PD7BZ

Field Day Contest (SSB) and WWF PAFF-038

2011-09-07T05:48:00.000-07:00

Sunday the 4th of September,i was active in the Field Day Contest as PD7BZ/p

I was active just with a small setup and 25 Watts.

The place i was active in,Boswachterij Grolloo,also counts as WFF PAFF-038.

As we know,it was the first activation on HF from this WFF area.

Setup was a Yaesu FT857 (25W) with Heil Headset.

Antenna was the HF6V from Butternut,with 12 wire radials connected.

Powersupply was the Diamond GSV3000
Generator was a small one Güde GSE950 (220v 650-950Watts)

This small setup got me 112 QSO's in the log.

Most were at the 40M band.
It was nice to be also on the other side in the contest.

For some years i work from th home QTH...and for us in the Netherlands,

in the Field Day Contest we should only work /p , /m and /mm.

The rules for other countries are different as they are for us.

See the photo's from the small activation....

Empty field....

Gear was setup :)

The Radioroom :)

Antenna and Generator

10 Meter propagation

2011-04-06T14:48:00.001-07:00

In the past days,the 10M band is very wide open.

Some weeks ago we had also one day with openings,but the day after it was gone.

Most of the propagation we have on 10M is to Africa or South America.

But in the past 2 weeks the openings changed...

On the 23th of March i managed to work my first station from NA on CW on thje 10M band.

It was N4BP..he was the only one i could hear from NA as well.

During the CQ WW WPX contest i did manage to work also ZS,PY,LU,D4,CE in SSB.

Thoose are the usual DXCC's we get with the 10M openings.

But during the contest i could also work OD,JY and VK6.

At the 29th of March i saw that NH7O (Hawaii) was working EU via Long Path on 10M.

I did put my beam towards 170 degrees and i could hear him very well.

After calling him several times and repeating my callsign,the QSO was made!!!!

My first QSO on ther 10M band with Hawaii was done.What a good propagation...

The same day and the days after i also could get in the log:

BD1EFO (CW) , S21YZ (SSB) , VU2DK (SSB) , VP5/W1CW (CW) , YI9NS (CW) ,

5M2TT (SSB+CW) , 9N&AN (SSB) , ZL1BYZ (CW) , KH2/N2NL (CW) ,

EL2GB (SSB) , P4/W1HEO (CW) , SU1SK (CW) .

Today i got another big new one worked on the 10M...XV1X Vietnam on CW.

I was very happy that Eddy,the op of XV1X,took the time to get me and my callsign correct.

Two days ago i worked also Nand,VU2NKS,with only 5 Watts output on RTTY on the 10M.

For me this good propagation gives me alot of new DXCC's on the band.

Also in the different modes...as i try to work as many DXCC's in as many modes possible for me.

One week ago i also had WSPR running on the 10M band.

I was seen also in NA with only 2 watts.Also i was seen in VQ9...

Propagation is very good and i hope it stays like this and even will get better.

I like the 10M band very much....it's a band that sometimes you hear nothing....

Few minutes later it's wide open.....

CQ WW WPX (SSB)

2011-03-28T04:47:00.000-07:00

The past weekend was again the CQ WW WPX in SSB.

A 48 hour during Contest only in phone.The CQ Contests are always very busy...also again this

one.The propagation was before the contest sometimes very good...

I started at 5:15 UTC.I didn't start earlier because we as Novice have only a little space at the 40M band to operate on and the 10 and 20M bands are closed during the night.

The 20M band was already open when i started.Did work 14 stations within the 20 minutes.After that i went to the 40M band,worked the stations i could and back to the 20M.

Around 6:55 i did hear a AH6 station very low....pointed my beam towards the Nordpole and there she was...AH6NF.After calling a few minutes i could write her in my log.

Putting the beam back to the East i could hear VK4WIP very clear.One call and also he's logged.

Few minutes later i could also log VK4KW.At my side,the strongest from the VK's,as i could hear him the whole weekend and also in the evening.

Sometimes i also went over the 10M band,to look if the band showed some openings...at 8:22 i could log the first.That was OT5A from belgium followed by OR0A.Few minutes later i could log HZ1FS who really was 5/9 at that moment.He was for that time the last one i did hear on the 10M band....Back to the 20M again.

Around 12:30 i listened again at the 10M band and now it was wide open.Many stations calling from SA and AF.Couldn't work them all,but still 33 stations logged.Strange was that i could work s someone over 11.000Km...when a station at 8.000Km couldn't hear me.

Sunday morning i managed to work also VK6NC on 10M.Also i got A61ZX in my log on 10 and 20M.He was very strong both times.

Here's an eQSL card from one of the SA stations i could work.LU5FF,Javi.

Also Dov was active in the contest.Managed to work him after calling several minutes.If Dov is on....everyone wants to work 4Z4DX....he told us that he will be in Nepal within 3 weeks.

My Goal is always to try to beat my own score of the year before.

Last year i logged 432 Qso's with 325 Multies....total of 296.075 Points.

For me,as just a small station with 3 bands and 25 Watts limited...not easy.

But...you never find out if you don't try,hi.

Sunday at 22:38 i logged QSO number 450...

Total Multies are.. 357...

Total of 320.229 Points....

Goal succeed :)

For my results is SH5 analyser:http://www.pd7bz.nl/2011%20CQ-WPX-SSB%20PD7BZ/

My last QSO's where on the 40M band.After that i put the TRX back on the 20M band and was very surprised that it was still wide open to NA.Some signals were still 5/9....

Hope this means that the propagation will stay and we will/can enjoy the DX again the whole day...

BARTG RTTY and Russian DX

2011-03-21T15:18:00.001-07:00

The last weekend was again one with two contest i wanted to join in.

The BARTG HF RTTY started at 02:00 UTC Saturday morning and is a 48 hours contest.

The Russian DX started at 12:00 UTC Saturday and is a 24 hours contest.

First i started in the BARTG RTTY.Looked around 4:00 UTC at 40M...but only got around 15 qso's logged in one hour time.Just went to sleep for 2 hours and did have a look again.I was suprised that the 20M band was open already so i started there.As a Novice HAM we are just allowed to use three bands on HF.The 10 , 20 and 40M band.During the contest i look so now and then on the other bands for Multies.Also on 10M....as we never know if it's opens up again.

I'm happy with the DX i could work and also was happy to work all the 6 continents,as that means extra points as well.Nice one was also when i saw 3A2MW coming back after my CQ call.

Got 314 QSO's and 152604 points.

Results by SH5 analyzer: http://www.pd7bz.nl/2011%20BARTG-RTTY/

See here some eQSL's i got right after the Contest

Saturday at 12:30 UTC i joined in the Russian DX Contest as well.I did SSB and CW.It's good to have both,because this way i worked more different Oblasts.I worked some in CW that i didn't hear in SSB at all.Worked total of 259 QSO's in mixed mode.Totally of 180744 points.

This is much more then i had in 2010...so very happy.

Results by SH5 analyzer: http://www.pd7bz.nl/2011%20RDXC/

So the weekend was very well for me.Total of the contest brought me to 573 QSO's in two days time.Worked all continents in RTTY and some very nice DXCC's as well.Very nice to see also alot of the same OM's joining in every week.Also very strange propagation...working ON,G,OZ and DL on 20M....and they where really strong signals.

10 Meter openings

2011-03-17T04:54:00.000-07:00

The 10 Meter band was this year already open a few times.I was able to work some nice DXCC's in several modes.Some of them are also new for me on this band.

Today i managed to work Agus,YB1ALL,on PKS63.A few weeks before i also coult get him in CW already.

Two days ago,on the 15th,i was able to work Bob,VP8LP,for the first time this year on 10M SSB again.The rst i got was just 4/4....but still 100% QSO.

Bob was here real 5/7 with QSB.I stayed a little at his frequenty listening to him and about 30 minutes later he was gone.I coult hear Bob saying that he had the whole morning good propagation to Europe.

After that i was looking over the band and did hear a signal on PSK31...That was VU2SWS Miss Sarla.She was strong here and i also managed to work her.New DXCC on 10M in PSK31 as well for me.

Between the 7th and 11th of March,t

he band was wide open.I managed to work:

* in SSB: VU2DSI , VK6XC , VK6ANC , CX2DK , PY2OE , D2AM , VK8NSB , YB3OX , 9M2IDJ ,

TJ3AY , BD8ASG , UK8OM , VP8LP and HZ1DG

* in CW: 4X/K2LS , LU7HN , 7Z1HL , YB1ALL , 3B8FQ , MD0CCE , E21EJC , BA8AG , BA8BA ,

4K9W , 6W2SC , D2SG , 9J2BO , 4Z5RT , A45XR , 5N7M

During the ARRL DX SSB i was also able to work one NA station,that was W4SVO from Florida.

Propagation was very good,but i also had much QRM on the band.It was mostly S8-9.

So you can see how good the prop was to NA...W4SVO was real 5/9 that time.

The 10 Meter band is a very nice band for DXing.Many HAM's don't like it.....

I think it's because it's not always easy to get a QSO on 10M.

For me the 10M band is the nicest...when there are openings ofcourse.

This morning there where spots of KH7Y,Hawai.I coult hear him very low...too low to try.

One week ago KH2 (Guam) was also strong on 10M in CW.Would be 559 here,but too big pileup.

I really hope that the propagation increases and that the 10M band will be open more and more.

Also during the contest in the weekends....

This weekend is the BARTG RTTY Contest and also the Russian DX (CW+SSB).

Hoping that the Propagation Gods are also good for us this weekend :-)

PACC 2011

2011-02-25T06:25:00.000-08:00

The Dutch PACC Contest is already 2 weeks over now.

This time i wasn't contesting from my own home,but was in a Holidayhouse we are taking care of.

This house is more in the open field,as my own place is surrounded with alot of houses..so also alot of QRN/QRM as well on my radio.My 3elm Tribander at my home is just 5 1/2 meters above the ground...so you can imagine that it will get alot of signals that i don't want to hear.

Friday morning at 11:00 local time,hte guests that where in the house for a week holiday,went out.

That was for me the time to go there with my gear and setup all the antenna's i wanted to use.

My antenne's where:

HF6V vertical

GPA30 vertical

3elm Tribander (Swan...32 years old :) )

2x 10 meters Dipole as Inverted V

FD3 wire dipole

This was what i wanted to put there and use....but.....

The most i did use the HF6V vertical from Butternut.I made myself radials from 2mm steelwire.

made 10 of them,then my spool of 100 meter wire was gone,hi.But also had still some copper wires who i first used at home for trying the antenna out.So also this ones where connected.

The best thing with the HF6V is that you don't have to switch antenna's when you want to use another band.This was for me also the first time i really did try the antenna and i can say...i am very pleased to have it and able to use it !!

My 3elm Swan Tribander also worked ok....but.....we couldn't get it higher then 4 meters above the ground.I used an old Militair tower what you have to pull up with your hands and then it should click when the whole section is out.Because the 3elm was too heavy,we only managed to get one section out.Also i didn't want the small tower to get broken....

Another problem was,that when you are not at home....and you don't see the sun shining...to find the North.I thought i knew it...but sunday after the PACC contest i found out it was totally wrong.Good to have from now one a compas in my radio gear,hi.

I was around 90 degrees wrong.....found it out after i saw the TV Dish at the neightbours house.That looks almost to the South...little East of it, 19,2 degrees to the ASTRA Satellite.

I did work some nice stations during the PACC on it....but after i changed it,it worked much better.Because after the PACC i went into the CQ WW WPX RTTY contest a

gain.

Worked some nice DX with it in RTTY...

Here you can see my radio and computer setup for the PACC and CQ WW WPC Contest.

I used just one radio,but had the other standby for when my first gave problems.

Here you see two photo's of my antenna's.One of them you see the foot of the HF6V with the radials attached.On the other you see on the forground the Swan Tribander and left from it the GPA30.At the right the HF6V and more right in the back of the garden the 2x 10 meters inverted V.

