Tag Archives: DX

Meeting E21EIC

Posted on by

During my stay in Bangkok in November 2023, I had the opportunity to meet probably the most famous and successful radio amateur in Asia: Champ E21EIC and his lovely wife Goi, E20NKB.
Champ is not only known by his own call sign, but also by E2A, under which he and his crew wins almost every major contest in Asia. In addition, he is probably known to most active DXers through many DX expeditions like XW1IC, XW4XR, 3W3B, OJ0A, HS60RAST to name just a few.
Thank you Champ and Goi for the lovely day and the meal together. We’ll meet again soon!

E21EIC_6
E21EIC_4
E21EIC_7
E21EIC_5
E21EIC_3
E21EIC_2
E21EIC_1

IARU Region-1 Marconi Memorial Contest VHF 2022

Posted on by

After a break of a few years, I took again part in my favorite contest, the “Marconi Contest VHF” this last weekend. In just a few hours on Saturday evening and Sunday morning, a total of 120 QSOs and a total of abt. 43,000 points with an average of 363 km/QSO were made. And it was a lot of fun working old friends and pounding the brass again!

These are the best DX contacts:

  • 9A4V JN95mm 921 km
  • IQ5NN JN63gn 907 km
  • IO2V JN54we 831 km
  • IZ5ILA/4 JN54pf 822 km
  • 9A4M JN85ei 817 km
  • IK4PMB JN54mm 789 km
  • 9A2AE JN86hf 754 km
  • HA2R JN87ue 714 km
  • HG1Z JN86ku 700 km
  • S59P JN86ao 685 km
  • S51ZO JN86dr 685 km
2022_MarconiContest

July 2020 – Sporadic E 6m/2m

Posted on by

50 MHz: Also the month of July brought some nice Es openings to Japan and minor openings to Florida and, after a very long time, again to Brazil. No new DXCC could be worked in July.

Overall the year 2020 ended up with 9 new DXCC Entities. Particularly worth mentioning are those 82 stations from Japan, never worked that much before on the Magic Band.

Stations worked on 50 MHz – July 2020
Top 10 distances on 50 MHz – July 2020

144 MHz: Regarding Sporadic E July was also a disappointed month. Only OH7RJ was heard and worked during a very short opening on July 3rd.

June 2020 – Sporadic E 6m/2m

Posted on by

50 MHz: Seasonally 6m was open every day within Europe. In addition, there were very long openings to Asia and North America. Towards the US and Canada, the terrain of my QTH rises to 10 degrees elevation, so at all again only a few stations from the west have been heard and worked.

In total, six new DXCC entities could be worked in May: 4S7VG (Sri Lanka), BU2EL (Taiwan), DU1IST (Philippines), HL2ZN (South Korea), JT1CO (Mongolia) and VR2XYL (Hong Kong).

Stations worked on 50 MHz – June 2020
Top 10 distances on 50 MHz – June 2020

144 MHz: Regarding Sporadic E, this June was a real disappointment. Only on June 21st there was a brief opening to the east and just two contacts could be logged. RU3GX, R3KBF, UA3QHF were heard only.

Meeting VK6MK & VK6KCC (VK6NC Club)

Posted on by

During my trip across Western Australia this January – February 2020 I had the pleasure to meet some Ham-Radio friends I knew from Hf contacts and from the EME Group.

Stuart, VK6MK, and his wife Jennifer live in Australind, a beautiful small town south of Perth. I met Stuart several times on Hf and we spent some nice hours in his beautiful home. Thanks for your kind hospitality folks!

Alex, VK6KCC, is one of the 2m EME gang, living north of Perth. He is member of the NCRG, Northern Corridor Radio Group from Western Australia. This Group is located within Whiteman Park and is home of the Neil Penfold State Amateur Radio Centre (NPSARC) and antenna farm. VK6ANC, one of the club callsigns, is very active on the bands. VK6NC, the other callsign, now appears in most of the big contests.  The Group is very well equipped and active from 1.8 MHz to 10 GHz. Thank you Alex for the nice discussions and explaining us your Clubstation!

DK5AI – D41CV on 144 MHz via Es: New Region I Distance Record on 2m – 4.966 km!

Posted on by

The day was quiet on 6m as the band opened up to Africa in the afternoon, July 23, 2019. I was busy watching for a TU2 station from Ivory Coast and a look to the MUF showed some red spots in southern France, means the MUF was above 140 MHz!

Time to switch to 144 MHz. Not too late and after some CQ-calls CT1FJW popped in, followed by other stations from Portugal. And there was another caller in between – could I trust my eyes? I thought my heart stopped beating. D41CV from Cape Verde was calling me! 15 second periodes for FT8-mode could be sooo long, would the propagations be stable enough to finish? Yes they were and then it was done: D41CV was worked on 144 MHz via Sporadic E plus Tropo Extension over an unbelievable distance of 4.966 km (3,086 mi), also setting a new Region I Distance Record! The signal of D41CV war copied for about less than 5 minutes.

