Painting to Propagation - A Colorful Weekend

Woke up to fresh snow this morning! 

I knew my weekend time for radio would be very limited. I'm still busy doing some projects at home and the paint brush and roller kept me focused on the big picture. I did however play a bit or radio. Bands still seem a bit rough these days. I had a bit of insomnia on Saturday morning and enjoyed a few European RTTY QSO's on 15 meters shortly after 1130z! My 100 watts was making it over the pond. I had spotted a European station on 15 meters and I received a twitter request from Marc, DO4DXA to try a RTTY QSO. Marc needed Alaska on 15 meters. Once I set up and was on frequency, I printed Marc with no problem! Marc and I made our contact and after Marc spotted me, a few others fell in behind him. 15 QSO's later, I headed back to bed for a few more hours of rest.

This past weekend was SKCC's Weekend Sprintathon (WES) I fired up the rig and straight key for a handful of contacts, balancing calling CQ and doing a bit of search & pounce. I found Sunday propagation to be extremely challenging so needless to say, I put much more paint on the walls of our living room than I put QSO's in my logbook. The highlight for me during the WES was being called by TF3DX who was mobile in Iceland! Villi had a great mobile signal into Alaska on 15 meters. I've operated from Iceland before and I love that country! I'm looking forward to a return trip someday. Seems I have this attraction to arctic environments. 

We woke up this morning to a fresh coating of snow. The weather has been pretty nice with some temperatures pushing 50 degrees this past weekend. Seeing snow this morning was a bit depressing as I'm hoping most of the winters accumulation melts from our yard in the next two weeks. We have lots of mud and water laying atop the ground at the moment so hopefully things will dry up soon. It's nice having nearly 24 hours of daylight right now. 

One of my recent Twitter posts

I'm a 10? Not Really, But I Did Rain RTTY All Over Europe This Morning on 15!

My rate...rates?

So, I happened to stumble across some pretty interesting information this afternoon regarding the 2012 CQ World Wide CW Contest. This page had Valery, R5GA's callsign all over it. He has a listing of stations within their classifications and claimed best 60 minute CW QSO rates. This appears to have been extracted from their submission files. Either way, this was extremely interesting to review.

Now mind you, I'm not a high speed CW operator. I've always dreamed of being able to mentally copy a long QSO at 40 wpm but, that will never happen. Not to make excuses but I think it boils down to how I first learned CW. I feel that if I had learned differently, my copy would be much better than it is 25+ years later. And it's not for lack of practice. I try to get on CW as often as possible and contest weekends are excellent practice! It's possible to work so many great DX stations but also increase your copy speed. I can be rusty on a Friday afternoon when a contest starts but if I try hard and stay focused, by Sunday, I'm ready for a 32 wpm QSO! Well, at least I feel that way. I like to refer to it as Contest Code Overload! It's like eating a bunch of chocolate or drinking several cups of leaded coffee. I'm ready for anything and bouncing off the walls. But as the contest ends, I will push myself away from the radio, exit the shack and take a long break before returning, even leaving the contest program running. I will rekindle my relationship with my wife, our beagle and the cat (well, actually my daughters cat that she forgot to take with her) who frequently visits over contest weekends. 

Anyhow, getting back on track...you can see my detailed break-out here. Or you can click on any of the callsigns on the "All time records" page and it will show you the individual best efforts. My effort apparently shows what a computer decided was worthy of 10th place for my single operator, low power entry. And when I look at the list of stations, there are some great operators! And it makes my key stick just thinking about being listed on the same page with them! Little ol me. 

