This past weekend was the Museum Ship weekend. I hope everyone got a chance to work the ships. I think that this event is one of my favorites when it comes to special "Get on the Air" events. This event is sponsored by the Battleship New Jersey Radio Station (NJ2BB). There were 85 different ships operating on the bands from Saturday June 6th - Sunday June 7th.
I was able to make contact with about 10 of them. Which was pretty cool as I made contact with some ships I hadn't contacted before (i.e. USS North Carolina, USS Indianapolis, and more). If you made contact with at least 15 ships, then you earned yourself a certificate. All you have to do is mail in your log information. The Battleship New Jersey Radio Station website linked above has all the info on that.
The next big event coming up is Field Day. June 27th - 28th. If you don't know about Field Day, then your either new, or you've been living under a rock, Hi Hi. Anyway this is one of the biggest events of the year. Operators from all over will be out in the field, mobile, or even in the comfort of their home QTH making contacts all over the bands. For more information about Field Day check out the Field Day link above.
We will be up in our Aunt Betty's field operating on the 27th. We plan to be running the Yaesu FT-450 that we went in half with Dad(KU4ME) on. We will have that hooked to the LDG AT200 Pro auto tuner and a ZS6BKV multiband dipole as well as a G5RV antenna, both homebrewed. You can check those out in previous posts of our out in the field experiences: HF in the Field With New Homebrew G5RV and Our Early Field Day.
Anyway, if you are on the air for field day, listen for us and feel free to make contact. Catch you down the log.
73 and good DX,
Tim - AJ4JD
Showing posts with label Yaesu Radio. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Yaesu Radio. Show all posts
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Sunday, March 1, 2009
QSO Parties and WAS
Well it has been a little while since I last blogged. So I thought I would sit down and give everyone an update of what has been going on here lately. I've definitely caught the contest bug. The past couple of weekends (ever since we got our shack set up) I've been working different contests that are feasible for me to work. Robin (AJ4IJ) worked the PODXS 070 Club Valentine Sprint. I have to say she did really good too. I've been working the different state QSO parties. I really haven't given them any major effort. I think I worked one station in the Vermont QSO Party, and a handful in the New Mexico QSO Party, as well as the New Hampshire, and Mississippi QSO parties. I did put forth more of an effort in the North Carolina QSO party today. I ended up with 33 contacts and about 1700 points total. While it will not win a prize or anything, it was still nice to work it and see how the radio/antenna/ and new antenna tuner was performing.
In case you didn't know we added a new LDG AT-200Pro Auto Tuner to the shack. It seems to be working really well. So well in fact that prior, I've been having to cut the power back on the upper end of the 75/80 meter band when checking into the Tennessee Phone net as the SWR runs a bit to high for our liking. So now with the tuner in place, I am able to hit 3.980MHz with full power without even blinking. Really, with the antenna, that was the only place we had trouble with as far as SWR was concern. Of course we can't work 15 meters at all but our Windom is not resonant at all for 15. It performs without issue on the other bands though.
I've also decided it was time to update my Worked All States map and have included it for you all to see my progress. I've got a ways to go and I'm going to have to get a 15 meter antenna up if I ever plan on get the 5 band WAS.
Did I mention we got a new FT-1802 to replace the new Radio Shack 2 meter rig. No more noise when we key up from the laptops. I'll have to get a shot of our shack up here soon.
Until next time 73, God Bless, and Good DX,
AJ4JD - Tim
In case you didn't know we added a new LDG AT-200Pro Auto Tuner to the shack. It seems to be working really well. So well in fact that prior, I've been having to cut the power back on the upper end of the 75/80 meter band when checking into the Tennessee Phone net as the SWR runs a bit to high for our liking. So now with the tuner in place, I am able to hit 3.980MHz with full power without even blinking. Really, with the antenna, that was the only place we had trouble with as far as SWR was concern. Of course we can't work 15 meters at all but our Windom is not resonant at all for 15. It performs without issue on the other bands though.
I've also decided it was time to update my Worked All States map and have included it for you all to see my progress. I've got a ways to go and I'm going to have to get a 15 meter antenna up if I ever plan on get the 5 band WAS.
Did I mention we got a new FT-1802 to replace the new Radio Shack 2 meter rig. No more noise when we key up from the laptops. I'll have to get a shot of our shack up here soon.