If we have a closer look at the Hepburn Tropo Index, we can find the highest value of 10+ for the area west of Africa just between the Canary and Cape Verde Islands. This maritime tropospheric ducting widens the range of the massive Sporadic E Opening between Germany and EA8. What a lucky constellation today!

Thanks Monteverde Contest Team Club for calling and for this incredible QSO and Record!

Thanks to EI7GL who made a very nice analysis about this remarkable contact, see here.

Heard but not worked were CT1BYM -9, EA1HRR -6 and EA8TJ -7.

10-Band-DXCC .. My Nightmare

Posted on by

Having been licensed for over 45 years now, I thought it would be time to apply for the 5-Band DXCC with several Stickers, alltogether 160m to 6m. Well, most of the required DXCC’s were already confirmed via the Logbook of the World. The last missing cards were requested by letter and received in most cases sooner or later. These were then, together with the Application, sent to a German ARRL Field Checker in April 2018. He checked fast, the cards came back quickly and he forwarded the paperwork to the ARRL in Newington USA. There everything was then processed in May 2018 and the 5-Band DXCC and Stickers for 160/30/17/12 and 6m were marked as issued. So far – so good.

Time goes by .. Beginning of September 2018 I asked ARRL about my application. Yes, it was there but ARRL planning a new Design for the 5B-DXCC and nobody could say how long that would take. And it took until February 09, 2019 when the parcel arrived – 10 long month after I sent my Application to the Field Checker. If you think the story is over now, unfortunately not.

The new 5B-DXCC consists of a modern designed acrylic plate, to which a golden stripe with callsign and name is affixed, as well as the round band Stickers, which are also affixed to it. No date, no number anymore – incredible! Unfortunately, all the stickers were loveless oblique and crooked glued, such as price tags on goods. I did not want to accept this, sent some photos to the ARRL and they assured me a new plaque. This came in early May – and – oh no – the sticker for 6m was missing again. So another email and last but not least, this arrived in early June.

Now, 14 month after the application, the 10-band DXCC with all the stickers hangs on the wall and waits for the last, the 144 MHz sticker to finally finish it.

(Picture to follow soon)

QSO with K1JT

Posted on by

Today K1JT, Prof. Dr. Joe Taylor, Nobel Prize Winner and father of the WSJT Software Package, showed up on 17m in FT8 mode. It was just a short and “digital” contact but very glad to meet this great personality and Radio Amateur on the band.

ARRL DXCC Challenge Award arrived

Posted on by

After waiting for almost exactly 4 months, the postman has finally delivered the long-awaited parcel today: Mail from the ARRL Headquater in Newington, USA, my DXCC-Challenge-Plaque with Endorsement 2.000.

2018_Challenge2000As the name says, this is plaque is a real challenge and a hardcore Award for the dedicated HF-Radio Amateur. The DXCC Challenge Award is given for worked and confirmed at least 1,000 DXCC band-entities on any amateur bands, 160 through 6 meters (except 60 meters). It’s a massive wooden plate with a blue-gold-etched plate on top. The Endorsement 2,000 means  an average of 200 confirmed DXCC Entities on every of those 10 bands.

To reach all these band points countless hours in front of the station were required but it was no less tough to get the necessary confirmations. Thanks to the help of the Logbook Of The World, things have become a bit easier in recent years. It would be nice if all stations finally could use this opportunity.

Next stop wants to be 2,500 – that might take a while and it’s great to have a next step in DXing.

Christmas Presents

Posted on by

The weather before Christmas was quiet and suitable for maintaining antennas. So I improved the matching of my 160m inverted L-antenna to get some more DXCC entities during the days off. Conditions on Top-Band were very good at a K-index of 1 and the signals, especially from Asia, were very loud in times. The following 6 new countries have been logged: Mozambique (C93PA), Azores (CU3EQ), Mongolia (JT1CO), South Korea (HL5IVL), Taiwan (BV1AP), Mexico (XE1TD). Also four new Zones for 160m WAZ (03 / 06 / 23 / 37) and seven new US-States for the 160m WAS were worked: Arkansas (K5GO), California (K6RW), Colorado (K0RF), Michigan (K8TLC), Minnesota (K0TT), Montana (KM7W) and Utah (WA7LNW). It was interesting to see how the terminus of the greyline correlated with the higher signal strengths (see picture).

2017-12-24_160_JATalking about 2m I concentrated to EME during the days between Christmas and New Year. The moon was in good position with low degradation and finally 43  initial callsigns, several new WW-locator and two new DXCC entities found the way into the log. After several tries I was very happy to work Ricardo, LU7FA, on Dec. 27 for DXCC #67 and Bing, YC2MDU, on Dec. 31, 2017 for DXCC #68. It is interesting to mention that LU7FA has just 2 antennas and YC2MDU using just 400 W output. Two great belated Christmas gifts and a happy ending 2017.