Ham Radio Antenna's Vs Storm Doris

Ham Radio Antenna's Hold Up Through Storm Doris.

Storm Doris is the latest weather front to hit the UK with wind speeds of up to 90 MPH I have been keeping an eye on my antenna's and shed roof. Storm Doris was loud last night and there was heavy sleet in the early hours with very strong gusts of wind but so far so good on all antenna's shed roofs and not forgetting wheelie bins.

Storm Doris weather affecting a flight coming into Leeds Bradford Airport which about 3 miles away from my home QTH. Picture from the Telegraph, taken by: CHARLOTTE GRAHAM/GUZELIAN

I am off work on half term holiday having a nice time with the family. Elsie my oldest got chicken pox a couple of days before the holidays so we have been taking it easy in doors which has allowed me to be in and out of the shack quite a lot where I have made many nice QSOs on 40m, 20m, 17m and 15m with a new DXCC - Antarctica in the log. The HF bands have been quite good at times throughout the week and I have enjoyed catching up with some good DX conditions as well as some good short skip contacts.  Best 73 and good DX!

 BTW Elsie is almost over chicken pox and is happy enough. I suspect her little sister will be showing signs of getting it in the next few days, better to get these things over and done with as I got it when I was thirty and look what happened to me..CQ CQ CQ & 73!

80M Sked With Fellow Blogger - Bas PE4BAS

This evening was the first time that I made QSO with fellow blogger and radio amateur Bas - PE4BAS. We have been following each others online activities for years and our radio contact was well over due. Bas suggested we try the 80 meter band at 21.45 utc, I checked to see if the frequency was clear and heard a big gun signal telling me to clear off h.i. It was the amateur station of PE4BAS who was coming in very nicely indeed. We moved up the band and managed to sustain a perfect QSO  for almost an hour with 5/9+ 20 to +40 db copies at both ends throughout the entire QSO. Bas was running an 80m Loop which was horizontally polarized with his ICOM and 100 watts out. I was running my FT-1000 MK-V and 100 watts into my Windom antenna. I checked the Hustler 6BTV during the QSO and found that I could hear Bas just as well apart from about 20 db drop in his signal strength with the vertical. All in all it was an excellent radio contact with plenty of information exchanged during some very nice radio propagation.

    The image is the signal received from PE4BAS at my station on Wednesday 15th of February

 I am looking forward to the next time I catch up with PE4BAS. Thanks again Bas and 73 to all!

Family, Work, Shack, & Sleep!

As another weekend draws to an end I am once again listening out for any interesting signals coming through on my ham radio equipment before bed. Me recent antenna modifications definitely seem to have improved my station both the beam and vertical are working well. My next tweak will be shortening the Carolina windom by 3 inches or so to make it more resonant higher up on the 80m band. That will be easy enough and I might get it done one evening after work weather permitting, currently the windom is showing SWR at 1:1 on 3.6 MHz and reading 1:8 - 2:0 on 3.8 MHz which is where I want to listen for DX. Besides that I am active working random stations near and far in between family life and work. 73 have a good week!

CUSHCRAFT MA5B - New Ally Mounting Pole

Last weekend I ordered a 50 mm / 2 inch diameter aluminum antenna mast from TLC electrical supplies, at a reasonable price. The tube arrived last Monday which was a very quick delivery, my YL Louise M3TLL knew I would be itching to put it into service so she sent me a message when it arrived at lunch. On the way home I asked my work mate Kyle who is also a neighbor if he was up for lending a hand which was fine by him. I have the Cushcraft 5 band mini beam mounted on a home-brew heavy duty tripod which is held stable with ground rods and large concrete blocks, I previously made a service platform above the tripod which allows the mast, rotator and antenna to be taken up and down reasonably quickly.  With the assistance of Kyle who towers over me at a mighty 6 ft 4 inch of height I knew the changing over of a short 2 ft tube to my new shiny 6 ft tube would be a lot easier than my usual one man struggle. Sure enough the extra pair of hands paid off and the Beam was up, down, switched and back up higher than before by a colossal 4 ft. :-) The new mounting pole is just what I was after as the antenna is now looking over the local roof tops. My QTH is situated on the edge of our estate/neighborhood, half way up a cliff side at 450 feet ASL on a elevated knoll surrounded by moorland and trees with a nice path to North and South America. I am now hoping that the extra few feet will improve the path to Japan and the far East.

Band conditions have been slightly better this week but I have yet to fully test out the stations latest updates to both the MA5B height gain and Hustler 6BTV radial install. However I have been active throughout the week trying my luck with one or two nice DX qso's entered in the log. 73 Have a nice weekend!

Hustler 6BTV - New Radials

HF radio conditions have been pretty grim on an evening back in the shack lately so I decided to try and optimize my Hustler 6 Band Trap Vertical in the hope that I may get a bit more of a helping hand on the 40 meter band. My new Pup Finn is already showing interest in antennas and is inspecting the new radials for size!

