The Madmen of Colorado

This Sunday sees the annual "Colorado 14er" event.  This is a unique ham radio event were sane men and women hike up 14,000' peaks in order to operate their ham radios.............don't ya wish we had a few here in Eastern Ontario?!?!?!?!?! (Yes Bob, I'd carry your oxygen bottle for you!)

The goal of this event is to see how many of the mountaintop stations you can contact. The prime operating hours are from 1500 to 1800 UTC.

Last year I took part in the event as VE3FCT and had a blast, but the highlight for me was to be one of the 104 contacts made by KB0SA - Boy Scout Troop 6 from Monument, Colorado from the summit of Pikes Peak. 

What is really great about this bunch of Scouts is that everyone of them has a ham ticket, as do their leaders. 

Troop 6 will be back up in the 14,000' peaks this coming Sunday for the 2012 Colorado 14er event and I hope to make contact with them again.  It's always good to support the kids in this hobby of ours.

The website is HERE, and the suggested frequency list HERE.  This year for the first time they have agreed to combine the event with the SOTA program to encourage participation in it.

Hope to hear you all on the bands this Sunday encouraging these guys.





Islands on the Air

This weekend is the annual IOTA weekend.  Lots of great DX should be on the air for this, including CY9M from St. Paul Island...look for them on 14.185. 

The contest runs from 1200Z July 28th to 1200Z July 29th.  The rules can be found HERE.

As I can't operate from my shack this weekend I'm going to have to find somewhere local to operate portable from, and someone to come along and give me a hand.  It's going to be very nice just to have nothing to think about and to be able to just play radio.

Fort Henry Hill is no longer an option thanks to the new visitors interpretation centre recently built on the east side of the parking lot.  The new centre is equipped with 25 or so plasma information screens being used entertain the visitors and the noise floor has duly risen from S0 to S8 and S9.

Antenna of choice will be my MFJ-1910 mast with a 31 foot radiator taped to it, and six 16 foot radials and two 31 foot radials.  This antenna works very well for collecting DX with a 4:1 Balun, and it's very light weight and easy to put up.  I have a drive on mast base for it.

Hopefully the SFI Gods, and the weather Gods, will be shining on us.

IARU - - - the aftermath

Things did not go the way I wanted them to....but when do they ever?  Selling our house, and looking for a new one got in the way of going to Hay Bay and using the high antennas.  Oh well, "She who must be obeyed" is happy at least.

So instead I stayed at home and operated in bits and pieces, closing down, and leaving the house, when we had a showing. 

On top of this I did another couple of goofs, the first one was my AF Gain was turned down and secondly I spent half of my operating time at 10w because I didn't check my power setting.  Obviously there's still more to learn with this radio.

The antennas used at home were a 40m off center fed dipole at about 30 feet, and a homebrew 31 foot vertical with 10 radials spread out on the grass.  Both antennas worked perfectly and I had great results with them.  A total of 120 contacts were made:

66 SSB on 20m
40 SSB on 10m
14 SSB on 40m

Contacts where made with stations in Europe, South America, North America, Africa, and the Middle East.

The bands were up and down with some very deep QSB at times, and the SFI, A, and K indexes were nothing to write home about either.....in fact this morning they're bloody awful:

SFI = 148
A index = 17
K index = 6
SN = 120

It was 30C here in Kingston yesterday with "a lot" of humidity, seems to be cooler today though.

All in all I'm happy with my score, considering I was only a part-time operator.

We'll see what happens next weekend for the VHF Contest.

IARU HF Contest

This coming weekend will see the 2012 IARU HF World Championships take place.  Should be a great weekend out at Hay Bay.....if the bands cooperate!

This contest is designed to have hams contact as many other amateurs, especially IARU member society HQ stations, around the world as possible using the 160, 80, 40, 20, 15 and 10 meter bands.

Timings for the contest is beginning 1200 UTC Saturday and ending 1200 UTC Sunday.

In the past few years it has been possible to work all of Europe in a few hours of the contest start time, so hopefully this year will be outstanding.

Radio being used will be the FT-950 into a 160m Off Center Fed Dipole up at 100 feet.   There will also be a 31 foot ground mounted vertical with multiple ground radials laid out. 

Here's hoping for a good weekend!

Busy July.......

It's looking like it will be a busy summer for portable operating this year, I'm hoping the weather is going to cooperate! 

'Tis the season to be outside playing radio, not cooped up indoors in the shack.  Try some antenna experiments, find a hilltop to work from, activate an island, activate a lighthouse.....there's always something to do when the weather is good....and some of us "nutcases" even do this in the winter!

So far there does not seem to be a free weekend in July!  So far we have:
July 1st - Canada Day Contest
July 8th - Iroquois Island Activation (ON271)
July 14/15th - IARU HF World Championships
July 21/22nd - CQ WW VHF Contest
July 22nd - 4 Mile point Light Activation (CAN823)
July 28/29th - RSGB IOTA Contest

Tucked in with all those dates is July 4th which just happens to be my 25th wedding anniversary.  How she puts up with me is one of lifes big mysteries!! Anyway......we'll see if I'm still alive at the end of the month!

The Field Day Report - 2012

What a superb weekend!!  Don-VE3MNE, Tim-VA3TIC and myself drove out to Hay Bay, about 45 kms west of Kingston, around noon on Thursday. We were joined by Richard-VA3VDP late Friday, and Derek-VE3HRW on Saturday.  We were operating at the cottage of VE3MNE, and a beautiful location it is.

The view from the 20m station

The weather was fantastic.  Lots of sunshine and blue skies for most of the weekend.  We did get a small amount of rain and some heavy wind on Thursday evening, but it didn't last long and the Hay Bay Amateur Radio Club was soon back at it laying out coax and preparing the antennas.

On Friday we sorted through our miles of coax fixing connectors as required, giving our notch filters some much needed maintainance and sorting out the operating positions.  As per our well established field day tradition, we went out for a steak dinner at the Wellington Grill in Prince Edward County and really had a good time. 


