Its cold so I’m dreaming of Field Day

Yes that’s right…

In only 142 days from now (and a few hours) we will all be swatting mosquitoes and dodging raindrops while we call CQ Field Day CQ…

The big reason for this post today is that I just wanted to think warm for a bit because its a really cold day in Ottawa and since the good Doctor put me on blood thinners a few years ago I really don’t like the cold….  On the plus side of things though I don’t find the heat so hard to handle any more so there might be a positive thing about getting older…  So far that’s the only one I have found worth bragging about though…

Above left Yaesu FT817 and Above Right Elecraft Kx3

As you know I already own (and love) my FT817 and I am thinking of getting an Elecraft KX3 later in the spring (unless something else new and shiny catches my attention)

This year my Field Day will be a back to the basics style event…  My QRP Radio ( FT 817 or whatever might replace it) ) with the battery pack and a solar panel and a couple of antennas will be set up in what i believe is a good location and I will be operating from start to dark….  pack up and head home…. then back again at first light and go to the end…    Operate for as much or as little I want to and HAVE FUN….

Looking back over the last 5 years that this blog has been around,  I think the two things I have really stressed have been:  “that it has to be fun….”  along with  “that Radio can be an outdoor sport…”

Field Day is just one example of the above statement…

However this weekend there is the BC QSO Party and (I think) the Arizona Scorpions have the FYBO….

I say “I think” as the scorpions run an excellent contest but their website is not updated so….  I have seen various snippets of info that the contest is going as usual…  The rules can be found here….  but the website is slightly behind the times…. But if you give a listen on the usual QRP Waterholes you should hear the usual group …  Don’t forget to check the SSB Portions of the bands as more and more people are finally finding out that you can make lots of contacts with QRP SSB…

Anyway get on the air and have some fun this weekend

73bob

Saturday in Mer Bleue Swamp

Now isn’t that an inviting title….  Saturday in the Swamp….  Sounds like a Redneck love song…

Anyway the Mer Blue Swamp is a conservation area in Ottawa’s South East Area and its fairly close to my QTH…  Easy to get to and the area is really under used so we normally have no issues setting up for a while…

Around 1300 edst VA3PCJ picked me up at home and we headed over to set up our gear…  I brought my FT 817 along with my Buddistick antenna…  Small Profile and easy to use…

And Jose VA3PCJ brought his IC 703 and decided to test out his home brewed 15m-40m magloop

And we enjoyed the great weather and the “average” band conditions…  It was not really a QRP day but there were some great contesters out there who managed to pull out some QRP signals out of the pile ups and they were:

20M _____K0N

40M_____WT8C

EQSL is really fast…

40M_____NB8I

20-M_____N0S

20M_____W0E

20M_____N0N

All of the contacts today were courtesy of the Ohio QSO Party and the Kansas QSO Party and believe me it was hard slugging to get the 6 contacts that I did.  We were at the park from around 1330 to about 1600 and I only got 6 stations in the log and all of them were CQing contest.

If you look at it another way….  My little QRP station managed to break 6 pile ups…. 

But we won’t talk about the ones I missed…

Anyway after a little after 1600 eastern time both Jose and myself heard some strange noise in the background…  We listened carefully and decided that it was the sound of a Cold Beer calling us from an air conditioned establishement and so we packed up and headed over to a local watering hole and relaxed…

All in all it was a great afternoon…  Wish you had been there…

73bob

Saturday at the Sand Point Light

On Saturday am Jose VA3PCJ and myself left Ottawa and headed west on Hwy 417 towards Arnprior Ontario where we had a breakfast stop at Mama Rosa’s Restaurant in Arnprior. (Thats the “B” on the map)… The food was fantastic…(highly recomended) and from there headed west on Renfrew County Road 1 towards Braeside-McNabb Township and the community of Sand Point.

View Larger Map

.

