AmateurRadio.com

Things are coming along

The boxes are slowly getting unpacked and things put away, the roll top ham radio shack is taking shape as well. I found I had a lot more gear than there was room for in the condo and may have to shed more gear! At this point there has been some bumps in the radio setup but all seems to be slowly coming together. I can't believe all the cables that are involved in having the radio talk to various hardware components. There has been one major mystery I am not as of yet to solve.....I have setup the Alexloop and added the K3 to the mix. I was able to get a great SWR and surprisingly a low to moderate noise level...BUT.....I was calling CQ on different bands with 5 watts but was not once spotted on the Reverse Beacon network. Hmmmm I then went "simple" I hooked up the KX3 to the Alexloop and again calling CQ at 5 watts was not spotted at all on the Reverse Beacon network????? I have tried to move the Alexloop closer to the window and the balcony door, the only thing that happened was the SWR was very hard to adjust on the Alexloop. I then move the loop about 4 feet from the balcony door and the SWR was great but no spots?
My setup is a stealth operation and really can't put the Alexloop on the balcony but I am 6 stories up and back in the townhouse I did have the Alexloop inside and it did very well so at this point I am stumped.

The K3 just stopped!

This weekend I hooked up the Elecraft k3 as it was all disconnected when we had the house painted as it had to be moved for safe keeping. I wanted to make sure it still worked with all the computer software and the Alexloop. Software can be a very funny thing in that you really don't have to do anything and for some strange reason it just stops working! I am happy to report that all between the PC and Elecraft K3 is working well.

There was one heart stopping moment, it was during a tuning session of  the Alexloop and the rig. I tuned the Alexloop for max receive I then hit the tune button on the K3 with the power on 3 watts the SWR was around 3.1 to 1 so some fine tuning was needed. As I tuned the Alexloop the SWR did a sharp rise and the rig powered off!! I waited for a moment and tried to power the K3 on again and NOTHING! I then checked the incoming power and it was dead. Well I thought better the Astron 20 amp supply taking a hit than the K3. Looking at the Astron supply the lights were on and 13.8 volts was showing on the meter. As I narrowed things down it was a fuse on the power bar that the Astron feeds power to. The K3 was fused at 1 amp at the power bar and not 5 amps and the fuse on the power bar went. After the proper fuse was installed all was well again.

Blown fuse

Last week I was able to purchase for a GREAT price a used very large roll top desk and this is going to be the desk that I use for the radio setup when we move to the condo. Not sure what I am going to do with my 3 monitor setup as it's great having all three. There seems at this point to be room for one monitor and all the radio gear. Whats great about the roll top once  your done all the radio equipment hides away into a nice oak desk. At this point I am brain storming on how to incorporate the other two monitors???
As for radio time Saturday was spent getting the K3 setup and my heart restarted when it powered down. There was a contest going on so the band were very busy but it did give me a change to see how Skimmer works under a contest situation. I can see how this piece of software will give my limited size station some advantages. The picture below is what sold me on the desk, the keyboard tray and the two pull outs.

I have changed the shots to try to make them larger as some readers were wanting to see more details. The original pictures were done with Windows Print screen key. Not a very good option if one wants to see detail....lesson learned.These are not the greatest but the best I can do with the original prints.


Well I'm off work today and tomorrow I was off last week with a very bad cold and sinus infection but went back to early and am off again. Now I'm on med's and things seem to be turning around. Oh one thing the doctor asked me to try was a Neti Pot. In a nut shell you flush out your nose with water, it goes in one nostril and flows out the other!! I have heard of this and my son actually does it but there is just something funny about running water all the way through your nose up and into the sinus cavities and out. You just have to be careful and not use tap water and only the solution that is advised to use..........any way what does this have to do with WSRPing.......NOTHING.......I again have set up my Elecraft K3 for WSPR and it works better than ever. I set it up on 20m this afternoon to see how my 5 watts could venture out and about. I was very surprised that my signal made it over into Europe. A fellow blogger Paul PC4T in the Netherlands has hoped to have a WSPR signal meeting....up to this point it has been a no go. But this time around I did make it into the Netherlands to PA0SLT and PA3EDR as well as Italy, Switzerland, Finland and France.