While at the Grill we all gave a farewell toast to our good friend John Snasdell-Taylor VA3GST, who sadly became a silent key a few days previously.  John, who was an engineer on the design and development team for the Canadarm, the space shuttle remote manipulator system, was an absolute gentleman.  He'll be missed by us all very much. 

By early Saturday morning we had seven antennas in the air, two 80m and one 160m off-center fed dipoles (two of which are up at 100 feet), a 20m Delta loop at about 50 feet off the ground, three 31 foot verticals with multiple radials, and a vintage WW2 No. 19 radio set 32 foot antenna for use on 40m and 15m.....and by 1130 we were pacing up and down awaiting the start time!

80m and 160m didn't provide us with much business and those bands had extremely high noise levels, but we still managed over 150 contacts on them.  The 40m band was a complete zoo with stations on top of stations all calling "CQ Field Day!!!".  I have to admit that it took a while for my ears to get used to the over abundance of signals and to be able to sort them out in my head.

After a few hours we had to do an antenna change for the 20m station.  The 20m Delta Loop wasn't working as efficient as it should have been.  With seven antennas in the air it was an easy job to switch things around without disturbing too many operators.

15m came, went and came back again.  When the band was working it was hot, and we managed to get most of the western US and Canada on it.  We even had a station from Northern Serbia answer our CQ.


VA3VDP

Richard-VA3VPD, the newest member of the Hay Bay Amateur Radio Club, operated our digital and CW station.  This was his very first field day, and what a superb job he did.   Richard operated on all bands and had the use of two antennas, a 80m OCF dipole and a 31 foot vertical, and he used both of them to his advantage.

All too soon Field Day was over and the bands magically went silent....well, the Sunday hemorrhoid nets were still in full swing complaining about the damn contesters, and the hillbilly nets from the deep south were swopping moonshine recipes, complete with their usual colourful language, but apart from them the other 35,000 hams went quiet.

The lack of contacts from Florida was very noticeable this year.  It wasn't until we got home and saw the news about the the bad weather they are having that we realized that they had other things on their minds than taking part in field day over the weekend.  Our thoughts and prayers go out to them all and we hope they and their families are safe and dry.

As a final thought the Hay Bay ARC would just like to point out to a couple of dozen hams that there is no prize, or certificate, for the station who can say their callsign the fastest and that we are sorry we could not understand your callsign well enough to establish contact.  Perhaps next year you could slow down?

It was a fantastic weekend, and as Don VE3MNE said as we left - "363 days to go till we do it all over again next year!".

Congratulations!!

I received the following email in my inbox this morning from the Prince Edward County Radio Club: 

New Ham - Aaron Wiik - VE3UDA - 10 years old!!
Posted by: Mike Papper ve3vmp
Date: Wed Jun 13, 2012 12:10 am ((EST))

I am pleased, honoured and excited to announce that Aaron Wiik VE3UDA,
10 years old, has passed the Basic Amateur Radio exam with a score of 74%.

Both Aaron VE3UDA and his dad Peter VA3ORU (passed with honours) were students of our Fall 2011 course. They live in Cherry Valley. So please welcome our new Hams to the Magic of Radio when you hear them on the air in the coming months.

Congratulations to Aaron-VE3UDA, and well done!!

RLCT 2012 - The Wrap Up

This past weekend saw the 41st annual Rideau Lakes Cycle Tour run between Ottawa and Kingston......and a great time was had by one and all.

For the seventh year running the Frontenac EmComm Group (FECG) provided the communications for the southern part of the route, between Perth Road Village and Kingston.  Ottawa ARES looks after Carleton University to Black's Corner's, and Lanark-North Leeds ARES looks after the middle section.  This year, all three groups, had over 40 operators working over the weekend.

Don-VE3MNE running the net
from his "command post"

FECG looked after the radio check points at Perth Road Village, Loughborough Lake, Inverary, Glenburnie, McAdoo's Lane, and Queen's University.  Both myself and Don-VE3MNE manned the Perth Road Village radio check point.  We ran net control for the southern portion on the VE3FRG repeater, and a liaison station with Westport net control on the Christie Lake repeater.

Establishing comms was pretty easy this year using the VE3FRG repeater, none of the stations required a lot of power to reach it.  VE3FRG has a huge footprint and we used an awful lot of it.

However, trying to hit the Christie Lake or Lavant repeaters was another matter.   It seems my Ringo Ranger has an issue, and as a result has an SWR of 4.1:1 and was pretty much unusable.  So, using typical ham ingenuity, we put up a 5/8 mag-mount, but we had to mount it on a cast iron frying pan for a ground plane as it was the only item we had that the magnet would stick to.  We then put the frying pan on top of the village sign to get enough height to reach the Christie Lake repeater.......and I've no idea why Don carries a frying pan in his truck!!

Riders at Perth Road Store

We arrived on scene at 1030L, and the first rider went through our location at 1140L - flying faster than Bob-VA3QV's electric Vesper!!   Everything was going smoothly until we were informed of a memorial service being held in the village church, just across the road from where we were set up.  I think they expected us to close up shop and disappear, but with 2200+ cyclists coming through the village there was nowhere else for us to go.  In the end we simply turned down the radios so they were not blaring away, and asked the riders to be quiet and slow down by the church, which they all did with the utmost of respect, and that calmed the situation. 

We ended up having some pretty heavy rain from about 1500L till 1630L.  The last rider blew through our location about 1730L and then we started the drive down to Queen's to play "tail-end Charlie" and pick up radio equipment there.

Sunday was a very early start for our portion of the event.  Out of bed at 0500L and on the road to Perth Road at 0525.  I past the first rider heading north at 0540L just past Hwy 401.  The fog on the Perth Road was very thick and visability was less than 50m at times.....kind of scary early in the morning with the deer out on the roads.

The weather was very hot and muggy, the Perth Road General Store was a hot spot for topping up on water and food for the long slog ahead.  The terrain around Perth Road is fairly hilly and the muggy weather must have made it pretty tough for some of the riders.

