Table of Contents
07 : Blog
2 Post(s) for March 2025
| Sun 09/03/25 : Tweaking The Blog Setup | 09/03/25 14:29 GMT | John Pumford-Green | blogging |
| Sun 09/03/25 : A New Blogging platform? | 09/03/25 14:00 GMT | John Pumford-Green | blogging, chyrp-lite |
Tue 09/01/24 : 60m WPSR
Brrr… it's chilly in the shack. My first trip in during winter.
I've started WSPR-ing on 60m (WARC Channel) to see how the band is performing, and to generate some heat in the shack.
And at 2050 I've moved to 10m at 5W. I heard some USA stations on 10mFM earlier in the evening. The band might be open occasionally….?
Fri 17 Nov 2023
After a couple of months away from the shack - domestic issues kept me away, and now it's winter and cold - I decided to have a look on 60m Olivia this evening, since I can do this from the comfort of the house without shutting myself away in the cold shed - the outside temp. is 0C and there's frost on the ground.
I made a VNC connection to the shack PC and ran Fldigi - it's been quite a long time since I've played radio like this.
After one CQ call at 1747z I was answered by Alan M0AGJ in Doncaster, which was a big surprise.
We had a nice, short QSO - and I found that his initial reply to me had been at only 1 watt, although he quickly increased to 100W fearing 1W was too weak. I have a feeling 1W would have been ok.
At full power his S/N was always positive, up to 18dB at times.
Mon 10 July 2023
- A catch up from yesterday to begin.
- Two periods of activity today, early evening on 30m and 40m, and later on 60m and 30m.
- Rig : 7200
- Using full 100W today - condx. seem a bit variable, especially at this northern latitude.
- Some Auroral sounding CW.
- Not much activity on 30m, despite many RBN spots of my CQ calls.
- Period 1
- 30m QSO : F5POJ : RSt
- 40m QSO : DL6LV/P : Hry, nr Keil. BVp. Short ~RC. Should look for him again for a longer chat.
- Period 2
- 60m QSO : G0IIK : Nigel, nr Heathrow, RCh. BVp me: “Vibroplex Presentation 1957”, him : “McElroy Bug 1940 same age as me, 82” Another nice chat w/ Nigel
- 30m QSO : DL4ST : RSt
- 30m QSO : IK2MMM/QRP : RSt “QSL only electronic” = LOTW confirmation
- 30m QSP : M0RQD : Steve, Isle of Wight : SKh. RC. slow and pleasant “beginner” QSO - hope for many more and for Steve to find CW improves rapidly with use.
Finding many RBN reports from my CQ calls - as far as Australia and Hong Kong, but very often no replies. Will endeavour to reply to any/all CQ calls I hear.
— John Pumford-Green 11/07/23 08:00
Sun 6 Aug 2023
A quick visit to the shack in the morning and I heard SM5COP - Rune - calling CQ. I always like to say hello so I called for a brief QSO, I couldn't stay long as I had to go out - swimming with friends, a regular Sunday morning activity. We had a nice, short QSO. It's always a pleasure to work Rune.
I had a few hours in the shack later in the afternoon.
I had a think about the higher bands - I don't often stray beyond 30m, occasionally going to 20m.
I had a quick tune around and wondered if I need to use the Pre-Amp on my IC-7200 or not. On the normal lower bands it's certainly not needed, and would be counterproductive.
The accepted wisdom is that “if the noise level increases when you connect the antenna then you have enough RX sensitivity, and you don't need the Pre-Amp”
I thought I'd see which bands (if any) would warrant the Pre-Amp:
| Band | p-p mV noise / Test Load | p-p mV noise / Antenna | Pre-Amp needed? |
|---|---|---|---|
| 160 | 260 | 800 | No |
| 80 | 280 | >300 | No |
| 60 | 240 | >600 | No |
| 40 | 250 | >800 | No |
| 30 | 280 | >1000 | No |
| 20 | 280 | >1000 | No |
| 17 | 260 | >600 | No |
| 15 | 260 | >600 | No |
| 12 | 260 | ~300 | Marginal Yes |
| 10 | 260 | 260 | Yes |
It appears that only 12m and 10m would warrant use of the pre-amp using my existing Inverted-L antenna.
on 12m and 10m I re-did the experiment with the Pre-Amp ON
| Band | p-p mV noise / Test Load | p-p mV noise / Antenna | Pre-Amp needed? |
|---|---|---|---|
| 12 | 330 | >1000 | Yes |
| 10 | 360 | >600 | Yes |
Sat 5 Aug 2023
The day's radio action started slowly, with what looked like very difficult propagation conditions.
