Chillycon.......the tale

VE3ORY & VE3MNE

Chillycon is over for another year and much fun and merriment was had by one and all.  The weather wasn't too bad, Friday and most of Saturday were fine with lots of blue sky and sunshine.  But....and there's always a "but".....about 2100 local on Saturday night it started to rain, but it did stop about 0100 Sunday morning......but man did it rain, Indian Monsoon type rain.   Luckily no tent was flooded out and everyone remained dry and survived.

We had eight campsites in use with 17 members of three clubs in attendance this year...The Ottawa Valley QRP Society, The West Island ARC from Montreal, and Frontenac Radio Group from Kingston.

The annual Chillycon DX Championship took place with many attendees vying for ownership of the "Upper Canada Cup for Chillycon DX Excellence".  I'm please to announce that this years winner was Don VE3MNE, with a contact into Moscow on a 20m Hamstick mounted on his truck.

Saturday night supper was the usual Pizza dinner around the campfire with the single malt scotch flowing.   Sunday morning saw many of us troop over to the local restaurant we always go to and had a great brunch, and lots more conversation before we returned to the camp to take down all the dripping tarps and tents.

Lots of time was spent working and building portable antennas over the weekend.  I spent some time building a W3EDP Jr, the idea came from the Blog of VA3PCJ 

The W3EDP Jr.

The antenna worked exactly as advertised on the Blog with many stations being worked in Europe and the USA.  The propagation really wasn't that good so the DX results I did get, Switzerland, Belgium, Holland, and Anguilla, impressed me.  The antenna was up in a tree about 25 feet and certainly didn't go up in a straight line.

Overall it was a great time and time was spent with many friends and many new friends were made.

Already looking forward to next year....hopefully it will not rain !!

Rick VE3ORY fixing his "secret weapon" antenna

Breakfast for the Chipmunks !!!

Coming Up Soon - Chillycon 2016

Coming up next weekend is the Ottawa Valley QRP Society's annual Chillycon Event at the Rideau River Provincial Park, near Kemptville, Ontario.

So far the long-range weather forecast is predicting sunny times for the weekend......a welcome change after two years of rain at this event.  Hopefully we will see a few more people out this year if the good weather shows up.

I'm looking forward to the weekend, it's always a highlight on my annual calendar......even if VA3QV is not going to put in an appearance this year and I won't have a chance to bug the hell out of him in person.

The gear is cleaned and ready to pack next Friday morning.  I'm planning on taking my FT-857D and two heavy duty 12v batteries.  The antenna for the weekend will be my 20m Buddipole vertical, with several added elevated radials, as well as a home-brewed W3EDP Jr antenna.  Jose, VA3PCJ, built this antenna.  Details of it are HERE on his Blog.  I'm very interested in comparing these two antennas and seeing which one performs best.  The winner will be my go-to portable antennas for future portable activities........well, until something better arrives!!

Place your bets on who will win this years DX Challenge......I'm sure a few of the previous winners are secretly plotting to win the prize this year.

Get Ready For.........

As the trustee for this callsign I want to let people know that coming up next year, XM3CARF will be on the air from 03 June 2017 to 03 July 2017 to help us celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the founding of The Canadian Amateur Radio Federation.   

CARF was Canada's first successful national amateur radio society and existed between 1967 and 1993, when it was amalgamated with the Canadian Radio Relay League to form the Radio Amateurs of Canada.

CARF was founded here in Kingston, Ontario, by Art Blick VE3AHU, Doug Burrill VE3CDC, and Ken Rollison VE3CRL.  These three fine gentlemen are all now Silent Keys.  

XM3CARF is sponsored by the Frontenac Radio Group and plan on having the call on the air everyday we have it, including Field Day and the Canada Day Contest.

A Change in the Shack......

Some of you may have noticed that "The Adventures of VE3CLQ" title above has been changed to "The Adventures of VE3FI".  This is because I recently managed to get this two letter callsign......thanks to Russ, the original VE3FI - who is now VE9FI.

Many thanks need to go to the Amateur Radio Service Centre in Sault St. Marie, who's help and patience were fantastic......they couldn't have helped more if I had asked them to.

Russ had some great luck using this call, so let's hope it rubs off here in this shack as this years Contest Season prepares to kick off.

A Great Saturday on the Bands

On the way to activate Wolfe Island, ON-009, we had beautiful clear blue skies, warm temperatures, and humidity through the roof!   It was definitely cooler than last weekends Lighthouse activation though.