Lots of hams involved besides those manning the radio check points.  We had five or six mobile in various vehicles, doing pick-ups for riders who opted out, or the repair trucks.  It was nice to see the amateur community come together and doing some worthwhile community service.

For a look at how things played out from the Ottawa end, have a look at my old friend Bob's page - HERE. 

'Twas a great weekend all-in-all, looking forward to next year, especially with the proposed changes.

Government Cutbacks......

We've all heard about it, everytime you pick up a newspaper or read the news on the Internet, all you see are articles on the federal cutbacks and provincial cutbacks.

Apparently the cutbacks have also impacted the Ontario Provincial Police!  You'll notice their new cruiser in the picture below.....

This picture was taken today on the campus of Queen's University here in Kingston.

This new model must be very good on gas...not sure how good it will be in a high speed highway chase.

Actually, all kidding aside, the Special Olympics are being held here in Kingston this weekend at the CFB Kingston Sports Complex, and police forces from all over the Province are here looking after, and mentoring, the kids, and this car was here for that event.  I'm sure it gave the kids as big a chuckle as it did me.

In fact the parking lot at Queen's looked like a police convention as there were cars from just about every police force in Ontario parked there.  Nice to see the boys in blue looking after the kids.

Early morning activities

It may be Saturday but I was still up at 0500 local to get ready to go to Fort Henry Hill to play radio and test out a new antenna that Tim, VA3TIC had made.

The first news about the "new" Fort Henry is that it is terrible.  They have now paved the parking lot making it almost impossible to use at any other time than very early morning, we should be OK between 0500 and 0800, but not later than that due to vehicle traffic on the site. 

Secondly they now have a "rent-a-cop" on site who came over to ask what the hell we were doing, and thirdly the new visitors center built on the east side of the parking lot is filled with a dozen or so huge plasma screens, and we now have a noise floor level of S7 on all bands.

Back to Tim's new antenna........it's a homebrewed 31 foot aluminum vertical made with salvaged parts from long dead antennas.  It has four 31 foot radials and four 16 foot radials, and he has it mounted on his trailer hitch and uses a homebrew 4:1 balun with it.

It works very well and we were getting out with no problem.  First station worked with it was PI9SRS, a Scout Troop radio club in Spijkenisse, Netherlands, on 20m who gave us a 54. 

Next up was a check into Ontars on 3.755 who gave us a 59.  The best contact of the morning was with ZL2WL, Wayne in Hastings, New Zealand, also on 20m who gave us a 55.  Not too shabby for a antenna made up of scrap aluminum.

So now the journey starts to find a new, quiet, hassle free early morning operating spot in or around Kingston.  Makes me wish I was back home in BC operating up in the mountains again. Oh happy days!!

Rideau Lakes Cycle Tour 2012

The Rideau Lakes Cycle Tour is THE Spring cycling event in the area with about 2000 riders going from Ottawa and Perth to Kingston on Saturday and back on Sunday. Four routes of varying difficulty are offered. The Tour is wholly organized and supported by Ottawa Bicycle Club volunteers.

The majority of riders come from Ontario and Quebec but there are also entrants from many of the other provinces, the United States and occasionally, even from abroad.

This year is the 41st year the ride has taken place and the 38th that amateur radio has provided communications support for the ride.  The Frontenac Radio Group provided comms from Perth Road Village to Queen's University, and has done for 5 years.

This year we will be operating five radio checkpoints, Perth Road Village, Loughborough Lake, Inverary, Glenburnie, and Queens University.  These locations will be manned for both Saturday and Sunday.

This year we are trying something different.  The Station at Perth Road Village will have two radios, one on the VA3TEL 2m repeater at Christie Lake and the other on the VE3FRG repeater using the 70cm link.  Hopefully this will stop any interference between the two radios.  In the past these two radios have both been on 2m, and we have had several interference issues.

Here's hoping the weather cooperates this year.

Memory Lane........

Today is a non-ham radio blog entry……which I do every once in a long while.

Some of you may have noticed the photo of the Chinook Helicopter at the top of this page. That photo was taken at a small gravel airstrip on Ellesmere Island called Eureka in the high Arctic. I had the pleasure of spending three summers there during the 1980’s flying as a Loadmaster on board the Chinooks of 450 Transport Helicopter Squadron.

In 1996 Canada retired its Chinooks and sold them to the Royal Netherlands Air Force where they continue to soldier on and fly today. In fact until we bought our own, Dutch Chinooks actually carried Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan…..kind of ironic!

Canada disbanded 450 Squadron and went without heavy lift helicopters until 2005 when we purchased several ‘second hand’ Chinook airframes from the US Army, and used them with great success in Afghanistan. They filled a need, and probably saved the lives of numerous Canadian soldiers who could now fly safely into camps and the out-stations instead of driving in vehicles on the IED infested dirt roads.

So why am I writing about this today? Good question. Today, a day I never thought I would see, the Minister of National Defence announced the reformation of 450 Tactical Helicopter Squadron. The squadron will be based in Petawawa, Ontario, and will have 15 F-Model Chinooks. These Chinooks will have a heavy lift capability to carry up to 40 personnel or 11 363 kilograms of cargo. 

I’m also extremely pleased, and proud, that LCol Duart Townsend will be the first Commanding Officer of the reborn 450 Tactical Helicopter Squadron. LCol Townsend was the very last Chinook pilot to be trained as part of the original 450 Tactical Helicopter Squadron before it was disbanded in 1996. We veterans of the original Squadron can rest assured that our customs and traditions will be passed on to the new Squadron by the new Commanding Officer.

For those ex-members of 450 Squadron, today’s announcement is a great thing. It ensures that the history we made in our youth will not be forgotten. To the ex-members it also means that the aircrew, and support crew, who died in the flying accidents aboard Chinook’s 147001 and 147002 will be remembered and honoured by the Squadron, and not just by those who remember them.