More photo's can be found at: http://www.pd7bz.nl/PACC2011

More info about my PACC Score via SH5 : http://www.pd7bz.nl/PACC

My QSO's results where like in 2010...but this year i got more Multies.

We have to wait till June to see the results.

Contests in 2011

2011-02-25T06:02:00.000-08:00

I did join in a few Contest already again this year.

From now on i will try to write some every week again.

SARTG RTTY New-Year Contest : 50 QSO's logged.

AGCW Happy New-Year Contest (CW) : 14 QSO's logged.

ARRL RTTY Round Up : 236 QSO's logged.

HA DX Contest (CW and SSB) : 93 QSO's logged.

UK DX RTTY : 154 QSO's logged.

UBA DX SSB : 124 QSO's logged.

EPC WW DX PSK (PSK63) : 219 QSO's logged.

Black Sea Cup Inter. (CW and SSB) : 44 QSO's logged.

Mexican International RTTY : 100 QSO's logged.

CQ WW WPX RTTY : 338 QSO's logged.

Dutch PACC Contest (CW and SSB) : 329 QSO's logged.

Russian PSK Contest : 103 QSO's logged.

ARRL International Contest (CW) : 110 QSO's logged.

About the Dutch PACC...more in my next message....

First message 2011...

2011-02-25T05:49:00.000-08:00

Sorry for the late start of my Blog this year..

2010 didn't ended very well for me.

On the 10th of December i had to put one of my Husky's to sleep.Something that took alot of pain for me to do.He had that day from 18:00 local time many epeliptic attacks...

The time the Animal Doctor came,around 22:50,i think he had around 40 attacks...small ones and also very heavy ones.

You could say that he had one big one,because he never came out..

I know that he didn't feel anything from this all,but for me it was HELL!!

The Doctor said me that the best thing to do is to put him in sleep....We did this at 23:30...he went asleep in my arms....

In his mememberance i designed a special QSL card...

Hope he's now somewhere without pain and is playing with his old friends...

ARRL 10M Contest

2010-12-14T01:26:00.000-08:00

The past weekend was again the ARRL 10M Contest.This contest covers the whole weekend,48 hours.

I was a little afraid about the propagation.The 10M band was for a few weeks ago better then it was the week before the contest.But everyone who knows how the 10M band can be,there's always hope,hi.

Saturday morning when i put on the radio it was very quiet on the band.Nothing in SSB and very low signals on CW.So it didn't look very well.

Kept monitoring the band and also an eye on the Cluster...Saw in the Cluster that other parts of Europe had very good openings.Some of the best DXCC's for DX/propagation are for sure EA8,5B,ZC4 etc.

My best DX was ZS6BRZ.The total qso's came to 26 in the log.

Yesterday i got a very nice suprice by the post.Award from the ARRL 10M contest 2009.

I was 1st in the Netherlands in the Low Power section..

TARA Melee and EPC Ukraine DX Contest

2010-12-06T10:15:00.000-08:00

The past weekend i was active in two contest.First the TARA Melee (RTTY) and later the EPC Ukraine DX (PSK63),

The TARA Melee started Saturday at 0:00 UTC till 23:59 UTC.

I was active from the start in an early contest...but that time there wasn't much to work.So i was only active from the morning 8:00 UTC.

I worked total 84 QSO's logged under who 2 Japanese stations.

Band QSOs Pts Cty

14 84 84 51

Total 84 84 51

Score: 4.284

-----------------------------

After that i went to PSK63.

Using for the digimodes MixW..so was easy to turn the modes.

Got a total of 156 QSO's logged....good for 68222 points.

QSOs Points OBL DXCC

40m 61 357 17 18

20m 94 527 20 21

10m 1 2 0 1

Total 156 886 37 40

Score: 886*(37 + 40 ) = 68222

eQSL's images download

2010-12-06T09:03:00.000-08:00

Till some weeks ago i was able to download the eQSL's that i had received.

I used a small programm for this and it worked very well.

For almost 2 months ago this changed.When i start the downloading i get an error.It tells me that it's not en eQSL 2.o Adif file.If i read the forums about it,it's possible that eQSL did change it because of high server CPU usage.

For me the beauty of the eQSL is the image you see with it.If we want just the QSO confirmation we could do it with LoTW only.

They talk about going to the eQSL and then downloading them....

I have over 1100 eQSL's waiting for me,if they have to be done one by one....

If i was able to download them at once,the amount wouldn't be this big.I would have getting most in then already.I did check normal once a week...once a Month.

I hope that one day we get the downloading back.

See here a few of my received eQSL's...

CQ WW CW

2010-11-29T06:51:00.000-08:00

The past weekend was again the CQ WW in CW.A very big contest with alot of stations that are joining it.This isn't only a nice contest for itself,but also a possibility to work some very nice DXCC's.Many op's are going to other places to get different DXCC and Zones on the air.

It's a 48 hours contest,starting at 0:00 UTC.

My goal is to try to get more QSO's and Points then the year before.Last year i had little more then 175.000 points with 560 QSO's.....so for me it wouldn't be that easy to get better.I just have a small station with 25 watts and my antenne's are 3elm Fritzel (FB33) and the PKW MHF1e40.And also for me as a Novice,only 3 band are allowed....10 , 20 and 40M.

I started at 0:00 UTC on 40M.In the start it's an easy job...all stations are new in the log.The best in this contest is to work DX outside your own continent,so for me outside Europe.Propagation wasn't very well this time,but still i managed to work a few stations from NA and also P40L.At 2:30 i decited to sleep a little...

6:00 UTC back at the radio,first again on 40M and from 6:24 UTC on the 20M.Propagation on 20M seemed to be ok...and i managed to work 3 stations from Japan.Also Asiatic Russia and Europe was very strong.After one hour on 20M i went back to the 40M band again to see how the propagation was.Propagation to NA was better as before,worked 28 stations in one hour,8 from NA and also KP2.After that back to 20M.

I also looked so now and then on the 10M and at 9:45 i did hear some good signals.Was able to work 21 Stations on 10M,mostly EU and 9J3A.Total i worked 58 stations on 10M during the contest from 11 different Zones.

This was the way i did work the whole contest.Checking so now and then other bands for propagation and new Multipliers.

Sometimes i also managed to work a station during a pile up.I just went up or down a few and this did work very well.I like to work contest.Also in CW but thats also difficult for me,as i work CW with my computer and MixW.This means that sometimes i got not everything ok or the other has mistakes.Sometimes i get back from the others GD7BZ instead of PD7BZ.Then it's always the question if it's my software that makes the mistakes or do they really send it wrong back.I can understand my own call in CW now,so the callmistakes are getting less.

Click here for the Contest results in SH5: http://www.pd7bz.nl/cqww/index.htm

Some nice DXCC's worked:

10M: 9J3A , VK6AA , 4K9W , OD5NJ , 9L5VT , D4C and C5A

20M: J28AA , VE2XAA/2 (Zone 2) , HK1X , 7Z1SJ , 5X1XA , TO5T , P40W , PZ5T ,

8P5A , HI3A , PJ2T , BY8AC , A73A , 8N5A and ZA3HA.

40M: ZA3HA , A73A , T70A , V47NT , OY6A , KP2M , OH0V , 8P5A , 8N5A and JA6GCE.

The results from N1MM:

Band --QSOs -- Pts -- Cty -- ZN

7 --221 -- 363 -- 60 -- 13

14 --298 -- 642 -- 66 -- 20

28 -- 58 -- 110 -- 26 -- 11

Total 577 -- 1115 -- 152 -- 44

Score: 218.540

WAE RTTY

2010-11-15T10:52:00.000-08:00

The past weekend was again the WAE (Work All Europe) in RTTY.

In RTTY are different rules......all can work all....so not only EU with DX.....and DX with EU.

It's a 48 hours contest.

I started at 1.20 UTC.Was looking on 40M,but the band wasn't really open.

Worked in 1 hour 21 stations and didn't find any new ones.So i went to sleep a little.

At 5.41 UTC i logged again the first one on 40M.Worked so 5 stations and had a look if the 20M was already open.That was already open and stayed there a bit.Propagation was mostly Europe that time....also on 20M.

I always look on the other bands as well,to see if they are open for multies.

We where lucky that also the 10M was a little open on both days.

For me as a Novice,i have only the 10 , 20 and 40M to use.

So if the 10M is open,this means always new multies.

Nicest DX where:

10M EA8,UN8,RG9

20M OD5,7Z1,KP4,E21,5C,J39,HP3,YW5,VK3

40M FY1,5C,VK3

If you want to see more info from my WAE Contest,just have a look here:

http://www.pd7bz.nl/WAE

There i have used SH5..a very nice programm to get the information out of your contests.

It has many nice things you can see.I saw the programm first at the blog of my friend Bas,PE4BAS.Talked with him about it and also got it registrated now.

The free programm only goes till 200 QSO's.

My WAE was better again then in 2009.

Got 403 QSO's and over 100.000 points this year.

Shame that the propagation wasn't very well...maybe next contest better....

CQ WW RTTY

2010-09-30T05:01:00.000-07:00

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

2010-09-23T03:22:00.000-07:00

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

2010-09-06T06:06:00.000-07:00

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.

ARRL DX Contest (CW)

2010-02-23T23:57:00.000-08:00

This weekend was the ARRL DX contest in CW.

I also joined this contest with my computer for the CW.

The contest is a 48 hours contest and started at 0:00 UTC saturday morning.I wanted to be there from the start so stayed up till then as well.

Propagation was looking ok at the start.Alot of stations where strong here at my side and i was able to work most stations that i did receive as well.For me as a Novice,only 25 watts is allowed.

So sometimes it was very difficult to get a state that had a pileup.

But i worked what i could hear.I was up till 2:33 UTC and got 74 stations in my log then.

At 9:33 i was back at the radio and did work one station on 40M.Prop wasn't good enought to get more that time.So i had to wait till propagation getting open on 20M to NA.

This happend around 11:00 UTC.Last station worked that afternoon was at 18:32 UTC.

Propagation was still ok,but we had a birthday party at the neightbours...so qrt for me.

Worked 2 stations on sunday morning on 40M and then it was again waiting for the propagation on 20M to open up.Around 11:35 i worked the first station on 20M.Was sometimes difficult to find stations i did have in my log yet.I was very suprised to see that the 20M was open sunday evening till at least 22:16 UTC to NA.Normal it closes at 19:00 UTC.Maybe a good sign that the propagation is getting slowly better.
Last station worked was at 23:20 UTC on 40M.

I made a total of 229 QSO's and total multipliers are 62.

I was very happy to have worked W7RN from Nevada state.This means state number 50 worked for me and the day after also confirmed via LoTW.This in basic and 20M.

My total points where 42408.

Got more qso's and points then in 2009.So i am very happy with this result.

Some people say that it's very easy to do CW by computer.But let they try it before giving that opinion.The computer needs a good signal to decode.This is not always the fact and then it come's to my ears to listen if they got my call correct.I am very happy that the computer is in our HAM radio hobby.Also like the digimodes alot.The digimodes make it possible to make bigger distances for the 25W i am allowed to use.

Athena,plugin for N1MM

2010-02-19T02:10:00.000-08:00

Today i got to read the magazine NCJ,National Contest Journal,from the ARRL.This magazine is in our clubs reading map.In the November/December issue is a article from Kirk,K4RO about software and he did mention Athena.

I never did hear from this programm before,so did read the article very carefully.

Athena is made by a Dutchman,PC5M.

It's a program that uses N1MM dbase and shows you many information about the contest you are in,or after what results you have made.In the article was also the url for the program and i did also go there to look ofcourse.

The url is: http://www.xs4all.nl/~kvgog/projects/athena.html

On the page you se alot of information about the program and also alot of graphics.i did download the program and did try it out on the PACC contest.

As you see,very nice graphics and info.

PACC and CQ WPX RTTY

2010-02-18T11:18:00.000-08:00

In the weekend from 13-14 Februar was the Dutch PACC contest and also the CQ WPX RTTY.

For us as Dutch HAMs,the PACC is the most important one.

