VE3FI and 60m

Just a general statement here:

I do not now, or in the past, have an antenna that will load up on 60m.  Today I received over 20 eQSL's from European stations looking for confirmation of QSO's last February.

If it was just one or two eQSL's I would write it off as honest screwups when entering the call sign in their logs......but 20+....Hmmmm!!

So, if you had a 60m QSO last February with a station using the VE3FI callsign, I can 100% guarantee that you where not talking to the real VE3FI.

Apparently Long John Silver lives !!

ARRL International DX Contest - SSB

Not a bad weekend on the bands, even if the propagation numbers were not the best.  We started off Friday night very slowly, contacts on 40m and 80m could be heard, but they where way down in the mud.  In fact it took about an hour before things got better, but for most of the weekend I had a S7 to S9 background noise.  They recently built two new houses across the road from me, and boy are they RF dirty!!

Saturday morning we awoke to SFI = 66, SN = 11, A Index = 6 and the K Index = 1, no different from the night before at 0000 UTC.

Given the late date in the current solar cycle there was lots of good DX to be had out there.  Both Saturday and Sunday the go-to bands where 15m and 20m.  The majority of my contacts where on 15m....I had a great run there.  Lots of EU and Russian stations in there as well as most of the Caribbean islands.   The EU stations where in there early in the morning and late in the afternoon, the remainder of the day it was the Caribbean and South Americans who kept me busy.  No new countries in the log this weekend though.

As usual, the downside was the usual large crop of "tuner-uppers" doing their business right on top of the DX - I guess these LIDS just don't know enough to move off frequency a couple of Kc and do it there.   On the plus side I didn't hear any band police out and about - how refreshing.

All-in-all a great weekend, over 200 contacts in the log, and now we wait for the last weekend of the month when we have the CQ WW WPX DX SSB Contest, and get to do it all over again.

Spring Plans.....

Well it's time to start planning another radio adventure!!!   In the planning stage is a trip out to the west coast following basically the same route as my last trip out in 2014.  That is, crossing the prairies using the Red Coat Trail.

It's a 1,300-Kiolometre (810 Mile) route that approximates the path taken in 1874 by the North-West Mounted Police across southern Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta, in their quest to bring law and order to the Canadian West.

It's a very scenic and relaxing route that I think is far superior than the Trans-Canada Highway....mainly because of the lack of big trucks and the slow speeds on this route.  No rushing here.

Due to the early time of year I'm planning on travelling, none of the provincial parks or commercial campgrounds are open.  So, I have been having fun trying to find places to Boondock at along the way....not very easy let me tell you !!  Hopefully the RCMP know the difference between "Resting" and "Camping".

I'll be taking my portable HF radio gear with me, both QRO and QRP variants, and I'm looking forward to making some great contacts along the way, as well as some SOTA activations out in BC.....I'm also planning on setting up at a beach campsite, probably Jordon River on Vancouver Island, for a few days and working as much South Asian DX as I can get.   On the actual trip, both ways, I will be operating at night and handing out some very rare grid squares for those taking part in this years ARRL International Grid Chase.

Stay tuned for more details!!

Winter Field Day Wrap Up...

Overall it wasn't a bad weekend....it was just that the propagation Gods never came out to play.   At 1330 UTC on Saturday, the propagation numbers were:   SFI = 69, SN = 0, A Index = 8, and the K Index = 2.

What the numbers didn't tell us about was the very deep QSB and the extreme noise levels on the bands.  I had a constant S8+ on 40m all weekend for example.

It was extremely frustrating hearing the typical morning American "hemorrhoid nets" on 40m coming in at S9 +30db, while most of the stations calling CQ WFD where way below the noise floor, very hard to pull out, and all dealing with massive QSB.

My antenna for the weekend was a 31' vertical with two 31' elevated radials, and two 16' elevated radials, all into a 4:1 Balun.   This was mounted on the back deck of the cottage we where at.  On the Friday evening before the event kicked off I did manage to work an Italian - IK2BCP, and two Belgium stations,  OP2A and OP4U...all of whom had lovely signals.....then it all went to hell  for the Field Day.

Saturday morning started off poorly as I couldn't get the antenna to tune up very well...it was taking ages for the ATU to work and sort out the SWR.   It turned out that the collapsible mast had in fact collapsed overnight in the wind and I was working with a compromised antenna.  It took five minutes to fix that issue and we were back on the air.

It was very interesting to listen to the difference of WFD this year compared to WFD nine years ago. This year a good number of stations had large pileups, nine years ago you where lucky to hear anyone calling CQ WFD.

One thing that did get my blood boiling over was a W9 station calling for relays as he couldn't get the information off of some stations trying to work him.  Relays??  In a contest ?? Really ?? Hmmmm !!!

I heard very few Canadian stations on this weekend, it could have just been the conditions, as the event was well advertised.