May the new 450 Squadron only have 'Fair Winds and Blue Skies'!

By Air To Battle!

The "Chillicon Special" Antenna

A couple of years ago I read an item on the blog of Martin VA3SIE on his latest canoeing adventure on Joeperry Lake in Frontenac Provincial Park. He was using two antennas on that trip, one was a 28’ vertical and the other was a 90’ inverted-L. It was the 28’ vertical that caught my attention as being a city dweller, space is at a premium on the antenna farm out back.

I emailed Martin a couple of times about it and Martin told me that it wasn’t the best of antennas, but would do in a pinch. Still intrigued about it but busy with other things, it went on the back burner for a while. It wasn’t until the Ottawa Valley QRP Societies annual “Chillicon” gathering of September, 2011 that I finally with the help of Jim-VA3KV made one. I used a 31 foot MFJ collapsible fiberglass pole as the support.


Picture from VA3SIE Blogsite
of the original design

 Originally Martin made his with only one 16 foot and one 32 foot radials, and I made my “Chillicon Special” using only four 16 foot radials. Right off the bat it worked very well - allowing me to check into the Trans-provincial Net on 40m and Ontars Net on 80m as well as numerous DX contacts around the world.

Last weekend I was cleaning out the garage, getting ready for the upcoming big move, I dragged it out and set it up again. This time I added two 32 foot radials to the original four 16 foot radials. What a difference that made! Using my IC-703, the first SSB contact was on 20m with W4P, a special event station in St. Petersburg, Florida, who gave me a nice 58 report.

Mainly I have been working 40m, 20m, 15m and 10m with it, but it will also tune up on 80m and 6m with no issues. 

Since then I have worked Kuwait, Dubai, Sweden, and Morocco with this antenna. I have a suspicion it’s going to get a lot more use up on Fort Henry Hill this summer on our very early Saturday morning get-togethers. I might even add another two 32 foot radials and see how that improves the overall performance.

This one is a keeper.

Field Day 2012

It's getting to be that time of year when we start thinking of Field Day, that joyous weekend of 24 hours of non-stop ham radio.  This year it falls on the weekend of June 23 and 24.....mark it on your calendar right now.  The full set of rules for 2012 can be found HERE.

Now normally the radio club I belong to drives out to Hay Bay to the cottage of Don, VE3MNE, and spends a delightful weekend at his cottage.  Last year, according to the scores published in QST we came third in North America and first in Canada in the 5A category.

So this year we find ourselves in the position of having out grown Don's cottage and in need of a second operating location.  There really are not that many good locations around Kingston where we can conduct Field Day.  But this year we have hit the jackpot of all Kingston locations.

Many thanks must go to Ron, VE3GO, who has managed to get us permission to conduct Field Day from aboard the retired Canadian Coast Guard Ship Alexander Henry, currently tied up next to the Maritime Museum of the Great Lakes here in Kingston.

CCGS Alexander Henry is a former Canadian Coast Guard light icebreaker and buoy tender on the Great Lakes.  Built by the Port Arthur Shipbuilding Company in what is now Thunder Bay, she was launched in 1958 and retired in 1984.  She has been laid up in the drydock at the Maritime Museum for a number of years and is actually run during the summer months as a Bed and Breakfast location.

So give a listen for VE3FRG this Field Day, the station will be operating from the actual radio room aboard the ship.

2m SSB

This morning, Saturday, April 28th, was my first activation of Fort Henry Hill for 2012.  Lots of construction still going on and the general area of the parking lot is still a real mess.  The construction is for the new multi-million dollar visitors center.  Kingston locals are wondering why we are spending $3.9 million on a building that actually detracts from the historical beauty of the fort it's there to explain.

Anyway, back to ham radio...... local VHF propagation was excellent this morning, and the prop charts were showing many good paths, so up to the hill I went. 

I decided to use my FT-857D today as I have not used it much lately, it just sits there beside the FT-950 looking rather lonely!  The antenna of choice was an Arrow II back pack portable four element Yagi.  This is a great little antenna, I had it up on a 16 foot painter pole and it really works well.

Four contacts were made today, two in Kingston, Tim-VA3TIC and Dave-VE3DZE, and two from the US.  Luther-N2SLN and Tom-KC2SFU who were on top of Rondaxe Mountain, near Old Forge, NY.  Booming signal from them.

We'll have to see if we can't work that ever elusive VA3QV next weekend on 2m SSB....if we can get him out of bed early enough ;-)

The DX Gods.......

What a great night on the HF bands!!  Tonight has to be the best night I've had for DX in a very long time.  Within minutes I had two from Kuwait, Dubai, and Israel in the log and all 59++.  Superb signals from the middle east tonight!  The other thing that was amazing was listening to one of the Kuwait stations working the different countries calling him.....and he had one heck of a pile up going, and switching languages as he went.  I must have heard him talk in 6 different languages in the course of 5 minutes.  Very impressive and a great operator!

I also managed to work the YW5PI DXpedition on Isla de Patos, SA-048, off the coast of Venezuela.  Not a strong signal, but enough to work them and get them in the log.  They had some deliberate jamming going on and it made it somewhat difficult to make the QSO.

The numbers tonight were SFI=142; A Index=7; K Index=1; and the SN was 122.  Let's hope it continues to improve!

1812 Special Event Station

On June 18, 1812, American President James Madison declared war on Great Britain and the Americans then tried to take Upper and Lower Canada. The Canadian Governor General, Georges Prevost had very few means to defend the colonies, a few British Regiments and the “rag-tag” Canadian Militia of the day.

Anyway, to wrap it up quickly........we won, the Americans lost, and the Whitehouse got burnt.

So, two hundred years later we are celebrating the War of 1812, and in true ham radio style we will have a special event station on the air.

The members of the Manotick Amateur Radio Group will be operating special event station - VX3W - from Fort Wellington in Prescott, Ontario, on Saturday, May 19th from 10:00 EDT to 16:00 EDT (1400Z to 2000Z) to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the War of 1812, and of course our glorious victory.