The CQ WPX is a 48 hours contest.Started at 0:01 saturday till sunday 23:59.

I also started at the begin of the contest,because i wanted to have some qso's in this contest as well.And the time the PACC is on...that the contest i will be in.

Propagation was very good on 40M.I could work alot of NA stations.Last QSO made before i got a little sleep was at 3:42.This was number 119 in my log....

At 7:29 i was back at the radio and back in the CQ WPX.I started again on the 40M band,but only European stations here and not much new to work.After 20 minutes i went to the 20M band,that was already open.But here also mostly Europeans that i could work.After 1 1/2 hour i went back to the 40M band again.Here i looked around some and started to call CQ on 7051.

After one hour on the 40M band,i went back to 20M.My last station logged before the PACC started was ZL1BYZ.
At 17:00 UTC i went from the PACC back to CQ WPX and was able to work Phil,KL8DX..confirmation via eQSL and LoTW came fast after the contest was over.

As i didn't hear much stations for the PACC i decited to stay in the CQ WPX.Could work till 20:30 stations on 20M,but the band was already getting to close down.So i went again to the 40M band.propagation was again very well,was able to work Francisco,YV5LI.At 1:16 i went QRT for bed.

I started the CQ WPX again after the PACC contest was done.First qso made again was around 13:12 UTC.propagation on the 20M was better then it was on saturday.I was able to work YB,XU7,E21,VU2,A61...

At 19:00 i went qrt for a little break..and was back at 21:40 UTC.

I was listening on the 20M band..thinking it was closed,but..no way.i still could hear some stations fron NA and also very strong Francisco,TG9ANF.It was very strange to work him at this time of the day,but did make me very happy as well.

After this qso i went back to the 40M band...till 23:30 UTC.Total i made 464 QSO's in the CQ WPX contest..almost 300 qso's more then i had in 2009.

Total points where 532980 !!!You bet i could sleep very well after this.

The PACC contest

At 13:00 UTC on saturday i did start the PACC contest.First looking for a free space,but the freq. was already very busy.So i went searching for stations in the contest.

I was able to work a few stations on all of the bands i am allowed to transmit on.PE4BAS,Bas and PD5JFK,Jelle are two of them.Also both did send eQSL's straight after the contest was over.Thanks guys for the QSO's and the points.

On the first day the contest didn't go well for me.Couldn't get a free freq. to call on and didn't find much stations who where calling in the contest.Around 17:00 UTC i did stop the PACC and went to the CQ WPX.So now and then i listened over the band and did pick some stations out for the PACC.Last station logged before bedtime was around 0:27.

Sunday mornig at 8:30 i was back at the radio and in the PACC.I first went to the 40m band,worked a couple stations.Nice was to work PA0AA with Peter that time as operator,PD1RP.Little later i went to the 20M and did hear Henk,VK2GWK giving point in the PACC.I could work Henk as well via Long Path.

After 30 minutes on 20M i decited to go on 40M and find a free freq.I did find one and did start calling CQ......wow..i never had such a pile up :) This made the bad start from the day before good again.I did work alot of Dutch stations as well.I think this year more PD stations where active then the years before.Good sign.

At the end i got 329 qso's logged and 57 Multies.Total points given from N1MM is 18.753.

I did join this contest for the 4th time and this time was the most succesfull.We have to wait a few months to see what place i am from the Dutch Novice stations.

This weekend was for me very good.Made in 2 contest almost 800 qso's !!

Black Sea Cup International and Mexico International RTTY Contest

2010-02-18T10:51:00.000-08:00

In the weekend of the 6th and the 7th of Februar was the Black Sea Cup International and the Mexico International RTTY Contest.

I was active in both of them.

First i started in the Black Sea contest,while that started at 12:00 UTC already.Was active till 18:00 UTC that saturday and started again sunday morning around 10:30 UTC.

My score was 13932 points.I was active in mixed mode so CW and SSB.

At 18:oo UTC started the Mexico International RTTY contest.I also started this at that time.

The 20M band is most closed that time.But still after a few qso's on the 40M band,i was able to work 9 stations on 20M.Few from NA and a few EU.

After that i went back to the 40M band.Was active till 0:38 UTC...had that time 50 stations logged.Sunday morning i started again at 6:30...and after a few worked on 40M i saw that the 20M was open as well.So i went to 20M.Propagation was very nice,could work E21,JA,XU7,DS5 and many more....

Due some TVI problems at my neightbours i did stop early in the afternoon.Total 166 QSO's logged.Points given by MixW where 27664.

BARTG Sprint RTTY Contest

2010-01-26T10:00:00.000-08:00

In the weekend of 23-24 Januar i was active during the BARTG Sprint RTTY Contest.

This is a 24 hour contest,from saturday 12 utc till sunday 12 utc.

I started at 12 utc at the 20M band.Propagation looked ok.

I got 40 qso's logged in the first hour.Also a few stations from NA already.

At 1447 i took a break to walk with my Husky's.At this time i got 94 qso's logged.

Also LX1EA was logged,always nice but difficult for me to get LX.

At 1538 back at the radio.

Very big suprise to see and work FR5GS.He was calling CQ when i worked him...after that the mess came to his freq.

At 17:50 i had a diner break...160 qso's logged now.I was already on 40M,as the 20M band closed around 17:30.

I was active till 23:40 UTC.Did work alot of EU and also some NA stations.

The next morning i did start again at 7:40 UTC.First looked on 40M again.P40YL was very strong and i could work her as well.

At the end i had 327 QSO's logged...something i was happy with.

Total points given from MixW where 115.758.

Ofcourse this will be lower after the crosschecking of the logs.Not everyone sends in their logs and also possibe that something went wrong with the numbers given.

500Khz WSPR...

2010-01-16T00:59:00.000-08:00

Last night i had my TRX on 500Khz with a simple vertical antenna.
Just curious what i could receive...

PA3FNY -20
SM6BHZ -21
G4JNT -27
PA0A +10

PA0A is only 46km from me.
Farest station is SM6BHZ with 629km.

Contest 10-11 Januar

2010-01-12T10:29:00.000-08:00

The weekend from 10-11 Januar where again some contest i wanted to join.

First started the PODXS 070 contest in PSK31.This did start at 0:00 UTC saturday morning till 23:59 UTC in the evening.I wasn't active in this contest and didn't know if it was a big one or not.

When the contest ended...i had just 7 QSO's logged.

Not too much activity was seen here at my end.But still i was happy to have worked 2 stations from NA on PSK.This are new DXCC for me,as i didn't work the US before on 40 in that mode.

Also in the same time on saturday was the Mongolian RTTY DX Contest.

In this contest there was more activity on the bands.Also got logged one station from Mongolia,JT1BE.Saw him calling CQ all the time and did try to work him...but no luck in the start.Few minutes later i did try again and bingo.

Total of 151 QSO's into 34 DXCC's.

ARRL RTTY Roundup

2010-01-04T04:38:00.000-08:00

Saturday and sunday,2nd and 3th of Januar,was the ARRL RTTY Roundup contest again.
This contest is in RTTY mode and started at 18:00 UTC on saturday.The contest is over 36hours,till sunday evening 23:59 UTC.

I also started at 18:00 UTC and looked on 20M first.The band looked almost dead.Only was able to work 3 stations before i went to 40M.
Also the 40M didn't look very well.It wasn'r easy to make qso's,not even with European stations.Sometimes they completely disapeared,while before they where real S9+ on my s-meter.Alot of QSB as well on the signals.Later in the evening the propagation got better.
After one hour i just got 23 QSO's,but also worked anice one,E21YDP

The second hour propagation went some better and got 30 qso's that hour.I was also calling on a frequency,7066...got there 14 stations that came back to me.Also YB1ALL called me,very happy with this qso from Gus.This was a qso over 11368 KM..wow.
After this mostly Europeans.First station logged from NA was after 21:00 UTC as also propagation started to get better.Last station worked before bedtime was at 2:20 UTC....3:20 local time,hi.
In this periode i worked alot of NA stations as well as Europeans.Also got two new DXCC's on RTTY,DP1POL Felix and AL9A Gary.
AL9A also means a new DXCC on 40M.Both did already confirm via LoTW.Gary also via eQSL as you see above.

Sunday morning i started again at 7:00 UTC.At this time the 20M was open already so i did start on 20M.First logged was 3V8SS,always very strong.propagation on 20M was also good.
Worked alot of EU stations,but also UN,JA,ZL.Also ZX2B was very strong via Long Path.
9M2CNC,Richard was also strong and with a very big pile up all the time.I was lucky to work him.

At 11:41 UTC i got my first NA station on 20M,AC4M Jonathan.Saw him on my screen and worked him beaming over the Northpole.Little later i worked PZ5RA,Ramon.I was lucky to work Ramon on 20 and 40M.He's also alot active in the RTTY Contest.
Some minutes later again a Big New DXCC on RTTY mode,KH2L Edward.He also did already confirm the QSO on loTW.

Around 19:00 i took a break till 23:00.
After this i did go again on 40M for the last hours.Propagation was not as good as the day before.
It was very difficult to work NA and also to find new stations.Band wasn't as croudy as the evening before.Ofcourse this has to do with,that it's sunday and the day after most people go to work again.Just got 23 stations in my log till 23:59 UTC.

I always want to try to get more QSO's and points as a year before.And i did it..
Last year 200 QSO's logged......This year i got 430 QSO's logged !!
You see 428 QSO's...i have 2 stations worked dupe.
MixW gives me 41.088 points.

Strange is,that doesn't matter how many stations from the USA i work,i still am missing Nevada state.If i would get Nevada confirmed on LoTW,i would have my WAS.
I really don't know why i don't hear a station from that State.Maybe it's a rare state to be acive on the bands,or that from my QTH it's almost impossible to get a QSO with.
In 2010 i will be looking and searching for them on the bands....

Some nice calls worked:
E21YDP (20+40M),YB1ALL (40M),JM1XCW (40M),DP1POL (40M),AL9A (40M),9M2CNC (20M),P49X (20+40M),P49YL (20M),PZ5RA (20+40M),ZL1BYZ (20M),JA1HGY (20M),ZX2B (20M),NP4BM (20M),HI3TEJ (20M)

Nice to see that more and more are using LoTW and/or eQSL.This way you get very fast the confirmations in.

SARTG and AGCW New Years Contest

2010-01-04T04:07:00.000-08:00

Friday the 1st was alread the start of the new contest year.

First was the SARTG that started at 8:00 UTC and one hour later started the AGCW.

The SARTG New Years contest was in RTTY mode.A mode i like very much for contesting.

The contest was only 3 hours long and also in this time i walked with my Husky's,so i wasn't active all three hours.

This contest we had to exchange RST-Number-Name and in our own language "Happy Newyear".In my language this is "Gelukkig Nieuwjaar".

It was nice to see this in all other languages,at least from the stations i worked.

Total qso's was for me 76 into 25 DXCC's.

After the SARTG contest i was active for one hour in the AGCW New Years contest.

This one did start at 9:00 UTC and was also only for three hours.

This contest was in CW mode,for me CW is using MixW and computer.

I made 27 QSO's,also some with AGCW Clubmembers.Worked 11 DXCC's.

Nicest one would be LX/DL5SE as LX is always hard to work from my QTH.
Worked Daniel on 40M

Looking back at 2009

2009-12-31T02:46:00.000-08:00

Today is the last day of 2009.
A good day to look back at things that happend this year.
I was pretty active during contesting and also in daytime i was looking on the clusters and listening on the bands for new DXCC's and prefixes.

In the Netherlands we have 2 clubs named the VERON and the VRZA.Both they have some kind of competitions.

The VERON has the Region-Competition.For this only QSO's made in HF Contesting counts.
Every 25 QSO's is one point and after 100 QSO's it's every 50 QSO's for one point.
This contest is not for OM's serparate,but for all the OM's from that Region.In my Region this year 10 OM's where active during some of the contests this year.Total we got 24519 QSO's,good for 663 points.With this we got the 12th place this year.
My score in this contest was with 10985 QSO's and 326 points good for the 9th place.But as i said before,this doesn't count,it's the total of the region what is important.

