AmateurRadio.com

The bands seemed very dead today at lunch.  I looked at SOTA Goat and saw that there were some guys spotted in New Mexico on some 10 point peaks.  I listened first for WS0TA (club call) and could not immediately here him – he was there, but not strong enough to copy.

So I put out a CQ about 14.059 and checked for reports on the Reverse Beacon Network.  I was spotted on both coasts by about 11 stations with many reporting 15-20+ DB – so I knew I was getting out.  Do you ever wonder if the bands are dead, or just nobody is calling CQ??

Contacts for today:

WS0TA – I was finally able to pull him out of the mud with 339 reports both ways on 20 meters.  This is a club call, so I am not sure who the OP was today.  He was on W5N/SE-001.  (Updated: Fred, KT5X was the Op today, and also the trustee, for WS0TA.  Looking at his QRZ page he is also into trail running, and running on mountains!  Very cool!)

K7SO – I saw him spotted on 10.110 and was able to work him easily thru the little pileup.  He was 599 and he gave me a 579.  He was on W5N/SE-003.

K1JD – He was 559 and he gave me 579, he was also on W5N/SE-003.  Worked him on 10.110 also.

NM5S – also on W5N/SE-003 but on 40 meters about 7.031 – very weak but I called him when he peaked a bit.  He gave me 449 and he was 339.

Fun to work 3 guys on the same peak – I bet they were having fun!  Unfortunately for me, the chaser, I only got 10 points for the 3 contacts since you only get points for a peak once per day.

Right now I am sitting at 88 points.

N7BBH – Right as I was ready to pull the plug and head back to the office I heard Steve calling CQ and he was nice and strong.  We have worked each other twice before.  I had to keep it short since I was almost late, but he got stronger during his second exchange, and he reported I did as well.

Fun day once again!

30″ Magnetic Loop Under Construction

As the list of major projects at our new home is starting to get shorter, I have been pondering an antenna installation that is more permanent than my Portable QRP Antenna that I strap to the deck railing when I want to operate.

The portable vertical I use, which is nice and quiet at the park, is VERY noisy at the home QTH which is full of all sorts of man made electrical noise.

First thought was to put a 66′ doublet in the attic and feed it with ladder line.  I have no doubt this would work, but I have to invest in ladder line to make it happen.

I have a 30″ square magnetic loop that I have built from 1″ copper pipe before we found out we were moving.  It is all soldered up, just sitting in my garage waiting for a tuning capacitor and feed loop to be installed.  I am leaning towards this being my first antenna install here at the QTH.

Why a magnetic loop?

You can read all about the good and bad of loops online, but one of the biggest drivers is that they are supposed to be very quiet.  Many hams that report S5+ noise on their dipoles are reporting S1-S2 noise on the loop.

The other reason is that it is almost done – probably a couple hours of work max and I could have it on the air.  Additionally I can hang this in my garage, or put it in the attic, so that I can keep in good graces with the ever watchful HOA observers!

So that is what I am going to do.  At first the tuning capacitor will be done with a coax stub tuned to a fixed frequency.  I will do this centered around 14.060.  This will give me a narrow little spot to play.

Then I am going to build a home brew butterfly capacitor – which I will document here.

Propagation numbers baffle me sometimes. Yesterday, when the numbers looked so good, I thought I was going to end up getting skunked. I did end up working Oleg UR3IFD, in the Ukraine, and I also had a very brief, QSB busted QSO with Paul WA9PWP. But other than those two very brief contacts, it was pretty grim. There wasn’t else much to be heard and my CQs on several bands went unanswered. Advance the clock 24 hours, to find the SSN is down to 35 and the SFI is only at 110. Not great numbers. But despite the numbers, I had a great outing.

I started out on 17 Meters with a brief QSO with Ted LZ1ND, who was calling CQ. Ted was a good 599+ here in New Jersey, and I got a 549 in return. Not a bad report, and Ted got all my basic information, so I was definitely copy-able in Bulgaria. And it looks like Ted is quite comfortable behind the dial of a QRP rig himself. Here’s an old photo I dug up of him on the Web, taken while he was participating in Bulgaria’s HF QRP Field Day.

After Ted, I switched on over to 20 Meters and called CQ. I was answered by Ron W5VYN, from Whitesboro, TX. Ron had a magnificent signal into New Jersey. The fact that he was using home brewed gear made it all the sweeter. Ron had asked me if he was generating any key clicks, and I was happy to be able to tell him that he had a perfect, solid and stable 9 in the “T” portion of RST. His home brew rig sounded just as good as any commercial rig out there. That was a nice QSO.

That was followed up by a “quickie” QSO with Greg N4KGL. Greg, who’s down in Florida, was using one of those new PAR ENDFEDZ Trail Friendly antennas, which was generating a nice 579 signal for him. It’s always nice chatting with Greg, and I wish I could have stayed on longer. But as always, time flies when you’re having fun, and it was time to break down and head on back to work.

So it just goes to show …. you can have a great QRP day, even when the solar conditions say, “Maybe not”.

