WPX SSB 2014 "THE VIEW"

Well my trip to Ore. for WPX with old bud K7BUY was again well worth the drive. We had a great time as old friends seem to do and for us we did ok in the contest even with a full blown radio blackout for some hours just more time to visit enjoy a beer and complain about world events.

I will not go into much detail here just that it was a great time and the view is soooo good, the photos will prove that, the photo of the Mountains is what you see from the operating position, who could get tired of that? Get on have fun and spend time with your best friend !

FT5ZM Amsterdam Isl.

The last few DXpedition stations I have worked were almost unbearable due to very poor operating practices and the normal frequency police and the jammers that just want to cause problems for no real reason.
I have been following the FT5ZM operation for some time thinking it would be a nice one to have, a very rare DX entity and about as far from Idaho as you can get. With my pewee antenna farm and 100w I knew it would be tough, but tough is not close to how it was it was painful !

The window of opportunity to work such a location from the PNW is narrow only a few hours a day morning was my best chance so my buddy K7BUY who lives in Ore. decided we would meet VIA text message at 0700 each morning and give it a try. K7BUY runs 100w to a very long wire. Our first morning was on 30m CW it was a mess more later on that, well Larry pulled it off and in the first hour had snagged them very good DX CW op. Well I was not so lucky so for the next 8 days a couple of hours in the morning and a little in the evening which was a very small window I soldered on.

For me this was the hardest fought battle for a new DX country that I had ever had, remember 100w 100 foot random wire and a flag pole vertical that was my tool box. The real problem was not the small station layout but the non stop bad operating and jamming most of the time you could not hear the DX station although much of the time he had a very good signal. For days this went on never in the clear.

It astounds me that most of the offenders that did not grasp the concept of split operation were one by 2 Extra class calls, I am still amazed at how bad it was hard to explain but you know if you worked this one. What does it take? How many of these operations are spoiled by bad operators....many but this was by far the worst ever in my opinion.

Europe was no better jamming, calling on DX freq. never ended, anyway up to day 8, I worked them this morning on 20m SSB first call, no jammers no one calling on Freq. he was in the clear and I could hear him, honestly thought this one may not happen for me.

I hope when we see the articles in the magazines they do not brush this aside, behavior like this is becoming the norm, I do not have the answer but this one reflected very badly on the ham community.

Well you know the ending, make the best of what you have, get on and have fun...and lets all try to set good examples on the air....73

Computers in the SHACK

I am not a computer guy I do not try to talk the talk with guys that are really in the know. A friend of mine once told me you should have at least three good friends one with a pickup truck, one with a hot tub, and one that is a computer tech....makes some sense !

Most all of us today have a computer at our operating position, some are used for simple tasks such as spotting DX, logging , and others are used for everything from rig control to SDR. What ever yours is doing it is no doubt important to your Ham Radio operation. I fall in the middle spotting, logging, RTTY, CW (transmit) and PSK.

But the same computer contains all my everyday stuff too photos, records on line business things and so on....Well where I am going with this is that this week for the first time ever starting with a C64 I had a total system failure...yes a hard drive failure the blue screen of death....I am also a so-so backup guy some things I do often some not so....I guess that is half of us....

Well long story short after some cash layout and much fretting I am up and running with a new hard drive and some improved features to my Dell Windows 7 machine. I was sooo lucky much was saved from my old drive but some was lost forever my bad ! So if you are like me a so-so back up guy change your ways it can happen, and if you are the other guy who has always backed up faithfully good on you I should have listened once again my bad !

So the moral of the story is BACK IT UP I lost some things I will never recover, gone forever so don't be me...Get on have fun and oh yes back up you files....73

160m

Well the WX here in Idaho is bitter cold was -6 this morning so good time for some warm shack time. This weekend was the ARRL 160m CW contest so thought I would give it a try with my 100 foot wire @ 25 feet and 100w ....yeah not so ideal but all I got !

Always surprised that it works at all, my high city noise and bad antenna are just a bugger but the idea is to have some fun and try to do better than last year, Well I had fun and did do better than last year, I ran the new FT-950 for the first time on 160 in high noise conditions, need to do some more setup so back to the book today, but was overall happy with it.

