CQWW-CW 2022

Entered SOSB 80M High assisted, but didn’t work long hours in the night.
Had a lot of RX-problems mainly because of the electric fence next to my antenna.
But the fence is necessary to keep the wolf out…

Nice DX were ZM1A (Long path in the morning), VK6, E2A (HS), 3B8 (missed 3B9, would have been an ATNO).
Didn’t work any Russian stations.

New DXCC on 2M: HV0A

On July 8 there was a big Es-opening, our qtf direction South Italy.
I knew HV0A was active on 6M, it was announced on the web.
But I was surprised to ‘see’ HV0A on 2m FT8, working locals.
I called him a few times but he was still working locals, not aware of the opening?

After 10 minutes he suddenly came back for me.
QSO was completed in the next sequences.

Hardly any traffic on .300 cw or ssb. QSO ssb is about 6x times faster than FT8 (4 per minute)
But every is stuck on .174

CQ 160

48 hours CQ-160M contest, crowded bands up to 1890, lots of interference and stations with horrible clicks.
Beverages are very necessary in order to get some more quiet signals, but no chance if a station from EU jumps on a DX-station in order to attract more customers….

Best DX East was JA (only 1), VR2 & E2X heard, JT worked.
Best DX West was XE and states TX, NM & AZ. 27 states worked (USA & Canada)
South only 3V8SF, no SA-continent, some Caribean stations.

Covid takes down many expeditions, especially the Carib was underperforming.
Usually there are many USA-expeditioners hunting multipliers on NA-mainland.
But no PJ4, P4, etc.

Stew Perry 2020 and Bella

The best contest of the year: Stew Perry full edition. Only 24 hours with a limit for 14h attendence. So time enough for sleep. In the night a huge storm system named Bella entered Europe which gave gail force winds in The Netherlands. But the next morning I found my vertical (17m) still straight up, bending in the wind. Pfoe…

Conditions were not very good, path close to the pole was closed in both directions. Lots of deep QSB.
Middle East was absent, Africa only one station, Caribean just a few. South America not heard here. So it was Europe and North America.

My best station East was HL5IVL (heard Japan) and West XE2X. I used 400W and two short (50m) beverages NE-NW. In logging I used Assisted by RBN.

CQWW CW 2020

I only wanted to enter the 160M section but heard some nice DX on 10M for the first time in several years.
So I also made some qso’s on 10M.
I uoloaded my log in the 160M High Assisted section, but I doubt that will be accepted.
Maybe better to split the log in two parts, the 10M log as ‘checklog”. Can you send in two logs?

New band DXCC confirmed: 60M

Today I received confirmation no. 100 on the 11th band: 60M.

Most contacts are with FT8. Not much cw/phone going on on 60M. But I was lucky to work nice DX like PJ5 and TT8 in cw.

I started 60M in December and worked about 300 calls. I was very selective in my qso’s. With FT8 it is just hitting the send-button and get some coffee and watch the screen, not very exciting.  The ‘deep search’ funtion delivered a real fake qso with ZA. Very strange in my log it was completed but the station never a qso with my computer. We both checked the logs (all transmissions are logged in a hash-file) and indeed in his his log no sign of my call&report. Very strange.

The ARRL doesn’t see 60M as a DXCC-band so no extension for my 10Band tablet. Strange that the ARRL can decide on which bands are valid for DXCC-validation. There are more than 170 DXCC’s active on 60M. In the USA the use of 60M is very restricted but why this leads no a non-qualification beats me.

But it what I think of my hobby, and now I worked 11 bands DXCC.

CQ160 cw

This is one of the best 160M cw contest every year. Like Stew but far more stations.
I worked assisted with skimmer and the bandmap was full of stations.
Sometimes I was working two stations the same time because if there is only 200 Hz seperation between calling stations it is obvious that they both will here my call/report. But only one makes it into my log…

Lots of DX to work too, like E2X, JT5DX, YV1DIG (new one), XE2X, CX6VM. Worked 30 States in W/VE with AZ, NM en CO as best DX.
CE2LR, LU hrd but weak like XV1X. XV1X was out of band (1809) but worked split with rx up 1 which is clever solution!