The plan was for us to acticvate the Sand Point Lighthouse on the Wharf at Sand Point for the Internationial Lightship/Lighthouse Weekend.  The Sand Point Light is known to the ILLW as CA0034.

.

.

We arrived around 11am edst at the Lighthouse and were operational and flooding the airwaves with RF.  Jose was using his ICOM IC 703 with his S9 43 foot vertical which was attached to the trailer hitch on his Jeep (we were allowed to drive onto the Wharf).

I was using my FT 817 along with my Par End Fed Antenna(QRP Version 10-20-40m)  supported by a 31 foot MFJ Telescopic flimsy fishing style pole support. ( Gosh Darn they work great for lightweight antennas) which I had bungee corded to an attachment on the edge of the wharf…

Although the S9 would load up on 80 m it was not a good day for 80m but we did manage contacts on 15m, 17m, 20m and 40m.  I have to admit that the S9 liked 15 and 17m but I made lots of contacts on 20m and 40m with the Par end Fed.

I managed contacts with the following Lighthouses/Lightships in the event

W9CQO- Port Washington Light- US0114- (20m)

W6A- Port of LA- US0031 (20m)

Nw8S- Loraine Harbor Light US0143 (40m)

K2USA- Sandy Hook Light- US0035 (40m)

KC2RA – Coney Island NY Light- US0091 (40m)

W2T- Tukerton NJ Light- US0911 (40m)

N2CMC- Cape May Light- US0011 (40m)

W4LX- Gasporilla Light- US0004  (20m)

W1NLS- Lightship in Boston Harbor- US0102 (40m)

W9LYA- Grosse Point Light- US0021 (20m)

KC2YYL- Ft. Niagara Light- US-0294 (40m)

W2GSB- Fire Island Light- US0019 (40m)

And then the following contacts were made with non Lighthouse stations…

N8AD- Pennsilvania, K7RL- Washington St, W9IMS- Indianna, K5LLA- Texas, W6TK- California, K7LUH- Montanna, VO1KVT- Newfoundland.

From East (VO1) to West (K7) using 5w ssb with a vertical… WOW!

By my count thats 12 Lighthouse/Lightships and 7 other stations…  19 contacts made by a QRP/Portable station using SSB only is not too shabby in my opinion.

Also this is my log only…  I’m not sure what VA3PCJ rustled up and I know he was making  contacts as well and as his antenna liked 15 and 17m I am eager to see what he got in the log…  Also he was also taking some pictures which I will be sharing with you once I see copies of them…

If the Lighthouses had anything updated on their QRZ Pages or their club websites I included the link to them…  If it was not updated then…  no point…

Shortly after 4pm (1600edst) or 2000utc we noticed that the wind was picking up and the batteries were getting weak so it was the perfect set of circumstances to convince us it was time to tear down and pack up…  Shortly after that we heading the Jeep east towards Ottawa and ended up at a local watering hole for a feast of Pizza and a cold beer to celebrate what I would have to say was our  most successfull activation of a lighthouse ever….  We were both pleased.  From what I can remember from Jose telling me …  He was around 10 contacts so that would put us close to 30 for the event…  Fantastic…

I really want to thank the community of Sand Point as well…  A few of the locals came over to see what the large fishing rods (not in the water) were all about and had a chat with us…  We were welcomed and appreciated…  They kind of thought it was neat that someone would come around and use the light for radio…  They brought back their friends and neighbors so we got to demonstrate amateur radio to some non amateurs and they had something to talk about…  It was a fair trade…  We were invited back for the next event…  Its nice to be wanted and I hope we can return…  Some of the local community leaders exchanged contact information with Jose and we hope we can stay in touch till the next event…

73bob

The DX Deity is not smiling on me today

Today could be one of those days…

I log into the cluster and see DX…  I tune to the frequency….  I hear lots of stations working the DX including some with callsigns that indicate that they are within 500 miles of me and I hear NADA…  NOTHING…. etc….