Other Alaskan stations who are listed are KL2R, KL7RA and NL7G. Of the three, I've only personally operated with Larry, N1TX (at KL2R). I have the utmost respect for Larry as an operator and contester. I only wished I lived a bit closer as I would love to spend more weekends at KL2R and continuing learning from Larry. I've written in previous blog posts about the team at KL2R. A very skilled and focused group of operators, all of which I very much look up to. I've always wanted to head down to Rich, KL7RA's station (been invited) but that is a very long haul for me. I still hope to. Rich has also been very instrumental in helping me become a better operator with advice, suggestions and more. There is a group of contesters here throughout Alaska that I keep in touch via email and a few I have met personally. I feel I owe my wallpaper success stories to them all, as they accepted this "out of stater" and have never made me feel like a "lid." They've answered all my questions and I feel I can ask anything of them, no matter how silly I might think it might be. 

One of the neat things about today's modern technology is, even though I've only personally met about half of the contesters I correspond with, I've been able to gain lots of great advice and insight from them via email. What I'm trying to say is, even if you live in the sticks like we do, you can still reach out and get valuable information and get your questions answered. You just need to ask. I arrived to Alaska entirely as a Search & Pounce (S&P) contest operator / DX'er and I will depart a "Park & Bark", not afraid to dig in and call CQ kinda guy. There are lots of publications available as well, both printed and electronic that give some good advice. In the latest National Contest Journal (NCJ), an article written by Mike, VE3GFN caught my eye. The title read, "The Little Pistol Pages." Mike's focus is more from a small station perspective so I'm looking forward to future reads from Mike in NCJ publications. I have found NCJ a valuable magazine with many articles from many a skilled operator, sharing experiences and advice on how to take operating to the next level. Most of the major magazines (like QST and CQ) and some organizational magazines also get into explaining the ins and outs of operating. Yes, I know, contesting is not for everybody but if you love ham radio and are in any way competitive, a good contest weekend might be just the ticket. 

15 Meter RTTY Contacts this morning - 100 watts

I had a bit of insomnia this morning so I strolled into the shack and found some great European signals on 15 meters! Well, I decided to take advantage of being awake and I worked one station one RTTY then I moved up and called CQ. I was on from 1015z to 1145z and that 1.5 hours flew by! To the right is a graphic illustration of where my 100 watts rained down over points east of me. My RTTY signal seemed to be raining all over Europe! I love openings like that. The only thing that could of made it better was doing the very same thing but on 10 meters! A ham can dream, right? As tired as I am now I hope I don't have a repeat but if so, I can only hope the bands will be open like they were this morning. 

Beaming Over North Pole Twice for Europe And Later Finding I Took A Continent!

April 1st RTTY QSO's on 20 Meters from KL8DX to Europe

I had high hopes of actually working some of the CQ World Wide WPX SSB Contest this past weekend. Those plans were changed once the solar wind picked up and absorption whet through the roof. I tuned the high bands for a large part of the weekend and from Friday to Sunday morning, I did not hear much of anything. Sunday morning the bands started to come back to life but it was short lived. By Sunday afternoon, I went from hearing some stations to hearing none. I knew my 100 watts would not make it out of the state of Alaska. I'm not much into SSB contests anyhow but compounded with the poor conditions, it was not hard for me to focus my attention on other things. I've worked tough contest weekends before but this one was a bust, from my location at least. Some of the other Alaskan efforts I've seen posted are a small fraction of what those stations normally work. I sadly flew the white flag of defeat for this contest.

In speaking of the WPX contest, there was a small window where I was hearing a few West Coast stations but those signals were not very strong and were accompanied by lots of QSB. One of the highlights for me was listening to 9 year old Emma, the daughter of Andreas, KU7T. I always enjoy listening to the "younger crowd" and Emma was doing a fantastic job! I listened to her for approximately 10 minutes and she sounded like a seasoned contester. She was CQ'n and picked up a few stations during my presence on the frequency. I only wish the band had been a bit better for me to be able to QSO with Emma. Maybe next time! I hope Emma enjoyed the contest and I sure hope to hear her voice again on the radio. We need to do what we can to encourage  younger generations to get involved with our hobby.  Awesome job, Emma! Keep up the good work!

