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Thought it was time this evening to power up the K3 and see what was on the bands. The software  I use is DXLab and it comes with a spot collector as it's called. I noticed a spot for AX7GN on 20m so I double clicked on the spot and the K3 magically was there! So here I am listening for AX7GN and yes there is a station there calling what sounded like CQ....or did I want it to be a station calling CQ? Well I hoped it was not little voices in my head talking to me. I heard nothing so I just put my call out there....and listened just maybe a little to intently. I did hear what sounded like VE? VE? By this time the APF was on the RF gain was being adjusted and the filtering narrowed.  I gave the call again at a deafening 5 watts!! Between the static and the ringing sound from the APF  I thought AX7GN was giving out what  "KINDA" sounded like my call.....or was it those voices again!! I passed along a 559 but did not hear much in return. To be honest I am not sure what the heck happened.....did I want to hear my call so bad that the static kinda sounded like VE3WDM?? For a short time I listened to the band and low and behold AX7GN was there and answering some U.S calls! I'm not going to put this one in the books as I am just not 100 percent it was just not the DX voices playing games with me. Has this ever happen to you??

The IMac and KX3

For those of you who are regular readers of my blog know that I run an Elecraft K3 along with Windows XP programs. I also have the Elecraft KX3 that runs on Mac programs. My eyes were sure opened up to the software programs out there for ham's running on Mac machines. I will admit for this long time Windows user getting the swing of Mac took some time.....and I am not done learning as of yet! My wife Julie is very much into photography she has a Mac pro laptop and did have the IMac desktop PC. Some months ago she felt it

Downsizing

was time to part with the IMac. I simply walked the IMac down the hall to my shack and hooked the KX3 up and thus began the Mac adventure. Julie since then has been taking some evening College course's in photography, this has put a flame to her picture taking!  As they say " to make a long story short" the IMac has found it's former home in Julie's office down the hall. I am now a strict Windows ham again! It sure was a fun ride and maybe in time the funds will come in to get a Mac of my own.

No time to do lots

There was many things to get done this evening (far from being done) and not much time to do them. I had emails to answer, two reviews to write for Eham, get some radio time in and post on the blog! So I was shocked this evening to find 20m alive and well. The wind has died down out this way and that means the 230kv lines outside the house had stopped moving about. They sure were giving me loads of interference right across the band. That is for another days blogging complete with YouTube action as well. This evening I first ran across 9A2N from Croatia  and his signal ranged from S4 to S7. I gave him a go with 1 watt, then 2 watts but I was able to make the contact with 3 watts.

 I  then found LZ833MBB...how is that for a call!!! This call is a special event station call and is in honour of Bulgarian Saint Martyr Knyaz Boyan Bylgarski.. I was able to work this Bulgarian club with just 1 watt.
Finally I moved on to 9A7R who is from Croatia as well and again got my contact in with just 1 watt. This evening the high flux and sunspot numbers sure are starting to pay off. I am going to have to get in on the action again tomorrow but for now it's off to other items on the check list.

I have seen the flux and sunspot numbers on the rise throughout the week and have been wanting to get on the radio to test the waters! This weekend I have decided to join in on the QRP DX Marathon than runs for the month of April. Fellow blogger Larry W2LJ is also involved in the Marathon and has posted great results. This is a QRP event were you are allowed make contacts using anywhere from 1 watt to 5 watts. There is a formula at the Marathon site that allows you to figure out your miles per watt. What makes this event a challenge is formula that is used to come up with your miles per watt. It seems to me that not only is your QRP power taken into the mix but the station you are contacting also counts toward your miles per watt outcome. So if you have a QRP to QRP contact then you earn a higher score. I found this out the hard way yesterday when I made contact with SP8FHK from Poland with 1 watt...but he was running 1KW and that really hurt my score!! At this point I am number 23.
Today I am at it again but so far no luck, I have been finding stations such as F7HKA, HB9TN and IK5ZWU all on 24 mhz but no luck in contacting them. I start out calling them at 1 watt and move my way up to 5 watts. I have not been able to hit the 5 watt level as they seem to fade into the noise level before then. The day is still young and opportunity awaits me on the bands.

