AmateurRadio.com

Last week at VE3WDM the radios were off all week as we had relatives visiting from England.  Julie and I took the week off to take them touring it was traveling each day and resting during the evening. This week I have been able after dinner to get on the radio for about an hour each night. I was not expecting much as the solar conditions have gone downhill. The sunspots along with the flux are now in the single digits.
1) HF2012EFC  On 20m  contact made with 5 watts  (special event station during the European Football Championship)

2)  HA6OA  On 20m contact made with 5watts. He was only S2 but using the Diversity receive option on the K3 along with the Audio Peak filter (APF) really helped.

On 17m I did have a very good copy on CO8LY from Cuba so I gave him a go with 1 watt.....but nothing. I eventually rolled the power up to 5 watts but he was still unable to hear my signal. Funny how Poland and Hungary  were no trouble with 5 watts but Cuba was a no go for me this time. 
I also heard 6Y5WJ from Jamaica again on 20m but there was a huge pileup waiting to contact him so I moved on.

Tuesdays events
1) HA6OA  On 20m was heard again but this time I reduced my power to 1 watts and gave him a go. With a solar flux of 94 and sunspots at 14 I thought..."what the heck" He came back to me on the first call and that gave me 4463 miles per watt contact.

2) SP3GXH on 20m this time I was feeling giddy from my last QRP contact so I dropped my power down to 500mW's and tried my luck!! He came back to me on my first attempt and that made it 8338 miles per watt contact.

I was only able to make 2 short contacts as I got home late from work and lots had to be done at home before any radio time so it was late and I do have to get up early so I pulled the plug for the night. It was good to know that even with the disappointing propagation I was still able to make at least one QRPp contact. My Hendricks 41dB attenuator kit has not come in as of yet but when it does I am going to go for contacts with less than 100mW's and see how that works out for me.

The Lancaster and Super-fortress together (click on all images to enlarge)

Julie's relatives are over from England for a few weeks and to start off the holidays on June 16th it was off to Hamilton Air show loaded with vintage aircraft. It was a nice sunny day with a temperature around 27C.

 The air show lasted 6 hours which included a nice lunch also table and chairs down by the runway....so we were close to the action. The air show hosted the Avro Lancaster this plane is only one of two that are still flying today the other one is in England.  Also the B-29 Super-fortress and this one at the air show being the

Corsair,  P40, Spitfire, Mustang, Sabre

 only air worthy B-29 in the world. Some other vintage plans were the B-24 Liberator, Avenger torpedo bomber, FM-2 Wildcat, Corsair, Spitfire, Curtiss P-40,  F-86 Sabre just to name a few!! It was great to see the Lancaster for the first time as it was the bomber my dad flew in during WWII as a tail-gunner. Two hours before the show began we purchased a ramp pass which allowed us to get up close and personal with most of the aircraft in the show. The Lancaster came with a

B-29

wireless operator. The transmitter/receiver used was the R1155 and T1154.  As for the B-29 they had a multi radio setup check this link out for info and great pictures of the B-29's radio op's rigs.  Now an air show would not be an air show wit the the JETS!!! Becuase this was a vintage aircraft show 99% of the aircraft were WWI and WWII. BUT there is always an exception to the rule and the exception this year was the CF-18 fast, loud and proud!! All photo's were taken by my wife Julie the shutter bug!!

Low level 1,000 km per-hr pass. Below flying dirty ( gear down) almost stopped then afterburners!!!

This past week a very interesting question was posed, one I had not really thought about but now has got me thinking. Paul PC4T asked the question " Are more and more radio amateurs are using social media such as Twitter and Facebook"  Paul had checked the stats on his blog traffic and it was down....due to what, was the question?? I will be the first to admit I am really not up on the social media scene at all. I do have a Face-book page and Twitter account but I really don't understand them or use them all that often.  Here is my question to the bloggers out there....

Not to shabby

There are hams out there that I pass by them now and then on my travels who have the luxury and availability to erect amazing towers with some amazing antennas on them. It would be great to have the land and be in the country and have "eye candy" towers and antennas. Then there are some with small city lots but do amazing things with long wires, smaller towers and beams. Last but not least there is "the other folks"...like me you either live in an apartment, townhouse and or have very strict neighborhood rules about all and any antennas!!! I am one who lives in a VERY antenna not so friendly place and I have to keep ham radio on the down low!! In my attic I have the DX-EE dipole from Alpha Delta it's good from 10m-40m but with the K3 antenna tuner I am able to add 17m and 30m. The attic is to small for the dipole to stretch from end to end, mine is in a "Z" configuration. It's about 25 to 30 feet off the ground but as said in the attic.