The VRZA has more competitions.Not only for HF but also for VHF/UHF.
In this competition all DXCC's and QSO's counting between the 15th of Januari untill the 14th of Dezember.One DXCC and prefix only counts one time.
I was active on HF in 4 competitions,DXCC's Phone,DXCC's Digimodes,DXCC's CW and Prefixes.

Last year i also was active in these 4 and got then:
DXCC Phone - 2nd (172 DXCC's)
DXCC Digi - 2nd (166 DXCC's)
Prefixes - 3th (1343 Prefixes)
DXCC's CW - 6th (140 DXCC's)

This year results are:
DXCC Phone - 2nd (199 DXCC's)
DXCC Digi - 2nd (180 DXCC's)
Prefixes - 1st (1716 Prefixes)
DXCC's CW - 1st (180 DXCC's)

In all 4 i was better then in 2008 and also got 2 times the 1st place.There are not much OM's that are in this competition,but every year more are also getting active.
For the 1st and 2nd places i did get prices as well.

For the 1ste place in the CW section i am very proud.The other as well ofcourse,but CW i do operate via Computer.

Every year i try to work all DXCC's again.
This year i got a total of 228 DXCC's worked in mixed mode.
10M - 103 DXCC's + 20M - 227 DXCC's + 40M - 116 DXCC's
In SSB:
Total - 194 DXCC's + 10M - 83 DXCC's + 20M - 188 DXCC's + 40M - 83 DXCC's
In CW:
Total - 180 DXCC's + 10M - 72 DXCC's + 20M - 172 DXCC's + 40M - 88 DXCC's
In RTTY:
Total - 173 DXCC's + 10M - 26 DXCC's + 20M - 172 DXCC's + 40M - 77 DXCC's
In PSK:
Total - 94 DXCC's + 10M - 25 DXCC's + 20M - 91 DXCC's + 40M - 25 DXCC's

Also i did manage to work all the 6 continents on all the three bands.

On LoTW i got now 4 DXCC certificates for the modes: Mixed,Phone,RTTY and 20M.
This month i also applied for the CW Certificate,got 115 DXCC's confirmed when i did apply.Now few days later i have 120 confirmed.
Also some very nice DXCC's where comfirmed via direct QSL:
3D2GM,3XM6JR,9Y4D,E21YDP,TL0A,5U5U,4S7BRG,FM5AN,VU7NRO,etc etc.

Also in 2009 i was active together with my dear friend Jelle,PD5JFK,from the Windmill the "Eendracht" in Gieterveen.First time we used our calls /P and in August we had PD6MILL.
Also in 2010 we will be active from the Windmill during the Dutch Millday,in May, and perhaps also again later in the year.
Also we activated PD55EA,55th aniverary from the Museum "Ellert and Brammert".This i did together with mark,NL10092.He's busy for his licence and hoping to get it in March 2010.Then i will do exam for the Full Licence.

In 2009 i also started with some WSJT mode on 20M,made already a few QSO's.
Also new for me is WSPR,very nice mode to check propagation,but also good for antenne's.
Some great modes by K1JT

I had alot of time this year for the radio hobby.I hope that this will change in 2010.
I got a back operation this year in June and are still recovering from this.In 2010 i got new exam to see what i can do again,what kind of job i mean.

I want to wish all of you a very Happy,Healthy and DXfull 2010.
Hoping that the DXgods will give us loads more sunspots and better propagation.
Hope to see you all down the log......cheers.

9A CW Contest

2009-12-21T04:45:00.000-08:00

After the OK DX RTTY i went to the 9A CW contest.

The contest already started saturday at 14:00 UTC.

As i do CW via Computer,i can only work the strongest stations.But still i manage to work some nice DXCC's.

I did work 7 stations on saturday evening on 40M already.

Sunday i did start at 10:00 UTC on the 40M band again.Worked only EU stations and went after one hour to 20M.

Here also mostly EU stations with some nice openings to Asiatic Russia.

At 11:23 i was able to work Frank,ZM2B.He is also active during contests and this was my 3th QSO with him already.Also got his confirmation already in via LoTW.

Later propagation also was open to NA and i did manage to work a few from the US as well.

Total QSO's where 70.

Total DXCC's on 20M 16.

Total DXCC's on 40M 14.

Total Points 4830.

OK DX RTTY

2009-12-21T02:01:00.000-08:00

The past weekend i was active in two contests.

Started with the OK DX RTTY and when this was finished i also did some in the 9A CW.

The OK DX is a 24 hours contest.Started at 0:01 UTC on Saturday morning untill 23:59 UTC.I started around 6:30 UTC.

First on 40M,because seemed that the propagation was good on that band.Worked only Europe and at 7:00 UTC i went to 20M.

Here i saw that there was some nice prop to Asia.Worked Asiatic Russia,Kazakhstan,China and a few stations from Japan as well.

At 8:30 UTC i was back on 40M,looking for some new Multi's.Propagation was good into Europe.Big suprise was to work K1SFA and NC4CS around 9 UTC.Normale it's very early in the morning,or late in the evening to work NA on 40M.Little later also K4XD and P40YL where logged.

At 11:00 UTC i went back to 20M again.Mostly Europa now.P40YL worked at 12:05 UTC.After this more NA stations worked.Also nice to work VK6HZ in the contest.Very difficult to work was HQ2T,but after some minutes i was able to work them.

Around 16:00 UTC the band started to close..but still i was able to work a few NA stations.

Also YV5AAX just came up suddenly very strong.Always nice to work him in the contest as well.

Think that Aldo is one of the most active QM's in YV land.

From 17:00 UTC it was only 40M for me to operate.

Until 19:00 i worked only EU,after that i could see and work some NA stations as well.

Last station logged was at 23:45 UTC....

Total logged 291 QSO's.

ARRL 10meter Contest

2009-12-16T01:55:00.000-08:00

The past weekend,12-13 Dec.,was again the ARRL 10M Contest.

Always a very nice contest,but.....as the band is not always open....also difficult.

The question was if it would be open for the contest weekend.

I was also active in 2008 and want to try to get a better result this year.

I started at 9:00 UTC.Got my first station logged at 9:17.This was 9H6A on CW.

So it seems that the band is ok for Europe.As i can use the computer for CW mode,i always try to do mixed mode in the contest,so also this year.

Propagation wasn't very good,i got 10 QSO's logged till 11:12 UTC.Mostly EU,besides C4N.

At 11:16 i did copy ZS6GF on SSB with real 5/7.After worked him i got 3 more stations from South Africa,ZS6JPY,ZS6BRZ and ZS9X.

Very strange to get the propagation to ZS,but not less happy with it,hi.

Wasn't active the whole afternoon and last station logged on saterday was at 17:37.

Still not bad...had now 26 QSO's logged...

Sunday i started at 8:30 UTC.

Started to listen on the CW and worked H2E at 8:34.

Was active till 10:00 UTC,because we had to go somewhere.Still worked 14 stations in this time.We where back at 15:45,worked 3 stations and then it was diner time.

After diner again to the radio and.....propagation was open to SA.

Got very strong stations from Brasil,Argentinia and also Uruguay.They where sometimes 5/7-9 but with strong QSB.It was just a job to work them fast,before the propagation would drop again.

Did work:

PY5KA,AY4D,LR2F,PY1BMB,ZX5J,LU1HF,CX5BW,PY1NB,PY2SEX,PQ5B,CW5W,PY5RB,

PY0FF and PY2LSM.

I did work PY2SEX on CW and on SSB.

At 19:00 UTC i had to qrt and thought that later the band would be closed.

But when i looked at 21:54 i could still hear 3 stations very loud.They where European stations,but i didn't have them in my log,so i worked them.

Very strange propagation on the 10M band in this weekend.

Total i got logged 74 stations.

On CW 29 qso's and 17 DXCC's

On SSB 45 qso's and 15 DXCC's

Total points in N1MM where 6592

My goal was again made.I got more QSO's logged as in 2008.Also more points then ofcourse.

It was very nice to see that the band was open with nice openings on saterday to ZS and on sunday to SA.

Also it was strange to work UK stations in this time of the year on 10M.

Also nice to work PE4BAS in the contest.

I hope that in 2010 propagation will increase and that the ARRL 10M Contest will be even a bigger succes as it was for me in 2009.

TARA Melee contest

2009-12-08T03:17:00.000-08:00

The past weekend,5th of Dezember,was again the TARA Melee contest.

This is not a very big contest,but i saw more stations active this year,as in 2008.

Last year only got 56 QSO's as well....so this year the goal was to get more then that.

I started in the morning around 9UTC and was active till 23:59 UTC.

First looking on 40M,then going to the 20M band.

Propagation wasn't very good that saterday.

Still made up to 153 QSO's,worked one dupe.

Nice calls worked:

E21YDP,ZC4LI,TF3PPN,TF3IGN,P40YL,A61OO,NP4BM.

Total worked: 38 DXCC's 21 US States 3 CA provinces

Total on 20M: 31 DXCC's 21 US States 3 CA Provinces

Total on 40M: 25 DXCC's 5 US States 0 CA Provinces

CQ WW Contest

2009-11-30T21:56:00.000-08:00

In the past weekend,28-29 Nov,was again the CQ WW CW contest.

I also was active during this contest with MixW as my CW decoder.

I started at 0:00 UTC saterday and worked on 40M untill 4:00 UTC.

In this time i got 97 QSO's logged.After this i went to bed for a few hours.

At 9:00 UTC i was present at the radio again,starting on 40M.At 10:23 i did switch to 20M and made multies from zones 14,15,16,17,18 and 20.

Around 11:00 UTC i did check the 10M and i did hear some low signals.Little later o could work zones 15,33,35 and 38.As new DXCC on 10M i worked A25NW.

The 10M wasn't open for more at my end,so i jumped into the 20M again.Did work VK6AA for zone 29.Worked my first station from NA around 11:45 UTC...after this more followed.

After 18:00 the 20M went death,so again to 40M.Last QSO made was as 0:33 UTC.....Bedtime.

Sundays i started again at 9:00 UTC on 40M.After a while i found out that 10M was also some activity and went there.Made 6 QSO's,all new multies.

After this again to the 20M and later checking 40M as well.Because we can have differend propagation on 40M in daytime,i got some more new multies again working ON,LX,TF,OZ and G stations.Back to 20M after this till 18:00 UTC again...while the band went death again.

Was active till 0:00 UTC...till the end of the contest.

I wasn't active all the time...had some breaks to do something else.Also have three Husky dogs that wanted to enjoy a walk outside as well,hi.At some time,mostly between 19:00-22:00 Utc,i went for a break as well.Had also some extra QRM on the 40M this periode and as was too early to get NA stations for me on 40M.So i was QRX for that time and started again around 22:00 UTC.

Worked some very nice DXCC's again in the contest and also some New ones on the bands.

Got new B7P China on 40M.Also HC8GR as new one on 40M.

Other nice calls worked:

6Y1V,A73A,P49Y,KP2M,V26K,D44AC,8P5A,NP4Z,PJ4A.

My goal was again to get more point/QSO's as in the year before.

Total QSO's now are 554,but got some dupes as well.

Total points are 165.958

Last year i got around 90.000 points,so my goal was made more then that.

LZ DX and EPC PSK63 contest

2009-11-24T05:29:00.000-08:00

In the past weekend,21-22 November,i was active in 2 contests.First the LZ DX and sundays the EPC PSK63.

LZ DX..
It started at 12:00 UTC on saterday till 12:00 UTC on sunday.
I started at 14:20 UTC.Before that time i was visiting the European Championship Cart race for dogs.As we have three Husky's at home as well...we ofcourse wanted to have a look there as well.

