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We had another cold snap hit us here with a wind chill in around -20C  it was time for some indoor radio activities. For some reason I settled in on 17m not a band that I frequent all that often, not sure why but never seem to stay long on this band. When looking at the P3 band scope the band did not look very active but as I slowly scanned across the band I came across some stations calling CQ. The first station was ZB2FK on Gibralter. There was not much of a pileup at the time when I made contact and I did receive a 559 from him and with 5 watts from an MFJ 1788 loop antenna I was very pleased with that contact. I then came across IW1DFU calling CQ again on 17m and I gave him a call he did come back to me but I had to repeat my call but again he gave me a pleasing 559 report. I then came across KH2L in Guam and he was in and out with the noise floor but I was very happy the loop was even picking him up! It was time to put the filtering of the K3 to use. I dropped the filter to 250 hz and added the Audio Peak filtering feature and that

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was all it took to bring him off the noise floor and into plan old CW. There really was no pileup to speak of but some where in line before me and I wanted to wait my turn. The propagation was such that his signal was up around S5 and then just at the noise floor. This is the exciting type of DX I like to try to work, it's a challenge and it could be hit or miss. It is very unusual for me to even hear signals from this part of the world but today at times he is S5. When given the opportunity I dropped my call and hoped for the best. Have you ever had this happen.......I for sure thought he was coming back to me and it happen to be the one time he was in the noise floor but maybe I was not at his end but at a possible S5. So I came back to him..........but it was not to be it was if the static was playing head games with me and coding VE3WDMmmmmm. To make a long
story short one of his contacts had spotted him on a cluster and then all hell broke loose!! My time was up as a HUGE pile started. I'm not saying QRP stations have not busted pileups but time was moving on and dinner was soon going to be on the table. KH2L maybe next time, I am not at all disappointed as these types of events help sharpen your skills and really allows you to become familiar with your radio. 

Pumping out 1/2 a watt

On Saturday I was very pleased to see that my MFJ 1788 loop antenna was getting out. On Sunday it was time to push my luck to the limits, here are VE3WDM I always like to see how little power it take to make a contact. It seemed yesterday 5 watts most if not all the time was getting through. Why stop at 5 watts it was time to drop the Elecraft K3 below the 5 watt maker.............wayyyyy below! The conditions once again were very nice Flux levels were up along with the Sun spot count but the K index was also in around 4. That did not seem to matter the bands were full of contest action. Once again I stayed on 15m and it was very busy with DX from the contest. Today I made only 20 contacts as there was chores to get done around the house.

Hard at work

Yesterday's post concentrated on the country count and locations today's post is all about power levels and miles per watt. From 5 watts I dropped down to 2 watts to see what would happen and DK3GI was in my cross hairs. I was able to make the contact first call which gave me 2020 miles per watt. From there on out of my 20 contacts 19 were all over 1,000 miles per watt. Here is a run down:
1 contact made at 3 watts
4 contacts were made at 2 watts
7 contacts were made at 1 watt
6 contacts were made at .5 of a watt
1 contact made at .1 of a watt
1 contact made at 5 watts ( this being the only contact not netting me 1000 miles per watt)
Some of the miles per watt numbers
II9P at .5 of a watts netted me 18,470 miles per watt
K5RT at .1 of a watt netted me 11,808 miles per watt
CN2AA at .5 of a watt netted me 7682 miles per watt
F8CIL at .5 of a watt netted me 7662 miles per watt
F5NBX at .5 of a watt netted me 7608 miles per watt
CS2C at .5 of a watt and netted me 7216 miles per watt
This contest I was just a point giver and not in the contest to submit a score. I wanted to test out the MFJ 1788 antenna to see how my location and antenna performed. Some things that still have to be done, I have to get the contesting software and radio control software up and running. Have the SWR problem on 10m and 20m figured out with the MFJ 1788 loop, for some reason the best SWR I can get is around 9! On a positive side this contest proved to me that the antenna will get out even with QRP or QRPp power!!

The K3 doing it's work

I was able to get in a few hours in the ARRL CW contest this afternoon and  operated only on 15m. My output power was QRP 5 watts into my balcony mounted MFJ 1788 iso-loop. I was pleasantly surprised with the results I was able to make 40 DX contacts in 23 different countries. I was not able to make any 1,000 mile per watt contacts but I did come close at 4500 miles (using 5 watts). I found the noise floor to be just great and the EU stations were just booming in. There were some stations that did have trouble with my signal but over all exchanges were made first time.
My SWR was in around 1.4 to 1 and it was very simple to adjust the SWR as I went up and down the band. You just have to get the hang of tuning the loop and it is a simple push of the fine adjustment button and your all set to go. This evening I tried 40m and there was lots of EU stations but for some reason I was not able to make any contacts so after a short time I shut things down for the evening.
Tomorrow I am going to try to make some contacts with less than 5 watts and hopefully get some 1,000 miles per watt contacts.
Some of the highlights were:
Tunisia
Balearic Island
Finland
Alaska
Nicaragua