The data as of 0905z:
| SFI | 171 |
| A | 13 |
| K | 5 |
The K index was still rising, up to K=7at 1015z
Solarham https://www.solarham.net/index.htm showed there had been a solar flare at 0936z reaching M2.1.
All pointed to a poor day's radio - STORM G3 - and the bands were very quiet, only one or two weak signals on 30m.
I sent a few CQ calls on 30m at 1030z, and despite the poor condx I still got spotted on the RBN system at 15 different locations around Europe.
After calling CQ for a few minutes without any replies I gave up and did some other work in the shack (trying to tidy some space for comfortable operating, and to make the work area clear in preparation for building my new K2 if/when it arrives).
Later in the afternoon I tuned around and heard SM5DAJ calling CQ at 1438z and we managed a short QSO, with RST 569 reports both ways, but deep QSB which sent signals into the noise at times. Still, it was a QSO when there didn't look like much chance of anything.
As part of the tidy-up I'd re-installed my homebrew 60m transceiver and connected it for RX only (using a feed from the Wellbrook loop) and heard G4AFU calling CQ on 5262kHz, not very strong, but certainly workable. I swapped to the IC7200 and replied.Then followed a QSO with Paul in Bedale, N.Yorks, not a great signal report from him (RST449) but at least we exchanged details ok. I tend to find 60m is difficult during the day inter-G from this more distant location, much like 80m, with D-layer absorption. Nice to have a daytime CW QSO on 60m.
I came back to the shack in the evening.
The solar data looked a bit better
| SFI | 171 |
| A | 13 |
| K | 2 |
but there was evidence on Solarham of another big flare at 1910z reaching at least C6.7!
Still on 60m, 5260kHz, I called CQ few times, and then heard Rupert G4XRV call CQ, to which I replied. We had a really good long ragchew starting at 2023z and ending at 2135z. We chatted about the Elecraft K2 and also K1 and K3 etc. Rupert has built several and still uses one as his main station rig. I built one in 2006 but sold it a few years later (and regret this) and I'm now awaiting a new K2 kit from Elecraft so that I can build another and this time I won't dispose of it! We had a nice long bug - bug chat and at the end we were called by G0IIK (Nigel) to say he'd enjoyed listening to a good Bug QSO. We exchanged reports a few overs (Nigel recommending a Cootie Key for an interesting alternative to the bug).
I was very pleased to have held up a long 2-way bug ragchew for an hour, very comfortable, informal chat, very little written down, all just “in the ears and straight to the brain” - as it's meant to be.
Later I tuned around the 30m band and found Ian IK4EWX and Jim SV8ANW in another bug-bug 2-way QSO. Conditions a bit more challenging on these more distant stations. The QSO was almost finished, both guys saying they were heading for bed… so at the end, just to say “Hello” to Ian, I called IK4EWX and we exchanged RST559 reports and a few short overs. Conditions not great, and getting worse. A good time to stop.
Ian's QSO with Jim SV8ANW is now on You Tube : https://youtu.be/MWvBj8R-PBw and at the very end you can hear my call to Ian!
I had a QSO myself yesterday (Friday 4th August at 2203-2225) with Jim SV8ANW - another bug-bug QSO, and it's contained in another of Jim's You Tube videos, this link should get to the point of the start of our QSO https://youtu.be/YYNCK6KCKds?t=2343
Saturday proved to be an interesting bug-related CW day, despite the poor conditions. I saw lots of RBN spots that were totally inaudible here, but fortunately I still managed to reach somewhere and have some QSOs.