Rig was my FlexRadio 6400M at 100 watts fed into a 40-6M OCF dipole using an inverted v configuration at 37ft.  I didn't use the Mercury IIIs amplifier because I used the internal tuner on the FlexRadio for quick band changes. QSO contacts were spread more or less evenly across the 15M, 20M and 40M bands.  I really loved 15 this weekend- it wasn't as crowded as 20m and 40m, contacts were easy to make, and the noise floor was noticeably quieter.  Some day I'll get that contest antenna / rotator setup. Logging was done using N3FJP's Contest log.  As a bonus I configured the logger to use the FlexRadio.API so that spots were sent directly to the panadapter on my FlexRadio's SmartSDR application.   After the contest was over, I submitted my logs onli...

I've been practicing my CW sending skills using the Elecraft KX3 keyer and text decoder as its pretty unforgiving.  Someone told me that if you can get the KX3 to decode you're probably sending clean CW correctly. Setup :  Put the KX3 in CW mode. Make sure VOX is off and the KX3 will generate a sidetone without transmitting. Hold the DLY button for 1/2 second to toggle VOX on or off . A VOX indicator will show in the display when it is on and a brief message will say "VOX=OFF" if you hit the paddle when VOX is off. The red TX LED should not light. Learn Morse Code has this this handy chart to learn which direction to push the paddle when you're sending CW.   Push the paddle to the left to send a DAH, to the right for a DIT.   Also is handy memory map when you're listening to CW and copying in your head.  Did I just hear an F (DIT DIT DAH DIT) or was that a U (DIT DIT DAH)?   Maybe both.... :)  

HD8R was active from October 26th to November 7th.  Glad I decided to hunt them on the last two days of their DXpedition !   Worked and confirmed 40M CW on Saturday 11/6, and 15M SSB on Sunday 11/7.    The CW contact was made at my Dallas QTH (EM12ou), using my FlexRadio 6400 and the 40M Delta Loop to send and CW-SKIMMER for receive assistance (I was able to head copy when they sent my call sign).  SSB was at the lakehouse (EM12ub) using my FTdx3000 and Wolf River Coil vertical tuned to 15M at 1.45 SWR.   I did not try FT8 but lots of members of the Richardson Wireless Klub did via WSJT-X Fox and Hound mode. The Galápagos Islands are about 2327 miles from Dallas TX!  Pictures and video below.    PS:  A DXpedition is an expedition to what is considered an exotic place (Island or Country) by amateur radio operators because there are very few radio amateurs active from that place. 73 Chris de WX7V