The Aftermath of CQ Worldwide DX Contest, CW 2014

Contest: CQWW-CW 2014 (November 29th - 30th)

Call: EI5IX

Operator: EI5IX / M0XII
Class: SAAB LP
QTH: Westport
Operating Time (hrs): 37.5
Summary: (Once Dupes etc. were removed)

       Band's   QSOs   Zones  Countries

--------------------------------------------

160:      12          3            6

80:       272        15         53

40:       375        16         58

20:       226        22         61

15:       210        27         68

10:       305        26         66

--------------------------------------------

Total:  1400      109       312

Total Score = 1,044,080

My plans for CQWW-CW were a bit ‘last minute’ this year, I decided early on the Friday to enter as a Low Power Assisted Single Operator on All Bands. I drove back from London to the Irish QTH on Wednesday Night arriving early Thursday morning. Once I had a nap for a few hours it was then time to get out with my Dad (EI9JA) and my Sister (EI1588) and start making antenna preparations for the contest at the weekend. The weather on the Thursday and early Friday was nice and dry so this helped us raise Verticals and Dipoles and even get a HEX beam up for the contest. 

Once everything was up and tested by late Friday evening it was time to grab something to eat and grab a quick nap before the contest. I was woken up by my Dad with 30 minutes to spare before the contest, so a quick dash of Tea and I was on-air Saturday 00:00, opened up the contest on 40m and immediately hit good rates at +170/h. The move to 80m around 01:30 was very productive although hard work to North America then back to 40m at 03:00. A quick jump up to 20m for some early Multipliers was nice then back to 80m and 40m for some Grey line activity. Once the sun had came up I found 15m and 10m quiet fruitful and got some nice runs on these bands. Busting pile ups with 100w and a simple set up is challenging but that is the thrill of the game, I thought conditions were in excellent shape for the weekend so at 18:00 on Saturday I was beginning to fatigue a bit and decided to grab a nap for a few hours and refuelled the body. I returned on-air at 21:00 on 20m as this band was in great shape into the late evening. 80m and 160m were the bands of choice until 03:00 then a jump over to 40m until Grey Line on Sunday morning on the higher bands 20m, 15m & 10m. I remained on these bands for most of the day with a nice break on 40m towards 18:00 unfortunately at 20:30 Sunday evening I had to physically stop contesting an I so wanted to continue and would have possibly improved my Total score by a bit more but I had a Migraine Headache from Hell and couldn't continue. I took some pain killers and went to bed. :-( I was happy to have finished the contest setting a new record score in EI for a SAAB-LP entry, there was some nice DX around throughout the weekend also.

I got to say I really enjoyed this contest, it was a fantastic experience it was also great to see how the newly built shack and the antennas that were put up for the weekend preformed, again a lot's of things learnt from this time around but the great news is that my home QTH station is slowly improving so hopefully I can make the extra improvements required and get the station working more efficiently in years to come, who knows it would be great to enter other sections of this contest in years to come.

I'd like to thank my Family for putting up with me throughout the weekend especially to my Dad (EI9JA) and my Sister Shauna (EI1588) for helping me get the station together and operational for the contest and for the many cups of Tea that were required to keep me awake for the weekend. Thank You :-)

Equipment Used:
IC7200, LDG AT11MP Tuner, Begali Magnetic Pro Key, WinKeyer 3, N1MM Logger+
Ant switch, HEX Beam @ 45ft, Carolina Windom 80, 1/4 waver Verticals 10m/15m/20m/40m & 80m, Inverted L for 160m. Loops for LF RX.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Delighted to have come 1st place and set a new Irish Record in the Single Op Assisted Low Power All Bands category, as always thanks to CQ Magazine for holding and adjudicating this contest and thanks to everyone that gave me points during the contest, I look forward to the next one! :)

73's DE EI5IX / M0XII - Pat

G8T - 144MHz IARU / RSGB Trophy Contest from JO01KJ - September 2014

On September 6th & 7th the RSGB & IARU R1 - 144 MHz International Trophy Contest took place. I was out active with The BlackSheep Contest and DX Group under the callsign "G8T" from Locator square JO01KJ. 

