New Radio...

The Easter Bunny delivered a new radio to my QTH this week, a new FT5Dr, 144/430 C4FM handheld.  

Originally I had the FT2Dr handheld, but recently it was traded for another mobile rig.  That was a mistake, for some reason I forgot that I like to take a HT along with me when I'm off to do a POTA activation.  We have a large contingent of POTA activators here in Kingston, and it's a good way to keep in touch with them on the local C4FM repeater, and keep track of where they all are.  That way two or three operators don't show up independently to the same park to attempt an activation.

This is a great HT.  The RX and TX audio is probably the best I have heard from a small radio before, and so far I have had many compliments on the audio quality.  I have changed out the stock antenna for a Diamond SRH77CA dual band antenna, but to be very honest I don't hear much of a difference between it and the stock antenna.

Is there a downside?  Yes, it takes a full nine hours to charge the battery.  I did purchase extra the AA battery pack for the radio.  I figured I could use that to finish a QSO, or continue to monitor while the main battery charges.

I haven't really started exploring the capabilities of this radio yet, but I very much like what I have seen so far.  Would I recommend it?  Yes, with no reservations.

Stay safe out there !!

Spooky Activation...

It's not very often I go to cemeteries, in fact I can't remember the last time I did.......before last night.  

Sometime last year Cataraqui Cemetery National Historic Site was added to the POTA list as VE-5300.  To be honest, at the time most of the hams in town thought it was kind of disrespectful to do that, myself included.

But then you hear the stories from the old guys about how many hams are actually buried there, so I decided to bite the bullet and activate it.

Let me tell you, it's a very spooky spot at night.  Yep, I did a late shift activation starting at 0001 UTC....but I won't do that again.  In fact I don't think I will ever activate there again, once was enough, thank you very much.

It took me 21 minutes to put 25 contacts in the log.  40m was just hopping, yet the QSB was bad and the propagation numbers weren't the best:  SFI-96, SN-24, A Index-12, and the K Index-3.   It was interesting that in the cemetery I had a constant S9 noise floor, so I know many stations who couldn't make it through the noise floor were missed.  The contacts made were all solid S9 plus.  

I must admit I was very uncomfortable there, it's not really the place to play ham radio, so I closed down with the 25 contacts and went home.

Here's last night's 40m contact map:

Stay safe out there!!

A North American First...

I was very pleased to take part in a first for North America this past Saturday.  It was the first ever "Annual HEMA Day".  HEMA, stands for Hills Excluding Marilyns Award.  In the UK a Marilyn is a hill of any height with a drop of 150 metres or more on all sides, and as this scheme originated in the UK, that's the term they use.

To qualify a Hill for this award, must have a 100m prominence, meaning it sticks up above the surrounding land by at least 100m.

So far there are 196 Hills in Ontario that qualify for this award.  Most are fairly hard to access, but there are some that are fairly easy to activate.

On Saturday I found a local hill, spotted myself on 20m, and called CQ.  Well, to say it was a waste of time was perhaps an understatement!!  The bands were in very poor shape.  I guess I should have paid more attention to the propagation numbers before I left home......I probably would have stayed in bed.

The numbers were:  SFI=147, SN=109, A Index=22, and the K Index=4.  Yeah, I wasn't going to talk anywhere that morning.

I had set up some Scheds with a couple of UK stations, in order to do Hill to Hill contacts, but that was not to be.

Have a look at the HEMA Award Scheme HERE.  If you're interested in getting HEMA up and running in your State of Province, get hold of Rob at: newDXCC at hema.org.uk

Plans are already underway for the next HEMA Day, to be held on October 22nd, 2022.

Stay safe out there!

More Bad Propagation on the Way...

Moderate (G2) to strong (G3) geomagnetic storms will be in the forecast beginning on Wednesday. A pair of coronal mass ejections that were observed on Monday are predicted to combine into one larger shock front and impact Earths geomagnetic field. 

The forecast calls for a passage by late in the day Wednesday (UTC time) and into early Thursday. The forecast doesn't look too good!