I think the East coast was hearing Europe better than the Western US, as I did hear many working EU stations. So good DX for my pewee station is East coast. Best this year was Alaska NY CT RI NH so that is good for me...I hope you are all planning at least one contest this winter, remember make the best of your situation get on and have some fun.

November DX and Contests

I guess the header should have October in it also.. I made my yearly trip to Oregon for the CQWWDXSSB contest and yes I did get snowed on again...We ran MULTI-ONE again this year and had a good time conditions were very good and as old friends do we spent a little to much time catching up so radio score suffered.
We never will win but we will always have a good time. We ran low power with a tri-band beam and a long wire spending most of our time on 10 and 15m. I hope all who were on during the contest had as much fun as we did. I am recovering from a bug so did not operate ARRL SS CW just did not feel well enough. May do SS SSB and CQDXCW if time allows...

I guess what I wanted to put out there now is two of this months DXpeditions running now, one is Wake Isl. K9W which I think is a less than exciting call, and the other is San Andres 5J0R now that is a good call. I have tried to work the Wake Isl. stations a few times on CW but the pile-up is so unruly and has not been controlled very well by the DX station I have about given up for now.

I have worked the 5J0R station on RTTY after a few days of trying and it seemed to go well, no one was unruly and the callers were well above the DX freq. and it seemed to be a good operation. I guess what I need to know is why these operations get so screwed up with band police sending UP UP every few seconds and operators that are just rude and exhibit poor operator skills ....Tell me if you know...sure makes it tough to hang around for a new one....

Some good stuff coming up in the contest world so if your not in it to win it...be like me in it for the fun of it....Get on have fun and 73....

ANTENNAS and THE SUN

Well as of today it looks like the numbers are looking better for a change as I compose this SN is 138 A index is 5 and K is 1.....Enjoyed some DX on both 10 and 15m this morning hope it holds out for a few days as I would like to chase some DX on RTTY this weekend.

From my past posts you all know I have antenna restrictions where I live and I have tried very hard not to let that put a damper on my love for the hobby. I have done some work arounds that have been ok and even better than just ok...I did not like the idea of attic antennas as they cause so many RF issues such as.....setting off the smoke alarms, turning on the dish washer, tripping the GFI's in the kitchen oh yes and in some cases inflating and deflating our air bed.....

This was not a constant problem but each band seemed to have it's favorite appliance to fool with.
I decided to install another vertical antenna ( have one hidden a flagpole) in the back yard in plain sight and see if I get any complaints....what's it hurt to try?

This is just an old Hustler 5BTV which I have found to work pretty well for what they are. I first painted it OD green so no shiny aluminum in the yard then installed radials which the flagpole is lacking on, it only has one for each band due to it's location....

So guess my point is see what the neighbors will accept ( I will let you know if I get busted) it has been up about a month and no complaints yet! The test will be when the leaves fall and it will be more visible....we will see..... : )

So no matter your situation try hard to get on have fun and 73....

RTTY CONTEST

Well my second try at RTTY contesting proved to be much harder than the first. My first try was a NA contest which seemed to be laid back and a good time to get my feet wet without to much stress....
Well my second try was the CQWWDX RTTY contest hummm....I told my friend for a new guy it goes like this....you put on your bee keeper suit wade into the swarm of bees and try to catch just one with a pair of tweezers...I give to the experienced RTTY contester my total respect you guys are the real deal. Due to family obligations I did not get to spend all the time I wanted to with the contest but as it turned out it was enough....

I managed to work some DX and some U.S. stations and I thank them for being good operator's and having the patents to work me, as I was screwed up about half the time with wrong macro clicks and the like....I have a renewed interest in RTTY and look for DX almost every day in the RTTY sub bands, and will no doubt jump in to another contest.

Thank you to all the great RTTY ops that taught me allot this past weekend I admire you all. RTTY being one of the old modes is great fun, and I recommend it to all who have not tried it or who have been away from it for a long time like me..... so if you are tired of the everyday digi modes give RTTY a try.....A great bunch of guys operate the mode and will be polite, and helpful to you.

RYRYRYRYRY...get on have fun and 73....Jim K7JAN