The G8T Station

I arrived on the site Friday morning and helped the Team put together our station for the weekend. We worked hard and got all antenna systems built and working by the Friday evening.

4x10ele + 6x3ele + 4x9ele + 2x14ele

G8T Team raising a Pipe Mast with 4x9ele

This contest was eventful more so than usual, despite testing our new pre-amplifier failed and had to be repaired. Luckily it was installed on our Versatower which allowed it to be lowered and raised again without too much effort! 

60ft Versatower on the way down

Later the bearings failed in the alternator of old faithful 2-cylinder diesel generator that the Team have been using for 25+ years! The backup petrol generator was unreliable also and we didn't have enough power for the radio station and the cook house! Fortunately the farmer of the site had a spare John Deere 6330 tractor and a 25KVA 3-phase PTO generator that we were able to use (after fixing it). :-) 

2-Cylinder Diesel Generator

John Deere 6330 Tractor and a 25KVA 3-phase PTO Generator

We had an intermittent connection in the TX IF drive to the Transverter which lost us nearly 2 hours during set up as we couldn't get any power out of the station, then during the contest the logging computer (laptop) decided that it was imperative to reboot at 10am on Sunday morning in order to install Microsoft updates and went off-line for 25 minutes forcing us to do a session of paper logging, nothing like going old school in the heat of battle:-)

Tim G4LOH operating the station

Bill M0BTZ in the heat of Battle...

As for Band conditions they seemed flat or slightly above average, some useful propagation to HB9 and southern France was welcome. We also managed QSOs in to OK, OE and SM and Mike G8TIC worked S57LM on a long meteor burst (over 30 seconds at 59+) around time of the reported asteroid pass and meteorite strike in Nicaragua.

We finished this contest in 2nd place with 773 QSO's and 319,629 Points our ODX was S57LM at 1,162Km, Thanks again to everybody who called us throughout the weekend during the contest.

Once again got to say a big Thank you to the guys of the Blacksheep Contest group for inviting me along again to contest with them, it certainly was a fantastic experience on 144MHz I'm looking forward to the next one. 
73's

Great News for 70MHz (4m)

Spotted this in the IRTS newsletter:

Some time back Dave EI3IO launched an initiative to try to secure a line in the European Common frequency Allocation table (ECA) that would provide for the granting of spectrum in the segment 69.9 to 70.5 MHz to the amateur service on a secondary basis and to amend Footnote EU9 to the table to state that CEPT administrations may allocate all or parts of that band to the Amateur service . The documentation which Dave drafted, which included briefing for National Societies, was adopted by IARU Region 1 and support was obtained from Bulgaria, Estonia, Finland, Iceland and Ireland. The documentation explained that about thirty CEPT administrations had already allowed national amateur use of the band but that some remaining CEPT countries required a clear regulatory decision before they were able to open all, or parts of this band to secondary two-way amateur usage.

Dave EI3IO, representing IARU Region 1, presented the proposal at the recent meeting in France of CEPT's European Communications Committee Frequency Management Working Group. The proposal received the support of more than ten CEPT administrations and was adopted. This excellent outcome does not necessarily mean that frequencies between 69.9 and 70.5 MHz will be immediately available in all CEPT countries but it does, however, provide a clear basis for IARU member societies to seek a 4 metre allocation from their national licensing authority.

The ECA is approved, revised and published by the ECC once per year. It is expected that the revision incorporating the changes regarding 70 MHz will be published in the summer of 2015. This is another excellent example of what can be achieved by amateurs working together within the International Amateur Radio Union (IARU).