I guess that this is one of those times that a beam could help as compared to the vertical…  But then the beam would not fit and if it might fit it would not rotate so…

I guess those are the breaks…

Now the weather is fantastic… hot…. and not raining so….  even without DX its a great day…   If there was some better conditions I might get outside with the FT817 and do the fresh air thing at the same time as the radio thing but…

I guess those are the breaks…

But talking about Portable Ops for a minute…. 

 Now that the KX3′s are being delivered are you noticing any new QRP/p style rigs being listed up for sale on your local swap lists???  I am figuring that very soon portable antennas will be a hot commodity as the new KX3 owners will be keeping they antennas and all the people who snapped up the FT 817s and the IC703s will be looking for Buddipoles, Buddisticks and other such antennas to play with their new toys…

Just a reminder to those of you who are new to QRP/portable ops….  YOU NEED A GOOD ANTENNA ….

I have seen lots of operators get depressed with their new QRP rigs because they did not research their antennas properly…  Some people go with a good antenna but it takes them too long to get it installed….  Others go with a poor antenna that made impressive claims about performance and now they have a dummy load…

I have had great success with various versions of End Fed Antennas (EFHW on 10-40 and W3EDP on 10 to 80) and think they are fantastic.

When the trees don’t cooperate I also use a Buddistick vertical and that has worked great for me as well…

Above Buddipole antenna

Above Buddistick vertical antenna

Recently I have tried a 33 foot vertical (4:1 balun, and radials) and it worked better than I had expected on 10m to 40m.  If you do a google search for 33 foot S9 Antenna you will see what I am talking about

Especially for the QRP operations you have to have a good antenna…  You can make lots of  contacts with QRP but you need a good antenna and an efficient feedline…

And you will have fun…

73bob

Friday Apr 13th at Brewer Park

If there had not been a couple of Hockey Games on the Telvision last Nite I might of gotten this posted last nite so the delay we can blame on the CBC and TSN.  I am not a real big hockey fan anymore (even with the Senators being in Ottawa) but I do get carried away with the game once the playoff start and last night there were 3 games I was able to watch…

Anyway…  Back to Radio…

Friday afternoon Jose VA3PCJ and myself headed over to Brewer Park and tested out a couple of setups ee are planning to use this coming Saturday (thats  a week today) when we (along with a few others) head up to the old Foymount —Cold War— Radar Base, setting up at the top and playing radio for a few hours and give out lots of contacts in the Ontario QSO Party.

We even had a visitor as Chris VA3CME walked over from his QTH and spent some time with us.  I had not seen Chris since the September 2011 Ottawa Amateur Radio Club  Portable Station Demonstration  where he took an excellent Video of the event.  It was good to see him and have a chat again… In a previous life Chris used to make really good videos and it shows with the one from the park…Check out the following:

Check out the video around the 3:05 mark for some equipment you have seen and heard of before…

I took my Yaesu FT 817/LDG QRP Autotuner with my homebrewed W3EDP Antenna and Jose brought his ICOM IC 703 and his Jeep mounted S9 43 foot vertical along with two different ununs to feed the antenna with.  The first one was a commercal 4:1 unun and the second was a home brewed 9:1 unun.  As far as loading up the antenna with the 703′s built in Tuner went the 9:1 was the victor  with the system able to load up on 10m to 160m (not sure how good it would of worked on 160 but at least it loaded up)…

Another inovation Jose wanted to test was hooking the ununs directly to the back of the IC703 (like we saw in the video a few days back) so ther was no line loss.

The wires of the S9 ran directly to the unun and as he has a built in tuner on the 703 there was no coax to get lossy..  Although it does limit where you can operate from and we did discuss how we would not want to operate from so close to the antenna if we were running 100w I feel that its acceptable for a QRP SSB signal that might be at a 5w output on the peaks…

However at my end testing the W3EDP brought some interesting comparisons that were to be expected….  The antenna performed faily well on the lower bands compard to the S9.  40m signal reports were very close and 80m noise levels seemed the same.  On the higher bands the 43 foot vertical beat the Horizontal W3EDP hands down.