I was active in the contest in Mixed mode,so CW and SSB.CW i do with MixW.
Started in SSB...but didn't hear much,so went to CW.There where more stations active.Also propagation to LZ was also very good.Could work many from them.It was also nice to see VQ9JC in the contest and giving away CQ zone 41.
In the evening i had to stop because i had problems with my 40m PKW dipole.Due the strong winds,it gave me bad SWR....
Today,24th of Nov.,we did fix the problem.A screw was damaged.
Sunday morning i started again in the contest at 8:30 UTC.
At 12:00 UTC i got 174 QSO's with 49 Multies.
N1MM came to 35.574 points.

EPC PSK63...
After the LZ DX i started in the EPC PSK63 contest.Can't do it all at the same time :)
PSK63 is a very fast mode and sometimes not easy to decode.I also use MixW for this contest and did use the software RA3BB Victor made for this.
Nice to see so many PSKers active on the freq. and so many EPC members active as well.
Some years ago i did join the EPC Group,i got EPC number 3647.
In the contest i saw high numbers like 9229.
Worked total of 183 stations in 33 DXCC's.Most where stations from EU.
Total points came to 50193.

WAE RTTY

2009-11-18T02:34:00.000-08:00

The weekend of 14/15 of November was the WAE RTTY Contest.WAE means Work All Europe.

In the RTTY contest the rules are different then in the SSB and CW.In the RTTY contest,everybody is allowed to work everyone...not only EU to outside EU.

The propagation wasn't very good the days before.Also the 20m band is closing early in the evening.For me this is a bad thing,because as a Novice HAM,i have only the 10 , 20 and 40m band.

I started at 6:00 UTC on the 40m band.In the first 40 minutes i got 25 QSO's and also 3 stations from NA logged.Propagation seemed to be ok...but not very good on 40M.

After that i went to the 20m band that opened just before.Worked on 20m till 11:40 UTC.We had to go away for some hours.In this periode on 20m,i got 2 Japanese stations.I could work them,but it went very difficult.Also i worked a Brasilian station via long path.

At 16:00 i did continue with the contest again,but the 20m seemed to get closing already.Staions from NA where not as strong as they where normal.Stopped the first day at 23:30,as there where no new stations for me to work on 40M.Also,propagation wasn't very well.Stations from outside EU where weak or not even readeble.I also had a 1 1/2 hour break....not much on 40M that time,so i could watch the soccer match from Italia against Netherlands.Last station worked was a nice one,that was Ted TI3TEJ.

Sunday i did start again around 9:00 UTC.The 20m was wide open into EU.Worked on 20m till 17:00 UTC.Then the 20m was most closed at my side.On 40m it was mostly EU that time.Worked till 19:00 UTC on 40m,then i had a break again,because no new stations for me to work.I did continue later at 22:30 UTC.I worked 2 stations from NA after that,mostly EU stations.I did stop at 0:40 UTC...with 351 QSO's logged.

Nice stations worked:

JA6ZPR,4Z5CP,ZX2B,JM1XCW,TK5EP,JA1OVD,VP2MNK,A45WG,VK3TDX,E21YDP,XE1GRR,

7Z1SJ,HI3TEJ,OY3JE.

I work in all contest also alot of stations from NA.But still i need one state,the state of Nevada.

If i get that confirmed at LoTW,i will have all 50 states in mixed mode.But it seems that they aren't much on the radio,or that i just don't seem to have propagation to them.

The last weeks i see and hear more and more stations from the West part of the US,but still no luck.On 40m the propagation to NA wasn't very good this weekend.I only got a few stations logged from NA.

Ukrainian DX and IPA Contest

2009-11-08T10:12:00.000-08:00

This weekend was the Ukrainian and the IPA contest.

The IPA is in 4 parts.The first two parts are in CW and was saterday between 6:00-10:00 UTC and 14:00-18:00 UTC.The second parts are in phone and where sunday between 6:00-10:00 UTC and 14:00-18:00 UTC.

The IPA isn't a big contest,for me only 27 QSO's in CW/SSB together.

The Ukrainian contest is bigger and i did join in mixed mode (CW+SSB).

I did start at 12:00 UTC saterday and it went very nice.I stopped saterday evening at 20:00 UTC,as the 20M was closed and the 40M band was too busy.Got 165 QSO's logged.

Sunday morning i started again around 6:30 UTC.

Started on 40M,while 20M wasn't open yet.At 12:00 UTC i got total of 282 QSO's in my log.

Worked total of 23 Ukrainian oblasts and total of 44 DXCC's.

N1MM came with 125.413 points.

Here you see the results:

CQ WW Contest

2009-10-27T03:34:00.000-07:00

The past weekend was the CQ WW Contest in SSB.

The days before the 10M band was very much open,so hoping that also during the contest this was going to happen...

And we where lucky...10 Meters was very much open now as well.

My goal was to get more points and QSO's then in 2008.That year i had just a little under 50.000 points.I wasn't very long active that year,so this year i planned to be longer active.

Saterday the propagation on 10M was better then sundays,but still stations could be worked.

Also 20M was wide open.Mostly my s-meter was above S9....

Some nice calls worked:

On 10M: OT5A,P33W,5B8AD,YC9MDX,9K2HN,SU1KM,ZS9X,3DA0WW,HZ1PS,PW5G,LT1F,6W1RY,

ZP8VAO,A47RS,4U1ITU,EE9K,ZS4U,JY5CC,5F8RU,C31CT.

On 20M:

FS/K1XM,4U1UN,4U1ITU,ZY2C,DP1POL,5R8FU,HC8A,C31CA,VK8PDX,PJ4K,7Z1SJ,A73A,

3DA0WW,HT2N,9Y4D,SU1KM,8P5A,HB0/HB9AON,TO7A.

On 40M:

HK1KXA,EE9Z,VP5T,OY3AA,V26B,VP5DX,GJ2A,4U1ITU,TF3CW.

My results:

Total QSO's: 516

Total points: 201.238

10 Meters open!!

2009-10-27T02:27:00.000-07:00

The 10 meter band was wide open in the past 5 days.
Maybe it had to do with the new sunspots or sporadic E openings...
But we are very happy with this.
Worked on 23 Okt the following stations:

Z21BC,LY1PM,ZD7FT,4X4DZ,E21EIC,4Z4DX,PD1DL,CU2AF,CN8SG,CU2KI,
A41MX,CT9/DL6LB,V51AS,JY4CI,4X/K2LS,UN7AB,5B4AHY.

We where hoping that also during the big CQ WW Contest the prop was like this....

Contesting October

2009-10-27T02:08:00.000-07:00

TARA RUMBLE PSK 3 Okt.
Total QSO's: 77
Total Points: Unknown
Remarks: Nice contest,just not much in the contest.

The MAKROTHEN Contest (RTTY) 10-11 Okt.
Total QSO's: 270
Total points: 1.134.422
Remarks: Nice contest in wich the distances between the stations are the point.Worked alot of NA..ment alot of KM/points that way.But also JA,E21,DV1.

JARTS WW RTTY 17-18 Okt.
Total QSO's: 404
Total points: 100425
Remarks: Propagation was good.Also 40M was good for me,worked few JA's and also YB,VK.YB and VK where new DXCC's for me on 40M.Got after the contest the eQSL already from VK3TDX.

Contesting September

2009-10-27T01:07:00.000-07:00

My contest results in September.

RUSSIAN "RADIO" WW RTTY Contest 5 Sept.
Total QSO's: 200
Total points: 127420
Remarks: Nice propagation again.Worked 38 DXCC's.DXX's like JA,A71,TF,SU,OZ,HI,FM etc.

ALL ASIAN DX (SSB) 5-6 Sept.
Total QSO's: 54
Total points: 2090
Remarks: Nice to work so many Asian OM's.Not very easy for me with 25 watts.Worked UA0,JA,VU,UN,5B,4X,7Z,EX,EK,TA.

IARU Fieldday Reg I (SSB) 5-6 Sept.
Total QSO's: 50
Total points: 4848
Remarks: Nice to see/hear so many fieldstations on air.

WAE DX (SSB) 12-13 Sept.
Total QSO's: 108
Total points: 12744
Remarks: Worked some nice DXCC's like C4,A71,4L0,4X,SU,7Z,PY,PZ,PJ4,JA,3V8,9V,A61,V5,YB,HK,TA,OA6,NP4,HI.Beside these alot of NA stations as well.

CQ WW DX Contest (RTTY) 26-27 Sept.
Total QSO's: 528
Total points: 293944
Remarks: I did really good in this contest.Propagation also good.Worked alot of nice DXCC's again.Also the PKW MHF1e40 40m dipole workes great.

Contesting

2009-10-27T00:36:00.000-07:00

I didn't update my blog for some time now,so now a update about my contest adventures from August...

SARTG WW RTTY 15-16 Aug.
Total QSO's: 206
Total points: 187370
Remarks: Some nice propagation...worked KH6,DV1 and some JA's as nice far DX.

RDA Contest (SSB-CW) 15-16 Aug.
Total QSO's: 109
Total points: 101370
Remarks: Very nice to work the Russian Provinces.Prop was good in that area.

EPC RUSSIA DX (PSK63) 22-23 Aug.
Total QSO's: 163
Total points: 162792
Remarks: Nice to work EPC members.

YO-DX Contest (SSB-CW) 29-30 Aug.
Total QSO's: 101
Total points: 18048
Remarks: Nice contest to work the YO Area's

SCC RTTY CHAMPIONSHIP 29-30 Aug.
Total QSO's: 260
Total points: 40918
Remarks: Propagation was ok,worked alot of NA and also ZS,PY,JA,LT,V5.

This where my contest results.Worked in all contest some nice DXCC's.Also very nice to see some friends again during the contest.Till next time...we meet again.

PD55EA

2009-08-10T03:38:00.000-07:00

From the 1th till the 29th of August,we will be active with a SES Callsign on 10,20,40meters and also sometimes on 2Meter band.

The Callsign is PD55EA...to celebrate the 55th Birthday of the Museum "Ellert and Brammert" in my town Schoonoord.

All QSL's will be send automatic via de buro.If you want it direct,please send me first with SAE.I also send eQSL with this callsign.

More info on http://www.pd7bz.nl/pd55ea

WAE Contest and PKW MHF1e40

2009-08-10T00:56:00.000-07:00

In the past week,my girlfriend put the Rotary Dipole from PKW for 40M,the PKW MHF1e40,on the roof.It's just in steady position,little North-West/South-East.

This because during contests,many from NA are on 40M.So for me this would be the best position.But as it is only a Dipole....it TX as well as to the front as to the back.But i am very happy to have it up on the roof....around 8 meters above the ground now.

Before it was only standing at the back at the house at 4 meters....but even on this height i was able to work XW1B,Bruce in RTTY....just 8800 Km. :)

The past weekend,8th and 9th of August,was the WAE Contest in CW....(Work All Europe).

Means....we from Europe where only allowed to get outside EU in our log.

Knowing this and that the propagation isn't still very well......

Still i did manage to get 101 QSO's logged.Started also very good with KH7XS and KH6MB logged within my first 12 QSO's.

Also 10M was open and got some nice ones on this band as well....total 14 QSO's.

Worked these nice DXCC's on 10M: LS1D , FJ/VE3EY , 5N0OCH , PY2NDX , etc..

On 20M also nice DXCC's: CO8ZZ , HK1X , CX1AA , etc..

On 40M is did try out my PKW MHF1e40 on the roof.Could work some NA stations without any problem with my 25W.Also got FM5CD and FJ/VE3EY on 40M.

Saw that YN9H was also active on 7054....also worked him in SSB in a pileup.So i am very happy with my PKW dipole on the roof.

Got total more QSO's and multies then last year,but have to wait how much points i get,after all logs where checked.As i do my CW with my computer,sometimes callsigns and numbers aren't correct.Or the other stations doesn't have my callsign correct.

In N1MM i got total 9.999 points till now.

Contesting

2009-08-09T23:56:00.000-07:00

On saterday the 1th of August,i was active during 2 contests.

First there was the TARA Grid Dip contest,in RTTY and PSK...from 0:00 till 23:59 UTC.
In this contest we had to exchance our name and part of our locator.I had to send "bernard jo32"
Didn't see too much stations active during this contest....was that the propagation or just lack an interest??
Still some nice DX was worked and got 52 QSO's logged.