Here you go:

Emergency Frequencies....Please Keep Clear

The island of São Jorge in the Azores has suffered over 1800 earthquakes over 48 hours causing concerns and prompting the Regional Government of the Azores to prepare contingency plans to protect the islands population. 

Carlos Nora CT1END, Emergency Communications Co-Ordinator for Portugal reports that a group of nine Radio Amateurs in the towns of Velas and Calheta are working to support emergency communications locally through VHF/UHF repeaters but also long range links back to Portugal on:

80M – 3,750.00 MHz. — 3,760.00 MHz. – LSB (Overnight)
40M – 7,100.00 MHz. — 7,110.00 MHz. – LSB (During the day)
20M – 14,300.00 MHz. USB (For outside region)

This external activity being supported by the Azores DX group and the Portuguese national society REP.

Other radio amateurs are encouraged to listen carefully and avoid causing any QRM to emergency operations on the above frequencies. 

Hard Going...

It was still fairly cold when I left to do a POTA activation this morning at VE-5141, Lemoine Point, but not enough to be uncomfortable.

Because of the CQ WPX Contest on this weekend I chose to avoid 20m and 40m.  Contest traffic on those bands was crammed into every inch of those bands.  I decided to get on 17m and avoid the congestion.  However, as soon as I starting calling CQ, the deliberate QRMing started.  Apparently the Children don't like POTA on 17m, that's too bad, I kept going anyway.

Propagation today was: SFI=112, SN=50, A Index=10, and K Index=1. 

There was some very deep QSB and lots of noise on 17m, which made things quite difficult, along with the deliberate QRMing, to actually complete a contact.  But after a pretty slow thirty minutes I had 14 contacts in the log, including 2 into Spain, and so I went QRT.  

I have to say that I was actually quite proud of the fact that my puny 10w into a 17m hamstick had so many of the regulars on 17m in a complete meltdown.  Some people just don't like to share their space I guess.  They insist POTA is a contest.....which it isn't.

By tomorrow morning the madness of the contest should have settled down, so I'm planning on another portable operating, this time on 10m and 15m, and see what DX I can work.

Here's todays QSO Map:

Remember, POTA is a team sport........Stay safe out there!

Spring has Sprung...

What a great day to be out playing portable radio today!!  It's a balmy +11C here, best day all year...so far. It's warming up fast here, in fact in less than a week the ice has all but disappeared from Lake Ontario.

This mornings propagation was "interesting".  The numbers were:  SFI=95, SN=39, A Index=9, and the K Index=1.   There was a great deal of very deep fading, and a fair bit of QRM going on.

The best contacts of the day were to Jean-Luc, F4GWG, and Jean, F4ILH, both located on the French mid-Atlantic Coast.  Not too shabby for 10w into a 20m Hamstick 😀

The bands are definitely getting better, but they are sure taking their sweet time!

Here's todays QSO Map:

Stay Safe Out There...

Bad Propagation...

This isn't looking too good for the next 24 hours....

A Day Playing Radio...

It was a rough day on the bands, the propagation numbers were not very good:  SFI=113, SN=77, A Index=10, and K Index=5.  So I figured it was a good morning to try and do some portable operating.  Of course, I forgot it was the ARRL DX Contest weekend.

The bands were full of contesters all screaming "CQ Contest", so it was off to 17m where the more saner operators had decided to hang out.

First up this morning was Bob, M0MJA, who gave me a nice signal report of '54'....not too bad for 10w into a 17m hamstick on my vans roof....and that was my last DX of the day.  I managed 7 contacts on 17m and then moved to 40m, which while busy, was still a comparatively sane place at that time of day.

Weather wise it was actually comfortable today, the temperature was hovering around 0C, but there was no wind at all.  Hopefully we'll start to get more days like that now that March is here.

Here's todays QSO Map:

Stay safe out there!

Slava Ukraini !!

ARRL International DX Contest - SSB

Coming up next weekend, March 6th - 7th, is the ARRL international DX Contest - SSB.   This is always a great contest to work on your DXCC.

Rules can be found HERE.

