Merry Christmas everyone !

 

Another #JO57GG activity by OZ group

Here's the information received from Henrik OZ8ZS : 

Same as previous Years, group of OZ operators will be QRV 2m and 23cm as OZ9KY in ARRL EME contest during weekend of 20-21 November 2021, on 2m and 23cm. 

Location is the same OZ1GWD qth as previous Years, located in #JO57GG gridsquare. 

23cm dish

2m X-pol Yagis

In spare time Henrik OZ8ZS and Ole OZ2OE ( probaby starting November 19) will be active on 70MHz tropo and MS on usual FT8/MSK144 frequencies, running Yagi antenna with rig stuff by OZ2OE. 

For detailsYou may ask him on ON4KST 50/70MHz chat.

Merry & safe Christmas 2k20 !

For all followers and readers of my blogpage - best season greetings from me & family. 

Stay safe and healthy during these weird Covid times . . . 

73 !

SILENT KEY Memorial Award

 Took a while to get results of the Silent Key Memorial Contest 2020, but happy to get nice Award. Long delayed echo of PF7M was heard across all EU. 

R.I.P Johan. 

 

SILENT KEY Memorial Nov.01.2020 - update

November 1st is almost over. 

95 QSO's made on 40m CW only, during 3hours Memorial, with "PF7M"  report, making Johan's call to be heard again on the waves...  R.I.P 

~~~~~~

       A day of remembrance, about all the folks already gone. 

No doubt all of us lost some ham radio friend, known personally, or even those never met "radio friend" always ready to talk, joking or just help. 

Some of them were daily on KST duty, giving You new one, pile-up fun on the expedition, or just sharing knowledge with You.

Hardy DC8TS/DI2BK, Johan PF7M, Arvo ES1CW to name a few... Maybe You miss your friend  worth to remember?  

Let's give their callsigns a life again. 

For 3 hours their callsigns can be heard again like sign of good memories.. 

November 1st is the best day to do it... 

Hungarian Radio Society MRASZ organizes Silent Key Memory Contest. 

Contest will start 06:00UTC, end at 08:59 UTC on 80 and 40m. 

Rules can be found HERE

 

 

Digging in the "salt mine"

 My friend Arvo ES1CW (R.I.P) said to me one day, that working with the QSL's card is like salt mine digging...well, Arvo was main ES (ERAU) QSL manager, so his salt mine was much bigger than mine. The only thing I have about, it's every QSL is like piece of crystal, keeping inside "moment" of QSO. Each one is different, and each one should have it's way to recipient. You can have e-qsl, LOTW - but it won't give You same personal memories when You keep paper card in your hands..

So if You have in your log S.E.S callsign 3Z95IARU (I know few of You 6m op's worked them) - You'll get your card soon (I hope). At least I'll do my best to make it happen. 

95yrs of IARU S.E.S QSL
  

Small :-) 31kg's batch just sorted for each DXCC. Guess which DXCC is won ths battle? 3rd column... yes, it's DL packet. Imagine how big it must be in Central PZK Bureau...? 

 

 

Noisy QTH? Tell me more.

As You probably QSO'ed me on 4 or 6m You know my QTH was almost noiseless few Years a go.
But time flies, and 2-3 Years a go situation started to get worse. 
Apart of small noise sources we can observe on 50MHz everywhere where we can find humans :-), it's time to add another which is bigger than anything before.

If Your neighbour decide to put PV on his roof, that can be shot in your heart.

Actually, your heart will suffer attack later, after You see what You get as surplus of his new shiny braight PV panels...

There are some screenshots from my IC-7300 waterfall, showing some noise conditions, with antenna pointed side to neighbours house, approximately same height as PV panels at distance ~50m.

2019 , September :

 Can be worse? Yes...

 2020, May 1st, sunny, no clouds.

2020, May 3rd, little clouds - lines got thinner - if sky gets cloudy noise matrix decreases a little, after dark almost dissapearing, but leaving something like screen noise on the background.

Rising count of Photo-Voltaic devices causing more and more QRM for us. Actually I am resigned, and looking for any place away from home to put remote RX station. There's no way to copy anything amongst this shitty QRM. Only directions left is East, There are points where antennas back null in pattern can lower the noise some 10-15dB. Not much better on 70MHz. Almost the same as on 6m.
Pointing antenna somewhere 230 - 360 causing waterfall getting white and no signals can be heard.

Spoken with friends noticed new PV in neighbouhood, almost same QRM on waterfall.

Will see what we can do about it, letter to the regulator is on the way.

So if You think your QTH is noisy, pray nobody will install something like this.

73