In the past the PAR QRP end fed in an almost vertial configuration (slight sloper) has performed just as well on 10m to 40 as the S9.  Seeing that we are not going to be operating at Foymount overnight (Just from the start of the contest till the sun goes down) I am concidering taking the PAR instead of the W3EDP for the trip…  Looks like I will be doing more testing before we leave (WX Permitting) on Saturday am

On to the weekend stuff….

Liz has hinted that I should be doing a little yard work this weekend.  I started the yardwork a few weeks ago when we had that very early heatwave then promptly lost interest when the tempetures returned to the more seasonal levels.  But now she wants the back yard cleaned up and it going to be easier if I do it as I won’t rake up the radials for the S9 that I did not  bury last fall when I installed it…  If she does the raking I will have to reinstall all the radial and then bury them so its easier just to rake carefully and then cover the radials with a slight covering of dirt and grass seed…  Other than that and a family BBQ there are no real events planned for the weekend.

With the usual weather permitting thoughts VA3PCJ and I might return to Brewer Park for the 80m Pothole Net on Sunday am… But being fair weather hams I don’t see us setting up in the rain…

I would also like to (as always check the cluster)  and try and get the DXCC count to rise.  It seems to happen in spurts though…  I sat the longest time at 124 and then in two day manged to get up to 127 where we have sat for 2 days…

The confirmed total on EQSL is sitting at 50 (and any of the Direct/Buro Cards I have are not for anything I have not got an EQSL for) so I am sitting at 50 confimred…  (And for those of you who are purists…  Yes I know that the ARRL DXCC Desk does not accept EQSLs.  But for a casural operator who has not fully gotten bitten by the DX bug it works great to keep count.  See my following comments about LoTW) For a while I have been procastinating about getting my account opened on Logbook of the World (LoTW) so I guess I should get off my duff and get the account up and running so I can u/l my log and see how I’m actually going.

The weather for Saturday if supposed to be good and they are saying that we might (in Ottawa) get wet on Sunday…  Perhaps I’ll meet you on the air over the weekend.  It fairly easy to find me though….

If you check on the right side of your screen you will see “VA3QV Links”  If you click on either the “VA3QV on line Log” or the “VA3QV on QRZ” and look around on the page you will see just above my log a little graphic that will say something like VA3QV is on the air and give the frequency”…  If you think we are within propagation range why not give me a shout…????

More later on how the weekend is progressing

73bob

Evening DX

Over the last few days I have had some good luck in the evenings working some DX…  Tonight I managed  YV5Z and YV1BYM from Venezuela along with Zs3D in South Africa and last but not least VP2MYZ from the Buddipole DXPediton on Montserrat.  I think there are 6 operators on the Buddipole event on Montserrat and so far I have 3 of them in the log.

South Africa was worked on 40m and the other 3 contacts were on 20m.. 

If you follow THIS LINK  you can see my most recent contact from my online logbook…

Talking about DXPeditons for a minute though…

The pieces are coming together and it looks like there will be 4 operators (could be more) heading from Ottawa to operate the Ontario QSO Party Saturday session from Renfrew County .  VA3PCJ, VA3QV, VA3SIE and VA3EpR will be heading out of Ottawa on Saturday April 21st to set up 4 QRP Stations at the top of Foymount Mountain…  Its a good mix with 2 cw operators (Martin and Tom) with Jose and myself operating SSB.  We will have two FT 817s along with an IC 703 and with a little bit of luck a brand new KX3 ( if Martin’s new toy gets delivered in time)…

Between the four of us we plan to operate 2m, 6m and the HF Bands from the start of the contest till the sun goes down and the temps drop…  Hoping to give out lots of contacts…

There will be more posted on this in the coming week….

CU tomorrow

73bob

 

Some info from Industry Canada on the 60m “Developmental” Band

After last weeks announcement and subsequent RAC Bulletin on the topic I sent an email out to Industry Canada asking them for the correct information on the topic.