One rule that I don't understand is the fact that we are not allowed to run multi-operator QRP stations.  The rule makes no sense at all to me, I guess I will have to contact the ARRL and ask why this rule is there.

I noticed that propagation went into the toilet this morning, hopefully it will improve before next Saturday!

Take care out there, and stay safe !!

A Quiet Month..so far...

February around here is normally a very quiet month, and this year seems to be no different.  Of course I'm talking about amateur radio here....not trucker convoys causing mayhem across the country.

I was out a few days ago, using my KX3 and my 20m EFHW.  To be honest, I didn't notice any difference between using the EFHW with a 20m Hamstick, the end result seemed to be exactly the same.  In fact if you overlay todays map with a map from last week, or even last month...they look pretty much the same.

Temperature wise it's actually warmed up to a balmy -3C here, although I'm sure we are going to get hit with another round, or two, of snow before the end of March.  It was quite comfortable doing my last POTA activation, I really didn't feel too cold at all.  The older you get the harder it seems you handle the cold.

This year, I am planning on taking part in the ARRL International SSB DX Contest.  This is being held on the weekend of March 5th & 6th.  I will do this contest QRO with my FT-950, as I think it will be a waste of time running QRP.  The Rules for this contest can be found HERE.

Stay warm and safe out there !!

Back Out Activating...

We've had some terrible weather here over the last week.  Another foot and a half (39 cm) of snow is on the ground and some freezing rain was added to it.  Luckily both my antenna have survived the wind and ice, but not much operating was done.

So today started with this strange golden yellow ball hanging in a beautiful deep blue sky, something we haven't seen for a few weeks now.....time to get out and play radio!!

It was still very cold, -20C in the wind, and the wind was gusting to 35 kph, so it had quite the bite to it.  I chose to go to Lemoine's Point, VE-5141, which is fairly close to my QTH.  With the bad propagation we have suffered through this past week I wasn't sure how the bands would be.

Propagation this morning was:

SFI=130, SN=87, A Index=32, and the K Index=3.....so it was going to be interesting.  Lot's of very deep QSB rounded things off.

Once again I stuck with 20m using the Hamstick, KX3 and 10w.  Really, I didn't think I was going to have much luck today operating....but it was nice just to get out of the house with a radio!

What an activation I had!   I put EA1FIC, Spain, and CU3HY, the Azores, in the log along with 26 US states and 2 Canadian provinces.  It turned out to be a great day.  The QSB was pretty deep at times, and I must apologize for the couple that I just could not work because of it.

Here's todays QSO map:

I'll be back out tomorrow doing another activation as the weather looks like it will still be good enough to do one.

Stay safe and warm out there!

Propagation...

Looks like it will be a tough couple of days on the bands....

UPDATED.....1300 UTC, February 2nd

UPDATED.....0300 UTC, February 3rd

Winter Field Day...the aftermath

This weekend was a tough one for operating at QRP levels! The bands were alive with the sound of signals...all weekend...and all right next to each other. While I stuck to 20m and 40m, contacts were heard being made on every band, 10m through 160m. Both WFD and POTA operators were out in force.

Propagation numbers were:

Saturday: SFI=125, SN=77, A Index= 19, K Index=1

Sunday: SFI=125, SN=74, A Index=17, K Index=2

Conditions are now starting to deteriorate in front of the expected G2 Solar Storm that is supposed to hit us on Tuesday, 1st February.

It was bitterly cold here the whole weekend, with temperatures down around -25C. The wind chill made it feel a lot worse than that. I found I could last about 40 to 50 minutes before I was just too cold and had to go and warm up. Because of this I split my operating into two parts, the first Saturday afternoon and the second on Sunday morning. This made the cold a bit more tolerable.

This year I operated in the "1 Outdoors" category, which I may have to reconsider next year. What amazed me the most over the weekend was the amount of stations operating as "1 Home", nearly all from the deep south where they don't have the cold we have here in the north. I have never figured out why people take part in a "Field Day" (Summer or Winter) and do so from home without ever going out to the field.

Once again I was using 10w from my KX3, and a 20m or 40m mag-mounted Hamstick. It saves so much time setting up in the deep cold not having to throw up a wire antenna.