The boys from Manotick will be operating on various HF bands, depending on the conditions. Local operators may be able to find them on simplex VHF and/or UHF. While most operations will be voice, they may also be operating some digital modes.

LED Lights

Yesterday I received a rather disturbing email from one of the local hams here in Kingston on the subject of the new LED lights that are currently coming on the market.

After watching this video (HERE) I'm sure you will agree that this is the type of thing our governments and our national amateur radio organizations should be addressing on our behalf. I really hope that they are as the local noise level is already getting out of sight with all the new electronic devices households are now using.  Perhaps this is why QRP and portable operating is getting more and more popular?

The reality of this matter is that pressure is always being shoved on us from eco-groups, the big box stores and paid lobbyists to introduce and use these kinds of products without any concern for proper testing, government regulations, or any harmful side effects that these might have.

I certainly hope that our national amateur radio organizations are fully aware of these concerns, plus similar ones such as the interference that plasma TV does to our ability to operate. How much our associations are doing or are able to do, I do not know. But the big questions is, does anyone know?

Lousy Contact

Tried to work Bob-VA3QV this afternoon on 40m but the propagation Gods were against us......again.  Even with all the filters on and the headset on, the best I could do was to give Bob a 43 signal report. 

Bob was at a park between the Ottawa airport and the Rideau River, and as usual was operating QRP with FT-817, and I "think" he was using his long wire antenna.


I guess we'll just have to keep trying until we manage a QSO between us!

Bob has posted a good account of his activity.  Have a look at: http://va3qv.wordpress.com/2012/04/06/friday-in-the-parks/

Congratulations to Russ - VX9GHD !!!

History was made yesterday as Industry Canada issued its first license on the new 60 meter developmental band, VX9GHD to VE3FI Russ Hemphill of Haliburton, Ontario.

Canadians have been waiting for 3 years for this new opportunity to join the USA, and Britain, and as usual RAC has done nothing to help with this process!  In fact RAC still has not made an announcement informing Canadian hams that they can even apply for a 60m experimental license !!

Russ-VE3FI, the Vice President for Administraion of ECOA, tells us that 60m is badly needed for Emergency Communications, especially when conditions on 40 and 80 are not suitable for transmitting or receiving traffic.

This experimental license is valid for one year.  After the one year period 60m will then be open for regular use by all Canadian amateurs using their own call sign.

Any Canadian amateur can apply for this new experimental license by sending in an application to Industry Canada with $52.80 upon approval.  Details available on the IC website.

Well done to Russ and ECOA for making this HUGE first step for Canadian hams!!!

CY9M - An update

From the official website:

The logistical aspect of activating St Paul island is now very much ongoing and a work in progress. No wonder it’s been seven long years since this DXCC entity was last active when you consider the island has nothing resembling human day-to-day, take for granted “luxuries”.

Now the group insurance and landing permit are formalised, we’re getting to work on the actual transmitting side of things. We know the east side of the island has a great take-off to EU and AF, whilst on the west there are excellent paths to NA, SA and AS. Initial thinking was to set up two camps at either side of the island, but this is proving a huge logistics problem, primarily because an overgrown and intertwined forest blocks all routes – and since we are active for a relatively short period, assembling quickly at one location seems more likely. We will update nearer the time on chosen location.

We sincerely thank and acknowledge the numerous organisations, clubs and individual donors who realise the task ahead. You too can help us get CY9M on air by checking out the official website.

CQ Contest......the aftermath

It was not a bad weekend on the bands and the new radio and headset worked a real treat.  This was without a doubt my most successful contest to date. 

SFI was 103, A Index was 10, K Index was 2, and the SN was at 65.  Not great, but we've all worked a lot worse.  Amongst a hell of a lot of other contacts, I managed to score three new countries:

Turkey - YM7KA on 15m
Namibia - V55V on 10m
Cyprus - P33W on 15m

Every country in Europe was worked with the exception of Switzerland, Denmark, and Sweden.  Never heard any stations from those countries at all.  The behaviour on the bands was great, and I heard no band police in action, what a nice change that was!

However (and there's always a "however"!!), I did hear some raised voices and frayed tempers over some peoples inability to communicate serial numbers in English.  I guess some people don't realize that not everyone speaks English, and that some actually have a language of their own.  Oh well, I guess some people just need to learn to slow down and chillout once in a while.

RMS Titanic

I came across the following while checking a callsign on QRZ.com today, and I thought it would be of interest to some of the readers of this blog.  Here it is:

"RMS Titanic, the world’s largest passenger ship at the time, sank on her maiden voyage from Southampton to New York, following a collision with an iceberg at approximately 0245 on the morning of April 15th 1912. 1,517 people lost their lives in the tragedy.


The 100th anniversary of the sinking will be marked by several special commemorative event stations at ports associated with the ships maiden voyage. These include Cobh, formerly Queenstown (EI100T), Belfast (GI100MGY), Southampton (M100T), Cape Race (VO1MCE) and a maritime mobile station (VE0MGY), at the site of the sinking.

Throughout 2012 EI100T will be operated regularly from Cobh ("Queenstown"), Lower Cork Harbour (IO51UU). Cork Harbour was the last port of call of the Titanic on her maiden and final voyage.

During the weekend of April 14th & 15th 2012, a significant special event station signing EI100T will be operated from Cobh town to coincide with the Titanic commemorations.

The Cork Radio Club sponsored Titanic Award will be available to radio amateurs who work EI100T on at least two bands or modes during 2012, with a special endorsement to the award if you work EI100T during the weekend of April 14th & 15th 2012."

World-Wide WPX Contest - SSB

Well the big contest starts tonight at 0000Z and runs till 2359Z on Sunday.  This is always a fun contest with the bands full of great DX.  If you can't work your DXCC this weekend you're just not trying.

