Category: Ham radio

Museum Ships Weekend 2016

Spent a few hours on the USS Yorktown yesterday activating it for Museum Ships Weekend as WA4USN. I had the Saturday afternoon shift from noon-4PM. Didn’t bother to count how many contacts I made, but managed to get a few in the log.

Operated mostly on 20m in seek and pounce mode as well as sitting on a frequency calling CQ. I wasn’t able to generate any pileups like some of the other ship stations out there, but there were a few times where I got a nice steady flow of contacts.

The band was pretty noisy with lots of QSB while I was operating. Contacts would be booming in one minute, and by the end of the QSO would be almost down in the noise. Still, it was a lot of fun getting back on the radio and making contacts. Getting to play radio on the Yorktown is always a lot of fun.

Charleston area school radio clubs

There are two school radio clubs in the Charleston area that aim to encourage kids to get involved in amateur radio: Dubose Middle School (K4DMS) in Summerville and Palmetto Scholars Academy (K4PSA) in North Charleston. I know K4DMS has connections with CARS, and I think K4PSA might have connections with TARC.

I haven’t worked with either club, but I do hear bits and pieces of some of the activities they participate in, and I occasionally hear them active on the radio. I’ve heard about the clubs doing high altitude balloon launches and operating during the ARRL School Club Roundups.

It’s pretty cool that there are schools with radio clubs around here.

CQ WW 2015 log check

The log check for the 2015 CQ WW contest landed in my email a few days ago. Only one busted QSO due to NIL (Not In Log). Not bad, although 0 would be better. That brought me down to 108 contacts and a final score of 24119.

Looking forward to being back on the air in time for the next CQ WW.

************************** Summary ***************************

     109 Claimed QSO before checking (does not include duplicates)
     108 Final   QSO after  checking reductions

     280 Claimed QSO points
     271 Final   QSO points

      59 Claimed countries
      59 Final   countries

      30 Claimed zones
      30 Final   zones

      89 Claimed mults
      89 Final   mults

   24920 Claimed score
   24119 Final   score

    3.2% Score reduction
    0.9% Error Rate based on claimed and final qso counts
       0 (0.0%) calls copied incorrectly
       0 (0.0%) exchanges copied incorrectly
       1 (0.9%) not in log
       0 (0.0%) duplicates (Removed without penalty)
       0 (0.0%) calls unique to this log only (not removed)

********************** Results By Band ***********************

             Band   QSO  QPts  Zone Cty Mult

   Claimed   160M     0     0     0   0    0
   Final     160M     0     0     0   0    0

   Claimed    80M     0     0     0   0    0
   Final      80M     0     0     0   0    0

   Claimed    40M     1     3     1   1    2
   Final      40M     1     3     1   1    2

   Claimed    20M    24    59    13  17   30
   Final      20M    24    59    13  17   30

   Claimed    15M     0     0     0   0    0
   Final      15M     0     0     0   0    0

   Claimed    10M    84   218    16  41   57
   Final      10M    83   209    16  41   57

   Claimed    All   109   280    30  59   89  Score    24920
   Final      All   108   271    30  59   89  Score    24119

************************* Not In Log *************************

28532 PH 2015-10-24 2139 AB4UG            5 LT0H            13

*******************  Multipliers by band  ********************

160M multiplier total 0





80M multiplier total 0





40M multiplier total 2

OK    

 15

20M multiplier total 30

CM    EI    FM    HC    HI    HK    HK0/a KG4   KL    OH    
P4    PJ4   PY    SM    TF    VE    YV    

  1  2  3  4  5  7  8  9 10 11 14 15 40

15M multiplier total 0





10M multiplier total 57

9A    CE    CN    CT    CT3   CX    D4    DL    EA    EA8   
F     FG    FJ    FM    FS    FY    HK    HK0/a HP    IT9   
JA    K     KP2   KP4   LU    OA    P4    PA    PJ2   PJ7   
PY    TI    V2    V4    VE    VK    VP2M  VP2V  XE    YN    
YV    

  3  4  6  7  8  9 10 11 12 13 14 15 25 30 33 35

K3NHI sweep system by VE7BPO

From Todd/VE7BPO/@QRPHB of QRP HomeBuilder is the K3NHI sweep system that he built. He put out a call asking for people to host a zip file of his build and I offered to stash them here for him.

Inside the zip file you’ll find a description of the sweep generator, schematics, build notes and lots of pictures by Todd.

Zip file: K3NHI sweep system or here

It’s a pretty cool looking build. I’ll have to spend some time studying it when I get a chance.