We had a number of stations on the local Thousand Islands, all manned by guys from the Frontenac Radio Group.

Propagation wise the bands had been in rough shape for most of the week, but Saturday rolled around and the numbers weren't too bad:  SFI=82, SN=44, A Index=6, and K Index=1, and the "go-to" bands were 20m and 40m.  I also made a couple of contacts on 6m.

I operated from the Winter Ferry Dock on Wolfe Island, a nice quiet spot RF wise with lots of good shade.  In fact I only spent the last half hour of the day in full sun, so it's a great spot.

Antenna for the day was a Buddipole Vertical, which performed fantastically, if I could hear them - I could work them.  However, I am going to cut some extra elevated radials, as the one supplied with the Buddipole kit needs more.  It works fine with just one, but I would think it will do even better with several.

By noon the bands were full of stations operating in the Ohio and Kansas State QSO Parties, several Venezuelan stations contesting as well as many Polish stations all calling in their contest.   In fact it became quite difficult to find stations in the Island QSO Party due to the high number of stations all calling CQ.  

All in all it was a great day, 45 contacts in the log including 7 islands.

W/VE Island QSO Party 2016

Coming up this weekend is the W/VE Island QSO Party.  Held each year hams on both sides of the border are asked to activate an island for the day, or weekend, to help promote the island programs.

I've decided to keep things simple this year and I'm going to activate Wolfe Island, ON-009.  Last time I was there we activated the island from the winter ferry dock and found it an excellent location to operate from.  That's where I plan on being again this Saturday.

Rules can be found HERE.

Frequencies for the day will be (+/- QRM):

7.250
14.250-14.260
50.125
144.200

Hopefully the propagation Gods will smile!!

A Pretty Good Day......

Greg-VA3GGF operating on 20m

Yesterday was a pretty good day at Nine Mile Lighthouse on Simcoe Island.  The weather was great, in fact it was probably just a little too hot judging by the suntans I saw this morning at the clubs breakfast.

We had two HF Stations up and running.  The HF bands worked were 40m and 20m and we made a total of 35 contacts, including five 2m SSB contacts.

Radios were both FT-857D's and the antennas were a 31' Chillycon Special, and a Buddipole 1/4 wave vertical on 20m, along with a 10 element 2m Yagi for some pre-arranged SSB work.

Best DX of the day was with GB2LBN at Barnes Ness Lighthouse, 30 miles east of Edinburgh.  Didn't think I was going to get him, and I managed it on the second call.

Today we were going to go to Point Petre in South-West Prince Edward County, but....the weather is atrocious here with very high winds and monsoon style rain.....so that expedition was cancelled.  Point Petre is very exposed to the weather and is wide open to the Lake.  In fact the next thing you would see looking west is the City of Hamilton!!  In this wind I doubt we could have got an antenna up, and have it stay up.

This year saw 471 lighthouses registered for this event, it's a great shame the propagation wasn't better, but it's that time in the solar cycle!

10 element 2m yagi

Rick-VE3ORY on 40m

International Lighthouse and Lightship Weekend

Plans are underway here in the shack to take part in next weekends International Lighthouse and Lightship Weekend.   2016 is the 18th consecutive year this event has been run, it's sponsored by the Ayr Amateur Radio Group from Scotland.

So far, as of today, Saturday August 14th, there are 423 entries from around the world, including 14 Canadian entries.   The Canadian entries are located in VE3, VE4, VE9, VO1, and VY2.  It's interesting that there are no VE2 or VE7's entered this year, but a lighthouse on Lake Winnipeg is.

 Guidelines for the event are available HERE.

Saturday will see me at Nine Mile Lighthouse on Simcoe Island, CAN-0031, operating as VE3FRG and on Sunday, weather permitting, I'll be at Point Petre Lighthouse in Prince Edward County, CAN-026, operating as VE3UDO.   Other members of the Frontenac Radio Group will there as well, we hope to have three HF stations running each day, including a PSK31 station.

Radio for the weekend will be a FT-857D into a 33' Chillicon Vertical antenna.

While there are no "official" SSB frequencies for this event, we will be on:

7.270
14.270
18.145
28.370
50.135

Our CW Frequencies will be:

7.030
14.030
18.070
28.030
50.030

Hope to work so of you guys on the air next weekend!