Until next time 73, God Bless, and Good DX,
AJ4JD - Tim
Sunday, August 10, 2008
The Arctic Circle, Smokey Bear's Birthday, and Maritime Mobile
This week sure has been a busy one. Last weekend we worked a few special event stations as there were plenty on the air. These include W8AL (The Pro Football Hall of Fame), Pittsburgh's 250th anniversary (we talked to K3MJW for this one), and the big one of last weekend was N9N (The Nautilus, celebrating its 50th anniversary of it's trip to the North Pole). You can get more information on about this event by looking at N4KC's bio on QRZed.
The big contact of the week was W1AW/KL7. We've been trying for days to make contact with the ARRL's portable station in the Arctic Circle. Every time we'd see them on the DXwatch, we'd call dad and have him listen. It was never any use, as you could just barely hear someone, but really couldn't make 'em out. Finally, on Friday night we struck pay-dirt. We saw they were spotted, so we rushed right over to dad's (well not necessarily as we had some errands to run). We got over to dad's and listened and go make them out a lot better than we had been able to before. I might also tell you that this time there wasn't a huge pile-up on him and dad (KU4ME) had aquired an Ameritron AL-811 linear amplifier this past week. Had it not been for that big piece of beauty, I don't think that the Arctic Circle would have heard us.
So the funny story behind the whole Arctic Circle is we are completely lucky we were able to make contact before they go QRT after today. This past week, dad was talking on the dual bander he has in his shack to some of our HAM friends here on 2 meters, when he got the report from someone that his audio went real week and scratchy. Dad started smell something burning. He sniffed the radio and sure enough that was the source of the smell. So he got under the desk and unplugged everything. When he was done, he let go of the ground wire and it smacked up against the power supply. Somehow the ground wire found it's way inside one of the vent holes and he said "Sparks went flyin' everywhere". Well it turns out the diodes have been burnt out, and the drive in his dual bander had burnt up. Luckily, dad had a spare power supply. If he hadn't, we would have never been able to contact the Arctic Circle.
So this weekend we've worked a couple few special events and some other contacts as well. We worked W1BIM, celebating the 64th birthday of Smokey the Bear. That's right folks 64 years in the prevention of forest fires. What a cool bear. I just hope we wasn't smokin' on a camel. LOL
Anyway, we also worked K5PRK. We spoke with Charlie who is part of the Plano ARC. They were celebrating the radio club's 35th anniversary.
Some other noteable contacts include:
HR2DX in Honduras
YN2N in Nicaragua
VK3SX in Australia
FK8CP in New Caledonia
and our first ever maritime mobile station, UU9JX/MM. Oleg was off the cost of California at 32*N/123*W.
In other happenings, we finally got the 440 rig up and running. We've tested it out and found it to work real well. Robin (AJ4IJ) got on it the other night and made her first 440 contact via FM simplex with her dad (KU4ME). I've still got to get all the memories programmed and a make a frequency chart to hang on the board.
Yes I know I promised pictures, and well right now our shack is an absolute mess. Once we get it cleaned up I will get some shots and post them. Until then, here's a pic of me on a trail with my HT (Yaesu VX-170).
AJ4JD - Frozen Head Portable
73 de AJ4JD
Tim
The big contact of the week was W1AW/KL7. We've been trying for days to make contact with the ARRL's portable station in the Arctic Circle. Every time we'd see them on the DXwatch, we'd call dad and have him listen. It was never any use, as you could just barely hear someone, but really couldn't make 'em out. Finally, on Friday night we struck pay-dirt. We saw they were spotted, so we rushed right over to dad's (well not necessarily as we had some errands to run). We got over to dad's and listened and go make them out a lot better than we had been able to before. I might also tell you that this time there wasn't a huge pile-up on him and dad (KU4ME) had aquired an Ameritron AL-811 linear amplifier this past week. Had it not been for that big piece of beauty, I don't think that the Arctic Circle would have heard us.
So the funny story behind the whole Arctic Circle is we are completely lucky we were able to make contact before they go QRT after today. This past week, dad was talking on the dual bander he has in his shack to some of our HAM friends here on 2 meters, when he got the report from someone that his audio went real week and scratchy. Dad started smell something burning. He sniffed the radio and sure enough that was the source of the smell. So he got under the desk and unplugged everything. When he was done, he let go of the ground wire and it smacked up against the power supply. Somehow the ground wire found it's way inside one of the vent holes and he said "Sparks went flyin' everywhere". Well it turns out the diodes have been burnt out, and the drive in his dual bander had burnt up. Luckily, dad had a spare power supply. If he hadn't, we would have never been able to contact the Arctic Circle.