2012 ARRL DX CW results for ARS KL8DX

The graph at the top of the blog gives a graphic illustration of my 20 meter RTTY contacts this morning. I had my antenna fixed to the lower 48 but was hearing some European stations. I saw it was about Greyline for that part of the world and I noticed TF3IG/2 had been spotted on the DX Cluster. I turned my beam and found TF3IG with a respectable signal into Alaska. I went from decoding him on my rig to firing up MMTTY and working Ingi. I had a few stations call me after I worked Ingi (it was his frequency) so I QSY'd up a few and called CQ beaming Europe. I was surprised to find a handful of stations coming back to me. One thing led to another and I eventually had enough stations calling me that I needed to work split. Sadly, I had to shut down, even with stations calling, but I enjoyed the short burst of activity. I worked the band for nearly 1.5 hours.

We made our weekly trip to the Post Office and a large white envelope found a home in our Post Office Box. It was from the American Radio Relay League (ARRL) and my wife was sure it was more wallpaper. When we arrived home, like a kid on Christmas morning, I opened it first. The certificate above is what I found in the envelope. I really like the new design and it has already found itself in a frame and will be hung on the wall tonight. What I'm most excited about is NO SCORE REDUCTION! Yea, I was just shouting out loud. If you look at the score on my certificate and the score on my 3830 submission, they are both the same. I strive for the "Golden Log" with each submission but I rarely get it. Practice makes perfect and I will continue to attempt to "get it right the first time." The other neat part of this certificate is being a "Continental Winner." That just takes this wallpaper up a notch. I've been lucky enough to do this two years in a row. Anyhow, I went into the archives and pulled up my 3830 submission and it's listed below. 

ARRL DX Contest, CW

Call: KL8DX
Operator(s): KL8DX
Station: KL8DX

Class: SOSB/20 LP
QTH: Alaska
Operating Time (hrs): 17.75

Summary:
Band  QSOs  Mults
-------------------
  160:          
  80:          
  40:          
  20:  828    57
  15:          
  10:          
-------------------
Total:  828    57  Total Score = 141,588

Club: North Coast Contesters

Comments:

I started out on 15 meters but needed to move to 20 due to line
noise in the direction of the lower 48. The aurora on Saturday
evening ended my daily effort but led to some beautiful displays
overhead. Sunday, things were slow in coming back but finally 
propagation got a bit better during the last 3 or 4 hours of the
contest. I had several DX stations call me over the weekend 
probably not knowing we were DX in this contest and not a state.

A more detailed breakout of my effort can be found on my blog. 
Thanks for the QSO's and patience! Contacts will be uploaded to
LOTW today. 

73,
Phil - KL8DX
Denali National Park, AK

For my signal to make it to Europe, it has to cross over North Pole not only once, but twice!  This is the secret to some of my European success stories I'm sure. The double North Pole crossings actually lead to an increase of signal strength by at least 2dB. Even though my amplifier has bit the dust, I realized quickly that I really do not need it. My shack might be a few degrees cooler but my electric bill has dropped significantly. And my European path is, and always will be, my secret weapon during contest weekends, due in part to my double North Pole crossing. 

As we enjoy this first day of April, my thoughts can only be on spring. By next month, I will be planning our camping trips and hitting the campgrounds early. As I mentioned in earlier blogs, I feel that 2013 may send us on some new adventures. We are looking forward to our favorite campground outside of North Pole opening up for the summer. Even though my blog may have a bit of an April 1st twist, it just so happens that the "other" North Pole has a Zip Code of 99705. It actually does not increase my signal strength by 2dB, but I point my HF beam that way for a large part of the winter and I camp there during several weekends throughout the summer. I love camping and I love radio and to combine the two, well that just better than...

Dabbled in the Diddle and then Hit the Club!