73's DE EI5IX / M0XII - Pat

M0XII/P - UKAC 50MHz Contest - October

The October UKAC 50Mhz Contest on the 28th from locator square IO91MP was hard going with very deep QSB on the band. I had an issue with my voice keyer (LogiTalker) these last few contests as it seems to suffer terribly on the 6m band with RFI, I've tried various things to get rid of the RF feedback, ferrite rings to grounding the unit to changing the feed cable to the unit from the rig which in my opinion is a bit dodgy anyway but certainly not having a voice keyer in a contest is beginning to become very annoying and I do need to get it sorted (Voice is on its last legs). Anyway sure this is what the fun is all about we will struggle on (If anyone has suggestions on eliminating RFI on a LogiTalker please email me: ei5ixpat at gmail.com)

Activity seemed reasonably good in this contest compared to previous months. I managed to get 7 DXCC's this months contest with the final one (Belgium) right on the line but there was a lot of QSB on the band. 

This month I finished the contest with a claimed score of 107 QSO's and 16 UK Multiplier squares and a total of 220,592 claimed points with 7 DXCC entities worked. It was really nice to work Dave GI4SNA in IO64XM Square as my furthest ODX of 467Km, Once again a big Thank you to all stations for the points and multipliers this month it was very much appreciated. Looking forward to the next contest. :)

My working conditions was an FT847 Transceiver with 100 watts into a 5 Element Tonna F9FT Yagi up 5m from Ground.

Here is a map of the QSO's made during the Contest:

The Aftermath of CQ Worldwide DX Contest, SSB 2014

The following is from Jim M0CKE:

Call: G2F
Operator(s): M0CKE M0CHK M0XII M0NKR G0FHM
Station: G2F

Class: M/2 HP
QTH: Wisbech
Operating Time (hrs): 48

Summary:
Band QSOs Zones Countries
------------------------------
160:    198       8        41
80:      456      14       69
40:      837      21       92
20:    1317      37      124
15:    1184      36      115
10:    1593      34      138
------------------------------
Total: 5585 150 579 Total Score = 7,755,831

Club: Wisbech Amateur Radio & Electronics Club

Comments:

After a plea on the UK contest reflector for operators we were joined by Pat

M0XII (EI5IX) and Andy M0NKR both looking for a SSB seat for 2014 :) .. Friday got off to a good start with nice weather setting up the station, setup was complete when the rain came and along with it the realisation that the 6x2 antenna switch was not working .. after diagnosis a trip to maplin for some 4011 IC's and 2N3906 transistors we finally got the switch working at about 2000hrs .. Pat and Andy tested the station and all was looking good. This is first time we have entered the M2 category in SSB and really didn't know what to expect from our QTH. Contest started slow with conditions on 40 and 80 being hard to say the least with crammed band and poor signal quality as expected, we just ploughed on, working what we could hear, doing some s&p when run rates had dropped and changed bands when conditions seemed to allow, not a winning strategy but we all had fun, ate lots of good food and had a few beers too :) 

I'm really pleased with how the contest went for our first attempt with very modest antennas and power allowed in the UK, although the aging hunter 1000 amp on station 2 decided to track over on the band switch on 80m band with couple hours to go .. so Pat stopped on 20m and 40m with station 2 .. We seemed to have a flare hit us about 2100hrs causing the bands to become real hard work with very high noise levels and fading signals.

2 x Elecreaft K3's, Acom 1000, Hunter 1000, N1MM Logger+, 5B4AGN Filters, 6x2

Ant switch, 3ele SteppIR @ 60ft, KT34A @ 60ft, 1/4 waver vert 40m & 80m, inverted L for 160m. K9AY for LF RX.

Thanks to everyone that called us! :)

Jim M0CKE 

I got to say I certainly enjoyed this contest and thanks to the Jim M0CKE and Andy M0CHK for giving me the opportunity to join them in this contest, I'm Looking forward to CQWW CW back in EI (Ireland) at the end of November, more updates to come on that station in the coming weeks.