At 12:00 UTC the European HF Championship started as well.This contest you could work in SSB,CW or mixed mode.I was active in both SSB and CW,so mixed mode.
In this contest we had to exchange the last two digits of the year we got our first licence,For me this was 2006...so i had to give away 06.We where only allowed to get QSO's with EU stations for this contest.Came to 200 QSO's in this contest,good for 17200 point,said it in N1MM.

As we as Novice HAM's in the Netherlands are bound with bands we are allowed to TRX on,it's good that 10M is open so now and then as well.We have on HF just 3 bands to be on,also during the contest.These are 10 , 20 and the 40 Meter band.

RSGB IOTA Contest

2009-07-28T15:09:00.000-07:00

Last weekend was the IOTA Contest.Nice to see so many Islands active.

I was active on 10 , 20 and 40 meters.Lucky for me that also 10M was open.It was only Europe what i could hear and work.

Total i could make 256 QSO's,more then in 2008.

Also got more IOTA's for the Multipliers...total was 105 mulities.

Total score in N1MM came to 238.140

Some info:

Contesten

2009-07-17T02:47:00.000-07:00

Since i am back home i am also back to the radio.Every day i get more and more time,can sit down longer with my back.It's nice to kill the day with some radio time.The first weeks i was only allowed to lay on the bed....wow what can a day take a long time then.Since i am up and also walk more,the days fly by again.

On the 1th of July was the RAC contest.Propagation wasn't very well that day.Made 25 QSO's in CW and SSB mode.Worked 10 Canadian stations during the contest in 4 ProvincesThis where ON,NS,QC and SK.Nice also to work XE2WWW,Jorge.

The weekend of 4/5 July there where also a few contests.

In the "Independence of Venezuela Contest" i made 27 QSO's

In the "DL DX RTTY Contest" i made 250 QSO's

In the past weekend of the 11th and 12th of July was the big "IARU HF World Champions Contest".

Last year i also joined this contest and wanted to try to get more QSO's/points this year.I made more hours this year at the radio and this also came out in the points.

Made 402 QSO's in CW/SSB.

I'm very happy with this result.Worked also some very nice stations during the contest,like:

CX1AA,8N3HQ,8H8HQ,9Y4HQ,OZ1HQ,P44HQ,YS1YS,LX0HQ,CO7PH,ZF1A,HD2A,XE1KK,

KH7XS,GJ0KYZ,A71A and many more.

Nice was to work KH7XS without a pileup :)

Some results from the contest you can see here:

back home and back to the radio

2009-07-01T00:51:00.000-07:00

After my backoperation on the 9th of June,i am back home since the 15th of June.Had to spend one week in the hospital.Glad to be home again and now slowly getting some quality time at the radio again,hi.

In the past two weekends i was again active during several contests.
On the weekend from the 21th and 22th of June i was active in the ARR PSK63 contest and the ALL Asian Contest in CW.In the ARR PSK63 Contest i got 79 QSO's and in the ALL Asian 52.

The past weekend i was active in three contests.
King of Spain (SSB) 100 QSO's
UKDX Digi (PSK63+RTTY 75baud) 150 QSO's
MM (CW) 26 QSO's

I am not able to sit down too long yet,have to take alot of breaks and get away from the radio/computer then.Slowly things getting better and also the time i can sit down will be longer.

CQ WPX CW

2009-05-31T23:57:00.000-07:00

The past weekend was the CQ WPX Contest in CW.Last year was the
first time i joined this contest.I'm not able to operate CW with a key and understand all,i
make use of my computer and MixW for this.A combination what can work very
good as well,only not the weak signals.

Last year i got a certificate from CQ,i was as Rookie low power, #1 from Netherlands, #5 from Europe and #6 from the World.Total points 187.110.
As i have just a simple setup,i am proud to get results like this.
Just working with 25 watts,3elm Tribander at 6 meters above the ground and windom FD3 for 40M.Also only 3 bands allowed here and not even the whole bands.
40M we,as Novice HAM,can only operate between 7050 and 7100.So the CW section isn't for us.But with big contests,many will also go above 7050...good for me :)

The goal this year was,to get more QSO's/points then last year.
I was very happy to see that also the 10M was open.This got an extra band for me as we have only 10,20 and 40M on HF.Both days the 10M was open.Saterday even to NA and SA.Worked 2 stations in NA and 1 in SA.Also whole Europe was open on 10M.
Propagation on 20M wasn't that good in my eyes.Got some nice QSO's,but didn't see as much NA as i did last year.
Got also a new DXCC in CW,TU2CI.

My results:
I made 501 QSO's and came total to 299.280 points.

EU PSK DX Contest,King of Spain and 10M

2009-05-18T00:40:00.000-07:00

In the past weekend i was again active in 2 contest.The EU DX PSK Contest and the King of Spain.

The PSK contest is nice to do,not only for the contest,but also to get some stations from new area's as well.The propagation was ok for Europe and also got some NA and SA stations logged.
But it's strange that i can work DX better then short distance.
Many stations till 1500km did ask me several times for my callsign and the nummer.
But stations on larger distances mostly went in one time ok.
Maybe it was too much QRM from active stations here in EU at the other sides?
Got 150 QSO's logged in the contest.

The King of Spain was in CW.Also some more contests where on that time in CW,so wasn't that easy for me,as computer CWer.
Came to 55 QSO's logged in the contest.

I was hoping for the 10M to open up during the contest,but nothing at that time at my side.
As we,Novice HAM in the Netherlands,have just the 10 and 20M for using CW.In big CW contest,sometimes CW is done in the section of the 40M where we can operate.
After the contest the 10M did open up.I did word several EU DXCC's in SSB,PSK,RTTY and CW.
Around 17:30 i did hear a PU station in QSO...it was PU2WDX,Celso.When he finished his QSO,i did call him and got respons.My First SA station worked on 10M this year WOW!!
Celso was here 5/7 and got a 5/5 with QSB back from him.Many thanks dear Celso for the first SA on 10 this year.
About 30 mins later i saw that PY2CX was spotted on 28430.After he finished his QSO i also called him and got my second QSO into SA on 10M.PY2CX,Maur,was here 5/7 and also got 5/7 back from him.
Nice to see/hear that 10M opens up more and more.Hope that everyone keeps an eye on that band,because it's a very nice band for DX.Not easy....but nice :)

Windmills On Air !!!!!!

2009-05-08T14:20:00.000-07:00

Hi all,We will be on air at the windmill "The EENDRACHT" te Gieterveen,Netherlands.The QRA Locator is JO33ka.

We will be active with our personal calls with /p.

So PD7BZ/p and PD5JFK/p.

We will be active on the 9th and 10th of May between 8:00 and 15:00 UTC.

Our TRX are: Yaesu FT847,FT897 and a 2m FM set.

We will be active on 10 , 20 , 40 and on 2Meters.We will also try digimodes.

Hope to work some of you guys.

This will be our first time we are active with this kind of event.It's for us also to show it to other people,as we have in the Netherlands this weekend Mill weekend.

The Mills are open for people to have a look around.

We are sitting inside the mill itself.

More info can be found at: http://www.pd7bz.nl/mill

Propagation and 10M open !!

2009-05-02T03:12:00.000-07:00

Yesterday started very well for me.

Propagation was in the morning very good to Hawaii and Alaska over the Northpole.

Could work KL8DX on CW,new one on this mode,and KH6MB on RTTY,also new in RTTY mode.

I was very happy to made this QSO's as it's not easy with 25W to make it in the pile up's.

Around 10:00 i did see and hear that the 10M was open as well.

My first QSO was made with 5F1ROM at 10:22.

After this i made several QSO's with I,EA,F and CT.

Sometimes with real good signals to 5/9++,good to see that 10M opens up.

I like this band alot,as it's not the easiest band to make DX/QSO's.

Propagation is not very good yet,but stil alot of nice QSO's and good DX can be made.

My counter of DXCC's for 2009 of worked stations is now 185.

SP DX RTTY

2009-04-26T23:16:00.000-07:00

This past weekend was the SP DX RTTY Contest.
Last year i also did take part of this and i wanted to get a better score this year.
But it's always the question,how the propagation will be...

I started at 12:00 UTC and my first station logged was JA1MZM,so thats what i call a very good start.He's one out of the three JA's that i could work,so very happy with this.
Strange was also,that i could work/see alot of Polish stations on 20M as well.
Normale i don't hear/see them so much...is this because they aren't so active then,or did we have just good propagation to Poland at the right day??

First station from NA i could work at 12:28 UTC and was WX4TM.This was while i was beaming to North-East.So propagation was getting good in NA direction as well that time.
Worked some more NA a little after that,just got the beam to North possition then.
Nice to have worked PU5OGE on 40M as well.I have just put up the 40M Rotary dipole,PKW MHF-1e40,at 4 meters from the ground for testing.Test went good with this RTTY QSO over 10.000 km.!!!

Got in total 272 QSO's logged and worked 20 Polish Provinces together on 20 and 40M bands.
On 20M i was able to work all 6 continents again,same as last year.On 40M i also able to get 4 continents,EU,NA,SA and AS.
My total points in MixW came out to: 915216
So i got my goal,got more QSO's and also more points then in the contest from 2008!!!
Now we wait for the final points,after the crosschecking.

Some nice calls i worked:
JA1MZM,A71EM,HL4RBR,JH0INP,JA2BQX,5C5W,DV1JM,LT0H,PZ5RA,E21YDP,YV5AAX,
ZC4LI,PR7AR,YV6BTF,J39BS,PU5OGE.

Results:

Paper QSL's,eQSL,LoTW

2009-04-02T00:43:00.000-07:00

We all love the paper QSL's...

But there are a few ways to send them.I like to use the Dutch QSL buro.

Here in the Netherlands,it works fast and save.But not everyone wants to use buro's...but why?

The buro here is free to use,we bring the QSL's to the montly meetings of our region.There's then also the QSL manager for our region,who takes our cards and also brings us the cards that are received by the Dutch QSL buro.

I hear stories from OM's that they wait for years for a card via buro's....

But is this maybe because the OM's that send the card,didn't send it straight after the QSO?

I got cards back from NA , SA and even JA within 6 months.

Sometimes our cards did cross....but also sometimes there's a "Tnx QSL" on it.

eQSL from HI8LAM

Maybe the buro's aren't working like here in other countries...?

Maybe also the buro's aren free to use,like here?

I can understand,that in some countries theymaybe have to travel too far to bring them.

Maybe even not possible and they have to post them anyway....

eQSL from D4C

For me,i try to QSL mostly via de buro.

Also direct cards are send out,but also for us it's a expencive way.First we have to pay the poststamp here and also alot want to get $1 or $2 for the returning QSL's.

If we send $2 with the QSL...we pay almost $4 to get the QSL we want.

I do get sometimes $1 with direct QSL requests....but i send the $1 then back.

I don't need to have the other OM pay for the stamp,as his QSL card is very welcome already.

eQSL from FK8DD

I also use eQSL and LoTW.Both are free to use and work also very nice.

LoTW counds for the DXCC's for awards by the ARRL,eQSL doesn't.

But eQSL is nice,because you also have a digital QSL card back as confirmation,not only some text.And some make really nice cards.

I have now already 2900 eQSL cards in my collection.

Both eQSL and LoTW are the fastest ways to get confirmations.I did work PF0F and got is within 3 weeks confirmed via LoTW.Same with DP1POL.

Propagation and DXCC's

2009-03-31T02:39:00.000-07:00

We would be going into Cycle 24...but still we are hanging inbetween.Propagation in 2009 is one from ups and downs.Still some very nice openings on long distance are possible.
Also we are in the start of the sporadic E season,so also bands like 20M stays open longer.Also the effect of the longer hours of daylight causes this.
Now we hope that the 10M will open up as well.For me,as a Novice HAM,this would mean 1 extra band to work at,as we are just allowed on 10 , 20 and 40M.