Today in my inbox came the following:

——

Good  afternoon Mr. Sharp:

Thank you for your query regarding the  licensing of Developmental Radio Stations utilizing frequencies within the 60  metre radio frequency band in Canada.

In the near future Industry Canada will  be publishing a consultation paper on the opening of the 60 metre band for use  by the Canadian Amateur Radio Service.

Favourable responses to the  consultation would allow radio amateurs access to 5 specific frequencies within  the band with specific emissions designators and power levels on a secondary, no  protection, non-interference basis. This would be in line with what US amateurs  currently have access to.

At this time, the Department is  accepting applications for the use of these frequencies under the authority of a  Developmental Radio Licence. Applicants are required to submit an application  and to pay licensing fees in accordance with the Radiocommunication  Regulations.

An Amateur Radio Operator holding the  Basic + (with Honours) or the Advanced Certificate will be eligible for  licensing on these frequencies.

Application may be made by means of the  Industry Canada form, IC-2365, (Application for Licence to Install and Operate a  Radio Station in Canada) accompanied by form IC-2430, (Radiocommunication and  Broadcasting Antenna Systems Attestation) available at our website at, http://www.ic.gc.ca/eic/site/smt-gst.nsf/eng/h_sf01700.html#radiocom

The application must  include, the NAD 83 Coordinates and the street address of the proposed station.  The current licensing fee for the month of April is $52.80. (This fee is  pro-rated based on the month that the station is authorized within a given  year.) Immediate payment may be made by telephone by means of VISA or  MASTERCARD.

Authority will be on a non-interference  and no-protection basis and shall not cause interference to the fixed and mobile  operations domestically or of other administrations and if such interference  occurs, the operator may be required to cease operations.

The developmental authority will  be restricted to the use of 5 specific frequencies with no antenna or height  restrictions.

The operating frequencies will be:  5.332 5.348 5.3585 5.373 5.405 (MHz)

Authority will be subject to the  following conditions:

- Transmissions must not exceed an  effective radiated power of 100 Watts (PEP)

- Transmissions shall be restricted to  the following emission modes and designations: 2K80JE3, 2K80J2D, 60H0J2B and  150HA1A

- Transmissions shall not occupy more  than 2.8 kHz (centered on each frequency)

- Operators shall not cause  interference to fixed and mobile operations domestically or of other  administrations

(if such interference occurs, the  operator may be required to cease operations.)

- Operators may not claim protection  from interference by fixed and mobile operations domestically or of other  administrations

- The authority may be withdrawn at any  time by the Department

Applications may be submitted to your  local district office which is at spectrum.ottawa@ic.gc.ca.

Regards,

Sylvia  Lamarche

Amateur Radio Service Centre | Centre de service pour la radio  amateur Spectrum  Management Operations Branch | Direction général des opérations de la gestion du  spectre Industry  Canada | Industrie Canada

——–

So there you have it….  Quick and easy and to the point…  Spelled out so easily that even I understand it…

If you want the operating privs and you meet the requirement (current Canadian HF Privs) then you can apply for the Developmental License to operate on 60m.  Eventually we all will be allowed there but if you want to get a head start you know what to do…

In my case my FT450 and FT897 need to get the frequencies programmed in as their 60m freqs are from before the USA changed the allotment.  I understand there is a fix coming soon from Yaesu.  My FT817 was the orignal version and does not come with 60m other than the Alaska Emergency Frequency so I don’t see any 60m portable work happening till I get a new radio.  However with everyone flogging their portable rigs to get the $$$ for a KX3 perhaps it might be sooner than later for me…

73bob

 

Announcing the Yaesu FT 818???

This morning I saw this picture on a blog but it had no real story to go with it…  It peaked my curiosity along with a feeling in the back of my mind that something was not right….

