LX-DXpedition on the air until 9/6

A group from the Low Land DXpedition Team are active in Luxembourg from Aug 30th through Sept 6th. I just worked LX/PA3EWP Ron on the LX-DXpedition, on 10.142.93 mhz 30m RTTY. It was an easy work with 50 watts into a non-resonant 40m sloper & tuner. They're on several bands and modes for the next few days, so it'll be fun trying to work them. They're using a new logging system powered by the CQFriends webserver.

Update: DX 10.104.04 LX/PA3EWP CW @ 2:02Z on 9/3/11. Nice sig into NC! Easy w/50w on 40m sloper & tuner

Update 2: DX 18083.04 LX/PA7FM . Worked on 80m Dipole w/tuner. Need to put up WARC antennas!

You can find out more about this DXpedition at www.CQFriends.com . See you on the bands!

Dave WB4IUY
www.WB4IUY.net

The CFARS FREE Hamfest was Saturday, 7/6/11

The CFARS hamfest was Saturday, Aug 6th, in Fayetteville NC. There was no admission charge and no fee for tables. Tailgating is permitted, if you could take the heat. Their website is http://www.CFARSNC.org.

There was a test session on site, walk-in's were accepted, and you needed to be there at 9am (testing at 9:30). If you were selling, you could get in as early as 6:30 am to set up. General admission was from 8am until 12-noon.

The site was in the Reeves Auditorium on the campus of the Methodist University, Hwy 401 North (5400 Ramsey Street, Fayetteville). The test session was in the Science building (look for the building with the tall tower behind Reeves Auditorium).

My oldest son, Chris KF4DBX, and I got up at 4am, pulled out at 4:30am, and headed that way. It was only about 65 miles from my home location. The raind was coming down so hard I could barely see the lines on the hiway, and I was worried about unloading at the site. We stopped along the way for breakfast, and headed onward. By the time we arrived, and weather had cleard and all was well. The swapmeet area was air conditioned, as was the test session site. Chris upgraded his call to General class, we sold a bit of goodies, picked up some goodies, and had a great time. We're ooking forward to next year, already!

There are a few pics on my facebook page HERE .

Dave WB4IUY
www.WB4IUY.net

APRS Keyboard QSOs, where did they go?

Many years ago (around 1995 or so), in a land not too far away (Zebulon NC), Jay KQ4MS and I put up the first APRS node east of Charlotte. At that time, we were cut off from the outside world, and used it for our own local keyboard chatting. From time to time, we would have band openings, and could work guys out in the western parts of NC and into Virginia. It was a lot of fun! Some of us had trackers and could see each other moving about, but for the most part we had daily communications via APRS.



The clock spun ahead, and other nodes began to appear on the map. It was awesome, we could easily work folks on the keyboard every night over a 3 state area. Friendships developed, and things improved in the network. Lots of folks were getting interested and wanted to participate in this network of mostly low altitude nodes.

We continued to revolve around the sun, and newer protocols arose that really helped with the unwanted ping-ponging, equipment got better, and lots more hams appeared on the scenes. Many of us had a blast every night, making keyboard contacts all around, even through the I-Gates that were beginning to pop up, and the many HF gateways that would allow us to work folks all over the US via RF APRS.

Sometime shortly after that, a new breed of APRS ops began to emerge that discouraged keyboarding due to the increased overhead on the network. Some of us got blacklisted on nodes and could no longer communicate with each other, and other were publicly chastised on the APRS forums. I closed my APRS station down and moved on to other modes of operation that were fun for me.

I recently got back on APRS, and discovered the crowds that were _all about_ APRS, telling the rest of us "how it should be done", are no longer there. There is a moderate amount of traffic, but a lot of the folks who used to operate APRS are now gone. What a shame, but that is the cycle we so often see on various modes of Ham Radio... AMTOR, SSTV, 2m repeaters, etc... Those of us who have been in the hobby many years have seen this over and over.

I've been sending out a CQ on APRS when I'm in the shack, and have been pleasantly surprised by making keyboard contacts with others who are interested in doing the same thing, once again. The maps aren't as crowded as they once were, but there are still lots of folks who enjoy actually communicating via APRS, even for just a short "hello" and to set up a schedule on a repeater or HF.

Dave WB4IUY
www.WB4IUY.net

Working Split, QSX, Up Up...please learn!!

I spent a goodly amount of time today, trying to work ST0R, and realized that there is a huge problem... People either don't listen to the DX station when they say things like "up 5 to 10", "qsx +3", etc., maybe they don't hear the DX at all and are just calling from cluster spots, or truly don't understand how to work split.

Those of us who do understand, have all made mistakes, and that's not what I'm typing about.. I've been a ham and DX'er since 1974, and the ST0R pileup is among the worst of the worst. The ST0R ops are great, its the rest of us who are calling on top, QRMing, and just being plain stupid.

Please, please,please.... before you jump into a pileup, understand how to work split, LISTEN to the DX, and behave!!!. It makes things much easier on everyone involved.

P.S. To all Kilocycle Cops and Frequency Cops: Why do you feel you have to have to handle the situation? Your constant additional comments turned the ST0R zoo into an even bigger mess! Yesterday, there was MORE QRM from the "Radio Police" than from those who were too stupid to follow the instructions from ST0R. Whew!

Published with Blogger-droid v1.7.2

CQ WW VHF Contest - 7/16-17!

This weekend is the CQ WorldWide VHF contest. It runs from 18:00Z Saturday 7/16 through 21:00Z Sunday 7/17. The full rules for it can be found HERE . Dust off your 2m & 6m rigs and get on the air. You can work all modes, and even FM... The only prohibited FM frequency is 146.52, the USA National Simplex Frequency, but all other standard simplex frequencies are acceptable like 146.49, 146.55, and 146.58. The contest exchange is [Callsign & Grid Square], signal reports are not necessary. Hope to see you on the air!!

Dave Wb4IUY
www.WB4IUY.net