WAE RTTY Contest - 2012

This past weekend was the WAE DX RTTY Contest. Another popular contest for this past weekend was the Japan International DX Contest. These obviously were not the only contest activities planned for this past weekend but both normally yield lots of activity world wide. The JIDX Contest was a SSB or voice contest and when I flipped the contesting coin on Friday to determine which contest I was going to operate in, of course, the RTTY contest won.

WAE RTTY Contest Breakdown

It was another busy weekend around our house so I did not have lots of time to dedicate to working the contest. No matter how busy the schedule, if I'm at home, I will always try to squeeze in a few hours anyhow. This weekend was no exception. I wanted to focus again on 10 meters with a side of 15 meters for the bulk of my activity. I know that I'm still missing Hawaii, South Dakota and Maine for my RTTY Worked All States (WAS) on 10 meters. I was hoping to once again attempt to snag those last needed states which upload to LOTW. I'm hoping to wrap that WAS band/mode up this winter. I have worked and confirmed all 50 States on 15 meter RTTY so I'm good there.

The band conditions were pretty fair. Lots of QSB on 10 meters in my neck of the woods. With some of the longer exchanges, that led to me asking for repeats, especially on Sunday. I think Saturday was much better, propagationally speaking. I did encounter a few problems with my older version of N1MM when it came to accepting QTC's from a few stations. The DX station was sending QTC's to me, which in the Ham Radio world references the passing of traffic, such as telegrams. I had specific problems with RA7A and RQ5D as N1MM kept telling me those exchanges were bad. I ended up having to save those QSO's with a temporary callsign and then go back and edit with the correct. Back in the day, (and still used today, even with modern technology) passing of messages was very popular.  QTC's are made up of receiving or sending already completed contacts from ones contest logbook. A successful QTC exchange would be me sending or receiving a previous contact consisting of the time of that contact, the callsign of the station worked and the serial number of that contact. 

For years I avoided the QTC exchange and little did I realize until a few years ago, how easy modern contest software makes exchanging QTC information. I only use N1MM for digital contests but the program is pretty darn smart. You can exchange QTC's with those outside of your continent. It's smart enough to know if I attempt to exchange QTC's with another station, let's say in North America, it would not even allow me to pull up the QTC screen. But, if I wanted to send or receive QTC's from anyone else, a simple use of CTL-Z brings up the QTC receive screen and another click of those same keys brings up the QTC send screen. If one was receiving QTC's, all you need to do is click on the received lines and the information is automatically populated into the log. If there is an error, the program will more than likely let you know this as well and even tell you which lines to repeat. That's a simple explanation but trust me, it's pretty easy and sure adds to the points score. For that which I used to avoid, I now embrace. :0)

Club Log 

 Inspired by Larry, N1TX who has used Club Log for several years, I had decided to give it a try. I must say, I'm once again impressed with hams and their software. Club Log allows an account holder to upload their log and will make available a very nice search feature so others can see if they are in your logbook. There is also some great statistical data available to you, once you upload your logbook. I found that HRD (Ham Radio Deluxe) had incorrectly populated the wrong entity into a handful of my contacts and Club Log identified those and sent me an email telling me! Anyhow, Club Log is my new best friend. If you have not tried it, I could recommend it. 

As we have several inches of snow on the ground and have dipped well below zero on temperatures recently, I have a new source of QRN that has reared it's ugly head. My noise blanker does work in limiting electrical interference  I'm hearing but at least with my Icom, using a NB during a crowded CW contest leads to more "splatter" and reduces the efficiency of the CW filters, making it harder to copy weaker stations. So, I guess it's time to drag my trusty portable AM radio outdoors and take a walk. With the BIG contest looming beginning on the 23rd (actually 24th in UTC time) of November, this is one thing I would like to find and resolve. Our electric company (GVEA) has been awesome to work with regarding power line noise. 