Still with this low sunspots...or better moslty no spots at all,i am able to work some nice DX and also new DXCC's as well.Worked in the weekend AH0BT (Mariana Islands OC-086) and yesterday TL0A (Central Africa).This brings my worked DXCC's now at 253 in all modes.
I am actice in phone,but also digimodes.Also i try to work CW via my computer.Can't make a QSO then,but workes ok for quick reports and also for contesting.

Every year i try to work again all DXCC's.This year the counter stands already on 169 DXCC's in all modes.On modes and bands is it:
10m - 7 DXCC's all modes
20M - 162 DXCC's all modes
40M - 64 DXCC's all modes
SSB - 115 DXCC's
CW - 77 DXCC's
Digi - 114 DXCC's (RTTY,PSK,HELL,etc)

Still looking out for VK9LA (Lord Howe Isl.),but till now i only had a small signal from them on RTTY,almost one week ago.I think that they are having a bad path to Western Europe,from the place where they are.If i think back at VP9DWX (Willes Isl.),i could hear them every day and also managed to work them.But still few days to go for VK9LA,so we keep our eyes and ears open :)
Also VK9GMW (Mellish Reef) started,after some delay due bad weather.

CW WW WPX Contest

2009-03-30T04:26:00.001-07:00

In the past weekend was again the CQ WW WPX contest.A very well used contest with many nice prefixes active.

It started at 0:00 UTC on friday night and ended at 0:00 sunday night,so it's a 48 hours contest.

Only SSB mode is allowed during this contest and no WARC bands.

Last year i also joined this contest and got 2nd for the Netherlands in the Low Power Single Operator All Band class.For me,only 25 watts is allowed.

Got last year a total score of 102.820.....the points that came out after cross checking the logs.

My goal was to beat that score...but would the propagation permit this.

The days before the contest,the propagation wasn't very stable as well.Sometimes nice openings,but followed by low signals as well short after.

I started saterday morning,logged my first station on 20M at 07:42 UTC.Last logged on saterday was at 23:11 on 40M.The 40M band was open,but very strong stations with alot of QRM as well.For me as Novice,only the freq. 7050-7100 is allowed.

Sunday morning i started again at 08:03 UTC on 20M and last logged was at 22:03 UTC.

In the Netherlands we did change into the Summertime again,so the difference between local and UTC is now 2 hours again.So i did stop at 0:03 local time.

I did made on saterday 168 and on sunday 121 QSO's.total came to 289 QSO's.

Most on 20 and 40M band.I was lucky to have 2 stations in the Netherlands that where calling on 10M.The 10M was besides them,very quiet.Saw some spots from other EU Country's,but here i couldn't hear a thing.Shame,as the 10M is a very nice band for DXing....but also difficult.

Came together to 137.475 points.Till now i got my goal...as this is the raw score.Have to wait till the cross checking of the logs is done,how much i keep.

Wouldn't be the first time they got my callsign as PT7BZ....not much difference in callsign...but alot in Temperature for sure :)

It was a very nice contest and i did enjoy it alot.

Got all Continents worked again as well.

Got one new DXCC worked as well,so always happy then ofcourse.

See the pictures for other results.

Some exotic callsigns in my log:

6W1RW,JJ5GMJ,P40A,E21EIC,V8AQM,9M8Z,OY9JD,HK3JJH,D4C,A73A,AH0BT,VP59V,

4V4JR,PJ2T,ZF1A,4M5IR

BARTG RTTY and RDXC

2009-03-24T09:46:00.000-07:00

The past weekend was again one with many Contests.
I was active in 2 of them,but due not too much time,didn't get many in my log.

I started with the BARTG RTTY Contest.
This is a 48's hours event,started at 02:00 UTC on Saterday the 21th.I was active mostly on 20 meters and worked a few on 40 meters as well.There wasn't much RTTY above 7050,because of the RDXC Contest.
Still got to work some very nice DXCC's again in this mode.
Got in my log: JA6ZPR,J5UAP,YV5AAX,LT0H,JH7XGN,E21YDP,ZS2EZ,J88DR,YB4IR,9M6XRO and PR7AR.
These are the more exotic callsigns...some you don't get every days i mean :)
Nice to see that the propagation is getting longer,20 meters is longer open as for 1 month ago.
Maybe this is a sign of the Sporadic E season to begin.

In the RDXC i did work 125 stations.For me,digital modes and CW work better,just working with 25 watts.Worked in the RDXC in mixed mode,most in CW.
Nice DXCC's worked are:
JA7DLE,YW4D,6W1SJ,YE1ZAT,VQ9JC and V47NT.

Hope the propagation will be good the next weekend as well,while the CQ WW WPX contest will be taken.Hope to work then as much as last year.

Propagation 16 March

2009-03-17T07:05:00.000-07:00

The past weeks the propagation isn't very well.

Sometimes even very bad.But i was very nice suprised to have the big signals yesterday from Asia.I did work Kazu (JH3NGD) , Nobu (JQ2QHQ) and Youn (HL4CBX) and they did have real 5/9+ signals with me.

I also got 5/9+ back from Kasu and just working here with 25watts and 3elm Tribander.

Kasu and Nobu did work both with 1KW and very big monoband antenne's.

Ofcourse this is also some of the reason i had such a big signal.

Also i could work D44TXI (SSB) and D44TXR (RTTY) from the German DX Pedition in Sal Island,Cape Verde (AF-086).

I did work D44TXS already in CW as well,few days ago.

We are all still waiting till Cycle 24 will start and give us some better and longer openings.Now,when there are nice openings on DX,it's mostly for just a short time.

PS0F via LoTW

2009-03-17T05:21:00.000-07:00

Today i saw that i got PS0F,Fernando de Noronha SA-003,confirmed via LoTW.

Many thanks for this fast reply on LoTW and the new DXCC for me.

Thanks to W9VA and K9PPY for the activation.

Paper QSL is via W9VA himself.

Propagation Difference

2009-03-14T04:14:00.000-07:00

You all know that Holland is just a very small and flat Country.

But still we have alot of differences in the Propagation inside this small area.

Years ago we had this already on 11M.In the South part of Holland they could work Country's we didn't even hear here in the North part.The distance between myself and the other stations is just 150-200KM.

In 2006 i did pass my Novice Licence...

Thought that this difference was maybe only on the 11M band.

But now i notice that this is also on other bands.

I did notice this also on the 20M band.Some stations in the South part of Holland,did work a DX expedition...i couldn't even hear a sound from them here.

It seems that the propagation goes from South to North.

The stations in the South first hear the station and if the band is open long enought,we can hear them here in the North part as well.

We also see this with other Country's.For example Italy has mostly better propagation to all corners as we here in Western Europe.

My antenne setup in Schoonoord JO32IU

For me is also the country's to the North difficult.

So did i hear JD1BMM just one day with sometimes 4/3....but that was it.

Also from ZL7T i didn't hear a thing.I was lucky to have worked and confirmed ZL7/DL2AH.That time i was at my old QTH with better sight to the North.

Antenne setup in my old QTH, JO32KX

Also my antenne setup here isn't very well yet.The FB33 tribander is too low,not even hight enought to look over the roof here.Later this year,we will change this.The beam will be around 10 meters hight from the ground then.Also will change the FB33 from Fritzel and put there then my old Swan TB-3HA.This is also a tribander (10-15-20) and has the elements much longer.Also i think that the F/B is better from this one.

Also i will put first my PKW 40M rotary dipole in the tower.

For now i have the FD3 from Fritzel and a 2x 10M home made wire dipole for the 40M.

The PKW rotary dipole is much better.Did work VP6DX with it on my old QTH.

In time,the rotary dipole from PKW will be changed into a two elm.

PKW MHF1e40 40M Rotary Dipole

PKW MHF2e40ss 2elm 40M

ARRL and Open Ukraine RTTY Contest

2009-03-14T03:20:00.000-07:00

In the weekend from 7 and 8 March i was again active in a few Contest.

In the "ARRL International DX Contest" and the "Open Ukraine RTTY Championship".

The propagation wasn't very well in my eyes.

During the ARRL International DX Contest in SSB,i made 61 QSO's.It was not easy to get the QSO's.Just with 25 watts of power.....and then between all thoose OM's using 100W-1KW.

I was also active in the ARRL DX CW Contest,a few weeks ago.CW is for low power as i use,easier.The tones from the CW are much harder then my voice and much more clear as well i think.

The result was 61 QSO's with 24 multies (states+provinces) comes to 4392 Points.

During the Open Ukriane RTTY Contest,i was only active on the 20M band.

Made just 50 QSO's in this periode of the contest,between 08:00 - 11:59 UTC.

Got 8 DXCC's in my log and 28 domains.Total of points 378.

Links:

www.arrl.org/contests/rules/2009/intldx.html

www.uarl.com.ua/openrtty

Contest weekend

2009-03-01T10:31:00.000-08:00

In the past weekend,i was again active in a few Contest.

It started friday evening with the Russian PSK Contest.In this contest you could use three kinds of PSK modes,or better to say,three different speeds.PSK31,PSK63 and PSK125.
The last one,PSK125,is very fast,even faster then in RTTY mode.
You could work all stations in all modes,but not direct.There must be 10 minutes betwen the contact before you could change mode with the same station.
Result was 113 QSO,with some nice ones as:
E21YDP and 9M6XRO.

Saterday was the UBA CW contest,but i was till around 18:00 UTC busy collecting PSK QSO's.After that,there was not much active anymore in the contest.Made 7 QSO's and started again on sunday morning.I stopped with 100 QSO's.All made on 20M.
Also not one Belgium station in my log,because i live to far from them for that and too close for the propagation we have in daytime.

After the Russian PSK contest on saterday,i did hear alot of signals on RTTY.
I did look and saw alot of stations from NA.They where active in the NAQP Contest.
It was a very big suprise to see and work NA stations this late in the evening.
Last made on 20M was at 21:16 UTC,22:16 Local time.
Most of the days the 20M band is closed at this time.
Worked 31 Stations in that Contest,23 on 20M and 8 later on 40M.
Here you see the log from this:

Start date UTC TX kHz Mode Call RST S RST R Exch S Exch R Dxcc
-------------------- -------- ---- ------ ----- ----- ------- --------- ----
28-Feb-2009 18:32:46 14078.5 RTTY N4IQ 599 599 Bernard Bill SC K
28-Feb-2009 18:49:35 14087.3 RTTY W4GKM 599 599 Bernard NICK TN K
28-Feb-2009 19:36:53 14089.9 RTTY K4TD 599 599 Bernard RICK AL K
28-Feb-2009 19:37:42 14090.5 RTTY WX4TM 599 599 Bernard TOM AL K
28-Feb-2009 19:38:35 14088.5 RTTY K2MK 599 599 Bernard MIKE NJ K
28-Feb-2009 19:46:29 14102.9 RTTY KE4KWE 599 599 Bernard TOM AL K
28-Feb-2009 19:49:37 14114.3 RTTY N4IG 599 599 Bernard DAVE FL K
28-Feb-2009 19:53:36 14114.9 RTTY AF4OX 599 599 Bernard BOB SC K
28-Feb-2009 19:57:00 14097.4 RTTY VE2SB 599 599 Bernard DANIEL QC VE
28-Feb-2009 19:58:57 14094.0 RTTY VA2UP 599 599 Bernard FABI QC VE
28-Feb-2009 20:00:42 14082.9 RTTY KE4UNA 599 599 Bernard JEFF AL K
28-Feb-2009 20:05:56 14080.3 RTTY K1ZZI 599 599 Bernard RALPH GA K
28-Feb-2009 20:08:59 14074.5 RTTY KK5OQ 599 599 Bernard JR MS K
28-Feb-2009 20:13:11 14083.6 RTTY NA5Q 599 599 Bernard ROLAND LA K
28-Feb-2009 20:15:29 14082.4 RTTY AA3B 599 599 Bernard BUD PA K
28-Feb-2009 20:17:51 14088.0 RTTY W1UE 599 599 Bernard DENNIS MA K
28-Feb-2009 20:20:30 14111.8 RTTY AE1T 599 599 Bernard PETER NH K
28-Feb-2009 20:30:28 14082.7 RTTY K4REB 599 599 Bernard JOE NC K
28-Feb-2009 20:44:11 14092.9 RTTY K1SFA 599 599 Bernard SUNNY MA K
28-Feb-2009 20:46:32 14127.5 RTTY K4FCC 599 599 Bernard DOUG FL K
28-Feb-2009 20:59:17 14093.7 RTTY VE1MC 599 599 Bernard BRIAN NC VE
28-Feb-2009 21:00:06 14093.2 RTTY N1SV 599 599 Bernard LES MA K
28-Feb-2009 21:16:42 14095.6 RTTY KS1J 599 599 Bernard ERNIE RI K
28-Feb-2009 21:46:55 7084.7 RTTY K2PAL 599 599 Bernard ALEX NY K
28-Feb-2009 21:48:31 7085.2 RTTY AA3B 599 599 Bernard BUD PA K
28-Feb-2009 22:11:10 7092.7 RTTY W4UEF 599 599 Bernard RICK NC K
28-Feb-2009 22:13:55 7092.3 RTTY AF4OX 599 599 Bernard BOB SC K
28-Feb-2009 22:17:08 7081.1 RTTY K1ZZI 599 599 Bernard RALPH GA K
28-Feb-2009 22:25:03 7081.4 RTTY N4IQ 599 599 Bernard BILL SC K
28-Feb-2009 22:28:08 7075.9 RTTY WW4LL 599 599 Bernard FRED GA K
28-Feb-2009 23:02:20 7080.8 RTTY W4GKM 599 599 Bernard NICK TN K