I've been spending quite a bit of time learning the new rig, and I've finally got comfortable with it.  This week I added a Heil Proset Elite Headset with the HC 6 wide response microphone element to the kit, hardest part of this was adjusting to using a foot switch as I've always had a hand switch.  This headset is light years ahead of my last Heil set, the dual traveller, which I also really liked, but there is just no comparision between the two headsets. 

As I write this we are having a moderate solar flare which is reaching M1.0.  The SFI is 102, the A Index is 6, the K Index is 2, and the SN at 86.  Not the best for the contest, but I've done it in much worse conditions.

The Rules can be found HERE.

Good luck to those taking part, and lets hope the band police take the weekend off.

Successful Launch and Flight

A balloon like VE3RMC-11

VE3RMC-11 was launched  successfully at 0930L this morning from Wingham Airport in very light winds.  In the first two minutes the balloon climbed to 902m and remained over the airport.

I had a phone call from a very happy Richard-VA3VDP just after it had launched. 

The balloon tracked in a South-East direction, and 26 minutes into the flight it was at 10,002m, and nearly a third of the way to its intended height.

At 1111L the balloon burst at 29,013m just short of its 35,000m target, and 39 minutes later it touched down in a farmers field about 23 Kms (as the crow flies) south of Wingham.

Looking at the APRS tracks of the chase vehicles it looks like a successful recovery of the payload was carried out.

Well done Richard!!  We look forward to hearing the details in a few days.

Track of VE3RMC-11

Balloon Launch is a go!

The Space ADS-B Receiver Experiment (SABRE) team will be launching a high altitude balloon about 0900L on Wednesday, March 21st at Wingham, Ontario to test the satellite payload.

The Royal Military College launch team is now in place at Wingham and no doubt pouring over tomorrows weather and winds aloft charts. 

I'm sure all will be fine and that Richard's balloon launch will be a great success. 

You can track the balloon on APRS.FI (click here) which will have the callsign VE3RMC-11, and the chase team will be beaconing as VA3VDP-9.  I'll post more details as I get them from launch control.

The Canadian Islands Award Program

Every summer for the past four years the ham radio group I belong to has activated several islands. Last summer was no different, we activated five of the Canadian Islands around the Kingston area over a two month period. According to what records we could find most of them had not been activated for several years, and a one had never been activated at all. This was done so we could take part in the Canadian Islands Award Program.

It was a lot of fun, the days were hot and sunny, but there always seemed to be a good breeze blowing of the St. Lawrence or Lake Ontario to keep us cool and the bugs down while we operated.  It's a great way to keep hone your portable operating skills.

What amazed us was the demand for these islands. On one remarkable Sunday afternoon we worked hundreds of stations calling us as we operated portable on Simcoe Island. In fact at one point we did 139 contacts in 58 minutes after some kind soul spotted us on the DX Cluster. It was a great afternoon.

This coming summer will be no different for us, we already have plans to activate three islands- Milton, Garden, and Iroquois Islands. Milton has never been activated before so we are expecting a good response to its activation.

The downside to all this is that the management of the Canadian Islands Award Program does not do a good job in promoting the activity. Last year we sent in five activation notices to the webmaster to be placed on their news page. Not one of our activation notices was ever dealt with, or posted on their website, and we have since heard from several fellow activators who have had a similar experience.

Now I did complain via email to the program manager and coordinator, and he kindly phoned me in return and we had a splendid chat about several issues. I understand that these guys are volunteers and that they do this in their spare time….Don't get me wrong, I don’t have a problem with this. But come on, if you’re going to run an award program at least keep your website up-to-date, and list upcoming activations so that the ham community can see what is going on.

It’s been nine months today since the website was last up-dated, and in fact one page, the “Activators & Chasers & Expeditions” hasn’t been up-dated since 25 April 2004!! It’s one hell of a way to run an award scheme, in fact it looks like the award scheme is actually dead from the way the website looks.

The Canadian Islands Award Program is something Canadian hams should be proud of, it showcases our outdoors in all its glory. 

The Americans have the US Islands Award Program as well. Here’s a link to their website...............quite a difference eh?

Balloon Launch - March 20th or 21st

The Royal Military College of Canada will be launching a high altitude balloon at 0900 local, on Tuesday, March 20th, or Wednesday, March 21st, depending on the weather and the winds aloft.

Major Richard Van Der Pryt, VA3VDP, hopes that the balloon will reach 109,000 feet before it bursts.  Two vans will be used to track the balloon after it has been launched from Wingham, Ontario.

The balloon is equipped with an APRS tracker, and will use the callsign: VE3RMC-11, and it's very nice to see the RMC callsign being used once again.

This launch is part of an experiment being done for Major Richard Van Der Pryt's Phd Thesis. 

Best of luck with it Richard, we'll all be watching !!

Just another weekend...........

The bands were certainly not in the best of shape over the weekend with large solar flares and CME's screaming towards us, but it was still a good weekend DXing......well, any weekend is good if you can spend it chasing DX!

The new FT-950 certainly helped, I'm amazed at the performance of this rig.  The ATU will not handle the mismatch, so I now have a MFJ-949E manual tuner in line with the rig so I can tune up my 40m OCF on 15m and 17m.  Works like a charm.

The hard thing to remember is to put the tuner back on "bypass" so the ATU can work once I have finished on 15m and 17m.  So far I haven't screwed up.

This weekend I managed to put 8 DX contacts, including another two new countries in the log.  This weekends catch was:

PJ7PT in Sint Maartin on 10m.
ZD7FT in Jamestown, St. Helena on 17m.

And on 15m I worked:

CO8LY in Santiago de Cuba.
F4DSD in St. Martin de Crau, France.
CT9/RC5A on Madeira Island.
HA5JI in Budapest, Hungary.
IZ5HPQ in Toscany, Italy, and
ER4DX in Otaci, Moldova.

I'm pretty confident that I'll do quite well during the CQ SSB DX Contest at the end of the month......hopefully the bands will improve before then.