The SWR for such an antenna mounted undercover is below...
  7.000 - 7.060 = 2.58- 2.03 tuner brings it too 1.01
14.000 - 14.060= 2.26-2.08 tuner brings it too 1.01
21.000 - 21.060= 1.01-1.15
28.000 - 28.060= 1.15-1.12
Extra bands with tuner
18.068-18.100= 1.01-1.01 with tuner and 9.98 after tuner
10.100-10.130=1.01-1.01 with tuner and 9.13 after tuner.

So where can  5 watts QRP power and an attic antenna go??
Italy, Switzerland, Japan, Jordan, South Africa,  all of South America, England, Greece, Azerbaijan, Cyprus, Niger, Algeria,Gambia, Alaska,Turkey, Ascension Island.........and the list could go on!!

How about 1 watt........
Germany, England, Scotland, Italy, South Africa, Czech Republic, France, Ireland, Poland, Ukraine, Sweden,

Lets move things down to 100mW's
Portugal, Finland, Germany, Netherlands, Madeira Island, Spain, Croatia, Italy, Hungary, Czech Republic and so on.

Until I get an attenuator 100mW's is a low as my K3 will take me new adventures await me when my Hendricks 41dB step attenuator is built.

1. Contact with HA8JV with 100mW's which worked out to 45,868 miles per watt contact.
2. This year I have worked 73 DXCC countries and am working towards my Diamond Jubilee award by year end.
3. Up to this point 80 contacts that are 1,000 miles per watt or more.
4. Lastly and most important......having a loads of fun!!!!!
If your situation does not allow you to install a dipole or similar medium size antenna my first QRP antennas were two mobile whip antennas made into a dipole configuration. With these antennas I was able to add to my 1000 miles per watt count......and more. So don't let some restrictions stop you from taking advantage of our hobby because less can mean more!!
UPDATE.......as Julian G4ILO has reminded me with his comment, I forgot to mention all the above was done with CW.

Fellow blogger's I  always like to comment on blogs and give my two cents worth about a topic....BUT.....is it just me or are these darn Captcha's getting harder and harder to decipher !! I understand about security and that our comments are to come from humans and not other computers. Having said that it seems to me that some of these Captcha's one needs divine glasses to figure out the letters. At times I fool myself thinking if I look at it long enough the letters will jump out from the blurred combinations.....!  There have been "events" of me trying up to 3 (or more)combinations to get the correct letters. To add insult to injury it wasn't bad enough bending my brain around one word now most Captcha's are two words!!

The K3 is ready to go at 100mW's

Well as many posts have mentioned the CQ WPX CW contest is now history for 2012. There is no total score, multiplier count or a prefix total to brag about here. This contest I was hunting DXCC's. When the hunt slowed down ( and it did for long periods of time) I then worked stations with as little power that my Elecraft K3 could muster to see if I could make contact. I was able to add 6 more DXCC's to my count (at 5 watts QRP) but I must admit at the start of the contest I was hoping to score around 15 or so. Oh well it seems that I have at this point most of the popular entities. I found conditions to Europe to be great but the South Pacific areas were dead up this way. There was more of Africa this year but the pile ups were huge at times.
To make things interesting as I was not "contesting" in the true sense I started to drop my power as I gave out contest points. I started at 1.5 watts to CR1X in Finland that worked out to 2755 miles per watt. Update....Thanks to PE4BAS my distance to CR1X who is in the Azores not Finland is 2417 miles per watt, thanks Bas for the info!  He had no  problem copying me so down went the power. I leveled out at 100mW's just for the reason this is as low as the K3 will venture.

Proof 100mW's is on it's way...no SWR showing

1.  HA8JV            45,868  miles per watt
2.  IR9Y               44,558   "                        "
3.  9A1A              44,187   "                        "
4.  OL7C             42,496   "                        "

Until this contest my personal best Miles per watt 16,737 miles per watt when making contact with ZS4TS at 500mW's. Even at 100mW's being copied was easy and I was very surprised. I did not want to drop my power to the point were the contest station was spending his valuable time trying to make contact with me, but that never happened. I am now in the market for an attenuator do get my power output to below 100mW's and see what happens. I was looking at the Hendricks 41db attenuator. It's a kits and looks like a very nice unit.

The action on 20m early in the evening

It's Saturday night and the bands sure are busy BUT it seems not with to many new DXCC's for me. I have picked up about 6 news ones since the contest began. I have decided to also drop my power down and try to contact the countries I already have DXCC's for. Up to this point I am at 100mW's and getting into Europe....mind you with repeats. I hope to pick up a few more DXCC's on Sunday but now it's time to relax!!