SSB Fieldday 2014

I wanted to prove to myself I could do a full fieldday (set up the station, operate 24 hours and tear down the station) without any help from anyone else. A few days ago I received the plaque for my first place in the QRP class. Thanks UBA!

Fieldday 2014

I wrote an article for CQ-QSO about my experiences in the fieldday but I haven’t found any time to translate it to English yet. Members of the UBA can read it on the UBA website in dutch or french.

I’m looking forward to work you all in the next UBA SSB fieldday first weekend of september!

Yes contesting sucks…

but I still have a lot of fun doing it!

Franki ON5ZO recently wrote a blog ‘Why contesting sucks’. And I can’t deny I sometimes have the same feelings during or after the contests.

http://disney.wikia.com/wiki/Grumpy

For example, the reason why our clubstation lost one of the last fielddays probably was because our biggest competitor probably used his home station with huge beam antennas via remote control. Okay, it’s only a suspicion and we can’t prove it but… At least since this year the rules for our national fieldday have changed and now all internet and dx-cluster use is forbidden.

And no, I probably can’t win any big contest from my average station (when speaking about contest stations).

But hey you’ll ask, why do you keep doing it? Continue reading Yes contesting sucks…

Writer’s block?

A lot of things have happened since my last post here but I didn’t really feel like writing anything about them lately.

A small summary:

  • we did the Region 1 SSB fieldday with the club station ON6CK/p (and came in second behind the OQ8A/p team)
  • the belgian guys conquered Rockall, congrats to the team!
  • the british guys decided not to go to Rockall. I don’t really understand the reasons, if all those who wanted to climb the Everest would have cancelled their plans because someone was there before them then only a few people would have done it. Moreover the pileups from Rockall will not be less for the second team going there than for the first one. And I still need EU189!
  • I finally ordered a new transceiver!
  • I modified my RTTY setup to do FSK instead of AFSK (with the FT990)
  • I made a portable setup to take on holiday

The last 3 of the list will probably be the subjects of some future posts!

So what makes me write this in the last hours of CQ WW SSB? I’m at the qth of my girlfriend and to tired to set up the portable station. Wedding parties are probably more tiring than 24hrs of contesting ๐Ÿ™‚ Moreover we have to leave for an other party in less than an hour.

My next contest is in 3 weeks from now… still some work to do (the 4 rotary switches problem, remember?)

 

Yes, we definitely won the UBA 2010 SSB-fieldday

The results have been updated on the UBA-website and now we’re sure, we (the ON4KB/p team) won the UBA 2010 SSB-fieldday in restricted category!

A member from an other competing station complained about some missing multipliers in their score so the logcheckers recalculated everything.

These are the final scores: Continue reading Yes, we definitely won the UBA 2010 SSB-fieldday

We won the 2010 SSB-fieldday, or not?

We (the ON4KB/p-team) had a good feeling after this years SSB-fieldday. As in the last few years we competed in the ‘restricted’ category: 40-80-160m.

The claimed scores also showed us on top with a few thousand points more than our next competitor ON6CK/p (our clubstation).

The day before yesterday the final scores were published on the uba-website and indeed showed us on the first rank above ON6CK/p: Continue reading We won the 2010 SSB-fieldday, or not?

We made the newspaper again!

The ON4KB/P fieldday team made the newspaper again, the full online article can be found at Het Nieuwsblad. The title says: ‘Radioamateurs have a successful training – ready for an emergency’

Our fieldday team + a visitor:
Top: Hugo ON7FU / Tom / Sofie ON3SC / Francis ON8AZ / Wim ON7WPE / Jurgen ON5MF / Jan ON4KB
Bottom: Tim ON5HC / Luc ON7KZ / Geert ON7USB

Fieldday 4 and 5 september 2010

As Jan seems to be a far better writer than I am, I copied his text from the ON4KB page at QRZ.com:

ANNUAL ON4KB/P FIELDDAY OPERATIONS …

Over the last 4 years, the callsign ON4KB/P stands for a state-of-the-art SSB Fieldday operation each first weekend of September. This emergency exercise is an initiative of a team of great and competent fellow hams, mostly living in the area. In 2010 these are Hugo ON7FU, Luc ON7KZ, Jurgen ON5MF, Tim ON5HC, Geert ON7USB, Francis ON8AZ and myself, who all share the work of preparing, building the station, operating and logging. We’re also grateful to Sofie ON3SC (qrp on7kz) for the occasional help.

The team takes a fieldday quite seriously, keeping in mind the original philosophy behind the event :

  • To test our technical competence as radio amateurs and to combine knowledge and teamwork into the installation of a comprehensive emergency radio operation ;
  • To discuss technical issues and experiment in the true spirit of amateur radio ;
  • To primarily consider a Fieldday to be a test setup for an emergency situation, where time is at a premium and without any access to fixed structures like cell phones, WiFi and power lines. Continue reading Fieldday 4 and 5 september 2010