ARRL DX SSB Contest 2012

Another great contest weekend is over, and the bands were in pretty good shape, but there was some pretty deep QSB at times.

I played at it for a few hours on Friday and Saturday nights, and most of the day on Sunday.  I managed to log over 200 contacts in 63 countries and put three new countries in the log.

Funniest incident?  How about a PA0 in the Netherlands asking a N5 station in Texas to "please speak English".   I thought the Texan was going to have a fit!

I actually heard VA3QV this weekend on 40m, but didn't get a chance to work Bob. 

For the most part behaviour on the bands was pretty good, but the LIDS were still out in force tuning up over active QSOs.  Do the guys who do that ever listen before they press tune?   I don't think they do.

Overall I'm extremely pleased with the new FT-950 and the way it performed over the weekend.  I've still got a few things to master and remember how to do....such as working split, but the filters really make a huge difference in the pile ups.

I'm looking forward to the CQ WW DX SSB Contest at the end of the month and giving the rig another good workout.

New Gear - Part 2

This is without a doubt the best radio I have ever owned.....and I've owned a lot. 

Every contact I have made in the past week has commented on how good the audio is, and I haven't even changed any settings yet.....it's still on the factory set-up.

The audio seems to punch through and I'm making contacts on the first or second call constantly.....never did that with the Kenwood TS-570D, and certainly never with the FT-857D. 

I've spent quite a bit of time tuning around and listening to QSO's.  While I'm listening I'm playing with the extensive filtering system, and I'm very impressed with the systems.  It seems I can take almost any QRM out and get a workable signal.  The ATU works as advertised and I've had no SWR problems with my 40m OCFD. 

The race is on to be 90% familiar with the rig in time for me to take part in the two big contests in March, those will be the tests.

New gear!

The day started off pretty early today, it was off to Radioworld in Toronto with Don-VE3MNE.  The trip down was "interesting", lots of snow and blowing snow, and lots of idiots driving way over the safe speed level.  No surprise then that we drove past 6 accidents, mainly cars and trucks in the ditch.  Several of them down pretty steep embankments.  A very busy day for the Police, Fire and Ambulance units who were doing a great job under pretty crappy conditions.

Our trip back wasn't much better as we were driving back into the storm, and the idiots were still on the road.....or should that be "all over the road"?  Once again lots of Police on the highway sorting out messes that could have been avoided by people driving to the conditions, and not like maniacs!

Don picked up a new FT-8800 Dual bander.  A nice piece of kit for his truck.  He also picked up a new "plug and play" Rigblaster.  Don will be cruising the bands on FLDigi in no time!

My purchase was a bit larger....a new FT-950.  What a nice piece of kit.  It will be a few days before I can give a proper report on the rig, but from what I have seen already it's a real winner.

More on the rig in a few days after I  experiment with the settings etc.

CY9 - 2012 Activation Update

The following news was received today from Col - MM0NDX:

Press Release #1

St Paul Island is called the ”Graveyard of the Gulf” and that is where an international, seasoned team of DXers will be heading to later this year.

Plans are well under way for a 10-man team to activate this now wanted DXCC entity, which was last on air in 2005. When you consider most needed entities (perhaps out with the Top 10) are activated every five years or so, it is now time to mount a serious effort from CY9.

Most operators will be unaware that in 2010, St Paul Island became the highest mover on DX Magazines most wanted list; from #77 to #47. Today, according to that list and ClubLog, CY9 is more needed than entities such as Tokelau (ZK3) or PY0T (Trindade & Martim Vaz).

The team consists of Mike AB5EB, Oscar EA1DR, George EA2TA, Christian EA3NT, Simon IZ7ATN, Col MM0NDX, Bjorn SM0MDG, Vicky SV2KBS, Steve VA3FM and Kevin VE3EN.

From late July to early August, IOTA contest included, the group will be active all bands, modes (160-2m) with special attention on 6m and 160m if propagation allows.

A website is currently under construction and will be ready in a few short weeks where much more info can be found.

QSL manager for the expedition is M0URX.

A Novel Concept in Ham Radio

Some of the readers of my blog may be aware of the mess RAC ARES in Ontario has found itself these days.  For most of us there has been zero communications from them for the past 12 months, how can you lead an organization with no communications?   How can this organization grow? 

It amazes me that RAC ARES in Ontario thinks it can get away with this very poor website (CLICK).   What is the purpose of this website?  It has no useful information on it, and some of what is on it seems to be out of date. 

In fact things seem to have fallen apart so much, I have to ask if RAC still has a viable ARES organization in Ontario anymore?  

Has anybody told RAC that in the 21st Century an organization needs an informative, easy to navigate, and a constantly updated website in order to attract and inform new, as well as old, members?  How about a Blog that actually allows its members to post comments.....negative and positive?   Unless you get the odd negative comment you don't know what may require a little tweak now and then to fix things......(and before anybody leaves me a comment, I'm well aware what RAC did to the Blog that Peter West - VA3HG built for RAC).

So I was very pleased to see that ECOA has announced their 2012 AGM on their new blogsite.  It will be held in Toronto on the 3rd March at 1200L, at Fort York Armouries, 660 Fleet Street West.

What is really nice to see is that ECOA members will have the opportunity to actually cast a vote on agenda items, and on who will be their new executive members.  Not bad for $15 a year membership fee - which includes $2 million liability insurance coverage, and a real voice in what the association does. 

A real vote you say?  What a novel concept in emergency communications!

CY9 in 2012

Plans are afoot for an international 10-man team to be active from St Paul Island, CY9 during the middle part of 2012.  One of the operators will be Kevin-VE3EN, the webmaster for Solarham.com.

CY9 is nearly always in the top 100 DXCC, so the crew should be pretty busy handling traffic.

The island is nicknamed the “Graveyard of the Gulf of St. Lawrence" as it is fog-bound throughout much of the navigation season and posed a significant hazard during the age of sail.  Access to the island is usually only granted in July and August due to weather concerns.

Full details and a website will be made available in the weeks ahead.

