The website for the May/June 2012 dxpedition to Rockall EU189 is online.
It can be found here:
I’d consider an invitation to operate from most spots on earth but I don’t think I’m crazy enough to go to Rockall.
I wish you good luck and lots of fun in the pileups guys!
And see you on RTTY (hint, hint)
Michael Jordan
not in the log…
Yesterday I spent some time in the shack because I wanted to hand out some points in the IOTA contest and in the mean time to work ST0R.
After some listening on 17m SSB I found where they listened and I worked them with one call.
Checked their online log this morning and it seems I’m not in the log {grrrrr}. Another callsign very similar to mine is in the log on 17m so I guess they must have misunderstood my callsign.
Back to the shack and try again!
Kristin and I are on our way back from our holiday to Jersey. While on the ferry back from the island we saw the Minkies and I realised it is way to long ago that I went on a dxpedition. As you can see on the picture taken this afternoon by Kristin, the Minkies/les Minquiers are still there 🙂
More info on our activation of EU099 can be found here and here
Anyone organising a dxpedition and in need of an operator (SSB/digital)?
As I wrote before I am thinking of buying a new transceiver for contesting. My FT990 / TS50S combination is getting really old now 🙂
I mostly operate contests in digital modes and sometimes in SSB and always in the low power category. My preferred mode is SO2R.
Now where to start? Continue reading In search of a new contest transceiver (1)
As I wrote in my report about the Ham Radio in Friedrichshafen I attended the Contest University on friday afternoon.
The afternoon started with a welcome by the organiser Michael DL6MHW and then a discussion of contest ethics. After this the group was split in 2, the beginners in one room, the more advanced contesters in an other.
The beginners got the following parts: Contest basics, contest logging, how to get a decent score with a small station, clubcompetition and motivation.
I attended the part for advanced contesters with these parts:
The end of the afternoon the two groups together got a presentation of the V31YN contest crew and their station and tactics.
This was a very well organised afternoon although most of the attendants thought maybe there should have been a little more time for each speaker to get even deeper into his subject. Congrats to DL6MHW and his crew!!!
I am not really proficient in the Gernan language but I got about 90% of what was said and the rest I got from the really excellent documentation provided!
Will it make me win more contests? Maybe not (the QSOs still have to be made) but at least it gave me a few more insights in the contest secrets and it was good for improving my understanding of the German language 🙂 (Learning a language is like learning CW: Practice, practice, practice!)
It was €20 well spent! Moreover for that price I got a T-shirt, the new Bavarian Contest Club ‘Handbuch für den Contester’, the CQ-DL contest special, a bottle of water and some gadgets.
My neighbour is running behind his lawnmower… S9+10dB hum in the RTTY segment on 15m 🙁
Guess I’ll have to play on another band in the DL-DX RTTY contest for a few hours. Luckily this is only a casual effort this time.
Last weekend we made our yearly ‘pilgrimage’ to the Friedrichshafen HAM RADIO in Germany. For the last few years there were always 4 of us, Andy ON7TS, Luc ON7KZ, Jan ON4KB and me. As Jan had to cancel at the last minute there were only 3 of us this year. (Jan, we missed you!)
For me it was the 18th year in a row and I can say I have seen a steady decline of the rally over the years. Every year there are less vendors at the flea market and at the ‘new’ market. I guess there are a few reasons for this: the prices for the rental of the fairgrounds and the competition of the internet sales.
This year there were only 2 halls of flea market with the second hall filled about 60%, last year it was 3 halls with the third hall filled about 50%. The following well known companies did not come back to the fair this year: Conrad, Classic International, Kabel Kusch etc. The room these companies took last year now seemed to be taken over by companies selling toy helicopters, handbags and even *very* cheap riflescopes…
But of course there were a few highlights for me at the Ham Radio: Continue reading Friedrichshafen 2011
The 2011 ARRL RTTY Roundup Results have been on the ARRL-site for a little while now.
I made it to 10th place and 3rd place in Europe (DX SOLP). As this was my first full 24hr SO contest in years I’m pretty happy with the score. Of course I was also first in Belgium but there’s nothing to brag about with almost no competition whatsoever (the only other ON stations who entered a log where ON6AT with 215 QSO and ON8NT with 101 QSO).
Of course there is lots of room for improval! The todo list is growing and growing but soon I’ll have a few weeks of holiday so I hope to be able to do some work in and around my station.
@ON5ZO: yes I know, the first thing to solve is the “turn 4 rotary switches every time” problem 🙂
Yesterday I participated in the 80m SSB UBA Spring contest. A few months ago I posted “I won my first contest 🙂” about my win in the 2010 edition of this very same contest.
So of course I wanted to try and get at least the same score as last year.
Since my friend and neighbour Luc ON7KZ wanted to participate also this time I could expect a little more competition than last year. Moreover Luc lives about 500m from here so we could expect a little QRM from each other. But, nothing better than a little hamspirit and we both decided to participate in the QRP-class (10W SSB). Thanks Luc! Moreover, as I knew Luc’s antenna was best at 3.620 MHz and mine was set at 3.580 MHz (digi-part of the band) I decided to make mine a little shorter so Luc could concentrate on the lower part of the band (3.600 to 3.650) and I mostly used the higher part of the band (above 3.700).
QRP power and good receivers and we didn’t get any QRM at all from eachother!
Now why do I have mixed feelings?
Last year my score was a little above 21000 points with 145 QSO, this year I had about 25% less QSO and about 45% less points. Luc ON7KZ was only about 1000 points behind me at the end of the contest.
Now the question is why is the score of this years effort so much less than last year? Same station, same antenna, same operator, same computer, same logging program… but a different callsign (last year I used ON5MF, this year I used OQ6A)
So this leaves me with a lot of questions which I guess will only be answered when the results of the contest get published.
Now, let’s have a look at the contest calendar and prepare for next effort!