It's heard to believe the holiday season is upon us! I'm not sure where this year went and time sure does feel like it goes faster the older I get. I have CQ World Wide CW and the ARRL 10 Meter Contest in my sights! December involves the first day of winter and our shortest day, yielding approximately 5 hours or less of daylight. Our temperatures will be dropping well below zero and staying there, except during the occasional Chinook that blows through. Ham Radio is my savior when it comes to mentally surviving Alaskan winters. I enjoy contest season almost as much as the summer season here in Alaska. Almost... 

Penetrox & Smoked

If you have been following my blog, I have mentioned that I began experiencing some problems with high SWR after a RTTY contest last year. I looked at some supporting documentation available from Mosley that helped me narrow down the issue to 15 meters. Each trap consists of two coils, with the inner trap catching 10 meters (band is still flat across the board), the second coil traps 15 (SWR off the scale) and 20 as it turns out, is a summation of the element (about 4.0 to 1 SWR in the SSB portion). Keeping that in mind, I knew I had to drop my beam and start pulling traps off of my elements to see which was producing my problem. Alaska has been seeing some pretty warm weather here due to a SE wind pattern so I took advantage to drop my driven element off of the boom to dive into the traps. I accomplished this yesterday and today I pulled the element apart.

If you have never used Penetrox, I would highly suggest it. One of my long time friends and one of the hams that helped me get my start into this hobby  suggested Penetrox. I have been using it ever since. When placed on connecting parts, it helps prevent oxidation without effecting the electrical characteristics of your antenna. I have had my beam up for several years now and when I pulled a piece of the driven element out of the trap, I found it to be in the same shape as it had been when I put it together a few years ago (see photo above). I will not build an antenna without this stuff!

 

I proceeded to pull the traps off of the driven element and I found that the Penetrox did an outstanding job there as well. In the photo above, I just wiped off the excess (bottom trap in the photo) and it shines like the day I assembled this beam.  Now, keep in mind, I used this beam for several years when I lived in Ohio. It operated there, made the trip to Alaska, and has taken a beating with extreme weather we experience here. I'm happy to say, with continued preventative maintenance, this beam will probably outlast me.

As I tore into the one of the traps on the driven element, I could detect an odor that pretty much confirmed my suspicions. I also had a bit of difficulty getting the trap apart on one end. As I was finally able to muscle the inner workings of the trap from the housing, I found the following damage showing

what happened during the RTTY contest I had been operating. I happened to make my best score yet in a RTTY contest but success came at a cost.

 When I pulled both traps apart, I found only one had this extensive damage. I wonder what my chances are of having the problem in only one trap? I won't be able to tell until I either inspect each trap individually or repair this one and put it back on checking the SWR curve with my beam to see. The other issue is, the insulator is riveted onto the tube (as seen in the photo above). So, it seems I will be touching base with Mosely looking for parts. If I wanted to get replacement traps from Mosely, they quoted me a price of $478.60 for this beam. Thankfully, replacement coils only run $39.50 each!  Living on a tight winter budget, you can sure guess which parts I will be ordering!

I would purchase another Mosley antenna in a heartbeat! It has done well but even the best antenna's have their breaking points. This beam has survived extreme cold, high wind gusts over 70 mph, ice, and more. In the end, it was RTTY at high power that did it in. You need to know the limits of your equipment. From the Mosley website, the following graphic below describes the limitations of the Mosley TA-34-XL antenna which I should have paid a bit more attention to prior to banging out a RTTY contest on legal limit high power all weekend long. I am proud to say, the beam did not fail until many hours of high power RTTY operating (actually, the last few hours). I can't see myself owning any other manufactured antenna during my ham career.

 

So, I can only hope that I can repair this trap and get it back in operation before the extreme cold and snow arrives. If not, I can always print this photo and keep it close as a grim reminder of what happens when you ask more from your equipment than it can take. My Ameritron AL-1500 might be enjoying the rest but I'm sure not enjoying the lack of activity. If I don't get this beam fixed, I may have to take up a new hobby for the winter as my 5BTV just ain't the same even though it's a good antenna.