Weather terrible, but band conditions good

Just in case you thought all I was doing was taking photos and blogging,
here's a photo of me operating on 20cw, with Liam on 40 SSB behind.

It's the second day of our operation at Gola Island and the EJ7NET team is in good form. The QSO rate on 20m and 30m CW this morning was pretty good. Declan EI6FR was first up (as usual!) and was on 30 cw. I joined a while later on 20 cw and found the going pretty good. There is slow fading of some signals but generally Europe and Russia were reasonably strong, and there was a good few QSOs from the UK as well.

The weather is terrible. It's raining heavily and has been for several hours. However, this has not dampened team spirits, especially with decent propagation. We are about to set up the 6 metre beam so hopefully we might make a few QSOs on that band during our activation.

We have passed 1,000 QSOs already which is great. We're hoping band conditions will remain good so that we can work as many of you as possible.

My view from the 20m CW station!

New (modified) home-brew hacksaw blade single-lever Morse paddle tested live with QSO on 30 metres

This is a video showing my new home-brew single-lever hacksaw blade Morse key in action. I decided to test it "live", with the webcam running, by CQing on the 30 metre band using 100 watts. First station into my log was DL0BZA. I enjoyed using the key. It has no weight, so holding it down is required during operation, which is not ideal. I have a couple of steel bases, one of which I hope to "stick" it to, in some way. The morse key is a modification of one which used a much smaller hacksaw blade. I also improved the contacts. I may make further modifications in order to get more use out of it.

The key was made with spare parts lying around the shack. The wooden base is off some old bookshelves. The contacts are nuts and bolts supported with eyelets - the type that you crimp onto your DC wires to connect to your power supply. The hacksaw blade required sanding because it was painted blue and a proper connection was not being made. Here are a couple of photos from the construction phase:

The new contacts were made from bits and pieces lying around the shack.

The hacksaw blade during sanding. The eyelets are in place.

The hacksaw blade being filed and sanded.

TX6G Austral Islands on 40m and 30m within 20 minutes!

I worked the British dxpedition to Austral Islands this morning on 40m CW and then 30m CW. 40m is a new band for me and I was delighted to hear them with such strong signals, and it was great to work them so easily, especially as they have only just begun their expedition. Here is a video I made just after working them. Excuse the voice - I am stuffed with a bad cold.

I also nabbed VP2V/SP9WZS on 10m CW and P29NO on 10 CW, both new countries on that band for me. That prompted me to look at my stats, and I'm surprised and delighted to see the progress I am making on HF.

All bands/mode: Worked 304 Confirmed 284
CW: Worked 296 Confirmed 264
Phone: Worked 267 Confirmed 222
160m: Worked 71 Confirmed 54
80m: Worked 141 Confirmed 115
40m: Worked 206 Confirmed 157
30m: Worked 219 Confirmed 168
20m: Worked 277 Confirmed 226
17m: Worked 273 Confirmed 210
15m: Worked 265 Confirmed 196
12m: Worked 248 Confirmed 181
10m: Worked 235 Confirmed 177

B9/BY9GA (zone 23) China booming into Ireland

The challenges of 80 metre operation from a small garden

Regular readers of this blog will already know that I operate from a small garden. You will all know that this hasn't prevented or deterred me from working DXCC on every band from 80 metres through 10 metres. My lowly Butternut HF6V, which is 26 feet tall, and ground mounted in a corner of the garden near the wall, has enabled me to operate in a limited capacity on 80m. Through last winter, especially as a result of my participation in the CQWW CW contest in late November, I was able to finally get 100 countries confirmed on that band on LoTW.

But I have never been able to enjoy good operation on 80m because the Butternut is too short and therefore limited in what it can hear. It gets out reasonably well for the DX stations, and the low angle of radiation definitely helps.

A photograph of my nested inverted vees, with labels.

Just this week, I decided to put back up the 80m inverted V, off the same feedpoint as the Vees on 30m and 40m. From previous experience, I knew this would involve some serious dog-legging. (For non amateurs, this means making the wire antenna "turn a corner", so to speak, because there isn't enough room for a straight run of wire that's 66 feet long on each leg. One leg - the "reflector" - is able to get a run down along the side of the house, as far as the gate pillar at the front, although about three feet of it still needs to be dog legged.

The other leg - the "transmit" leg - runs down above the back wall of the garden, and then dog-legs up the side wall of the garden to a point at the back wall of the house under the eave. From there, it is dog-legged again by about three feet and tied off. And the mast (insert word "pole" here!) is only 30 feet at the apex.

It's far from ideal, I know. I bet some of you are trying to picture this all in your head and wondering how I've managed to defy the laws of physics, and indeed the laws of effective radiation of RF fields. So how's it working?

The reflector leg of the 80m inverted v dipole runs down
between the houses and is tied off (dog-legged) at a gate pillar.

