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The setup at the park

Last weekend on Saturday the weather here was great lots of sunshine and very few clouds. So it was off the the park with the radio to give the ARCI welcome to QRP contest a go. Its a 3 hour contest from late morning to early afternoon. I setup my Elecraft K2 along with my mono band mobile whip antennas. The key I used was the Mini Palm paddle which works great and has a super feel to it. I found the bands to be in good shape but was not able to find many who were participating in the contest. In total I made 3 contacts contacts in 2.5 hours of operation. While operating I did hear W6/DL6AP/P who was operating in the SOTA at location CT-086....translation Strawberry peak in California. I was not able to contact W6/DL6AP/P but I did hear him in there. There was some other very attended State QSO party contests going on at the same time and were very well attended. So over all I did not strike it rich in the contest by any means...BUT.......I did pickup some bonus points for just being portable on battery power with a portable antenna.

Its been one of those days

As those who read my blog on a regular basis I did have a post not to long ago about these DAM captchas that are used when you post a comment. After reading the post you may had gotten the idea that I was not really a fan of them....in fact I don't use them on my blog. I do get more spam now but I just delete them and move on. Well this weekend I have been trying to post a comment or two on blogs that use the captcha. For some reason I have not been able to crack the letter pattern. At first I thought it may had been my laptop and it being Linux and all......but not so. I have tried it on my XP OS, Mac OS and Windows 7 and on all the machines I am shut out from solving the captcha!!!!! Are the chaptcha gods raining their wrath down on me OR are others of you having troubles as well?? As a side note I thought maybe it was due to the fact my Linux OS was out of date and needed to upgrade. So I began the upgrade and for some reason Oliver my cat (for now anyway) walked across the keyboard. He must had "Pawed" in a keyboard combo and now I have to totally re-instal Linux and all the programs that were on the laptop are now gone.

Missing fingers on SD card

This weekend I took part in the ARCI  Welcome to QRP contest it's only a 3 hour contest from 11:00 am to 2:00pm (local time). I decided to take this contest to the park as it sure does help with the bonus points that are offered for going portable. I took my camera along to snap some shots. Most of us who blog do have a camera of some kind to add the flavor of pictures to the blog post. My camera is a Nikon D60 and has been giving me some trouble,  now then it would not recognize the SD memory card and failed to take a picture.
Just like a sore tooth that gets better just before the dentist visit....the camera would work just fine at the camera store. Today the camera worked great and when I go home I wanted to email a contacts I had that turned into a very nice QSO.

Seam problem

Seemed the SD card knew I was in a hurry and wanted  pictures to add to an email. The computer told me it could not recognize the memory card. The card was then put back in the Nikon D60 but now it too would not recognize the card either. GREAT here we go again I thought but after close examination I found the card to have some damaged fingers at the far right!!! I went on the internet and downloaded some programs that claimed they could recover pictures from damaged SD cards. I didn't have any luck with these programs other than them taking up space on my hard drive. I still was getting a

The fix until all was downloaded

message to place the SD card into the reader so photos could be recovered. Well the card was in the reader and it was not looking good at all. I then had a closer look at the card there was not only fingers missing but the card was separating at it's seam. I tried  taping the seam as the card may be separating when entering the card reader and not allowing the contacts of the card to come in contact with the reader. After a few attempts it worked and I just copied the photos to my external hard drive. Now the SD card is in the garbage, I also had a very close look at the other SD cards for damage. All the cards were in good shape but lesson learned.....take a close look at the SD cards as I believe this was the problem with the camera from the get go as it is the only card I was using.

Finished product

A few months ago I built and blogged about my  QRPometer build from the 4 state qrp club its a great kit. In the post there was only 2 con's that I could think of regarding the kit.
1.The TX and Antenna connections were RCA and not BNC, the kit now ships with the RCA to BNC      adapters.  
2. The meter did not come with a case and the rear of the meter had an exposed circuit board. I felt this left the meter vulnerable to damage.

No room for Oliver on the old desk

The new desk twice the size

The first half of August sure has been busy around the shack here, not busy with on air time but with getting things done. I have built the A A Engineering smart battery charger for my Elecraft K2. I will be posting the build in the near future. On this project for the first time the during the "smoke test" I actually had SMOKE!!! With kits I have found some of the final check out testing is what I call "destructive" testing as opposed to non destructive testing. Going to a destructive testing  with the Smart battery charger post. One of the kits I built just a short while ago was the QRPometer and it did not have a case...well it does now and that too is going to be another post. I am really not finished with that case yet. I was at the
electronics store the other day (picking up parts as a result of a destructive test going wrong) and saw a neat 9 volt battery holder I am going to add to the QRPometer case. I also have sold all of my items that were up for sale and I have the funds to order my Elecraft KX3. It's not going to be here until  October but that will give me time to read the manual and set up a place for the radio. While on that topic with some of my funds I went online to Ikea and purchased a much needed larger table for my kit building. The old desk was just way to small and things were falling off. The old table was actually a computer desk and it now is off to the side in my shack with an  iMac (27 inch screen) one that Julie donated to me!!! So the new Elecraft KX3 is going to run on Mac software.

iMac waiting for the KX3

F8DGY's antenna

The on air time has been very limited as having to get things done around the house and shack the rig really has not been turned on. I did manage to get some radio time in late last week in the evening. I heard clear as a bell Chris F8DGY calling CQ on 20m. I dropped the K3's power down to 500mW's and gave him a go. He came right back to me with a 579 report. It was a fast exchange and he was off answering others. For me that that a 7,597 miles per watt contact.