There has been a big change here since our move with regards to ham radio.   Antenna challenges, finding a spot for the radio, having the setup "eye friendly" to non hams who visit.  The antenna challenge seems to be solved with the MFJ 1788 loop antenna. There are still some hick ups with it, for example not being able to tune 20m below a 9.1 to 1 SWR. I have spoken with MFJ and they have given me some great ideas to try with the loop. (more on that as I venture into the loop's insides) The setup was solved with a great roll top desk all is hidden away and protected with a very fashionable piece of furniture. Now it's time to look at expanding my radio operations beyond CW but still very much not forgetting about CW it will still be a large part of my operating. CW is perfect for low power and simple antenna operating. BUT also with my new antenna it has a narrow bandwidth and needs to be returned as you move up or down the band. With practice the loop can be retuned very fast. I was wanting now to add a mode that would favour the loops narrow band width. The digital world came to mind.
The last time I was in digi land PSK31 was the ground breaking mode and I have come to understand by many of the blogs I read there are some new modes in town!! PSK is still around but it too has changed. There is also now SIM31 and 63,  JT65, Olivia and the list goes on, I have been out of digital for some time now and am not sure what all is out there. What I am looking for is something that uses a narrow bandwidth, (most digi modes do) only requiring low power, would be great to have a "conversation mode" and not signal reports and goodbye and not a mode that takes forever for exchanges as I have heard about some digi modes. Having said all that one thing I can remember about the digi modes is they can be lot of "fun" to setup with your rig and PC! BUT that is all part of the fun I guess. So you digi fans out there help me out with some suggestions as to an HF low power narrow bandwidth digi mode I can scramble my brains with. Oh and if it helps the bands I have available are 10-40m and the rigs I have are the Elecraft K3  and KX3.

I had some spare time today to put the MFJ 1788 loop to the balcony test once again. Up to this point I have not been able to make any CW contacts with the antenna. I was able to pull in some State side WSPR spots but that was it. I was coming to the conclusion that my DX was going to be Canada to U.S contacts. Today I set the Loop antenna for 15m and the SWR was great at 1.1:1. and up and down the band I went. I heard KP2/AG2J calling CQ at 21.025 and he was booming in here. I called out to him and low and behold he came back to me with a fast report! Fast report or not my 5 watts signal from the balcony just made it to the Virgin islands!! I then heard KH6LC from Hawaii..........but I was not able to make contact BUT for the first time I was hearing some DX stations. I then was able to contact PJ4LS with some repeats on my part but I still had my 1788 loop signal down to the Antilles off the coast of Venezuela!! The other station I heard but was not able to contact was ZZ80MT in Brazil. This was a good afternoon on the radio of me I was able to hear and make some DX contacts.

A shot of the loop with the "T" fitting

I have been looking for a way to place the Alexloop  in the horizontal position as from my playing with the loop it seems to work better for me on the balcony in the omnidirectional horizontal position. Yesterday I was able to pick up a 1 inch "T" fitting mainly used for piecing together plastic pipe. I was able to feed the loops center support through the "T" fitting and place it nicely on the tripod. With just a little electrical tape to hold it in place it worked great. 
I finally set things up to get  WSPR up and going, so yesterday during the day and then into the evening I was WSPRing to see how my signal was getting out from the condo. Up to this point I have only used the Reverse Beacon Network or RBN which involved CW at 5 watts. I was not thrilled with the results and was really wanting to give WSPR a go. During the day I tried 10m and 20m I started out with 1 watt and in terms of WSPR that is some pretty high power. The antenna once again was the Alexloop in the horizontal position, at first attempt on both bands the Alexloop was indoors. It was not surprise that there were no spots at all it was time to move the loop out onto the balcony. Once setup I went back to 10m and it was about 2pm local time with no results again. I then jumped over to 20m and it was just U.S stations and very few I might add that received my signal. It was time to pack it in for the afternoon and some chores had to be done and I would get back on in the evening hours.
At 7 pm local time I was up and WSPRing on 40m and with great hopes as the band sounded good and I was decoding some WSPR DX such as EA3NEI. I once again was only heard in the U.S and this time I used up to 5 watts!! Maybe it was that conditions were poor out this way as they have been over the past week. Over the weekend if I get time I am going to give WSPR a go once again and see how it works out.

Keeping it simple

I'm only 54 years old but over the past few years it's either my age or the growing of the hobby both technically and gadget wise that has given me some senior moments!! I really can't blame just the hobby as I have had times when heading to the car to only stop and wondering where is was I was heading too and for what! I'm comforted from online reading that says this is from having lots on the go and nothing to do with loosing your memory.  How does this relate to ham radio you say...........The rigs I have are the Elecraft K3 and KX3 both are menu driven as are many other rigs on the market are. I find myself going to the user manual or as I call it sometimes the "useless manual" to relearn a function that was just used the week before. I have had my ego get the best of me at times and refused to hit the books as I "knew" how to do this silly function command!! After going through several unknown menu's and not knowing how I got there, what I have done to the rig and better yet how to get the hell out! Oh and don't get me started on passwords that a whole other blog post!

3x5 life savers

For those of you who have the same memory melt downs at times as I do here are some helps that I use. In high school and University the good old 3x5 cards helped me learn (notice I said learn and not memorize very big difference) and pass many a test. The 3x5 helped me in the past and is doing so today, I write down step by step instructions for anything ham related items so I can refer to the card and not the Advil bottle. I cover over the card with clear tape so it will last for some time and the only thing I have to do is keep the cards in a place I can remember.....but maybe there is a card for that...:)). Just today I wanted to charge an external battery for my KX3 as I was going to do some hamming this weekend. I pulled out the battery and for the life of me I could not remember the setup to charge this darn battery. Thanks to a fellow blogger Larry W2LJ who has the same battery set me on the right path with an email. Now the instructions (simple as they may be) are taped on the side of the battery.