Winter Field Day - The Sunday Report

It was a dark and windy morning…….so goes the tale! Well, at 0600L at Lamoine Point on Sunday morning it was very dark and very windy; thankfully the snow never really arrived in force.


Jim - VE3ULC

We set up five HF stations with only headlamps and flashlights bobbing around in the dark. The surprising thing was that it didn’t take us much longer to set up than it does during the summer, and nobody got hurt.  Granted the weather wasn’t that bad…..and it could have been a lot worse, but still, I believe that the many island and lighthouse activations we do over the summer really are helping us get our act together.

The Motley Crew on Sunday Morning

We had VE3MNE, VE3HRW, VA3TBZ, VA3ORP, VE3ULC, VA3VDP, and VE3CLQ in attendance. Thanks must go to Dave-VE3DZE who arrived around 0800L to do a coffee and bathroom run for those that needed it, and a very welcome sight he was to!

Thanks also must go out to Les-VE3KFS and Tim-VA3TIC, these guys couldn’t be on site but they were on the air making sure we made a few contacts.

Special mention must also go out to Bob-VA3QV in Ottawa, who also came looking for us on 40m. It’s always good to chat with Bob on, or off, the air, unfortunately I was on the 20m radio when he called in, but his message was passed to me via 2m simplex.

Don VE3MNE

We made contact with 11 countries: Canada, USA, France, Poland, Ukraine, Netherlands, Yugoslavia, Russia, Belgium, Bulgaria, and Iceland. We had 43 HF contacts, 2 VHF contacts, and 2 PSK31 contacts. All contacts were done on battery power.

Overall it was a good time; everyone was cheery and seemed to have a good time at the park.  Winter Field Day next year? You bet, the plan is to find a cabin or cottage like we did in 2011 and make it a weekend event.

Until next year………stay warm!

Winter Field Day - The Saturday Report

A slow day on the bands, and I could hear a lot more than I could work.  I did hear quite a number of stations calling CQ Winter Field Day, and I managed to work three of them.

First up was KB3BHL in Georgetown, Delaware on 40m.  Then it was Joe WA4VAG in Walton, Kentucky on 20m.  Joe was using an ex-military PRC-70 putting out 45 watts, and then it was back on 40m to work K8UO in Mt. Clemens, Minnesota.

Only DX for the day was Anderson CT2IUK in Caldas da Rainha, Portugal, on 17m.

SFI today was 115.  The A index was 7, the K index was 1, and the sunspot number was 39.  Nothing really to get excited about, maybe tomorrow will be better? 

Weather today was not nice, -3C in winds gusting up to 70 KPH, and driving snow.

I've an early morning start on Sunday.  Frontenac ARES group are meeting at Lamoine Point Conservation Area at 0600L, and plan on working the HF bands until about 1030L when we will break things down and go to breakfast.

Hope to work a few early birds.......hey, maybe VA3QV will be waiting for us to come up on 40m !  Listen out for VE3FCT.

The Coldest Event of the Year???

Get your winter gear ready!! The FYBO (Freeze Your Butt Off) Winter QRP Sprint, sponsored by the Arizona ScQRPions, is being held Saturday, February 4, 2012, from 1400Z-2400Z.

Apart from Winter Field Day this is one of the coldest events of the year…..you just don’t want to miss it!!

Rules can be found here

Winter Deployment Training

You don't need to be a genius to figure out that emergencies can happen at any time of the year, and that holding practice deployments only during the warmer months isn't going to help you when you get called out at midnight on a sub-zero, and very snowy mid-February night!  

One only has to remember back 14 years ago today, January 8th, 1998, when the people of Frontenac County awoke to the biggest ice storm in a century, to know that as a member of an ARES group, one never knows when the call will come.  One hopes a callout will never come, but you must be prepared....just in case.  There is a lot of truth to the phrase "practice makes perfect".

So it felt very strange this morning, with the temperature at -5C, no wind, no snow on the ground and a brilliant blue sky, to be heading off to Rotary Park with nine other members for a winter deployment training session with the Frontenac County ARES group.  

Dave VA3ORP, our training officer, took us through several subjects including how to dress in layers, and the best type of boots.  Dave also went over the use of the buddy system, and checking each other over periodically for frostbite.  We were reminded that it doesn't take long for hypothermia, or frostbite, to set in and those items need to be looked after immediately.

Other topics included the effect of cold on our equipment, the danger that abrupt changes in temperature (from outside to inside) could have on the equipment with condensation.  The effect of freezing temperatures have on coax, and ways of keeping things dry.  We also talked about how easy it is in the snow to lose bits of kit......normally the important bits go first!

We ended the session by putting up and guying a portable mast system, designed to hold a VHF antenna and a HF dipole.  It was interesting to see it go up, and who had to take their gloves off to make it happen.

All in all it was a great training session, for those members who are ex-military it was a good refresher, and it'll probably bring back a few nightmares of sleeping naked in a sleeping bag, in a snow hole, at -45C....I get cold just remembering it!

This morning was a good lead up for Winter Field Day, an event every ARES and EmComm group should support.

Winter Field Day

Coming up at the end of the month is Winter Field Day.  From their website:

"The 2012 Winter Field Day will be held from 1700 UTC (12:00 noon EST) Saturday January 28, 2011 through 1700 UTC (12:00 noon EST) Sunday January 29, 2012. The object of the event is familiar to most Amateur Radio operators: set up emergency-style communications and make as many contacts as possible during the 24 hour period. The rules encourage as many contacts on as many bands and modes as possible, because during a real emergency, the most important factor is the ability to communicate, regardless of band, mode or distance".

The official rules can be found at the SPAR web site. This event is open to all amateurs.  Frontenac ARES will be setting up at Rotary Park in the west end of Kingston, and taking part for the fourth year in a row.  It's great practice deploying and setting up in inclement weather, as SPAR likes to state, not all emergencies happen in the good weather.

Give a listen for VE3FRG, you'll know it's us by the chattering teeth!