73's to all :)

UPDATE

***************

WE CAME IN 1st PLACE IN THE MULTI TWO CATEGORY IN THIS CONTEST IN ENGLAND

***************

73's DE EI5IX / M0XII - Pat

The SSB CQ World Wide DX Contest 2014

This weekend the 25th & 26th of October is the CQ World Wide DX Contest on SSB. 

The contest Starts: 0000 UTC Saturday 25th and Ends: 2359 UTC Sunday 26th

I will be active this weekend with Wisbech Amateur Radio Club under the callsign "G2F" located on the East coast of England in the district of Cambridgeshire.

I'm hoping to give a bash to SSB on the HF bands throughout the weekend so hopefully conditions will prevail, if you hear us on the air do feel free to give us a shout as it would be great to work you over the weekend. Good Luck to all participants involved in the contest and most of all have fun on the bands and a fantastic weekend contesting.

73's

ATV Activity

Ronnie EI9ED reports that EI2SDR is sending pictures of Dublin Bay on frequency 2390 MHz from 3 Rock Mountain. It is on test and orientated towards Dublin and Dundalk. Rx Input 1240 MHz and will be available next with DTMF Control via 144.775.

RSGB CONTEST COMMITTEE NEWSLETTER - SPECIAL ISSUE

A special issue of the CC Newsletter, timed to coincide with the RSGB Convention, has just been published on the CC website at

http://www.rsgbcc.org/hf/newsletter/newscurrent.shtml




73's DE EI5IX / M0XII - Pat

The West of Ireland's Mayo Radio Rally 2014

Sunday 12th of October 2014

The Mayo Radio Experimenter's Network Radio Rally

Check out the clubs Website (www.ei7mre.org) 

for equipment already checked in for sale that can be purchased on the day. 

The 5MHz Newsletter

It's been found necessary to change the URL of the Worldwide 5 MHz Amateur Allocations chart.

The new URL is

http://tinyurl.com/pjhd943

Sherwood Engineering ranks the Flex - 6700 SDR

Rob Sherwood has now tested and ranked the new FlexRadio Systems 6700 transceiver on his benchmark receiver test data page. 

The ‘6700 tops the list when sorted by third-order dynamic range, narrow spaced. 

Click here to view the results.

Galway VHF Group 70cm Repeater Project

Happy to hear that the new Galway VHF Group 70cm repeater project is almost complete.

Repeater stats:

Callsign - EI7AKR
TX-438.825Mhz
RX-430.825Mhz
Tone access 77Hz
Pwr output - 30w
Location - Knockroe, Co. Galway.

IP addresses for APRS-I Gate have now being secured and can now be configured for its new location. The Repeater will also incorporate Echo Link & IRLP.

Congrats to all the team involved, it should provide a good link across the West of Ireland.

M0XII/P - UKAC 50MHz Contest - September

The September UKAC 50Mhz Contest on the 23rd from locator square IO91MP was hard going with very little propagation to the North of the UK. Activity seemed down in this contest compared to previous months. I managed with a hard struggle to get EI in the log from IO91 Square heard two stations in EI this month but only completed the QSO with one and worked GI/MI a couple of moments later but I didn't hear or work any GM/MM or GD/MD or GU/GJ on the band, conditions were just too weak to to the North this month. 

This month I finished the contest with a claimed score of 84 QSO's and 14 UK Multiplier squares and a total of 133,868 claimed points with 4 DXCC entities worked. It was really nice to work Joe EI3IX in IO53KU Square as my furthest ODX of 602Km, Once again a big Thank you to all stations for the points and multipliers this month it was very much appreciated. Looking forward to the next contest. :)

My working conditions was an FT847 Transceiver with 100 watts into a 5 Element Tonna F9FT Yagi up 5m from Ground.