Links:
http://www.ncjweb.com/naqprules.php
http://mixw-contest.narod.ru/Files/RusWW.htm
http://www.uba.be/hf_contests/rules/ubatest_dx.pdf

ARRL DX Contest

2009-02-23T03:22:00.000-08:00

The past weekend was the ARRL DX Contest in CW.

I also took a part in it,but just with the small power i have,just 25watts.

Sometimes it wasn't easy to get the QSO good.I was active on 20M and a small part at the 40M as well.

For 20m i can use my 3elm Tribander,FB33 from Fritzel.

For the 40M i did use just a simple 2x 10M wire dipole,just haning as inverted V.The top hangs at 5 meters and the ends at 2 meters above the ground.

This simple setup works better for me then my Fritzel FD3 windom.This one is also hanging higher,top at 9 meters and the ends at 4 meters above the ground.

Soon i will let the 2x 10m dipole in the same way as the FD3,just to test how that will work then.

Later this year,i will get a 2elm PKW up for 40M.

The first day of the Contest went very well.Got 134 QSO's logged that day.

The second day was not that well.I did found alot of OM's that i did work already the first day.

Also no propagation to the West Coast of the US,so also no Multies from that area.

Total came to 179 QSO's with 47 Multies.

These QSO's are made with only 25 watts and also by use of computer and MixW.

So alot of weak signals couldn't be worked because of this.

I'm very happy with the result and hope to work you guys again soon,in other contest.

Links: ARRL Dx Contest 2009

: MixW

K5D Desecheo 2009 DXpedition update

2009-02-21T02:18:00.000-08:00

In the start of the expedition K5D,they where very strong here at my side.But as later the time went,the signals went also lower and lower.Sometimes not even signals that came above the noicelevel.Thursday is daytime it was the same.In whole Europe they could work K5D,but here at my radio is was all silence.

Till around 18:00 UTC,the signals came up and getting stronger and stronger.
The SSB station went up to 5/5 at the top.In the cluster i did read,that K5D was going to listen 14234 till they change operators.I went there and just had to call one time....Lucky i was....i was logged !!!

The signals where not very strong,just 5/5 on top,sometimes even lower.I just waited till the online log was update,before i did my happydance :)

K5D is a very big new DXCC for me,and many others as well.It's a DXCC that won't be active alot in the future,because it's not just a Island that is easy to acces.

In December 1976, Desecheo was transferred to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which is now responsible for its management as a wildlife refuge. Desecheo has been closed to all visitors.

So special papers/permit need to be asked for to get there.

Sometimes you hear and see alot of OM's complaining about the K5D crew.I really don't understand why...Ofcourse not all members have years of experiences on expeditions.But with new operators at the Dx Expeditions,it helps to get the active expedition OM's community bigger.This way we will get more and more very nice DXCC's active in the coming years.

View of Desecheo Island - K5D

For me,and for sure many others,the K5D is already a very good expedition.Not only now because if have worked them,but before iw as as well.For many this will be a very new DXCC....for some the last on the list.

Many thanks again to the crew and sponsors for make this happen!!!!!!!

Links: http://www.kp5.us/

http://69.89.25.185/~trexsoft/t-rexsoftware.com/desecheo/about.htm

http://www.kp1-5.com/

LOtW

2009-02-19T00:48:00.000-08:00

Not many OM's are using the system on LoTW.
It's a shame,because it's a very nice system for collecting DXCC's and also Awards.

I'm using it now for some time.All my QSO's will be uploaded via a special *.tq6 file,that will be made by a special small programm that will be used from LoTW.
This *.tq6 file will be used in the database and for your DXCC list and QSO's.

LOtW is under the wings of the ARRL.This means,that all DXCC'sconfirmed by LoTW will count for ARRL Awards.

It works like this....
If i work for example XX1XX,i will upload my log to LoTW.If XX1XX is also user of LoTW and he also uploads his log,the database on LoTW finds the match between us.It find our QSO and will show up.If something is wrong with the QSO data,for example the mode,date or so...it won't show up.
This was just a small explaining of how it works ofcourse.For more info,look at the ARRL homepage.

Here you see my results till now:

Above is my DXCC list

Above is my WAS list

ARRL: American Radio Relay League, the US national organization of Amateur Radio operators
Link: http://www.arrl.org/lotw/
Link: http://tobbe.net.au/lotw/ Dutch explaining for using LoTW by VK2GWK,Henk

K5D Desecheo 2009 DXpedition

2009-02-19T00:30:00.000-08:00

For almost one week K5D is active on the bands.
Before they started,they asked that OM's that have already worked K5D before,not to call in the first week.But.....i think they said it to deaf OM's.
As also many try to work them on all slots...
Some are even 2 times or more in the log on one band !!!!
This way,the OM's that don't have much power or big antenna systems,aren't able to work them.It's a shame that in the HAM world,the real world reflects as well.Just think about yourself and not about your fellow HAM in this case.
There's still one week to go before K5D will stop,so still some changes to work them.

But the propagation isn't the same all days as well.Like yesterday K5D wasn't strong here at all on 20M.Most of the time not even so strong to work them.I just hope that all OM's will have a fair change to work them and to give them also the BIG new DXCC in their list.

Thanks anyway to the OM's and Sponsors that make K5D happen.It's for sure one of the nicest DXCC's that will be active in 2009.

Link: http://www.kp5.us/

PACC 2009

2009-02-16T03:22:00.000-08:00

This past weekend was the weekend of the PACC Contest.
For us in Holland the biggest contest,but for outside not very interrested.
I am not active during the contest since 2007 and see that every year less OM's outside Holland are interrested to work us.Maybe it the setup of the contest that does this.
OM's outside Holland can only work us for points...
Maybe if the setup changes,that everyone can work everyone,with the Dutch Provinces as extra Multi's,makes it more interresting.
Just a little thought....

I did work in the Novice style,this means only 10,20 and 40 meters,with maxima of 25 Watts.
The 10 meter wasn't open,only did work a few Dutch provinces on that.
The 20 meter was open,but also closed early in the evening.....but th strange thing is,that still RTTY qso's could be made with NA/SA.So i think this is also because the PACC isn't that interresting.
The 40 meter was also not very good propagation.And a big problem with all the RTTY stations as well.How later in the evening,how higher in the band the RTTY came.

But most of all,i did enjoy it again to be a part of the PACC.
This is the most important thing,in my opinion.
And we learn as well from it.I did want to change some things,after the PACC from 2008.
But i did move in with my girlfriend and the antenna setup wasn't ready as i wanted it to be.
Something to fix before the PACC 2010 !!!

The Score of this year came to 8448 in N1MM logger.This can be changed after all logs are send in ofcourse.Here are some of my statistics:

The setup used was:

TRX : Yaesu FT847 25 watt

Antenne's: Fritzel FB33 (10-20m) , Fritzel GPA50 (10-20m) , Fritzel FD3 (10-40m) and home made 2x 10m dipole (40m)

The FB33 is at 6 meters above the ground.Soon it will be higher.The GPA50 is at the roof of the house,also the FD3 is there connected,and as Inverted V hanging down.The home made 2x 10m dipole,was hanging as Inverted V at my tower.The top at 5 meters at the gound.

I hope that the propagation will improve,until the PACC in 2010.Also that more OM's find it interresting to work all of us during this 24 hours contest.When the weather permits,and also my health,we will be changing the antenne setup here in the spring.The FB33 will be removed and in that place my old Swan TB-3HA will be put in his place.The Swan tribander has in my opinion a better f/b and is also bigger.The radials are all 1 meter longer then from the FB33.This means also a better performing.I used the Swan at my old place and am very happy with it.It's now over 30 years old and old American made.

For the 40m i will change my PKW MHF1e40 Rotary dipole,that is also still not up here,to a 2elm beam.This will for sure improve my skills on 40m.The antenne's will be up then around 10 meters above the ground.I am trying to get them higher,but need another tower for this,of must see if this tower can be changed.Our garden is only around 9m long....

So this is my story of the Dutch PACC 2009.Thanks all that did work us and hope to see/hear you again next year or in other contest.

Vertical for 40 meters

2009-02-12T04:36:00.000-08:00

I am trying to make myself a Vertical antenna for the 40 meter band.
Till now,i am still not happy with the results.

I wanted to make the vertical,so i have other signals then on my FD3 windom from Fritzel.
But till now,the signals are almost the same.
Problem is also that i can't have radials from 10 meter long here in the garden.
I use 5 radials now.Two of them are 10 meters long,the others are 5 meters.
They aren't in one straight line as well.
Our garden is onlu 9x6 meters.The antenna is in the middle...

Here are some photo's i made today.It doesn't look very proffesional ofcourse.
The is just testing it.If i am happy with the design,i will make a better one of better materials as well.

Testing with PE4BAS

2009-02-12T03:42:00.000-08:00

Yesterday evening Bas,PE4BAS,did ask me if we could test his PDL2 Quad on 10meters.
I turned my 3elm Tribander in to his direction,around 10 degrees,and i did hear him with 4/3 in the start.Later he came up with the signal to 5/7 by some upliving of the propagations.
It's very difficult to see any changes with this kind of propagation.
The s/r on both sides seemed to be the same as it was in the past.

We also did try our voicekeyers out,if they where still working ok without problems.
Bas did make a short recording of my testing,i have put it on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xnILfgV4SwA

Today Bas wants to put up his Vertical Antenna with his automatic Matcher.
The weather is good for it,hope it will all work out good.

Propagation

2009-02-10T07:10:00.000-08:00

Today the propagation is very poor.
The coming weekend we have the big PACC coming up,so hopefully it will improve before then.

But also with this bad propagation,we have sometimes nice openings.
So did i work in the past weekend some nice DXCC's in the XE RTTY Contest.
For example in my log are:
Australia,Thailand,Japan,Venezuela,Mexico,Argentinia,Brasil and many more.
The propagation wasn't very good,and the openings where just short in that directions.

I hope that many HAMs will be trying to work all us Dutch HAMs and the Dutch PACC contest will be a big succes.

Blog

2009-02-10T04:32:00.000-08:00

Hi all,
Today i started also a Blog.
It will be about my experience on the radio and the things surrounding it.
I'm very active making QSO's and working new DXCC prefixes,but also i like to chat with friends.

Hope you like this Blog and will come back so now and then to see my experiences.

73's
Bernard de PD7BZ
http://www.pd7bz.nl