So, a good weekend.....lots of good food, friends and a decent bottle of Scotch.  Thanks to Dennis VA3DOY for coming out and paying us a visit, and finding us a supper venue on Friday evening.  Who knew "uptown metropolitan Westport" was so up market ??

Thanks go out to the many stations who struggled to work us, as we struggled to work them.  See you back at it next year!!

VE3 SOTA Update...

There's another update on the VE3 SOTA Association just been posted on their Blog.  It's available to read HERE.

By the look of things it seems we are getting very close to the first VE3 Activation Day which is fantastic news.

Some amateurs in VE3 land have been working for about 10 years to bring SOTA to our province, and it's thanks to the current crop that they were able to persuade the SOTA Management Committee to drop the 150m prominence requirement down to 100m.  If we were restricted to the p150, just about every available summit would have been located in Ontario North, and completely off the beaten track.  In other words it would have taken just about a whole two week vacation to do a simple activation.

The Radio Amateur Society of Australia

Congratulations go out to the newly formed “Radio Amateur Society of Australia” (RASA).   
Their website (Click HERE) states that the organisation is made up of
active radio amateurs who want to see progress in their hobby, and that 
their primary efforts will be focused on improved education and 
awareness in the areas of regulation and administration, as well as
strong evidence based representation with their national
telecommunications regulator.

It’s great to see individuals standing up and making things right after years of abysmal performance by 

the Australian equivalent of RAC, the Wireless Institute of Australia (WIA).  From articles available on 

the web it’s clear to see that many clubs feel disenfranchised with the WIA and feel there is a great need 

for change.

Much like here in Canada, many clubs also feel very disenfranchised with RAC.  We have questions too, 

what is RAC actually doing for clubs and club members?  Other than the public liability insurance, what 

value does a club (or its members) receive by being a member of an affiliated club?  Why don’t the 

membership have the pleasure of personally being able to cast a vote the RAC presidents position?

I’m sorry, but I expect a hell of a lot more for my annual membership subscription, especially at its 

current price, than what is on offer.

But, the big issue is the fact that RAC refuses to represent ALL amateurs in Canada.  They insist that if 

you’re not a paid up RAC member they do not represent you at any level.  There needs to be a lot more 

openness, accountability and leadership at the Executive level than what we see these days.

So, perhaps we need to take a leaf out go the RASA play book and form a new national Canadian amateur 

radio society, one that is not an old boys clique, or one filled with cronyism, and one that truly represents 

ALL Canadian amateurs, paid members or not.

WFD 2018 - Getting Ready

I spent quite a bit of the afternoon sorting through portable radio gear getting things sorted out for this years Winter Field Day (WFD).......I didn't realize I have so much "stuff" !!

I have three antennas packed up and ready to go, a 31' vertical with a 4:1 Balun and two 31' radials, a 65' long wire with a 9:1 Balun, and a 17' collapsible whip, tripod mount and three 33' radials.  Those should cover all of my needs for the weekend.  I've used them all before on various outings and they all work very well, and have lots of great DX to their credit.  No need to change what works at this late date.

Two radios will make the trip with me, my FT-817ND and my FT-897D.  I received a BX-8x7 Dynamic Compressor kit V2.0 for Christmas.  This piece of gear works on the 817, 857, and the 897.  So far on the tests I have done this has lived up to its promise of pumping out an extra S Unit on transmit.  So hopefully the extra punch will help on the WFD weekend.

Two portable masts will be going with me, my MFJ 33' collapsible mast, and a 22' painter pole, along with a bag of rope and another one of bungy cords to make sure they stay up.

My shack, at the moment, has piles of gear scattered all over the floor, all waiting to be either stacked ready to go or to be put away, awaiting another suitable adventure.

There are four of us going to a cottage on Burridge Lake, near Westport, Ontario, for the event.  Hopefully the road will have been plowed before we attempt the journey.  I believe we will be using the VE3UCC callsign that belongs to the Upper Canada QRP Club, so give a listen for us.

Burridge Lake, north of Kingston.

Plans for 2018

Here we are in 2018 and wondering what surprises this year will bring.  I'm making my amateur radio plans for this year such as continuing my QRP operating, regardless of our place in the current solar cycle and continuing my portable antenna experimentation.

I'm continuing with the "do my own thing" agenda that I started back in October 2017.  I'm doing what I want to, when I want to do it....on my time and my space.  It's a healthy "no stress" way of living, and I feel a lot better for it.

The Sunday morning QRP group activities will continue as soon as the temperatures come out of the single digits and the snow disappears from the operating location at Lake Ontario Park.  This is an extremely relaxing time, lots of radio talk, lots of building portable antennas and lots of operating.  Just a great way to spend a Sunday....you guys should try it.

I still have a pile of islands that I want to activate and will definitely be taking part in Winter Field Day, the ILLW and the W/VE Island QSO Party.

I'm also leaning towards another long road trip home to the West Coast again this year if I can fit it in amongst everything else that needs to be done.

And as usual this year, I look forward to writing about my adventures....or lack thereof !!