Here is a map of the QSO's made during the Contest:

Transmitter Noise

An interesting article I read in the IRTS news bulletin:

Many of us are familiar with the work done by Rob Sherwood NC0B over the years to identify rigs with poor strong-signal performance on receive - of particular relevance to contesters and DXers

http://www.sherweng.com/table.html

Jim Brown K9YC has now done a similar exercise, except he has measured the trash (key clicks, inter-modulation distortion, and phase noise) generated by some popular

rigs on transmit. If you're thinking of buying a new rig, it's worth reading this first.

http://k9yc.com/TXNoise.pdf

September 144 MHz International Trophy Contest

This weekend the 6th & 7th of September is the RSGB & IARU 144 MHz International Trophy Contest takes place. 

I will be active this weekend with The Black Sheep Contest and DX Group under the callsign "G8T"  from QRA: JO01KJ 

I'm hoping to give a bash on CW & SSB throughout the weekend so hopefully conditions will prevail. 
If you hear us on the band do feel free to give a shout, it would be great to work you over the weekend.

Here's some videos of our previous contests;

Looking forward to the weekend, see you in the contest.

73's

Mayo Radio Experimenters Network Radio Rally

The Mayo Radio Experimenters Network have set the date
for the Radio Rally in the usual venue the Welcome Inn
Hotel, Castlebar for Sunday the 12 October 2014.

For further details please contact the rally director,
Padraic EI9JA on +353 (0) 87 695 7154.


73's DE EI5IX / M0XII - Pat

Footage of powerful solar flares released by Nasa

The US Space Agency NASA has released new footage showing a series of powerful solar flares. There have been a number of eruptions on the surface of the sun in the last week.

Some have warned that this explosion of energy might have a serious impact here on earth.

The BBC's Tim Allman explains:

.

Newly Formed UK Island Group

This weekend on the 6th & 7th September 2014 the newly formed UK
Island group will be signing M0UKI/p from the rare Farne Islands ( IOTA EU-109 ).

Team members EI9FBB,G0VJG, G7GLW & M0OXO will be QRV with 2 stations and aim to give this IOTA to as many chasers as possible within the short time frame. (Dave EI9FBB mentioned that special attention will be given to work as many EI's as possible too!)

QSL's via M0OXO.

73's DE EI5IX / M0XII - Pat

IRTS SSB Field Day Contest

Irish Radio Transmitters Society has it's SSB Field Day Contest taking place this weekend on Saturday and Sunday 6th / 7th September 2014.

The final day for the submission of logs is on 21st September.
Full details available on the contest from www.irts.ie/contests.


73's DE EI5IX / M0XII - Pat

M0XII/P - UKAC 50MHz Contest - August

The August UKAC 50Mhz Contest on the 26th from locator square IO91MP was excellent with regards to propagation some sporadic E contacts during contest into Spain and Sweden. Activity in this contest was again up this month and it was great to hear a few new stations give away extra multipliers on the band. I managed with a struggle to get three Scottish (GM/MM) stations a few Welsh (GW/MW) stations and one Northern Irish station (GI/MI) and one station from the Isle Of Mann (GD) including a station from (ON) Belgium these were all worked from IO91 Square unfortunately this month I didn't work (EI) Ireland but I could hear Dave EI9FBB on the band but conditions were too weak to complete the QSO. Maybe next month we will get my home country in the log.

This month I finished the contest with a claimed score of 113 QSO's and 15 UK Multiplier squares and a total of 300,390 claimed points with 8 DXCC entities worked. It was really nice to work Hans EA5/DL5EO on his holiday's in JM08AQ Square as my furthest ODX of 1443Km, Once again a big Thank you to all stations for the points and multipliers this month it was very much appreciated. Looking forward to the next contest. :)

My working conditions was an FT847 Transceiver with 100 watts into a 5 Element Tonna F9FT Yagi up 5m from Ground.

Here is a map of the QSO's made during the Contest:

73's DE EI5IX / M0XII - Pat