TO7BC Mayotte

A good day today. Not much operating as I had to install a new PC monitor here in the shack and then a new Freetime Freesat receiver down in the living room. It's one of the new ones with WiFi support so I don't need to run a network cable down to the living room which all existing boxes have required.

After that I came up to the shack to see if I had installed any new QRM generators. Switched to 10m PSK31 and heard a single solitary station - TO7BC  from Mayotte!

I'm not a DXer but this signal on its own in the clear was too much to resist. It took about 15 minutes to break the pileup. I couldn't hear any other callers so I used XIT to dial in 0.5kHz up and hoped for the best. After a while with no success I decided to go up another 100Hz and he came right back! I must have been the only station who received a 579 report.

I shall check the website later to see if I got in the log. I will also have to find out where Mayotte Island is! I don't often get to work DXpedition stations so I'm quite pleased with this afternoon's work. I'll check for QRM generators another time.

A good session on 15m

There was not much life on 10m this morning but 15m was really hopping. I started off using PSK31 and my first QSO was with a Ukrainian YL named Olga! Her call was US5UFF and her QSL shows that she is (X)YL of UR4UHE. I think the UFF stands for Ukrainian Flora and Fauna which seems to be a popular award scheme over in Ukraine.

I was calling CQ and worked a whole string of east European and Russian stations. Calling CQ is a good way to fill the log but not a good way to work much DX as if any DX did reply it would likely be lost under the strong local stations calling.

As the hour approached lunch time I did some search and pouncing and managed to nab HS4ESF from Mahasarakham University in Thailand. I don't think it's the first time I have worked Thailand on PSK but it was nice nonetheless, and he has a nice QSL.

I've often noticed from my beacon monitoring that the time around midday to lunch time is a good time to work DX on the higher HF bands. I didn't work any other DX today but I was pleased to see on Propagation Reporter that my 40W of PSK31 to an attic dipole had been decoded near Sydney in Australia! Perhaps I'll work VK on PSK31 one day!

PSK31 spots of G4ILO on 15m

I tried JT65A briefly but the band segment was full of the same stations I could easily work using PSK31 so I thought I would try CW instead. I "shook hands" (as John N8ZYA puts it) with Z320K, a special call to commemorate 20 years of the Z3 prefix (Macedonia.)  I then had a real QSO with Bill, WA1HMW who is an ex-Royal Navy. That QSO taxed my receiving abilities a bit so I decided to call it a day.

10m 18 November 2012

I nearly got myself locked out of the WSPR map page today. I must have managed to save the settings to try to display spots for all bands for the last 24 jours, or something like that, because whenever I went to the page the web browser froze up while it tried to render the map and I couln't get back to the settings boxes to change it. I had to find out how to delete all cached files in Chrome before I could access it again.

10m WSPR spots @ G4ILO 18 November 2012

I lost quite a lot of time trying to sort that out. I also spent an hour or so seeing what I could work on 10m PSK31. I managed to QSO with several US stations including N7WET in Tucson, Arizona and KB5IAV in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

I worked two all time new countries as well. Fabio CU3HN in the Azores has one of those QSLs that never fail to bring a smile to my face.

QSL of CU3HN

Victor, HP1AVS in Panama I had heard before but not managed to work. So I was pleased to add his call to the log as well.

QSL of HP1AVS

I love 10 metres!

10m wide open!

Ten metres has been wide open today. Stations have been heard or worked in just about all directions. I ran 2 watts of WSPR during the periods that I wasn't in the shack and the program screen resembled 30m!

WSPR spots on 10m at G4ILO, 26/9/2012

After a short period of WSPR I switched to voice mode and made a nice SSB contact with Ken, JA2FJP near Nagoya (nothing to do with cheap Chinese antennas!) After a rubber-stamp contact with R100BG I found phone a bit hard going with all the QRM and pileups so I retreated to the more restful pastime of working digimodes.

