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Yesterday I dabbled in the OK/OM DX CW contest for about an hour and a half. This time for some fun and interest I entered QRP level but lowered my power to just one watt. Propagation has been surprisingly nice over the past week or so and I wanted to give the new solar flux a test run. My radio is the Icom 7610 and my antenna is a slopped Endfed antenna at about 25 feet. I stayed on 20m as the radio gods seemed to be smiling on me there. I made only 10 contacts as I was not in the contest for scoring just to see how the fishing was with one watt. I was only asked for repeats regarding my exchange twice other than that the 1 watt made it through. 

Because I was operating at only 1 watt I also wanted to take the loss of my SWR into account. I checked with my antenna analyzer and the CW portion on 20m my SWR was 2.3:1. According to the power loss at various SWR readings chart at 2.3:1, I was in around 15% so this took my 1 watt down to 850 milliwatts. 

Below are the results of my QRPp contest efforts: 

Band     20m 

QSO     10

Score    300

Contacts and Miles per watt using grid square to grid square for millage  

1. OM7M        3720 miles  4376 miles per watt at .850 watts. 

2. OM3CGN    3795 miles 4464 miles per watt at .850 watts.

3. OL3Z           3515 miles  4135 miles per watt at .850 watts. 

4.OK7K          3503 miles 4121 miles per watt at .850 watts.          

5. OK1DOL    3478 miles 4091 miles per watt at .850 watts. 

Starting out on my cool walk

CHA P-Loop antenna

I had the day off work today and it looked very nice outside, the sky was clear and the sun was out. I wanted to take this opportunity to test out my new portable antenna. I packed up my Elecraft KX3, batteries, key and my new Chameleon CHA P-Loop antenna. This post is not a review of the new antenna before I do that I want to try out the antenna several times. Before heading out I did not check the propagation reports, I find if I do this and they are poor it casts a shadow over the outing.As I was saying the day from inside the house looked nice but once out there was a cold wind off the lake, it felt like a cool fall day and not spring. Anyway.....because of the poor weather, my lack of warm clothing I quickly setup the antenna, checked out how it tuned on 10, 15, 20 and 30m and gave a few CW CQ's. With no answers and the wind picking up I was satisfied the antenna at least worked.

My setup

Starting out on my cool walk

CHA P-Loop antenna

I had the day off work today and it looked very nice outside, the sky was clear and the sun was out. I wanted to take this opportunity to test out my new portable antenna. I packed up my Elecraft KX3, batteries, key and my new Chameleon CHA P-Loop antenna. This post is not a review of the new antenna before I do that I want to try out the antenna several times. Before heading out I did not check the propagation reports, I find if I do this and they are poor it casts a shadow over the outing.As I was saying the day from inside the house looked nice but once out there was a cold wind off the lake, it felt like a cool fall day and not spring. Anyway.....because of the poor weather, my lack of warm clothing I quickly setup the antenna, checked out how it tuned on 10, 15, 20 and 30m and gave a few CW CQ's. With no answers and the wind picking up I was satisfied the antenna at least worked.

My setup

40m from 7am-7pm local time

With the Solar cycle heading on a downward trend I have been reading how 40, 80 and 160m may be the bands of choice for QSO's. Since my MFJ 1788 will only venture down to 40m and at the best of times I have found it to preform like a wet noodle on this band. I decided this weekend to give WSPR a go on 40m using 1 watt to see what results I got. My 1 watt signal was picked up throughout Canada and the U.S. There was a one off to Spain but the consensus from WSRP.net was on 40m my DX was going to be North America. There was one odd report which repeated itself over and over, it was from WY1R saying he was hearing me on 6m?? Not to sure what that was all about. I also was checking with PSK reporter looking at WSPR mode and funny thing was there was never any hits for my call?

40m from 7am-1am local time

40m from 7am-7pm local time

With the Solar cycle heading on a downward trend I have been reading how 40, 80 and 160m may be the bands of choice for QSO's. Since my MFJ 1788 will only venture down to 40m and at the best of times I have found it to preform like a wet noodle on this band. I decided this weekend to give WSPR a go on 40m using 1 watt to see what results I got. My 1 watt signal was picked up throughout Canada and the U.S. There was a one off to Spain but the consensus from WSRP.net was on 40m my DX was going to be North America. There was one odd report which repeated itself over and over, it was from WY1R saying he was hearing me on 6m?? Not to sure what that was all about. I also was checking with PSK reporter looking at WSPR mode and funny thing was there was never any hits for my call?

40m from 7am-1am local time