So this weekend we've worked a couple few special events and some other contacts as well. We worked W1BIM, celebating the 64th birthday of Smokey the Bear. That's right folks 64 years in the prevention of forest fires. What a cool bear. I just hope we wasn't smokin' on a camel. LOL
Anyway, we also worked K5PRK. We spoke with Charlie who is part of the Plano ARC. They were celebrating the radio club's 35th anniversary.
Some other noteable contacts include:
HR2DX in Honduras
YN2N in Nicaragua
VK3SX in Australia
FK8CP in New Caledonia
and our first ever maritime mobile station, UU9JX/MM. Oleg was off the cost of California at 32*N/123*W.
In other happenings, we finally got the 440 rig up and running. We've tested it out and found it to work real well. Robin (AJ4IJ) got on it the other night and made her first 440 contact via FM simplex with her dad (KU4ME). I've still got to get all the memories programmed and a make a frequency chart to hang on the board.
Yes I know I promised pictures, and well right now our shack is an absolute mess. Once we get it cleaned up I will get some shots and post them. Until then, here's a pic of me on a trail with my HT (Yaesu VX-170).
AJ4JD - Frozen Head Portable73 de AJ4JD
Tim
Friday, August 1, 2008
I Feel Like a Ham
The more I'm in this hobby, the more I learn and the more I want. Do you ever get that feeling? It all started when I got my technician license back in April of this year. Robin (AJ4IJ) got me my first HAM radio after I got my ticket. It's a Yaesu VX-170 2 meter FM HT (for those non-hams HT means handy talky). It was long after that that we were both itching for a base station at the house. We've been driving dad's (KU4ME) jeep and it is equiped with an Alinco DR150 2 meter FM mobile radio. It wasn't long before we put a Kenwood TM-261A 2 meter FM in the car. This was Robin's old 2 meter rig she used to have in her old Saturn. It wasn't long before we finally got a base station set up. Dad let us have his old Radio Shack HTX-212 2 meter FM transceiver. To add to all that equipment, you might already know that we have a Jetstream JTB-1 2 meter/440 antenna put up in the air in the back yard. You can check out the post Hoisting the 2meter Vertical for more info on that. Robin has a Kenwood TH-22AT 2 meter FM HT radio, and our daughter Ashby (KJ4EGJ) was presented with an Alinco DJ-V17 2 meter FM HT upon getting her Ham ticket.
So we've been having fun rag chewin on 2 meters with our different radios. We check in to various nets around our area here in East Tennessee. We rag chew late into the night, and recently, as you may well know, we steal moments over at mom (KI4SSI) and dads to chase some DX and play on dad's HF radio (Icom IC-756 Pro). We've worked on his existing antennas, we've put up an inverted V cut for 75 meters (aka 80 meters), and we built a mutliband HF dipole for field day, which we now have up in the air over at mom and dad's as it gets out a bit better than his gap verticle.
The next thing we have to work on, is to hook up the Alinco DR430 70cm FM transceiver radio that dad has lent us to play with. We also have to help dad ground mom's radio and antenna, she has a Ten-Tech 526. This was dad's radio (I guess it still is) but he's set it up for mom to use. So as you can see I'm well into the Ham world since I started back in April. I've since earned my General back in May, and then my Extra ticket in June.
However, I think the thing that has made me really feel like a HAM is that I got my first ever issue of QST magazine. That's right folks, Robin signed us up for a family membership to ARRL earlier this week. Today I got my membership card and my first issue of QST magazine. I thumbed through it almost immediately when I got home from work. I drooled over all the HAM gear that was in it (well I didn't really drool by my eyes were as big as a kid's at Christmas when they first walk into the room and see all the presents under the tree). I read a few little columns and letters, and started to read a really interesting article on grounding your station (which I need to finish).
Anyway, between all the gear, catalogs, the ARRL memberships, and much more (like working toward earning the Worked All States, aka WAS, award) I can honestly and happily admit that I am a HAM.