Digital stations hrd/wkd at G4ILO, 26/9/2012

I made one more Japanese contact - with JI4POR - and made my first-ever China contact - with BG8GAM - all on PSK31. I heard several more stations from those countries and also one from Korea (South, presumably) and one from Indonesia but didn't manage to work them. Better luck next time!

A session of calling CQ produced an endless succession of Russian stations. Where do they all come from? There is no chance of working interesting DX unless you search and pounce on the DX stations. Even when calling a specific DX station I was being called by Russian stations! Why do they do it? I lost the chance of a couple of first contacts because of it.

As the afternoon wore on many stations from North America and Canada started to be in evidence. My final PSK31 contact for the day was with Bob KZ0G in Missouri which is probably a first for that state for me.

Not a bad haul for a few hours listening / operating using a maximum of 40 watts PSK31 to an attic dipole. I wish there were more days like that!

Radio Tirana

Propagation on 10m today is as good as I can remember. I made a few nice contacts using SSB including Japan, India and Bahrain. I heard several Chinese stations as well but have yet to work one.

Not really DX but a new country for me was Albania, in the shape of Dik, ZA1E. Decades ago as a teenaged short wave listener I remember hearing Radio Tirana, a huge signal on 7.065MHz, smack in the middle of the 40m phone band. I wonder whether anyone ever listened to its broadcasts? They were pure anti-capitalist tirades read by a woman announcer who sounded like she had a beard and no sense of humour. They actually used phrases like "capitalist running dogs" if I remember correctly. At least Radio Moscow tried to make life on the other side of the iron curtain sound attractive.

I don't think there was any ham radio activity in communist Albania and there still aren't all that many hams there now so I was pleased to work Dik for a new one.

A day by the lake

The fine weather we have enjoyed for several weeks was forecast to change, so on Wednesday Olga and I decided to take the bus and go for a picnic lunch by Bassenthwaite Lake. For radio entertainment I took the UV-3R (in case of any SOTA or WOTA activations) and the FT-817ND.

HF conditions were pretty dire - WWV has been predicting blackouts - and I initially heard nothing above 20m. But even though I called the loudest stations that weren't calling "CQ DX outside Europe" no-one even acknowledged my existence. (What's wrong with working stations inside Europe, I'd like to know, especially when no-one is replying to your CQs anyway?)

The antenna I was using, the Wonder Wand L-Whip, could have been better. It does, however, have the advantage that it is small and light. At the moment I can't carry much, needing one hand for my walking stick and the other for balance, so everything has to fit in a small shoulder bag. So I didn't have anything else suitable.

The UV-3R produced a contact with Terry, G0VWP/P activating Walla Crag, the lowest Wainwright, prompting Olga to comment that the small radio was better than the big one!

After lunch I tuned around some more and heard some activity on 15m and 17m. And whilst tuning 17m I stumbled across this. Actually, that's what I heard a couple of minutes later after I'd dug my smartphone out of my jacket pocket to make the recording using Voice Recorder. What I heard first was ZD8D (Ascension Island) calling CQ. Repeatedly. With no takers. He was not very strong - about S4 on the '817 S-meter - with some QSB, but perfectly clear. Clearer in fact than in the recording. I called, but needless to say he didn't hear me.

As I've said before, I have little interest in working stations just to tick countries off a list. But I have a particular interest in the British colonies of Ascension Island and St. Helena as I visited both places during a "trip of a lifetime" in 1999 but have never worked either of them. Just my luck to come across a DX station calling CQ with no pileup when I'm surrounded by mountains and running just 5W to an extremely inefficient antenna!

Unwanted

Charles M0OXO laments the fact that England is 334th in the list of the most wanted 338 DXCC entities, in other words the fifth least wanted. Isn't it a sad waste of a hobby not to mention the vast sums of money people spend on equipment and antennas if the main interest in making a contact is just to be able to tick off a new country? I guess that's why I find DXing and DX blogs boring. I'd rather read about what people are building, new things that they are experimenting with or how far (even if it isn't all that far) someone manages to work with a peanut whistle.

