Well so far I have not been burning up the airwaves but I have been having fun….
According to the log so far I have made 51 contacts consisting of 13 DXCC entities. This is in the order the contacts were made…
USA (18 States), Canada (4 Provinces), Mexico, Puerto Rico, England, Barbados, Brazil, Argentina, Italy, Croatia, Slovenia, Hungary and Greenland…
So far I have made contacts on 15m, 20m, 40m and 80m (still waiting for my first 10m contact)…
Now this score is not going to set the world on fire but it does mean I have given out 51 contacts and in reality it would be a boring contest is only the strong stations participated… I have been using my FT 847 along with my LDG Z100 autotuner and the antenna is my end fed long wire folded vertical antenna. If you have read the blog in the past I think you will know what I am talking about. Tomorrow afternoon I will try putting up my home brewed tri band vertical (10-15-20) for the end of the contest…
More details on this later but it you think of it… Just counting todays events I have only 87 more countries to go for DXCC and only 38 more states to go for WAS… This contest so far is a huge success… I see a need for a much better logging program than my spreadsheet but other than that so far its been fun…
73bob
Tags: amateur radio, amateur radio contesting, CQ WPX Contest, DXCC, WAS
March 29, 2009 at 2:34 am |
Best DX this weekend and low-power, low-profile RadioSport operators are game changers. You are spot on! I’m curious about your end fed long wire folded vertical. That is an antenna for the condo contest station as well.
73 & GL
Scot, KA3DRR
March 29, 2009 at 3:33 am |
Hi Scot,
Conditions are great this weekend….SO FAR at least…
I am using a 60 foot end fed long wire that runs up one side of a Maple tree in my back yard and goes over a branch then comes back down the other side of the tree. No problems with 10-80 using a tuner… In addition to this I have 2 40 foot counterpoises that go around the fence in my backyard. I live in a garden home in Ottawa and my back yard is only 20 feet by 20 feet with the maple tree smack in the center of the yard. No room to stretch out wire but I can use the tree. I am allowed antennas but everything must fit in the back yard and nothing obivious above roof height…
73bob
March 29, 2009 at 1:18 pm |
Good Morning.
I can construct the same type of antenna within available square footage as well. There is a flag mounting post on the second floor terrace that currently supports my mini flat top dipole. I feed the antenna with 450Ohm window line and it’s overall length is 50ft plus/minus. I have #14 AWG stranded wire for a random wire vertical. Are you feeding the vertical with 300Ohm window line?
Good luck through the weekend and best from the condo contest station.
73
Scot, KA3DRR
March 29, 2009 at 2:17 pm |
Hi Scot,
I have RG 58 coming out beside my dryer vent in the basement and that runs to an old Canadian Military antenna coupler. The brand name has long worn off it along with the model number. Its roughly the same size as a Yaesu FC40 (which I also use at times).
I connect the two counterpoises to the ground side of the coupler and the ground side also goes to a ground stake. This is brought into line using a LDG Auto tuner… I am not worried too much about the RG 58 coax as the line is only 25 feet long so the line loss is not an issue with me…
73bob