Ham radio : Better safe than sorry...

In COVID-19 times always remember to wear ANY available protection, even if You neighbour friend ask You to program his rag chew 2m RIG. Even if You drank box of Whisky together. You never know...

 

  Beware ! : Simple programming of radio (mostly) unknown source can be hazardous !

Stay safe everyone, CU on the bands. 

QSH / OCV  

 

Recent F/SP3RNZ winter activity @JN08XW - addendum.

Although it's been quite sometime this activity took place, I want to share some pics and summary of my QRP activity as F/SP3RNZ and ofc somehow thank to all, who patiently made QSO with me ;-)

Portable Hotel setup ;-)

I was using FT-817 mostly battery powered, sometimes with external switching PSU causing tremendous noises over HF bands. One reason is the EFHW (End Fed Half Wave) antenna used has no countepoise, or better to say coax shield acting as the second leg of antenna. Using CMC choke usually helps to minimize noise pickups, but this time did not.

80/40/20 EFHW antenna and QRM sources on the rooftop

Additionally runnning ham radio in Hotel building can be limited only to daylight hours, or even impossible because of man made noise concentration. The reason is, there are LED lamp installed almost everywhere for safety reasons, some of them are broken, making more noises when wet after rain, or in cold temperatures and lot's of small switching devices as phone/laptop chargers etc.
Anyway every dxp can teach something new, I've got my lesson - will be prepared next time.    

During limited time of operation 40+ QSO were made on FT8, and only 2 CW unfortunately, but I was happy to get Ted SP3OCC on CW and all other modes :-)

Many more can be worked, but guys running big power on FT8 are usually DEAF for QRP signals. At least I am sure QRP worked well being heard daily across EU, and even EA8. 

All QSL's were sent already in January 2020, so if You worked me, You'll have another, if not - look for me in August/September ( if we ged rid of this CORONA-shit until then )

If by any chance You'll hear me calling CQ somewhere on HF/6m in August/September 2020, don't hesitate to call me :-)

73, QSH and OCV... 

Happy New Year 2020 for all !

Happy New Year for all, with special french wishes to my followers and readers !

CU on the HF bands CW/FT8 this time QRP ;-)

Honorary badge of Polish Radio Union #139

Last week of October, during recent "ARISS" Poland conference in Ostrów, I had the honor to be awarded with Gold Honorary Badge of Polish Radio Union #136 for all activities for PZK Association, and all the development of ham radio.  

President of the OT27 PZK branch, and Coordinator ARISS - Sławomir Szymanowski SQ3OOK, me :-), and President of Polish Radio Union Waldemar Sznajder 3Z6AEF.    

More about ARISS Poland and conference LINK  (Polish)

President of ISSfanclub Micol Ivancic IU2LXR report on ISS fanclub page LINK (English)

New QSL project, still under construction :-)

For those who need my card and still not get any, please be patient :-)
Final project sholud look like that :

The way we work DX changed nowadays, so opposite to the flow we need to support old good modes.   But of course - we can't deny any other way one using to get the QSO. It's always operator choice.  

Happy spring everyone :-)

It's been quite sometime from last post here, but let's hope I can find few free minutes to publish something new what can be interesting to all followers/readers.

Of course no advertisements here, this blog will never flood your screen with new bra for your wife, intelligent egg vibrator or similar sh* You can find elsewhere on the web.

The truth is end of 2018 was very busy for me, and being abroad I was not able to focus on the blog page. But that's not excluded ham radio.
My short story about New Years activity as F/SP3RNZ will be published later.

Anyway, if you awaited any new post here, I promise they will be added if only my time permit.
Thanks for all your comments below previous post - and just reminder - I am reading all of them by ocassion, but have no time to answer them all, sorry. If you want me to answer, please send a copy of your comment to my e-mail.
  
Have a nice spring everyone ! (at least in Europe). 

CU - Greg

First Polish MGM Contest

Contest will be run in two parts, parallel to RSGB Contest,
Organiser: Polish National UKF Club SP0VHF.
Rules below, any question or comment please send to sp6mlk@wp.pl 

RULES OF POLISH MGM CONTEST  

GL !

Testing, hoooola, 1,2,3 :-) is there anybody out there?

Welcome in 2018.
Better late than never, busy start of the Year totally deprived my free time for writing.
