CQ WW RTTY

The past weekend was again the CQ WW RTTY contest.I always like Contesting and most also in RTTY.I started at 0:15 UTC and as the 20M band was closed,i went to the 40M band.

For this i use my PKW MHF1e40 who is on the roof,static in the North West-South East direction.This because in the big contest there are alot of NA stations active and they also count for more points.

At 3:15 UTC i took a little sleep break and was back at the radio around 6:14 for the first QSO again.The 40M band was still full of RTTY signals and also very big signals.Propagation to NA was closed,so mostly European stations.Still the last QSO on 40M,before i went to the 20M band,was PJ2S who still had a great signal here.

On the 20M band is was most EU what i did see and sometimes some Asiatic Russians.

At 10:17 UTC i managed to work JT5DX in the pile up.He was the only JT station i saw in the contest so happy to have him logged.

So now and then i also looked on the 10M band,as that is one of my favourite bands.At 11:39 UTC i made my first QSO on the 10M.It was with ER0FEO.I made 14 QSO's within the hour,with nice DX as well like ST2AR and 6V7X.

At 12:34 UTC i was back on the 20M.First QSO was with SU/HA3JB.From that time also the stations from NA got stronger.VE3DZ was the first one i worked.

At 14:00 the propagation to NA seemed to get lower and i got the beam towards the East.Saw a YB station when beaming to NA...when turned the beam i saw it was YB0PAH with a pile up.I waited a little and when it got a little calm i called him and could write him also in my log.

After this also BA1GM and VU2LBW could be worked.

After checking the 10M band again,it seemed to be open again and also to other directions.

First was ZW5B with a great signal.After that i managed to work Christian,TL0A,who didn't have much takes at that time.He was at 28094.8 a little higer then most contesters.This also made it easier to work him without QRM from other stations.

At 17:29 i worked PY2MTV and got already his eQSL card in.I managed also to work a few Argentinian stations and also 5N7M got logged.

Back to 20M again,working EU and NA...but also 9M2TO and VQ9LA were logged.

Propagation was very good in most directions.I managed to get also ZX2B,YV5AAX,FG5LA,FM5CD,CO2GL

At 21:40 UTC i took a little break,my soccerteam was playing (Ajax) so i looked that game last 45 minutes :)

After this i was back on the radio and the 40M band until 23:20 UTC.Bedtime,hi

Back on the radio at 7:20 UTC.First checking the 40M.Propagation to NA was down and only could work one,K1TTT, that morning.All other stations on 40M where EU.

At 11:55 i managed to work ZS2I on the 10M band giving me CQ Zone 38.

This was the only station who i could hear/see that time on 10M.So back to 20M...

First looking around 14063....and saw KL7RA...He wasn't very busy and i was able to work him.CQ zone 1 also in the log.

At 17:16 i did stop the contest.I managed to get my goal...more QSO's and points as the year before....

The propagation was very good for DX and sometimes also for short distances on 20M.

I managed to work a few Dutch stations from the South part,few Germans,Belgium,Luxembourg and Danmark as well.

It was very nice to have ST2AR on 10,20 and 40 M.Also i worked Larry,VQ9LA,on 20 and 40M.For me VQ9 is a new DXCC on 40M.

It was nice to see also more stations from Iceland active in the contest.Got 4 different OM's in my log.

More and more OM's are getting to use eQSL.I find it a very nice tool/qsl.I also do LoTW,but thats text only...eQSL you als have a kind of QSL card.

PD6MILL

Last weekend we were again active from the Windmill the Eendracht in Gieterveen,JO33KA.We are then active from friday till sunday afternoon.

We did start friday morning at 7:30 UTC to put the SWAN Tribander together.It was laying on a small trailer,what made it easier for us.When it was complete we did first look how the SWR was....and we got shocked.Putting the radio on we did hear ZL2 with 5/8...so all looked ok,hi.

After this we did put up a small militair tower and did put the tribander on it.Then we wanted to put the antenna up...but it was much to heavy.So it was only 3 meters up from the ground.

The SWAN is a 31 year old US made antenna,it's the TB-3HA.

After this was done we had to wait for a tower what we borrowed from the neightbour pirates.A 18 meter tower on a trailer.We also did borrow it last Mai,when we we where also radio active from the Mill.

In the maintime while waiting for them,we put together the Diamond N300 (2/70) and did dismantle the PKW MHF1e40 at Jelle's (PD5JFK) house.This one we did use several times already for the 40Mband and works very well.

The guys with the tower came around 16:00 UTC and in 30 minutes time it was up with the antenna's in.Now we coult get the coax to the Windmill.

We made alraedy a few QSO's on the 20M but now we could really start.

We where active on friday mostly on the 40M and stopped at 21:00 UTC.We did get around 60 QSO's in the log.After that,we did dismantle our radio's and Laptops and went to Jelle's home,who lives close to the Mill.

Saturday morning at 7:00 UTC we where up and running again with two stations.One on 20M and the other on 40M.The 20M band was not really open yet and maybe also because of the low antenna it wasn't a succes yet in the start.

The 40M antenna worked very well and also the propagation into EU was good.The location also was great for the 40M with no QRN/QRM.The band was very quiet so also the weak signals we could pick up.We went QRT saturday around 20:00.

The 20M didn't seem to be very open and the 40M got very crowdy.Not easy to find a free place for us,as we only are allowed to TRX between 7050 and 7100.

Sunday morning we started again around 6:30 UTC.

After putting up the radio's again,we did listen VK3XL on 20M.Jelle did try to call him and yess...we got him.With the SWAN Tribander on just 3 meters above the ground and 25 watts,we got 5/5 back,as he was 5/7 at our end.This was really magic forus and we where also lucky that he just started calling CQ.After Jelle's QSO.....the Zoo started,hi.

Jelle was active on 20M and also some on the 2M band.I stayed mostly on 40M.

Sunday was also a Harvest market at the Mill and alot of farmproducts were sold.

People can then also visite the Windmill and look inside.They ask us then questions about what we are doing etc....We have a Worldmap in wich we get pins in the countries we work.This way people can see what we worked.

So that we are active in the Mill has different reasons.For us nice to be active on the radio,for the Windmill some extra advertisemend and also for our radio hobby.

Sunday at 14:45 we did stop our activity.We got still alot of OM's calling for us,but we also need time to get our things dismantled and get ready to transport it home again.

We where very happy with the results...

Total amount of QSO's : 411

Total amount of DXCC's : 48

Biggest Distance: 16345 Km

We will be active from the Windmill again in May 2011.That weekend will be the National Windmill's day.We did start to transmit in 2009 in this weekend and were the only Mill active.We made some advertisemend and got in 2010 6 Mills active.

From now we try again to get more on the air.In the UK are in that weekend around 50-60 Mills active.We hope in time that maybe that weekend can be a kind of International Mills Festival with Mills active all around the World.If someone wants info or also would like to activate in that weekend,just mail us please at: nationalemolendag@gmail.com

73's The PD6MILL team

Jelle (PD5JFK) / Bernard (PD7BZ)

Starting Blog again

From today i will start to update my blog again.

Didn't do this since februar and now we are 7 month later in the year.

Alot of QSO's made since then also during the contests in the weekends.

In the next days i will get some more info inhere about the past months.

We will be also again activating a Windmill from the 17th till the 19 of September.

Our call will be again PD6MILL,from the Windmill the Eendracht in Gieterveen,JO33KA.

We will be mostly active on HF on 10 , 20 and 40M band.

This in SSB and Digimodes.We will also have a vertical for the 2M band with us.