Packing up for the contest

I took part in the first annual Skeeter contest sponsored by the NJQRP club the first years theme was to go to  your favorate outdoor operating place and get involved with the contest. Well up this way the weather was not looking like it was going to co-operate. My fav place to operate was out in the open and very vulnerable to the weather....namely rain!! I decided to head out to a location that offered some trees as

The weather to look forward too

shelter just in case of a sprinkle, as for a down pour my car was beside me and the rest of the contest could be finished from there. I was using my Elecract K2 and this by the way this was the first contest  this rig has ever done as battery powered. My key was the Mini Palm Paddle which by the way worked great!! My antennas were mono band mobile whips on the back of my car. I operated QRP at 5 watts Oh and the K2's battery lasted for 4.5 hours at 5
watts with me calling CQ and not searching and pouncing.
The weather was a mixed bag from nice sunny skies (very rare) to very threatening overcast that did let go

The setup...with a bit of rare sunshine

with rain at times.Over the last month the temperatures have been in the upper 30's and low 40C...today it was nice and cool almost to the point of putting on a long sleeve shirt (which was used to cover the rig during light rain). The location I chose was about 15 minutes from my home and offered a pic-nick table, trees and what I consider a luxury when operating out and about a portable washroom!! The bands were busy with not only the Skeeter contest but the WAE contest as well. I did have some European stations involved in the WAE contest respond to my "CQ Buzz contest" Thats ok they gave me their report and serial and  I asked for their power output and then they moved on this made it a skeeter contact....I believe anyway???

Covering for rain drizzle

I confined my operating to 20m as it seemed to be a "buzz" with skeeters but at 14.060 for some time there was some SSB going on, not sure if anyone else heard it but they were there right on the CW QRP calling frequency. While calling CQ I did have someone come back to me at the same time a passer by asked me what I was doing and showed an interest in ham radio. So I sacrificed the contact for taking time to talk with this gentleman about the hobby. So if your reading this blog I was not ignoring you just had to promote the hobby.....:). I had to end the contest around 4:40 as the Elecract K2 was telling me that the battery is getting to the point of no return so it was time to shut things down.

When it really rained

I made in total 19 contacts including DJ5AV from Germany and YU2A from Serbia. 12 of  the contacts were fellow Skeeters as they had Skeeter numbers. One contact was just an average QRP op not in the contest but wanted to know what he had to give me as an exchange so he could count in the log. Over all I had a great time even though the weather was touch and go at times.

Finally...a must have!!!

See all you Skeeters next year!!!

KPA3 cover plate

Those who are regular readers of this blog know I have all Elecraft equipment and enjoy it very much. My Elecraft K3 was purchased with the 100 watt module (KPA3) and up to this point it has been sitting in the rig and just adding weight. The other week it was decided to unload some unused gear then put these funds together for the purchase of the Elecraft KX3. One of the items on the selling block was the KPA3 unit. When the KPA3 is removed from the radio there is a  hole in the rear of the radio were the cooling fans were located. Elecraft sells a plate (6 x 2 3/4 inch aluminum plate)  that covers the hole. I called up and placed an order, the cost of the plate was 20.37. A little expensive I thought but what are you going to do. Ten days later the plate
arrived looking at the bill  the plate cost 20.37 and the shipping was 10.00!!!

Opening when fans are removed

Plastic plugs

 This is half the cost of the plate. The package weighted ONE OUNCE  and was shipped parcel rate. To add insult to injury the plate has a hole labeled "ANT 3". I believe this is for the 2m  antenna out port .........if you have the 2m module!!!! Anyway I had to drive to the local electronics store to buy the plastic plug. They came in a package of 2 for forty nine cents. You know what Elecraft throw in the plastic plug and add one dollar to the cost. Back to the shipping rant........  my Elecraft KX3 according to Elecraft weights in at 1.4 LBS and lets knock that up to 1.6 pounds when you add in the shipping box, packing material,manual and bill. The cost for shipping me my KX3 is 48.00 dollars and that is more reasonable and understandable. TEN DOLLARS TO SHIP A 1 OUNCE PACKAGE.....COME ON ELECRAFT !!!!