Good DX everyone.
73 de AJ4JD
Tim
P.S. I promise I'll get some station pics, antenna pics, and rig pics of our stuff up here soon.
So we've been having fun rag chewin on 2 meters with our different radios. We check in to various nets around our area here in East Tennessee. We rag chew late into the night, and recently, as you may well know, we steal moments over at mom (KI4SSI) and dads to chase some DX and play on dad's HF radio (Icom IC-756 Pro). We've worked on his existing antennas, we've put up an inverted V cut for 75 meters (aka 80 meters), and we built a mutliband HF dipole for field day, which we now have up in the air over at mom and dad's as it gets out a bit better than his gap verticle.
The next thing we have to work on, is to hook up the Alinco DR430 70cm FM transceiver radio that dad has lent us to play with. We also have to help dad ground mom's radio and antenna, she has a Ten-Tech 526. This was dad's radio (I guess it still is) but he's set it up for mom to use. So as you can see I'm well into the Ham world since I started back in April. I've since earned my General back in May, and then my Extra ticket in June.
However, I think the thing that has made me really feel like a HAM is that I got my first ever issue of QST magazine. That's right folks, Robin signed us up for a family membership to ARRL earlier this week. Today I got my membership card and my first issue of QST magazine. I thumbed through it almost immediately when I got home from work. I drooled over all the HAM gear that was in it (well I didn't really drool by my eyes were as big as a kid's at Christmas when they first walk into the room and see all the presents under the tree). I read a few little columns and letters, and started to read a really interesting article on grounding your station (which I need to finish).
Anyway, between all the gear, catalogs, the ARRL memberships, and much more (like working toward earning the Worked All States, aka WAS, award) I can honestly and happily admit that I am a HAM.
Good DX everyone.
73 de AJ4JD
Tim
P.S. I promise I'll get some station pics, antenna pics, and rig pics of our stuff up here soon.
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
Radio Vacation
Hello my faithful fans and friends. LOL. I just thought I would get on here and let everyone know how the vacation has been going. For those that do not know, we are in Panama City for the week and then we are heading to New Orleans for a couple of days before heading back home. We've been here at the beach for a couple days now and have had a really enjoyable and relaxing time so far. The beach hasn't been to good due to rough surf, jelly fish, seaweed, and garbage but other than that we can't complain.
As for the radio, we've been doing some radio during the trip. On the way down we talked with KJ4CGG until he made it back to Chattanooga to conclude his week. After that we carried on a QSO with a HAM from Cleveland, N4AOW, on simplex all the way down to Altoona, GA. He was rather impressed with Dad's (KU4ME) setup we were operating on (A Yaesu FT-90 on a 1/4 wave trunk mount). We didn't talk much after that as I was behind the wheel the rest of the trip down. We did pick up a repeater in Dothan, Alabama and a repeater in Chipley, Florida. Today, on our way to get lunch, I made contact with a HAM, KD5RBR, here in Panama City on their club repeater, 146.210. I was under the impression there wasn't much activity in the area, however, I've mainly listened on the HT and I don't think I was picking up anything. Anyway, the week is still young and they have an echolink repeater I may give a try at some point and see if I can make contact with home. I'll let you know how that goes soon.
Until then, be safe, have fun, and most of all, behave. LOL
73 de AJ4JD.
Tim
As for the radio, we've been doing some radio during the trip. On the way down we talked with KJ4CGG until he made it back to Chattanooga to conclude his week. After that we carried on a QSO with a HAM from Cleveland, N4AOW, on simplex all the way down to Altoona, GA. He was rather impressed with Dad's (KU4ME) setup we were operating on (A Yaesu FT-90 on a 1/4 wave trunk mount). We didn't talk much after that as I was behind the wheel the rest of the trip down. We did pick up a repeater in Dothan, Alabama and a repeater in Chipley, Florida. Today, on our way to get lunch, I made contact with a HAM, KD5RBR, here in Panama City on their club repeater, 146.210. I was under the impression there wasn't much activity in the area, however, I've mainly listened on the HT and I don't think I was picking up anything. Anyway, the week is still young and they have an echolink repeater I may give a try at some point and see if I can make contact with home. I'll let you know how that goes soon.
Until then, be safe, have fun, and most of all, behave. LOL
73 de AJ4JD.
Tim
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