Ham Radio Operator

Sunday, June 21, 2009

The 2E0HTS Ham Shack Gets a New Desk

Last week I finished building up my new office desk which was to be used to house both computer and radio gear. The desk assembly took long enough (flat pack), but the real work was re-fitting the radio’s, feeder’s, mike’s, and the rest of the ham radio paraphernalia. Since the re-arranging of the equipment has been finalised I have had the opportunity to play radio and last night I worked 9 US stations which most were 5/9.

The new shack desk wasn’t stamped and approved until a visit and tinker around with the rigs and a quick swing in the chair by old mate Barry – 2E0OOC (Pictured above) had taken place. Once I could prise 2E0OOC out of the hot seat I managed to get back on 20m and play some more before the evening comes to an end. I wonder where the weekend went?

Friday, June 19, 2009

New Treads For The Toyota Mobile Ham Station

Today I used my holiday day off work to tinker with the Toyota to ensure many more miles of driving/Dx-ing. I started by fitting some new anti roll bar bushes as the originals have had plenty of stick with the 1.5 mile long dirt track to the qth. The rubber bushes were cheap enough and I easily fitted the new ones in both sides in just over an hour which included a tea break.
Later in the day after testing out the now silent drive over the bumps I got 4 new tyres fitted and balanced, the mobile station is once again ready to roll.

On board the Toyota Estima 4X4, I run two antenna mounts - HF & VHF, with a variety of Maldol and Comet mono band HF whips, as well as a watson dual band whip into a Yaesu FT-857 radio.
Bands regularly used /mobile are: 80m, 40m, 20m, 15m, 10m, 6m, 2m & 70cms, I am mainly found on 20M more often than not but do get on the other bands as well.

73 have a great weekend and hope to hear you from my mobile!

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Busy, Busy, Busy!

I have finally finished most of the jobs that I have had looming in the background at home which has kept me occupied over the last week. We now have a very nice Veranda to sit out on during the summer evenings were i will be able to play some radio (especially Satellite operations). I also have built a fantastic new office desk/shack bench which accommodates the radio gear and p.c admirably. Louise is highly suited as last week I built up a new sofa and chair where she can now be found usually semi horizontally.

I have also set up an account on twitter and from now on I can be found here - Twitter 2E0HTS , hope to catch up with some of you soon.

Now that things are settling down again I am planning on been active tonight on 40M from around 19.30utc, see you on the bands!

Saturday, June 06, 2009

QRZ 40 Meters!

After having so much fun the other night I decided to play some more on 40M and ended up working many Amateur Radio Stations on 7.156 mhz (40M). I was also joined by local stations: Adam - 2E0LXA, Phil - M1PAC and Craig - M6CIW.
Check out the latest video here:

We had some great contacts with a lot of "rag chewing" going on and I was also called by some of my other radio friends over in Europe as well as lots of new contacts.
A special hello goes out to Peter - DC2PM, Ton - PHoTR and Satellite buddy Steve - DL1YAL who were also on the band with me last night. Catch you guys later!

Thanks to all Stations worked on 7.156mhz, all were big signals!
2E0LXA
M6CIW
M1PAC
ON3TD/M
OZ/DH8IJ
G0KSS
MI5JYK
M3ULT
M1JHG
GW6GCK
DC2PM
2W0TAR
MI3OZX
M0HEM
MW3VQJ
DL6AN
PA3YH
DL1YAL
DJ5DC
EI9JO
PH0TR
PA3FYI
Hope to catch you all on the bands soon, I should be back on the Air tonight.

73 Have a great weekend

Friday, June 05, 2009

Foundation Licence Exam Success

Today Adam Hanson (pictured above) successfully passed the Foundation Licence exam at the College where I work.

Adam has been with me in the Fabrication and Welding department for the last three years where he has just about finished his level 2 City & Guilds in Fabrication & Welding.

During Adams time at the College he has also attended the College radio club where I am the RSGB (Radio Society of Great Britain) registered instructor.

Adam has shown a keen interest in Amateur Radio and has been studying hard for the exam.

Well done Adam! I cant wait to work you when you get your new Call sign - M6???

It is nice to know that young Hams are taking the hobby seriously and will help to keep Amateur radio alive for many years to come.

New Doublet Working Well On 40M

please click on log to enlarge

Last night was spent calling CQ on 40m, I was very pleased to make many interesting contacts on the band.
I was very surprised how well my relatively newly installed 130ft home brew Doublet was performing and I made some great signal report exchanges.

Many Stations were operating with only a 40/50 watts and the odd station was only running 5 watts. I managed to work into Europe - Belgium, Germany, Netherlands, Sweden and European Russia.

I also had some great contacts up and down G-Land working Scotland, England, Wales and Northern Ireland with 5/9 reports both ways and sometimes stronger. Later in the evening I was called by a Canadian Mobile station from Halifax in Nova Scotia.

