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Hanz W1JSB and I hiked along the river in Bristol this afternoon. We worked Germany, Lithuania and the Balaeric Islands.

On the Old Back Road there are lots of unused mill buildings along the river. Hanz discovered a trail there last year and we went to explore it today. We walked along a narrow footpath across some rocks and cement dam structures that hung out over the river. Soon we came to a trail that lead south right along the river. It was glorious.

After walking a mile or so we started looking for a place to set up our gear. We found a flat outcropping that just happened to be under a large, over-hanging maple tree. Voila! Hanz threw his water bottle over the branch and hauled up a half wave wire for 20 meters. He used the Par End-Fedz and had a perfect SWR. He operated with his souped up SWL rig.

After tuning around a bit, he made a quick contact with DF5DM, Wilfred in Germany. Happy smiles!

Then I set up my KX3 and clipped onto his antenna. I listened on 15 and 17 meters, but didn’t hear much, so I switched to 20. That was very active and I made two quick contacts. The first one was with Pranas, LY2J in Lithuania. He was a 599 and gave me a 559. Then I worked Keith EA6/G3SZU in the Balaeric Islands. Keith was 589 and he gave me a 459. With that we packed up our gear and headed back toward Bristol.

As we got there, the sun was just setting and I snapped a quick shot of the falls above the river.

Like the incoming tide washing away a beautifully constructed and elegant sandcastle, bit by bit, this week’s tropospheric ducting crumbled away with equal inevitability.

At its height, this radio superhighway, formed by different layers of air density and temperature, ‘hotwired’ parts of Europe together on 2m and above like they were connected with RG45 coax itself.

The opening was heralded, accurately, by William Hepburn’s tropospheric ducting forecast (see http://www.dxinfocentre.com/). This site also explains various propagation modes on VHF and above, in a clear and informative manner.

Let me tell you a little about my 2m station here in North Wales. I have a lovely Icom IC-910HX and my antenna is an HB9CV. Yes, you heard right, a peashooter. Two small elements phased together and put up on a pole on the side of the house. You see, I’m starting modestly because our national culture demands that we never do things the easy way. Added to the equation of difficulty, I have a range of 3000ft mountains not too far away from me. Did I mention the HB9CV was fixed? It points plaintively towards the south-east in cold, metallic expectation of flux. It points towards the long, golden beaches of the low countries, the rolling fields of northern France, the great cities of Western Europe and finally, the snow-capped Alps and beyond. But it also has a ‘heart’, a cardiod footprint in fact. The characteristics of the HB9CV trade-off a modest gain with quite a wide beam-width, with a sharp null behind it, giving it its heart shape.

The humble HB9′

You need good hearing. The receive gain is lacking for weak-signal work, but work it does. And this week I worked a station (OE2XRM) in Salzburg, Austria. 5,5 both ways! The pure magic of hearing a man who may be wearing lederhosen over what is normally a line-of-sight form of communication, is thrilling! A couple of stations from Bavaria followed and I was then content to listen as the chatter of stations from France and the Netherlands filled the band.

Later in the afternoon, fuelled by electromagnetic excitement, I ventured onto a local hill (178m/584ft.) with my lovely FT-817 and a 9-element 2m yagi. I also took along a 70cm yagi for fun. A quick scan through the beacons bought in HB9HB in Switzerland! The Alps, the chocolate and cuckoo clocks! Unleashing my 5W on Europe didn’t produce much, unfortunately – just a couple of cheery calls from the UK, so I thought I’d swing the beam round to Spain. Now, the DX cluster was not showing any propagation in this direction and I wasn’t hearing any of the beacons on the north Spanish coast. But suddenly, out of nowhere, and at 5,9+, came a signal booming in. Danny, EB1LA, on the northern Spanish coast was stunned to hear me at 5,9 with my humble five Watts. What a result! I can only conclude that the beacons may have been situated too high to ‘tap in’ to the duct. How many people in the UK and Ireland must have been beaming away from Spain that day having assumed that no beacon = no path? I wonder. A quick scan on 70cm revealed no traffic, but I did receive the Netherlands beacon PI7CIS. Quite a trip for UHF.

My hilltop station

The two metre band can be sublime, but comes in two parts. The FM part of it is like an amateur ‘pub’. It seems the place where people gather in the evening to discuss their day and engage in chat (For example, one QSO I heard earlier this year was despairingly on the subject of “my favourite biscuits”). But the lower portion of the band has the elegance and sophistication of a Grand Cru. It’s as if it’s optimised in terms of antenna size, required power and number of users to give you a fighting chance of achieving glory in the aether. And I did.

