Four ham radio contacts, all different

A few days ago while I worked on my bills and sorted through some receipts to post, I turned on the radio nearby and dialed around on the 20-meter band (about 14.250 MHz). I listened for quite a while as a ham in Green River, WY talked with Cub and Boy Scouts in several California cities. He was a former professional scouter, served in the Army, and sounded like an interesting fellow.

When N7COA left the air I twiddled the dial some more and heard a station in NY who was participating in the NY QSO party (see Note 1 below). I called W2CCC, he answered, and the contact was over. I will likely send a QSL card to confirm the contact.

Then I dialed around some more and heard a special event station at a Wildlife Refuge in Homer, AK. I called K7P and we chatted for a bit. I definitely will send a QSL card (see Note 2) and possibly $2 for a nice certificate about the refuge.

Again, I spun the dial and heard a station with an unusual call sign: T32C. I looked up the call sign and discovered they were transmitting from Christmas Island in the Pacific near the equator. I just confirmed my call sign is in the log! This is a new ham country for me (see Note 3).

A couple days ago I talked with some local friends using the 2-meter band. Two-meter signals can travel long distances, but not half way round the world. Technicians have full use of all the ham bands above 30 MHz, plus small segments in the HF bands. General and higher licensees can use the HF bands to talk around the world when conditions are right.

I enjoyed my three casual contacts.

Note 1: A QSO is a contact between hams. A QSO Party encourages hams to contact other hams within the QSO Party boundaries (in this case New York). Hams within the boundary contact anyone. This is one way to increase the number of county contacts, and helps me learn some geography.

Note 2: QSL cards can be simple (call sign, names, date and time of contact, band or frequency, and usually mode (single sideband, CW, etc.). Some cards have beautiful photos that show the area where the ham lives. The cards confirm a contact between hams.
Note 3: Hams count countries differently than the UN or geographers. Portions of countries (such as AK and HI) separated from the rest of the country by some distance (I think 100 miles, but not sure) count as different countries. So a person who works all 50 states will have 3 DX countries in the bag.

Radio magic with DX

This morning when I sat down at my desk to organize my workplan for the day and week, I turned on the radio to just listen. I twiddled the dial on 20 meters and heard nothing but static, so I tried 40 meters. A few stations were on but nothing that interested me, so I went back to 20 meters, and after a bit of hunting, heard a distant (DX) station working North American stations in succession.

Before I go further, let me briefly describe my station so you get a feel for the situation. I have an Icom 706 MkIIG that runs on batteries below my desk (they are heavy!). My feedline snakes out the window (haven't cut a hole in the wall yet) without a tuner and connects to a short feedline for a G5RV antenna. The wire slopes from 40' atop my garage to 30' diagonally across my home (mainly so my wife does not complain about the appearance). Simple station with minimal directivity.

I've learned with experience that when stations sound relatively loud at my location, I have a chance to talk with them. Maybe. John was not loud, but definately readable. As I listened to John work several stations per minute in what sounded like a relaxed manner, the thought crossed my mind that I should at least call him once or twice. Perhaps my signal would be strongest at his end for a brief moment. As John finished with a station, he would then say QRZ (which means who is calling me?). That was my cue.

I said my call sign phonetically but he answered another station. So I tried again on the next round, and he said MY callsign! We exchanged brief pleasantries and signal reports at 1014 Z May 15, 2011. The magic part is how a thin wire hung between metal poles about 75 feet apart allowed me to talk briefly with a station 7300 miles around the world. John, 9M6JC, was speaking from Borneo Island in Malaysia just 5° north of the equator and I live slightly north of halfway to the pole. So far this is the longest distance I've talked. I sure like ham radio as a hobby. Now I need to figure out the island identifier for IOTA (Islands on the Air).

I have a number of friends who have talked with nearly all entities (countries and country segments) around the world. Currently there are 337 recognized "ham countries". To put this contact into perspective, Borneo is my 12th ham country. I doubt I will ever have all of the countries confirmed, but certainly will not unless I get on the radio, listen, and try. Yesterday I heard a station from Croatia for the first time, so I'll keep listening. There is magic in the ether!

DX serendipity

On my home from the Ham Basics workshop (see previous post), I turned on the radio in my car to see what stations might be on the air. I was pleasantly surprised to hear several European stations booming in. To say this is rare for my mobile station would be an understatement! I had heard a Finnish station once before a year or more ago, but none others.

I've also learned that my chances of working a weak station from my car (I have a hamstick mounted near the trunk with a line tuner between the antenna and radio) approach nil. Since the station was loud enough, I called DL7MEV (he was in a contest) and he even answered back. I now have exactly ONE European contact from Germany near the Austrian border.

Since that time, I have not heard any stations more distant than Texas and Minnesota (about 1500 miles). That magic of radio continues....

Postscript: I uploaded my German contact into Logbook of the World, and he verified the contact a couple of days later. I assume he needed some rest after a 48-hour contest. Now my trail towards DXCC advances to 14. Just for comparison, several of my friends have contacts with 337 countries verified, so I have a ways to go.

Unexpected contact with the far north

Saturday I went to a fellow church member's apartment to help him move to a new place. I had the wrong address to start with, so arrived near the end of the loading process. So we finished loading, tied everything down, and headed for his new duplex across town. Since I had an errand I needed to do after we unloaded, I took my car rather than riding with the rest of the crew.

During the 20-minute drive to the new address, I put on my traveling headphone and tuned around the 20-meter band. Not much loud enough to hear me on the first couple scans. Then I heard a loud call (which I've learned might actually hear the signal from my car). He worked several stations I could not hear, and then called, "CQ, CQ". I reached down to press the push to talk button, gave my call sign, and was rather pleased to hear VX8X return my call. He said he was working from Ellice Island in the Arctic Ocean.

We exchanged signal reports (he was 59, mine was 48). I listened for a while as he worked more stations, and then his signal simply faded away. I could not hear VX8X at all when I returned to my car after helping unload at my friend's new duplex.

I think some events in life are very much like this transitory contact with a station far to the north on a remote island. Opportunities such as this appear and then disappear. If we fail to recognize and act on the opportunity, the chance is lost.

I looked for VX8X on the web earlier today, and found more information on the DX-pedition on his blog (http://ve8ev.blogspot.com/). I feel fortunate to be among the 2,228 contacts (QSOs) he made from Ellice Island (IOTA NA-192). Guess I need to start looking for other islands on the air one of these days. The official site for islands worldwide is at http://www.rsgbiota.org/.