Two new continents on 40m

I popped up to the shack after watching some evening TV and decided to have a listen to what was happening on JT65A on 40m. I tuned my K3 to 7.076MHz and had only been listening for a couple of minutes when I saw a CQ call from VK6BN appear on the screen. I only just managed to set up a reply before the start of the transmit period and you could have knocked me down with a feather when he came back with a report! We completed the QSO in the minimum 6 minutes.

I've been reported in VK before using WSPR, that's nothing unusual, but this is my first ever two-way contact with Australia on any band or mode and I'm pretty amazed to have achieved it on 40m of all bands using just 30 watts to my attic dipole. JT65A really is amazing!

As if that wasn't enough, I then worked KE1AF for my first contact with North America on 40m. So I shall be going to bed this evening feeling pretty pleased!

Denmark on 2m!

I have just worked OZ1HXM on 2m SSB, using 100W to a SuperMoxon antenna in the attic of a house on the west coast of England with a lot of mountains between here and Denmark. The fact that he was using 200W to a pair of 10 element Yagis must have helped a bit!

This is my first European DX on 2m and I am thrilled to bits. I can only imagine what the band must be like for people with a decent VHF take-off. OZ1HXM is the only station I can currently hear on the band so there doesn't seem to be much chance of working anyone else.

Japan on 15m

This morning I worked Kei, JI1BBN, on 15m PSK31 using 50W to the MFJ magnetic loop in the attic.

 I heard several other DX stations on both the loop and the dipole, including DU3MEL in the Philippines whom I last worked in 2003, also on 15m. That was also the last time I worked Japan. Then I would only have been using QRP with my Elecraft K3, and the antenna would have been a horizontal loop of wire round the perimeter of the attic, with a 4:1 balun at the centre of one side, tuned using the K2 internal ATU.

What's that about stealth antennas not working?

Bye bye Beaconworld

The Beaconworld website will be closing down in May. If you've never heard of it before, neither had I until I read about it in M0XPD's blog. But having visited the site, it seems to be an excellent and comprehensive resource for anyone interested in beacon DXing. It's a shame that it will disappear even though it is being closed for reasons that I can understand.

Have a look while it's still here. Perhaps someone will step in and offer to take over the site and carry it on, or at least to preserve the pages as they are.

C91VM QSLs invalid for IOTA awards

I have a lot of sympathy for people who live in rare DX locations. Whenever they go on the air they must find themselves on the receiving end of a pile-up of people interested only in claiming a tick in the box, making it impossible to enjoy a normal radio contact. If that isn't bad enough they are then expected to incur the considerable costs of QSLing all these rubber-stamp contacts. I think it is fair and reasonable for DX stations to make a charge for QSLs that covers the costs of printing and mailing the cards. (I also think that awards should accept eQSLs as valid confirmations, which would eliminate both the cost and the chore of QSLing for the DX station.)

But is it right for DXpeditions that travel to an exotic location specifically to give out contacts with that location to demand payment not just for the QSL but also a contribution towards the costs of the expedition itself? The RSGB IOTA Committee and G3KMA do not think so. They have announced that C91VM QSLs will be rejected for credit towards IOTA awards because of the operator's policy of requiring a $5 payment for each QSL. The cards will be accepted for IOTA credit only if the operator changes its policy and agrees that requests made with sufficient return postage will be met in a timely manner.

It is very costly, time-consuming and often hazardous to life and health to mount a major DXpedition. It must be hard to get sponsors for expeditions in these difficult economic times. And I dare say too few of those who request a QSL are willing to make voluntary donations. So expeditioners must bear most of the costs themselves.

But nobody forces the DXpeditioners to go. Rather than open the gate to a flood of commercial DXpeditions with cards at $5 a time it would be better if these operations didn't take place at all. This could be the thin end of the wedge that could lead to all kinds of 'organizations' obtaining desirable special prefixes from their licensing authority and then demanding a fee for the cards.

I don't think this kind of commercialization is in the interests of the hobby. I think the IOTA committee has made the right decision here.