All in all, the entire evening provided some great conversation both local and DX all on 7.175 MHZ. I like thank all of the Stations that came back to my CQ call and I shall be active tonight somewhere near by that frequency again calling CQ. Good DXing and happy weekend.

Wednesday, June 03, 2009

144 SSB Contest

Last nights VHFCC Contest was as good fun as usual on the 2m ssb band, I used the FT-847 and 30 watts into a homebrew IOIo loop antenna.

Contest Title: 144MHz UKAC 2 Jun 2009
Section: UKAC Restricted. Number of QSOs made: 27. Claimed points: 4652. Multiplier: 10. Overall score: 46520. Best DX station callsign: G4WFR/P. Distance: 316
Locator: IO91DA

click on log to enlarge
Thanks to all Stations works and look out for me next month.

Monday, June 01, 2009

Aeroplanes and Radio

Last week was spent holidaying on the Welsh island of Anglesey. During our stay I was able to watch many aircraft come and go from RAF Valley which was right next to our campsite.

I received quite a lot of interesting transmissions from the comms tower around 128MHz.Using my mobile station (FT-857) and numerous monoband antennas I was able to work many stations on HF and VHF. Amazingly I even worked as far back as my home QTH on 2m FM and had a contact with fellow CRAG member 2E0XLG Chris.

Here are the stations I worked from my mobile during our stay:

UA1AFT VASSILY 5/9 + 20M
YU1HFG 5/8 20M
C4SV 5/9 20M
UW1GZ 5/9 20M
UR5ZVP 5/9 20M
HA1TNX 5/9 40M
GI4MNA/P 2M FM 5/9
GB5BOO 2M FM 5/3
2E0XLG/P 2M FM 5/5
2E0MAS 2M FM 5/0 WIGAN
G0PZO/P 2M FM 5/5 CUMBRIA
M0OTE/M 2M FM 5/9
GW0EWN/P 2M FM 5/3
2E0EJF 2M FM 5/5
M0GGR/M 2M FM 5/5

All these contacts were great but as you can see, Dudley the greyhound was not quite so impressed!

Tuesday, May 19, 2009

Mobiling

Despite the constant downpours of rain that we have been experiencing, as arranged from the previous weekend Barry - 2E0OOC fellow Ham and good friend was waiting for me as I returned home Sunday evening. He had recently changed his vehicle to a Toyota Estima which was the same as mine so I had offered to install his radio equipment for him as I had already established the best way to do the job. 2E0OOC 's rig and antenna's are also the same as what I use in the mobile which are: Yaesu FT-857 Rig & Maldol HFC Antenna's.
After around 90 minutes the Rig was mounted in the dash fed direct to the vehicle battery and I had fitted two antenna mounts (HF & VHF) to the rear of the vehicle. Barry was mobile once again and I was slightly weathered and rained on but satisfied with the result.
All in all a good evenings work!

I also have had the pleasure of working BARD member and fellow YouTuber M0OGY - Dave from North Lincs. This time we have worked each other mobile to mobile on three occasions over the last week.
Dave and I have caught each other on 2M FM around 17.03 local time during our journeys back home from work. M0OGY/M - Dave comes through well (5/6 - 5/9) as I am driving up the top of the moors at around 1000ft ASL.
I am not sure of the exact distance to Dave in Lincolnshire, but it is at least 70 - 80 miles East of my location.

I am always impressed with the mobile side of amateur radio both on HF and VHF, hope to work some more of you mobile stations "mobile to mobile" soon.

Thursday, May 14, 2009

Bancroft Mill Activation - Mills On The Air

This Sunday the 17th of May we will be active alongside the rest of the CRAG Members at Bancroft Mill , Barnoldswick, Lancashire.
The Craven Radio Amateur Group will be operating from the Steam powered mill which will be running with the steam engine fully powered up.
Listen out for the CRAG call sign – MX0BCQ/A operating on most of the HF bands as well as VHF. The WAB square at the steam powered mill is SD84 which will be up for grabs during the activation. We will be on air from around 10.00 utc and the event will be all available to the general public.
Louise – M3TLL and I, will be taking some pictures in between playing radio as well as learning about steam powered mills and weaving. It should be a great day out as I used to be the Maintenance Engineer during the 80s working in a still existent local Baildon Steam Powered Mill. I will tell you more about Sundays event when it happens and hope to work some of you on the day.

Tuesday, May 12, 2009

20M DX Band

Solar activity was favourable last night and I was fortunate with my timing as I tuned across 20m to find VK3MO putting out a CQ call. I was straight back to Melbourne, Australia with a 5/9 report from Ian – VK3MO. Earlier around 22.30 utc also on 20m I made another QSO with CO6LC located in Cuba exchanging 5/7 reports. The band did seem to be quite stable with plenty of good DX openings, I heard The British Virgin Islands as well as lots of Stateside some of which were loud 5/9 signals. The only problem I encountered was the clock ticking away and at Midnight (local time) I had to pull the plug to catch some shut eye ready for work in the morning.