But some post were prepared - hope to fill this space with some usefull information soon.

Good DX on 4 & 6m - season almost knocking at the door...

73

New JT65 dedicated cluster DL9GTB

As per information by Max DK1MAX posted today on KST chat, growing DIGI community got new tool to monitor JT65 frequencies.
New cluster can be entered via telnet at port 8500, under address

cluster.dl9gtb.de

You can use ordinary black command DOS screen, or any telnet software. Can be added to cluster list under standard log's i.e UCXLog

below filtered 6m band few minutes a go :

Vy 73

Simple antenna switch - DIY

Necessity is the mother of invention, so today's post showing how to do some recycling and change junk stuff into quite usable thing. 
Working on HF with more than one antenna, or better to say, using radio with single antenna connector is always complicated. Things get worse when You need to switch to some other antenna HERE and NOW, and of course there's always lack of any switch. Recent dx-peditions VP6EU or TX5T are the examples :-) 

We will use ferrite circulator salvaged from Telecom equipment. This will give us perfect enclosure, 3-4 SO-239 sockets, piece of silvered wire and old ceramic junk switch. 
Overall costs - not more than 15-20 Euro, few hours time, including painting. 

This is our base - soon it will switch 2 antennas with more than 500W RF power.

After removing unusable parts, 3 holes were drilled to fit SO-239 sockets

Some painting to get neat look, and sockets installed :

Time for switching part

To ensure that 500W will not harm the switch we need to cross both connector sides with silvered 1,5mm diameter wire :

 No worries about the lenght of connections, it's not microwave device ;-) 

Just add a knob and suitable labels on top and the switch is ready for use :

Tested at solid 500W while hunting for TX5T, measurements done with two 50Ohm terminator shows SWR 1:1,05 on HF bands up to 50MHz. 

Have fun with your own DIY switch ! 

 

Finnaly arrived ;-) 4m Double Century MLA Award

Today finally got my first of Awards issued by IRTS - Irish Radio Transmitters Society.

Looking good, ready to printout from convenient pdf format file.
No fee's, Awards are free, all You need is only spreadsheet with QSO's/grids certified by local Award manager or two ham operators and send it to IRTS Award manager.

Read more at IRTS site  http://www.irts.ie/cgi/st.cgi?70mhz

Good luck! 

GJ Tracker for EME - MSSTDFMT.dll issue

Installing free W7GJ "GJTracker" software for EME prediction found some annoying issue with Windows dynamic loaded libraries underWin10 OS.
This can happen in Win7, Win 8 and 8.1 as well, but very rarely on XP SP3.

After unpacking the GJTracker software and copying unzipped folder into root directory clicking .exe file caused Windows to splash an error warning :

"Class not registered. MSSTDFDMT.dll is missing or corrupt."   

This is caused by wrong registry setting or accidental unregistering the library from System.
Another (probable) cause is than some version of Windows do not use this .dll which is actually connected with Visual Basic libraries and partially Outlook Express/Office.

Below is a simple solution, choose 32 or 64 bit version depending on OS You're running.

1. Try to find MSSTDFDMT.dll in Your system - check if it's already there - if YES - should be located in  C:/WINDOWS/System32 for 32 bit version, or C:/WINDOWS/sysWOW64 for 64bit OS.

If it's missing - You need to download it from net, or copy it from another PC and simply paste downloaded file into the folder (depending on which version of OS You're running) 

Last step is registering the .dll file in Windows registry using regsvr32 command.

32bit OS: click Start, Run - type cmd in the dialog box and run it.
After old good DOS window appear You should see something like c:/windows/system32
Type:

and press Enter. You will see OS note that registering the file is successfull.

64bit OS: same as above, but using Win8.1 or Win10 to get Command Prompt with Administrator prvileges we need to click the "Windows", type "cmd" directly to "Run" box and choose "Run as administrator".
After confirming we want to use Administrator rights type in Command prompt as below:

and hit Enter.
OS will confirm the file was registered successfully.

Now You can run GJtracker again and all should be fine.

73!




 

Merry Christmas and happy New Year everyone !

For all kind readers and sympathics of my blog and their families...

Let the coming Christmas give You amazing gifts, love and happiness,

and New Year bring all the missing DX's  :-)

Merry Christmas everyone!