Even so, I had to laugh on the way home from work.  As I was driving, I was listening to two Hams on a local 2 Meter repeater bemoan the current sunspot cycle.  One was complaining about “How you just can’t work any decent DX without at least a 500 Watt amplifier!”.  I almost lost it right there, I started chuckling so hard.

Lots of QRPers, including N8ZYA, K3WWP, W2LJ and many, many others have log books that attest to the direct opposite!

72 de Larry W2LJ
QRP – When you care to send the very least!

What an evening! Nearly 80 degrees and humid. Judy and I walked to Knox Mountain. I worked Spain, California, Cuba, Morocco, and Texas.

The hike in was fast in order to keep ahead of the mosquitoes. It was well rewarded by the view of the pond after the 1.5 mile hike.

As I approached the pond, a large gray heron swooped up in front of me and headed east to the other end of the pond. It was stunning. We walked around to the front of the cabin. Beautiful!

I tossed a line nearly 50 feet into the cherry tree at the edge of the pond and pulled up a 33 foot wire. I set up the KX3 and used the earchi.org 9 to 1 unun. At first I operated on 20 meters. I worked two Spanish stations in a row and lost them both at the very end to QSB.

After that things picked up a bit. California and Cuba on 20 meters, then I switched to 17 and worked Morocco and Texas. Here’s the log:

27 Aug-13 2134 14.008 EA5HFW CW 559 599 Spain
27 Aug-13 2140 14.013 EA8AGF CW 449 579 Spain
27 Aug-13 2145 14.022 N6QQ CW 559 599 CA
27 Aug-13 2146 14.011 CO6RD CW 599 599 Cuba
27 Aug-13 2155 18.086 CN8KD CW 599 599 Morocco
27 Aug-13 2156 18.075 WF5W CW 579 599 TX

Mid-way during the operating a hoot owl in the woods not far away let forth with several calls. It was remarkable. Down by the pond Judy was knitting some baby booties in the sunlight.

As I packed up the gear, a bunch of jays started squabbling down by the pond… a chorus of “Dee Dee… Dee Dee. As we headed down the path, I turned back for one more snapshot of the pond.

I’ve tried out a number of mapping apps on my iPhone but only recently found one that I really like for hiking. Most of these apps access maps on the network when needed so they are not stored on the smart phone. When you fall of the edge of the network in the backcountry they don’t work. This is a non starter for most of my backcountry hikes. Even if I am close to civilization, I’ll typically drop down into a valley at some point on the hike, losing my network connection.

The MotionX GPS app solves this problem by allowing you to download and storing maps on your iPhone. This requires you to do a bit of planning on what maps you need but it seems to work pretty well. The map quality is good and includes topographic information. (Click on the map image above to zoom in.) No, you probably don’t want to download maps to cover the entire US as you’ll consume all available storage!

Besides mapping, MotionX supports a ton of other features such as tracks, waypoints, compass headings, etc. It is quite flexible and I am still learning all of its tools.

Oh, did I mention this app only costs $1.99? Amazing!

- Bob K0NR

Ham Radio Deluxe has announced that the final free version of HRD will be removed from their servers September 1, 2013.  After the HRD freeware product was sold by its author, it was converted to a commercial software product.  The current owner, W4PC, has stated that the freeware 5.x version will continue to be free, however they will no longer host the files for download and there will be no further development on the 5.x version.  Others may host the files for download free of charge.

I hate to keep sounding like a broken record, but the situation with HRD, and in particular with the 5.x freeware version, illustrates just why freeware is a problematic software model and ultimately a technological dead end for a hobby like amateur radio.  Luckily with HRD, development is continuing with the commercial product.

Do you use other freeware amateur radio programs?  Ask your favorite program authors if they would consider open sourcing their software.  If they don’t, ask them why not and what do they have to lose.

The summary page of submitted scores is ready for viewing!  To check out the spreadsheet, click here.

The soapbox comments are going to take me a bit longer as there are so many!  Hope to have those up by the end of the week.

Here’s a summary of the top scores:

1st Place Overall – Sean KX9X – 17,024 points
2nd Place Overall – Gene N5GW – 17,000 points
3rd Place Overall – George KX0R – 11,700 points
4th Place Overall – Rick NK9G – 11,444 points
5th Place Overall – Mid-MO ARC N0SS – 10,276 points

Top Multi-Op Station – Mid-MO ARC N0SS – 10,276 points

Top Multi Multi Station – NAQCC N3AQC – 10,160 points

Top SSB Station – a tie between Joe KK4NWC and Lloyd KC5FM

Top Mixed Mode Station – Bill W9LR

In addition to these, the top scorer for each state will be receive a Certificate of Achievement.  You can see these stations are denoted in the comments column in the extreme right column of the spreadsheet.

Thanks to all who participated!  In addition to the 68 Skeeters who submitted log summaries, I also received 3 log summaries from Non-Skeeters who chose to operate.  In fact, Non-Skeeter George K4EOR ended up being Top Score for Georgia!

Participation was up from last year, log summary submissions were up from last year – this all bodes well for the NJQRP Skeeter Hunt for 2014!  Hope to hear your Bzzzzzzzz next year!

72 de Larry W2LJ
QRP – When you care to send the very least!