Heres the pic and then we can talk about it after…

 Here it its… The Yaesu FT818

When I first say this I was wondering about it because there was a splash of colour (color if your American) on the face of the rig and a lot of colour on the display…  and it got me thinking…

First of all the FT818 looks a whole bunch like a FT817 with a simple splash of color in a couple of places…

Now if you think about it for a second why would a quality company like Yaesu who made a great radio for portable use suddenly replace the model with a radio that had a colour display that would use more power…  This makes no sense….

And while we are debunking the rumour (rumor if your an American) why would Yaesu not be releasing this at Dayton in a month from now rather than on the internet…  This also makes more sense…

But something seemed out of place with the radio… almost like I had seen it before…

Take a close look at thie IC 7000,  does the display look like something you have seen before?

What someone has done is “Photoshop” the display from an IC 7000 onto the face of a FT817… 

APRIL FOOLS …

so to speak..

Now its a good job and it could get us thinking or dreaming about a new radio…

So this morning while we are dreaming for an updated version lets look a what we would like.  I have been using my FT817 for a long time now and my wishes would be:

**220 mhz SSB for that extra band when out on a DXPediton or as a hilltopper in a VHF Contest 

**Perhaps some sort of built in PSK Modem

**Perhaps a larger display as my eyes are not as good as they used to be

And if there was a way to give us a DSP on the IF section (like my FT 450) I would really be pleased…

And if anyone from Yaesu is reading this (and I know sometimes they do) I offer my services as a tester of this new radio…  Now I’m not sure if this is the first offer you got about this but it could/might be the first made in a public forum…

With the current station including a FT450, FT897, FT 817 FT2900, FT2400, FT60, VX5, VX8gr, FC40 and a VX1 it proves that I know quality equipment and am qualified to review if there is a new radio coming along…

Just wanted to offer my services…

So just to rehash it folks…  its a great idea but as far as I can tell…  Its a joke… A good joke… But a joke…

73bob

At least its dry…

Wednesdays snow has finally melted…  Just a few snowbanks (where the plows deposited the parking lot snow) and they seem to be departing very quickly…  The forcast (best guess) for today  is overcast with temps around 7 deg C (thats 45 deg F in American) .  The key part of the forcast however is they think its going to be dry and above freezing…  Seeing that we are not going to get many more days this year where I can walk to the park and set up to play radio without the need for a Parka and Mukluks (warm style of winter boots) I am getting the urge to charge up the battery on the FT817 and head out around noon to stretch the Par End Fed QRP Multiband antenna from a tree branch and take advantage of the good band conditions and the above average weather conditons.

I’ll do some listening from home before I plan to leave and if the bands seem open and the weather is still cooperating I think a walk to Starbucks with a walk to Weston Park right after could the activity of the day… 

73bob

SOTA – VE2/OU-014 – In the Log!

Well this morning was  a treat…  If you remember I was going to try and contact VA3SIE, VA2EPR and VE3EMB as they were heading up to the Blue Sea Lake area of QC ( bout 100k north of Ottawa) and activate Mount Morrisette which is known by its SOTA Tag as  VE2/OU-014 .

I was fortunate to hear the FT817 of VA2EPR on 144.250 and also on 50.125 (no luck on HF but then they were only 100k north of me) which gave me contact with my 2nd Quebec Summit and also as it turns out a new square on both bands as I did not have FN16 in my log previously.  Tom was using his FT817 with the Arrow Dual Band Beam for 2m and a Dipole for 6m and as we all should know the FT817 has an output of 5w.  At my end I was using a 2m loop and a 6m loop with my FT897 giving me an output of 50w on 2m and 100w on 6m.  The loops at home were just above roof height (aprox 25 feet) and fed with lossy RG58 coax.

After working the vhf side of things I did follow them on QRPSPOTS and SOTAWATCH but was unable to hear even anyone working them on 20 and 40m.   But we did have that solar flare that might of messed things up a bit or just perhaps we were too close…

I’ve got time for a little more radio before I start the tear down so I am hoping for good conditions…

73bob