I’ve worked Lubo (LZ1NP) in Bulgaria before; but last night he was 599 into the valley. I’ve also worked eleven other stations in this country. There seems to be a “pipeline” from here to there. I’ve heard other QRP stations here on the east coast mention the same phenomenon. They’ve got great ears over there!

All these contacts are over 5,000 miles from here; some of them are very weak but they still hear my 3 watt signal from the valley floor. I congratulate them all….

I also found openings into the Netherlands (PA4VHF) and in the southerly direction, PV8ADI in Brazil.

The Brazil logbook comes in with fifteen contacts. The Netherlands comes in with seven contacts. Despite my success with some of these DX stations, I still feel an excitement every time I work a new one.

This is an article I wrote for LIMARC here on Long Island, and also posted at my blog Fofio!.  Some of it is targeted to beginners in the hobby, so I apologize for the elementary nature of some of it.  Many of the kit references can also be found at my list of radio-related kits RadioKitGuide.com

I have been slowly getting into QRP these days (low-power for you beginners).  Being an outdoorsy kind of guy, it mixes well with my outings.  What has really surprised me lately though, is how well you can do with some inexpensive equipment, and a simple antenna.

Most of my portable setup is relatively Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve been to this creepy state park several times since moving to Long Island.  Why creepy?  Mostly the abandoned buildings from the previous tenant on

Nissequogue River State Park

this property; The Kings Park Psychiatric Center.  So, crumbling scary buildings, and a great view of the Nissequogue River Inlet?  Is there a better place for a Sunday afternoon QRP outing?  I think not!

While I was here last time, I spotted a great spot for a QRP setup.  At the top of the long hill, and past the courtyards is a nice grassy area that terminates at a fence at the top of a Read the rest of this entry »

I was sitting in our Board Meeting for the NI4CE repeater system – http://ni4ce.org and realized that I have not been playing radio in quite some time. There is more than one reason. I have been extremely busy at work and due to that I have had no time for anything else.

One of those other life factors besides work, kids, family, and other hobbies is school. For many of you this might sound odd, but for others you will completely understand.

At this point in my life, even though I have been in computer industry for over 25 years, I have never had a college degree. My wife was starting her MBA and I said with her going to be taking on the stress and challenge of that maybe it’s something I should consider. I looked into what my company would help pay for, I looked into the time commitments, and I landed on University of Phoenix.

Online works great for me – I am a computer geek and live online. I thought this would be a great time in life and then I would finally not be the only person around the table that couldn’t talk about having their degree. It was just something that always has been in the back of my mind.

Well, I started and finished week 1 with all A’s in my two classes and I’m on my way. I understand that this isn’t Ham Radio specific but if you ever read my story about how Ham Radio helped put me on a better path you will understand why this ties back together. Ham Radio helped me get my 15-year-old head on straight; many people in the hobby-helped push me into computers. I have worked for one of the largest software companies for the last 18 years and been pretty lucky to still know the two guys that did it.

I am sure my story of going back and getting my college education will bring more bliss to a great story they had impact on.

I won’t post all of my weeks progress, but I thought I would start with week one:

http://nicktoday.com/week-one-officially-books-university-phoenix/

I am still active on the Board of Directors for NI4CE and I am going to do my best to get back into radio further. I promise J for not if you want to find me it will most likely be in the library.

Hanz W1JSB and I hiked to Knox Mountain this afternoon. What a day! We worked England, Italy, Hungary and Spain… but that was only part of it. This was the most stunning early fall day. Perfect for a hike. We walked along the brook, sparking in gold sunlight. The greenest moss I’ve ever seen adorned the rocks. Piercingly blue gentians were in full bloom below the dam as we approached the pond. It was a dazzling view.

We walked around the pond and came to the two small cabins that overlook the water.

We set up between the cabins, in front, toward the lake. We threw a water bottle over a 40 foot high branch on the large cherry tree. I used the KX3 at 5 watts. The antenna was a 33 foot wire connected to the rig through an earchi.org 9:1 unun. I started on 15 meters with a quick contact with G3PJT. Bob gave me a 559 and he was a 599. Then I gave the key to Hanz.

We switched to 17 meters and right away Hanz worked Laci, HA0NAR in Hungary. Laci was very strong and gave Hanz a 579. It’s really exciting to set up portable gear from a small backpack and work across Europe with a few minutes’ effort.

Hanz handed the key back and I worked IK5ZWU, Walter in Italy. I was 559 and he was a 589. “FB UR 5 WATTS,” he sent before we signed.

I made one more quick QSO with Vic in Spain before packing up. EA3MM gave me a 559 and he was a 599.

We paused on the way back to take one more photo of the pond.

Hanz and I talked about the places we want to hike to during the fall… the ledges, mountain pond, and, of course, a return to Knox Mountain.