Sunday morning brought some good DX on 20m, first up was CU3HY, quickly followed by CU3BL, both from the Azores. Then it was the turn of EA1FIC from Spain, and the biggest surprise was YV1GIY from Venezuela. I'm really pleased with those contacts.

Here's the map of the weekends 40 contacts:

Stay safe and warm out there!

Good Day Activating...

It was a very cold day here yesterday, so the new PackTenna linked dipole didn't make it out of the container.  Once again I used the 20m hamstick with a mag-mount on the roof of the van to save time out in the cold.  It was -20C without the wind, and the wind was absolutely howling.

Equipment, as usual, was my KX3 pumping out 10 screaming watts into the 20m Hamstick.

Propagation was good when I started.  SFI=102, SN=71, A Index=10, K Index=2.  Shortly after I went QRT the bands died within minutes.

As you can see from the map, 20m started long and as I logged contacts it started to shorten up, and eventually disappeared.

My Bioenno battery certainly doesn't like the cold, and I have noticed that it will remain good for about 40 minutes in deep cold.  

Yesterday I shut things down after 20 minutes with 27 contacts in the log.  The battery was still fine, but it's probably time to re-charge it.

I will have both batteries charged up ready for Winter Field Day this weekend.  I'm planning on doing dual POTA and WFD activations...hopefully that will drum up more business for the log book. 😋

Stay warm and safe out there!

Winter Field Day...

Coming up this weekend, January 29th - 30th, is Winter Field Day.....you know that weekend we get to go play radio and freeze our butts off......oh...and have fun doing it!!!

The Rules can be found HERE.   There are a few changes this year, so have a read of them and make sure you understand them....especially the point about submitting logs.

Both Saturday and Sunday are forecasted to have a high of -11C, but on the plus side, there's no snow on the horizon.

I have just received today, from PackTenna, a new 20m/40m linked dipole. Winter Field Day should be a great opportunity to use it for the first time....if a location can be found where I can put it up.  

20m/40m linked dipole

Stay warm and safe out there!

A Cold Activation...

This weekend the Winter Support Your Parks event is taking place, and it coincided with probably the coldest weekend we have had yet this year.  It was -37C with the wind chill when I left for Lemoine Point, VE-5141.  Absolutely bone chilling.

The propagation, as I reported earlier in another post, was not forecasted to be very good, but it did improve enough for me to think I could squeeze in an activation.   The propagation numbers were:  SFI=83, SN=39, A Index=9, and the K Index=2.

Before I left home I checked both 20m and 40m which were very busy, with very little room between the big signals.  By the time I got to my site, 20 minutes later, the signals on 17m and 15m had totally gone, and those on 40m were quickly disappearing. So I set up on 20m and hoped for the best.

Once again it was my KX3 being used with a 20m Hamstick.  I used the Hamstick today for the simple reason it was the fastest option to get on the air, and get me out of the cold.

Now activating using QRP levels does have a disadvantage, and I knew that going in to this, but the killer today was not the power level, but the extremely deep QSB.  One minute a signal was S9 and the next it had disappeared completely never to be heard again.  

I must admit that when I set out this morning I thought, given the amount of POTA traffic on the bands that it wouldn't take too long to do this, but in the end it took me 30 minutes to make 21 contacts. That's pretty slow for me, even operating QRP.

Todays activation map is below.

Stay warm and safe out there!

Weekend Propagation...

This weekend, January 15th & 16th is the annual POTA Winter Support Your Parks event, and my clubs QRP HF Sprint on Saturday evening.

Well......I think from the forecasted propagation we can just about forget those events....and here is that forecast:

Tomorrow may be a quiet radio day.  Weather wise it's going down to -32C (-25F) tonight and Monday we're expecting over 35 cm of snow (that's over 12" for my American friends).  

This weekend is shaping up to be a golden opportunity to work on some maintenance to my portable wire antennas and get the gear ready for my spring activations.  I need to go over what I have and see if I have to order any new or replacement items.

Stay warm and safe out there!

NOTE:  Updated Saturday Morning, January 15th.