CT8/PA4N

I finally had a chance to fire up the K3 on Monday afternoon, it has been a very busy weekend besides I have been reading on most blogs how poor the conditions were....even for the digi folks. It was very windy and cold up this way on Monday with the surprise of snow in the morning. We have some 230KV lines at the back of the house and when they start to blowing around some (I guessing) loose insulator cause me some QRN. The blogs were spot on and the bands were not in real good shape at all besides the power line QRN was not helping either. Later in the afternoon the winds settled and the bands had some CW spikes showing on the P3 here and there.

230KV lines out back

I was on 20m and heard CT8/PA4N who was operating from Sao Miguel island (EU-003) on the Azores.  Frank was only going to be on the island until April 3rd so I wanted to give him a shot. The band was not busy at all, they were not running split and since conditions were not that great I pumped the K3 up to 5 watts. With only one repeat of my call I made the contact. As I was entering the logging info into DxLabs there was a pileup developing so it would seem I got in at the right time.  I also noticed that fellow blogger John N8ZYA has also made contact with the team as well.

Things don't seem to work  when you really need them

I have been reading on many blogs of fellow hams who have had an increase in QRN due to many electrical sources and routers just to mention a few. The enjoyment of ham radio has been for many cut short due to devices blowing a hole in the spectrum!! Yes the companies are suppose to adhere to regulations regarding emissions. BUT both the adhering and the enforcement are very much lacking. We as hams are left to somehow deal with the hash that many modern items produce. I have this feeling it is not going to decrease as time goes on but increase. I have found this is were in my case the MFJ 1026 shines for me. I have a Plasma TV on the main floor and when Julie is cooking, surfing the net or relaxing the TV is on with some music playing in the background. I could go down and ask her to turn the TV off....but....I am a married man not a foolish man. Below is a YouTube video I did today showing how effective the MFJ 1026 is. It was done with my Iphone so some movement will be noticed. (note to self....get a proper recording device)

Signals on 10m this afternoon

Sunday afternoon has seemed to pass just a little faster with setting our clocks ahead last evening an hour. I did find some time to get on the radio (finally after about 5 days off). I tried 10m and according to the P3 screen things were fairly calm for that band. As I was starting up my PC along with the DXlab software I did notice some small and large spikes on the P3. Most of the time when the band is this dead and it was about 2 in the afternoon as well these spikes are just QRM.

EA2LU antennas

Upon investigation to my surprise the first spike was a signal from PV8ADI in Brazil. For some reason I have had troubles with South American station. Not sure if it's the position of the dipole in the attic or just one of those always hard to get spots for me. I gave the station a go with 500mW's but as I expected....nothing. He was having lots of stations (ones I could not hear) come back to him. The flavor of the contact was signal report and move on. I brought the K3 up to 5 watts and gave him a another call. He came back to me and we exchanged reports and moved on.

I was now noticing some stronger signals, the first I tuned in was EA2LU from Spain. I tried Jorge with 500mW's and made the contact without any troubles. He was running a  Yagi at 100 watts. This was a nice contact as we were able to exchange rig info, antenna info and

EA2LU setup

 chat about how well he found my attic dipole preforming along with only 500mW's. I then moved on to another strong signal that had just shown up while my QSO what Jorge was ending. This station was EA1ND calling CQ and again I was able to make the contact with only 500mW's as well. Nacho had told me this was his first contact into Canada and he was very thankful that I came back to him. For sure I will upload to LoTW and Eqsl.  We spoke for a short time about the weather both here and there along with  RST, power and name. These Spanish contacts at 500mW's netted me 7600 miles per watt. Just made contact with FG5FR from Guadeloupe with 500mW's on 15m.  I have been keeping one ear on the rig (headphones) and writing the blog post.....multi tasking who would had thunk.