Ham Radio Operator - M0YKS

Happy New year to you all. Can't wait to get started with some Ham Radio fun and games. Happy New Year DX ing 2019!

I decided to remember an old friend and re use this picture of our never forgotten buddy Dudley. Have a very Merry Christmas 2018!

I sometimes try the odd radio app that I come across on playstore but find most to be not that exciting or beneficial to my needs or requirements. I recently tried QRZ assistant and I quite like it so far. The best bit is the built in compass that moves to the coordinates of any station that you look up. I think it could be fun and useful for anyone using rotatable antennas and their smartphones, perhaps from a portable location away from a pc. It's also free!

I was lucky to catch WW1USA earlier this month at the top end of the 20 meter band. Today I received the certificate which is very nice and also a great way to remember the fallen heroes of present and past. Best 73

The Raw Scores are available in case you were wondering. I didn't do as well as I have done on low power but still came a respectful 8th place (Country) 126 place (Continent) and 351 place (World) in the Single Op High power All Band CQ WW SSB Contest. I will find out more once the scores have been finalised and checked over and also I will be downloading my participation certificate/award for my collection. In the meantime I will be playing ham radio in between the chaos of life. Best 73 all!

This year was just as awesome as ever even though band conditions were limited I still worked lots of World Wide DX during the 2018 CQ WW SSB Contest. I managed to get in quite a few hours here and there throughout the entire contest and spent a lot of time on 15m and 20m during the daylight hours where I worked some big signals from Asia, North and South America as well as a few slightly weaker signals such as China and Japan. I was pleased to catch three stations in a row from India with armchair copies up on 15m and all in all I did quite well with the help of my latest addition the G17B amplifier. The Cushcraft MA5B Beam worked well on 15 and 20 meters and my Hustler 6BTV vertical with radials did it for me on 40 meters but the biggest surprise was the dipole which I cut for 80 meters which was previously the windom. As a designated 80m dipole I was able to get some good signals out with the extra power (400 Watts) I worked some good DX multipliers on 80 meters into North Africa...

It's half term at College so I get to catch my self up a little and spend time away from the busyness of teaching, relaxing and spending quality time with my lovely family. So far I have been doing some D.I.Y jobs around the house and in between the fun I have been on my ham radio station making the final checks before the up coming weekend. This weekend if you did not know or perhaps had forge,t is the one weekend where I give my full attention to the HF bands. It's when I try my luck at making contact with as many stations as possible from as many zones as possible out of a total of 40 worldwide. It's that time again for CQ World Wide DX Contest fun!! More info at CQ WW DX SSB site . Last year was amazingly good despite average to poor band conditions I ended up in 3rd place as Low Power, England which was probably a one off lol. Last year my oldest daughter was keeping track of the zones that I worked which ended up at 21 zones out of 40. I can imagine I will need ...