CW | N4BC

Hammin’ in the Woods

Operating has been pretty spotty lately. I’ve just been so busy with other things that radio has had to take a back seat. I have worked a few of the W1AW/x stations, but not much else.

This weekend, though, I did get on the air in a different manner. I am also a Scout leader, so I took all of my portable gear with me on a weekend camping trip into the woods. I wanted to expose the kids to ham radio, and gauge the interest for participation in the Radio Merit Badge.

This was really the first weekend I’ve had the time (and the decent weather) to get out and do some portable operation. This past winter was too nasty for me to trek to the woods and do ham radio!

I had the Ten-Tec R4040 QRP transceiver, the ZM-2 tuner, and a 40-6 Meter End Fed antenna with 9:1 balun from Steve at kx3helper.com, along with the assorted odds and ends needed to connect everything. The antenna was up in a “L” configuration, no more than 20 feet high at its highest point.

I powered up everything from a 12V 7AH battery, tuned up, and got on the air. The Florida QSO Party was going, and the signals were pretty good. I answered a few stations and they came right back to me. I was impressed. I was even more impressed when I noticed I’d made quite a few QSOs with the ZM-2 in the TUNE position … I wasn’t even connected to the antenna! I flipped the switch, and the results were much better!

This was the first “Field Test” of the entire setup and I was duly impressed. Everything worked just like it was supposed to, and I had several of the boys (and adults) interested in learning more. It was really a great weekend in all respects.

73 de Dick K4FTW

Antennas and One and Zeros

Digital modes are addictive. I’ve worked several days now of JT-9 and JT-65 and managed to pick up a few new states that had been elusive in the past. I tried a couple of different software programs and settled on WSJT-X with JT-Alert and linked everything to my DXLab software.

I was noticing a few tuning issues on my vertical antenna, so I finally went out to the back yard and checked it. It’s a 31-ft wire on a Jackite collapsible fiberglass pole and one of the sections had collapsed. I had a wire tie at each joint to keep that from happening, but I guess this one was not snug enough or had slipped. Anyway, to make a long story short, I re-extended the pole section and twisted it to lock it.SWR readings are back to normal now. I’ll put another wire-tie on it when I get around to finding one :-).

Tomorrow is a Holiday — President’s Day, so maybe I’ll have a chance to get some operating accomplished. I did work a couple of stations in the ARRL International CW contest this weekend, but those don’t count as a ragchew, for sure!

73 de Dick

CQ WW CW 2013

So … the CQ Worldwide CW is done for this year. I spent a bit of time participating, not so much to run up a big score, but more to catch a few new ones. I DID catch a bunch of new ones. I think the most surprising was Indonesia. He was just calling CQ … no pileup, no takers.

I uploaded my log right after the contest to LOTW, and checked today (Monday). Lots of band and mode confirmations, and 5 brand-new countries confirmed. Wow … that’s efficiency! Makes me wonder what the rest of the week will bring :-).

I found that even though there was lots of action, I kept my blood pressure under control. If I couldn’t bust a pileup with my 100 watts to a vertical, I just went away and worked somebody else, returning later and maybe working them … maybe not.

All in all, it was a fun and productive weekend. I had 280 QSOs and really enjoyed myself. Looking forward to the next one!

73 de Dick K4FTW

NAQCC November Sprint

I participated in my first NAQCC Sprint last night. It was a rather inauspicious debut. I only had two contacts … band conditions were pretty bad here at my qth … lots of qrn and not many signals. Twenty meters was dead and forty was not great. For a simple antenna and five watts, it was ok though. I’m looking forward to the next one, hopefully with better conditions.

73 de Dick k4ftw

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The QRP Bug

I think I got bitten by a bug last week. I’ve mentioned that I was looking at a Ten Tec Rebel 506. Well, I had access to a QRP rig and did a bit of portable “in the woods” operating last week. Wow, what FUN! It was almost like Novice operating again. I had so much fun, it convinced me to order a rig – but not the Ten Tec 506. I looked at a lot of rigs, kits, etc., and decided that bang-for-buck, I kept returning to the Ten Tec R4040 … 4 bands, 5+ watts, and not much bigger than a QSL card (but much thicker!). I’m still assembling “stuff” and building an antenna and hope to get it on the air from the boonies this weekend. I will hook it up to my home antenna this evening and give it a checkout, though.

73 de Dick K4FTW