Here's a summary of the contacts made last night on CW using just 100 watts: PI4EME, US8UX, EI3HMB, HA5OV, IK6DIN, YU9CF, EI6IL, F5TVG/P, HB9FBA, EI7BA, S51FZ, GM3ZLC, EI2EO, UT8MM, G4LEM, PA1MUC and HB30OK. So it's getting out, as far as Ukraine. Hardly a comprehensive test of its abilities, but the reports coming back were generally 579 or 599 or 599 plus! The previous morning, I had worked N8NA on 100w on CW, so that wasn't bad either, but it's likely that he's got bigger antennas than me.

Time will tell if it's up to the job of making more distant contacts. I will run 400 watts when conditions improve and the band quietens a bit - the QRN here can be s9 at times.

Interestingly, the 80/40/30m nested V system also has some resonance on the lower portion of the 160m band. When I say "some", I mean about 3:1 at best, maybe 3.5:1. It might allow me a limited amount of operation on that band over the next couple of months. I may figure out a way to tune it better for 160m. We will see.

In the meantime, I will keep you posted as to the performance of this compromise antenna system.

Yes!!! Austral Islands worked on 30 metres

It's definitely worth getting out of bed in the mornings!! I got up at 7.30am to see if there was any action on 80 metres, where I have had recent early morning successes with the likes of PJ4 and H7H. With not much happening there (H7H was on 3.520 but already logged this week), I saw TX5D, a suitcase dxpedition to Austral Islands, spotted on 30 metres (10 Mhz). So I QSYd to his frequency and was surprised to hear him coming in strong. I had the linear on, and hit him with the 400 watts, up just 1.15 kcs. Within a short time, he was calling "EI2C?" I gave the call a couple of times, but I knew I was being QRMed because I could hear it with the split on between my dits and dahs. Then he said "Only EI2C". It took a few more attempts, but eventually I could hear him coming back with the magic "EI2KC EI2KC 5NN BK". Oh yes!! I gave him "RRR 5NN TU". That's only the second time I've ever worked Austral Islands, the first being on 17m CW this past summer. Nice to get a rare one into the log, especially when battling with the QRM from the rest of the EU. Above is a video taken a couple of minutes after I had worked him.

Comreg publishes new amateur station guidelines

Comreg, the Communications Regulator, who govern the Irish amateur radio service (among many other communication services), have just published the updated Amateur Station Licence Guidelines. Two very notable changes include the increase of the power limit on the 10Mhz band (30 metres), from 100 watts to 400 watts, and also the allocation on a secondary basis of 472-479 Khz for use with CW, QRSS and narrow band digital modes. The maximum power allowed on this MF allocation is 5 watts (7 dBW).

If my calculations are right, that means the wavelength on 472 Khz is 220 metres, meaning if you wanted to put up a quarter-wave dipole for that band you would need 55 metres (181.5ft) of wire!!

Also, under section 8.2, maritime mobile operation is allowed.

Under section 8.1: Land Based Mobile Station Operation the following is interesting to say the least:


67. An Amateur Mobile Station may not be established or used at sea (other than
as part of Maritime Mobile Operation) or within any estuary, dock or harbour
or in the vicinity of an airport or radio navigation installation.

Also interesting is a five-year timeout on Silent Key callsign applications (where next of kin want to apply to retain or re-enact the callsign of a deceased relative):


53. The only exception to the rule that Amateur Station call-signs issue for the
lifetime of the Amateur Station Licensee is that a “silent key” call-sign may be
transferred to an immediate next of kin of a deceased Amateur Station
Licensee. Such a transfer will only be permitted where that the call-sign in
question had not lapsed within the lifetime of the deceased Amateur Station
Licensee and an application to obtain the call-sign is made within five years
(10)
of the date of death of the Licensee. "Next of kin" for these purposes means a
child, grandchild, sibling or spouse of a deceased Amateur Station Licensee.
Further, a next of kin who applies for such a call-sign must hold a valid
Amateur Station Licence or have passed a HAREC exam.


(10) All files relating to cancelled licences are destroyed after five years in accordance with ComReg’s Data
Protection guidelines

The new Amateur Station Licence Guidelines can be viewed on the Comreg website here: http://www.comreg.ie/publications/amateur_station_licence_guidelines.583.104272.p.html 
http://www.comreg.ie/_fileupload/publications/ComReg0945R1.pdf

Swains in the log on 30m CW

I was the happiest ham alive this morning when, with all of Europe calling the NH8S Swains dxpedition, they picked my call out of the pile-up!! It took a while to work them. They were on 10.103, listening approx 3kc up, but I worked them 2.5 kc up. They kept calling "EI2 EI2" and of course I was QRMed but I just kept giving my call and eventually I heard EI2KC 5NN ! So I gave them 5NN and TU. So thrilled. I spent the rest of the morning with a smile on my face!!

I did not have time to make a video recording as I had to leave the kids to school. That was slot number four for me. They were strong for a while on 15m CW for a while in the middle of the day but I was not able to break the pile on that occasion. But I will keep trying for more slots . . .