I found this contest to be a bit harder than it’s WW cousin. In this one you send a serial number, the other is just your CQ zone. I definitely improved me CW number recognition skills but 206 contacts over almost 15 hours isn’t a good score. I’ll get there eventually. I’m working on an iPhone app for morse code practice. More on that in a future post. Here’s a map of the contacts I made in this contest.
Saturday was the WORM Fest at Freedom Lake park. This is at the same spot as the SPARCfest and a very similar setup. I talked to one guy who got there at 5am to setup and said he was the 4th one there so they get started early. I didn’t buy anything but a coffee this time but I’m starting to know more people and had a few good conversations. I wish I had saved all the computer stuff we recycled when the office moved, then I could run my own table. Here’s a link to next years WORMfest.
Day 2 was hotter than Day 1 but I had the lay of the land so I did the flea market in the morning and watched the air conditioned forums in the afternoon. Today I hit traffic on the way in, but it wasn’t anywhere near as bad as the way out yesterday. The flea market is massive here. I spent over 2 hours looking through it. I came across this guy (forgot to get his callsign), he was running a net from the flea market on an old Vietnam era field radio. The net was for people operating for old military radios. This is another section of the hobby…
I typically go to a music festival on this weekend of the year. Last year at that festival I realized I didn’t know anyone there anymore and I used to know everyone, so I decided then that I would do Dayton this year. Dayton totally has the music festival vibe only everyone is carrying walkie talkies instead of beers. I had a chance to talk with Julie K8VOX and Thom W8TAM from POTA, they were hanging out next to the Wolf River Coil booth. I picked up the Wolf River Coil setup and I’ll be trying that out at a park soon. Tomorrow I’m going to the DX and Contest…
I travel to Miami every once and awhile for work and I’ve stopped 3 times now to try to activate the Big Cypress National Preserve. There’s a “rest area” with no facilities off I-75 that has an entrance to the preserve. I tried to activate from this part twice before. The first time I setup in the field near the road. I was stopped by a trooper to see what I was doing (the mast looks sort of like a mortar launcher before you extend it). I explained it was ham radio and he said cool, but not to run the wire over the road. I had terrible noise and…
Got a card from 4U1WB, the World Bank Amateur Radio Club, from a contact back in March of last year. This weekend was the Armed Forces Crossband Test event where amateurs try to contact the military stations by listening on their frequencies and transmitting back using split mode. I was able to contact the Pentagon, callsign WAR with voice and talked to Claude. I also talked to NSS, the Navy’s station, via morse code. Also, I made some rare, well past dark 20m contacts to the middle of the Pacific Ocean, FW5JG on Futuna Island and E51JD on South Cook Islands. Just happend to notice them on the cluster and…
I gave a presentation at the SPARC club meeting on May 3rd. I used the presentation file I got from Julie K8VOX that she gave at Hamcation. I modified it to be a little more Florida related (as well as adding more pictures from my activations). I also brought in my gear. The presentation went about 30 minutes, and then I fielded a few questions as well as a few more questions regarding the gear. Alan W4UB from the Upper Pinellas Amateur Radio Club saw the presentation online and asked me to do it again at the UPARC meeting on July 6th so I’ll be running through it again for…
I helped as ground crew installing a new tower at Tom NY4I’s house today. Dan K1TO is a very experienced tower installer, he made it look easy. It was my first time seeing how a gin pole works. We pulled up 3 sections of Rohn 55 tower onto about half a section that was above ground as the base. There’s still a last mast to be installed at the top of the tower which will hold the main antenna, but they’re saving that for another day. For now Dan installed a 2m/70cm vertical. It was an interesting day seeing how it all goes together. Here’s a video of the tower…
The new version of WSJT-X v2.10-rc5 was released yesterday which includes a new FT4 mode. This mode is designed to compete with RTTY for contesting. It uses a 6 second transmission vs. the 15 second transmission of FT8. It definitely feels much faster than FT8 but I personally feel it should be it’s own contest mode vs being used in RTTY contests. We’ll see how it all plays out over time.
My first bureau card shipment came in. These QSO’s are pretty old. One is from 10 days after I was first licensed. All of them to my old callsign. I’ll have to remember to send out some envelopes to the 0 call area incoming bureau.