I decided to go with the recommended radial sizes seen below taken from the Hustler 6BTV user manual. I used some 2.5 mm multi-strand PVC coated copper wire which is typically used in electrical installations. With the help of my larger soldering iron I was able to join three radials to two sides of the mount giving a total of six radials which worked out as, two for 40M, two for 20M and two for 10M. I might add some more bands later as the result so far are providing excellent SWR readings less than 1.2 without the ATU. I just need some half decent conditions to get some good DX signal reports down on 40M and I shall post the outcome. In the meantime check out the recommended radial sizes below. Best 73!

M0YKS Mobile - ZL1BD New Zealand

On the way in to work I was fortunate to get my 100 watts and FT-857 /m heard by AL - ZL1BD

 I have been hearing AL ZL1BD on and off in the mornings for the past week or so but today was especially good conditions as his signal was peaking at 5/9 as I drove over Baildon Moor. I had a good couple of overs into Hamilton New Zealand and received a 5/3 signal report back to the van.


The Shack of ZL1BD AL

Puppy Love

Hello from Finn, our new 8 week Lurcher pup. Finn will soon be learning about Ham radio, especially portable operations once he is big enough to embrace the great outdoors.

Dudley The DX Hound

Sadly My Beloved Companion and Loyal Friend Passed Away On Wednesday The 28th Of December 2016

Dudley was the best dog I could have ever hoped to have had the pleasure of sharing 13 years of pure happiness with. He will be in our hearts forever, My family and I are feeling very sad and hope the New Year brings some good times for everyone.

Christmas Eve QSO with Santa

Up early and checking the bands on Christmas eve, I found two nice stations to work. The first was Bob VP8LP located on the Falklands Islands and the second was Santa Claus operating as OF9X from the Arctic circle. My two young daughters were in the shack and heard me talking with Santa just before he gets ready to set off on his reindeer powered sledge delivering lots of presents.

Seasons Greetings 2016

We hope you have a lovely Christmas and a great holiday!

5T5TI on 40m

5T5TI  Mauritania Ahmad 5T2AI and Vlad 5T9VB Tidra Island Mauritania It's always worth that last flick through the bands before bed. I just got lucky with a new DXCC in the log on 40m with my Hustler 6btv and 100 watts out of the FT-1000mp. Now it's time for bed 73

Antenna's and Telescopes

Last weekend I carried out the planned work on my Cushcraft MA5B which was the swapping over of antenna masts. In the end I decided not to go with the telescopic mast as it seemed slightly flimsy compared to my 50 mm diameter tube so I ended up just carrying out some maintenance checks on the fixings and rotator.

The higher end of the HF bands have been unreliable on an evening for the past couple of weeks so I have been having a listen down on 40 meters as well as 80 meters where some activity has been found but nothing to write home about. I have been pleased with the performance on 40 meters from the vertical Hustler 6BTV since I re-sited it away from the trees. The Carolina Windom has also had some of my time as I decided to get the feed point higher up in the air from around 20 feet to 30 feet, which seems to be working out reasonably well on 80 meters.

Hopefully the conditions will be improved on the higher end of HF and I will be able to use the beam but for now its the vertical and off-center fed wire that is in use as I listen to the static crashes coming in with a few late night DXers down on 3.795 MHz.

The Yorkshire night sky's has been clear and full of stars this week so I keep taking time out to observe some inter-stellar wonders with last years Christmas present which is a pretty neat Celestron EQ114mm which I got from my family who are fast asleep tucked up in bed when I am engaging in these zany activities.

Best 73 and happy Ham'ing de M0YKS

Home brew telescopic mast clamp

Just finished making a new clamp system to use with a telescopic mast.

I am planning to swap it over this coming weekend and it will be used for the Cushcraft MA5B.

CQ WW SSB Contest 2016

As usual I caught some of the Contest on video.

Counting Down For CQ World Wide DX 2016

4 Days To Go!

I am getting my amateur radio station ready to participate in this years CQ World Wide DX SSB Contest. 

The CQ WW is the largest Amateur Radio competition in the world. Over 35,000 participants take to the airwaves on the last weekend of October (SSB) and November (CW) with the goal of making as many contacts with as many different DXCC entities and CQ Zones as possible.

More info on CQ WW DX 2016

Last years CQ WW DX 2015, I finished with an England 16th position with a score of 50,050, the year before I was the 17th highest score in England. So its 15th highest scoring out of England to aim for or higher this coming weekend! Hopefully the antenna tweaks and new beam will give me what I need to succeed but most of all good band conditions are what I am hoping for. 

The Contest starts at  0000 UTC Saturday 29th     Ends: 2359 UTC Sunday 29th

Last years Certificate for M0YKS

Hope to catch you in the contest. 73. Good DX!