The attic dipole is working it's magic agian!

It's Sunday afternoon and thought I would flip the K3 to the on position. The RSGB IOTA contest is in full swing but I was only able to hear  few stations. As I spun across the band I came across G0PZA/EU11 in London area. I gave him a call at 500 mW's but it was just not going to happen. As I slowly raised my power I was able to make the contact with 1 watt for a 3594 miles per watt contact. I then moved around the band but was not able to hear all that much. I was pleased with this contact as the bands over the last couple of days have not been really all that great. Last night I heard a station calling CQ from Nova Scotia and even with full power at 5 watts I was not able to raise this station. I consider this evening to be an accomplishment with a 1 watt DX contact as compared to almost a local call and being shut out with 5 watts. It's 5 o'clock in the evening and I am very tired (considering I pulled an all nigher at work on Saturday) so it's soon time to hit the hay and looking forward to another week at work....NOT!!!
Have a good week everyone
 

Over the past few days if not weeks I have been getting updates on my Iphone of the solar conditions and it seemed solar flares were a dime a dozen!! Here at VE3WDM it's QRP all the way and max power is 5 watts. This evening I turned on the K3 and was not expecting to hear all that much and maybe just log some "local" QSO's. I was able to hear S573DX  and he was about an S9, I tried to make the contact using 1 watt but was only met with "VE3?" I then doubled the power and that did the trick with 2 watts for a 5NN and 2,222 miles per watt contact. I then spun the dial again and came across H70ORO from Nicaragua and was able to work him with 3 watts. I have for some reason always had trouble with South and Central America from my location but was thrilled to work him with only 3 watts for 729 miles per watt. That's not bad at all considering that part of the globe on a real good day is very hard for me to hit with a contact. Finally I was able to just at one point pick out Z33Z from the noise floor but as I was writing this post and listening Z33Z from Macedonia became an S5 signal. I decided to crank the power to a full 5 watts and give him a go. I made it but with a few repeats and Z33Z is in the log. That was it for the evening with ham radio I was very happy with the contacts that were made.
YOU GOTTA LOVE QRP!!!!

OM7RU

This evening 20m was once again rather slow but I was able to catch EI3KG from Ireland, Michal was 599 into Canada.  It was a very fast QSO with just the exchange of reports but I was able to raise Michal on my first call to him. I then came across LZ1IQ from Bulgaria and he was not able to pick me out from the noise floor. I did try a few times but gave up as there was a pileup waiting to work him and I did not want to hold him from working other stronger station.  Then came OM7RU Ricki from the Slovak Republic and I was refreshed to get a report of 569. I did mention to him that I was /QRP this is something I don't often do. Ricki was more of a relaxed DX op with giving out his name, RST and wanted the same along with the traditional TU 73.
It was time to shut the radio down for the evening and get on and  blog about the great contacts. As a side note my XYL's mom and aunt are over from England for a 4 week visit. This means the Plasma TV down in the living room is on. I get terrible interference on the rig from this TV. Its great that I have the MFJ 1026 noise cancelling unit when adjusted properly I lose any sign of the Plasma TV. This unit is great.

One day my call will be in the confirmation box

I had some time to flip the switch on the K3 this evening and the bands at first did not seem to be in great shape. As I tuned around I came across a station that was S2 and up to S6, the station was 9K2MU from Kuwait! He was operating split and it did not seem to be to much action trying to contact him. He was calling CQ and listening I threw my call out there and the propagation gods were not smiling on me as my call was not heard. He did come back to some other stations as time went on but I still threw my call out there. Then he was spotted on a cluster and all hell broke loose! The action went from casual to bumper to bumper. By that time is was tea time for me....which I am sipping as I write this post. Even though I did not contact Kuwait it was very cool to hear him in there and have the opportunity  to make the contact.