Have to look into my Linear 1K-FA, I think the display is all wrong about power output. In operate mode (but no tx) the meter already displays 15W. When tuning with 20W the meter displays 45W out. Something wrong here.
My feeling is that the output itself was OK, but have to check too.
Never a dull moment.

Big Stew (December Stew)

Big Stew is the best 160M contest in my opinion. Very busy and good operating. And no multiplier-effect so all stations are workable in a decent way with no or short waiting (in the cqww there are big pile-ups on “new multipliers”).

Nice DX were KL7RA XE2X K0RF VE6WZ. No SA heard, PJ2T heard but couldn’t get my call in.

Als a new DXCC (for me) showed up 7X7X in the contest. 158 DXCC worked on 160M.

I have the feeling that my reception has to improve, when I listen to stations in my neigbourhood I’m sometimes not able to hear what they are working. On 160M the distance between stations is not a big deal (not like Sporadic Es on 2M).
From PA to antenne is about 50 meter but on 160M that will only cost 3 dB. And the beverages I use are close to my house, one has a preamp.

Looking into small rx-systems like SAL-30 or the 9-circle (article by W1FV)

 

 

60M running

With a FT-857D which was made ready for 60M, I tried to work some new ones.
But I needed an antenna for this band and after some research bought EZwire-500W-16m endfed (with 1:9 balun)
On the website an swr of 1.2 is promised on 60M.

After a lot of experimenting and moving the antenne around on my lot (close to the tower, high in the tree, etc.)
I gave up. This type (16m version) is not going to work on 60M.

Strangely enough on the website of Ezwire there is a page which shows that on 5353 kHz the swr is way up and Rs > 100 ohm.
That matches with my measurments.

I found a spare 18m Spiderbeam pole in the barn and mounted it in between the trees (we have to manage the WAF – wife acceptance factor).
With a wire length of 13,5 meter the vertical was easy tuned to 60M: Rs = 50 ohm, X=10 and swr 1.2
In the last 48 hours worked about 50 countries, most of them on FT8 and a few on cw. VR2 heard, XE worked, zone 3 worked.

I’m planning to use my TS-2000 for this job but it needs a small ‘operation’ for that. The TS-2000 has a port for an external rx-antenne and with the beverages I might work DX more easy.

Never a dull moment.

FT8 is here to stay

It is a sad development but unstoppeble. FT8 is here to stay, and other (digital) modes will die out. RTTY? Hardly heard in 2019.
The last 2 DXCC’s on 160M added to my track record are FT8-qso’s. I tried to work those stations in cw on 160M but the percentage of time they were spending on 160 cw versus FT8 was very low. See A50BOC stats on clublog. Low number on cw, zero RTTY.

Band	CW	FT8	SSB	Total
160	268	669	0	937

(This only shows 160m but no RTTY-qso on any band.)

TO9W: 153 RTTY out of 12888 qso
V6K no RTTY qso
PJ5-expedition: no RTTY
VK9CZ no RTTY

So conclusion can be: RTTY (and maybe other modes but not much in use on dx-peditions) is DEAD.

I worked them on 80m in cw for a new one. But I didn’t manage a cw-qso on 160M, but I did in FT8.

When working with WSJT some data is already predefined (time-block). The automation (sequencing) is nearly perfect, you hit the enter key once and can make coffee while the machine is running the qso. Technically speaking it is (nearly) unattended working which is forbidden in our license.

Last week I started with WSJT on 144 MHz, MSK-144 mode. But no rx because my frequency was not within the limits of WSJT (200 Hz).
Thanks to PA3BIY I tried MSHV which has a much bigger window. That is how I found out that my trx is off by 400 Hz (better: +400 Hz.)
I then worked 2 stations with 50W rf only. My first MS-qso’s since…when? I don’t know, maybe last century.

Still experimenting with 60M antenna’s. The endfed from EZwire doesn’t work but don’t know why. So I started to build a 1/4 wave vertical, still had a spare 18m glasfiber-pole. Nearly ready this weekend but a storm on Saturday blew it away. Have to restart again, luckely no irreversible damage done.