Jun 05 2018
Todays NAC contest just finished. There were very good tropo conditions. Yesterday I could hear the OY beacon on both 144 and 432 MHz, today I didn’t (yet). But heard and worked many stations in GM and even a little bonus with stations in North Ireland. ODX: GM7PKT/P IO76NO 824 km with FT-817 and 5 Watts.
The other good thing: many active stations including many PA-stations. The amount of PD (Novice) stations participating is growing to every moth.
The map is too small 🙂
May 20 2018
Saturday during the start and Sunday morning I spend a few hours in the shack and was able to work 21 stations. Amongst them, 1 in Schotland, 2 in Wales and the rest from England. I was using a 9-elements LFA and 100 Watts power. ODXC was GM6MD in IO75VG (717km). The log is uploaded as checklog.
May 14 2018
Last week a new antenna for 23cm arrived. It’s the SHF-design 67-element (5 meter boom) from Wimo. It should give about 20 dBd gain and will replace the borrowed 23-elements Tonna. I hope that this beam, in combination with the Gemnini amp, gives me enough punch to work stations more than 500 kilometer away.
I hope to put the beam in the mast tomorrow and test it during the Nordic Activity Contest every 3th Thuesday of the month. Eventually this antenna will be replaced by a 120cm dish with dual-band ringfeed for 23cm and 13cm but I need to shop for a new rotator and (2nd) mast first, so this will cost me some more time.
Jan 21 2018
Last weeks I’ve changed the HAMNET set-up. The radio is switched from Ubiquiti PBE M5-400 to Mikrotik using a 60 cm dish. The s/n ratio is now 50 dB(!) from my home to PI1UTR in the Gerbrandy tower, 31 km away. Furthermore I’ve switched to BGP-based routing with the fiber internet connection as back-up.
Jan 20 2018
Last week, storm hit the Netherlands with speeds up till 128 km/h. My temporary mast went down. A new base is ready to be mounted. This time with more counterpose and guy wires. The Moxon for 50 and 70 MHz needs some new aluminium. Besides that (and the bent platform) no damage to the roof. 
Jan 13 2018
Last week I’ve received a shipment with several 23cm capable transceivers from Japan. One was the Kenwood TM-541 and two others were Kenwood TM-833’s. The 833’s are quite unknown since there are only brought to the Japanese market. basically it’s the more familiar dual-band 733 but now with the bands 70cm/23cm.
Nov 04 2017
I’ve build an extra 23cm receiver for the regional 23cm repeater system PI6NOS in Hilversum. Building was quite straightforward. Just take a Raspberry Pi, an RTL-SDR stick and connect it to an antenna (using a band-pass filter not to overload the RTL-stick with crap).
The repeater system is based on an svxlink controller so just installing remotetrx on the RPi is enough to get started. And since we’re hamradio operators and not internet amateurs, the remote receiver is connected via 5 GHz HAMNET. It even uses an indirect link from my house via the IJsselstein tower towards the Hilversum tower where the controller and transmitter is located.
There are still some improvements to be made and I have to mount a dedicated antenna for the system. There is only one problem: when using my Alinco DJ-G5 triband portable on 23cm the signal, even with 100 mWatt, is blocking the receiver.
Jul 14 2017
I won the first prize in the Belgium UBA spring contest on 144 MHz. within the QRP segment outside of Belgium. The caveat: I was the only one who send in a log :). Nevertheless I’d like to thank all Belgium stations for there patience working me. I was using about 5 Watts of power using a Ukrainian transverter behind the Icom IC-7300.
If I was sending in a regular log (no QRP) then I would have been second of the DX-stations. See you next year.
Jul 04 2017
The first two hours I started beaming OZ and DL. Signals from OZ (and SM) where very loud. From 120 degrees (Germany Ruhrgebiet) I noticed local QRN. That’s why dots are missing in Germany. Later on I directed the beam 270 degrees towards the UK. Unfortunately no Wales or Scotland. The biggest surprise was a neighbour station a few hundred of meters away calling me. He said “Well. I guess this QSO doesn’t give you lots of points since we’re in the same locator”. Wrong! Each new locator (JO22) gives 500 bonus points. And since I didn’t work any other stations in JO22, this QSO gave almost the same points as a QSO with an OZ station in Denmark with a competitor in the same grid locator. So dutch hams. Build a Moxon (It will only costs you 15 minutes), put it on a broom and put it out of your attic window. Or take it with a FT-817 up a hill. You will work OZ, DL and G-stations and you will contribute to other competitors in the contest. Don’t have 144 MHz SSB? Visit PI4RCG. They have 2 base-stations for sale for 100 Euro each.
Jul 02 2017
New DXCC: SP (Poland) and EI (Ireland). The last one, I was able to work on 432 MHz in SSB and 144 Mhz in CW. Distance: 827km zo my ODX for this contest. I didn’t hear and work SM (Sweden) stations. I had a sked with an OE (Austria) station but unfortunately this didn’t work out. Maybe next time.
May 22 2017
Last weekend the RSGB held the annual 144 MHz May contest. I’ve made 17 QSO’s on Saturday. Just for fun. The log is send as checklog. I”ve made one mistake with G3WSK’s locator. UT1FG/MM was a surprise as operator, active from his boat on the Northsea. The band was quiet dead. ODX was M0WYB with 548 kilometers.
May 11 2017
I’m preparing my 23cm station. Last weekend I’ve made some QSO’s during the May contest but with a very limited set-up. Time to have some more punch. Onboartd is a Gemini SSPA easily capable of delivering 180 Watts. More than enough for the 120 Watt limit here in the Netherlands for bands above 1 GHz. Also mountes is the SHF Elektrotechnik LNA capable of handling the same power. The todo is the antenna. I have to mount a 45-elements (5-elements reflector) 3,4 meters boom yagi for the 23cm band.
May 08 2017
Active on 144 and 432 MHz. New was 1296 MHz with a (very) limited set-up: 15-elements yagi (120cm boom) without pre-amp and 10 Watts of output power. Still able to work Belgium, Germany and England.
May 08 2017
Last weekend I’ve performed some antenne maintenance. The LNA’s for 144 and 432 MHz are in place. I also mounted a small 15-elements antenna for 1296 MHz (23cm). During the contest last weekend I was able to make a QSO with Belgium, Germany and England with only 10 Watts of power and no LNA. I even heard a OK-station from the Czech Republic but due to lack of power I wasn’t able to work him.
For the Sporadic E season, a dual-band Moxon antenne is mounted for the 50 and 70 MHz bands. So with this set-up I’m able to work on 50, 70, 144, 432 and 1296 MHz and the HAMNET dish for 5600 MHz.
Special thanks goed to Gerton (PD0G) for helping me out. He was driving by for a cup of coffee while I was packing stuff to go to the roof.
Hamnieuws.nl