I was running the Yaesu FT-767GX, Heil Gold line Mic and 50Watts into the Vertical Delta Loop cut for 20M. This homebrew antenna is still outperforming the Doublet and Hustler 99% of the time, I recommend trying one found in my earlier post on the. 20M home brew Delta Loop

I also got the chance to set up the Arrow Satellite antenna and use the two hand held rigs to work some Stations during the AO-51 pass that took place. It was fun but windy and very cold despite the lovely sunset, typically the kind of WX which limited the Satellite Ham fun to just the single outdoor session. (With a quick retreat indoors and a hot cup of Coffee)

Wednesday, May 06, 2009

144MHz UKAC

During last nights 144MHz UKAC I worked 27 Stations the furthest being G4RRA, at a distance of 371 miles. Claimed points: 4013
Multiplier: 11 DXCC: 2
Overall score: 44143

G4WFR/P IO91DA
G8BUN IO93EQ
G3YJR IO93FJ
G1HLT IO93JD
G0TAL IO93DR
M6AXL/P IO93BV
M0XLT IO83WX
G4DEZ JO03AE
MX0SRA/P IO93AF
GM4PPT IO75SK
MM0GPZ/P IO85SK
G3SDC/A IO92FM
G8CUL IO91JO
G0KPW JO02RF
M0NUT IO91IN
M0COP/P IO82NN
2E0DOD IO93AF
G4CPA IO93AV
M1PAC IO93AU
G0XDI IO91RQ
M1DDD IO93AE
G3ZVW IO80MS
M0YJT/P IO92EN
G4RRA IO80BS
G3UUV IO81WK
G4GSB IO82XM
2E0XLG/p IO83WV

Equipment used: Yaesu FT-847, 50 watts. Antenna – IOIo home made 1 element/loop.

The Contest started off quiet at first but livened up after ½ an hour or so. Lots of QSB was present throughout the full 2 ½ hours but I still managed to do quite well calling CQ as well as a lot of hunting up and down the band.
Somewhere around the ½ way mark Louise – M3TLL presented me with some freshly made and deliciously still warm jam dumplings which went down very well. Thanks goes to all Stations worked and see you all in the 144MHz UKAC next month.

Friday, May 01, 2009

Aeronautical Mobile On 20M

Tonight at 16.52 utc I worked my first Aeronautical Mobile Ham Station. I was listening around on 20m when I heard NQ4I/AM - Rick 5/9+20 on 14.192 usb. I gave Rick a call just before the pile up kicked in and Rick- NQ4I/AM returned back giving me a 5/9+10 signal report. During the QSO Ricks Aircraft was at 40,000 feet somewhere between England and Ireland, flying over the sea. NQ4I/ Aeronautical Mobile told me they had a 9 hour flight ahead and were heading for California via Greenland and Canada. May be some of you guys will catch him on 20M?

Thursday, April 30, 2009

Home Brew Yagi and Tower

Earlier Today I built myself a Yagi beam and a lattice tower.

What I forgot to mention was that its a model Yagi & tower that I made from 3mm wire, MIG welded together. I would like to build the real thing one day!

It looks good in the shack and it would make a nice ornament or gift, I am considering mass production with different antenna themes.

Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Two Wheel Station

The past week has been a busy one both at work and at home but I still managed to play quite a lot of radio. I also got a bargain buy on Friday which was a Yamaha XT600E.
I am already considering the XT600E for portable off road radio operation and I will be fabricating some brackets to be used to mount the FT-100 and a mobile whip. I can also ride the Enduro machine up to the trig point located on the summit of Baildon Moor. Set up the Arrow beam and see what happens during the monthly VHFCC contests (WX permitting of course). The new Bike should prove to be an interesting way to play some Ham radio on two wheels rather than four, as well as getting to the slightly more difficult locations.
Picture shows the XT being guarded by DX Sniffer Dudley

Besides riding the Yamaha XT600E with Louise- M3TLL (riding pillion), I did work 6 Stations on 20M, 4 Stations on 40M, 13 Stations on 2M FM and 3 Stations Via VO-52 Satellite. Check the log for Call Signs and information. click to enlarge log

Antenna Swap
I recently went back to the IOIo for VHF work as it out performed the recently constructed 4 element yagi. The old saying “If it works, leave it well alone” came to mind when swapping back to the IOIo antenna.
HF
When I have been active, propagation levels on the HF bands has remained fairly low with mainly DX openings happening in the early morning times. Hopefully solar activity will awake soon allowing some long awaited 10M DX activity, as well as opening up the other HF bands.

Ham Radio Operator - M0YKS