Some reasons I enjoy ham radio

Radio still seems like magic to me. In my early teenage years, I listened to distant AM radio stations on a small radio. On some nights the stations came in clearly, and other nights not at all. Today, my antennas and radios are much larger and more sensitive, but I still feel the magic. I may listen to friends across town, or talk with someone perched on a small atoll in mid-Pacific Ocean, or talk with someone commuting the highways in a far-away city. Once I talked for nearly an hour from Vancouver with a ham on Lake Powell who described a lovely sunset from his part of the world.
Many hams earned their license to help communicate during times when their community needed help. During and after the windstorms along the Oregon coast in December 2007, ham radio operators dispatched police, fire, and other county personnel because the county radio system failed. Many of the hams who served along the coast were relatively new, and they used simple radio systems. After the Gulf hurricanes in 2005, hams helped rescue and support agencies with needed communications. Most communities lost their local public service communication facilities from wind and water damage, so ham radio filled the gap.
Ham radio operators often help with non-emergency events such as parades and large events like the Hood-to-Coast relay. The race course covers over 190 miles. Hams set up at most checkpoints which are 6-8 miles apart. They handle emergency and health-related communications along the route. Hams do this without pay as a community service.
The hams I’ve met all seem genuinely nice and helpful, and are usually willing to share what they know to help other hams. I’m sure some do not fit this pattern, but those folks apparently avoided meeting me. Most are willing to answer questions from a newbie, or help in the community when needed.
Ham radio includes many sub hobbies. Some became hams so they could communicate during search and rescue events. Others earned their license to help learn electronic principles and experiment (cell phones, and cable TV came from such experimentation). Still others joined so they could talk with people in distant places. My personal interests include using radios to support community and church events, participating in radio contests to improve my operating skill, and helping others earn their licenses. Sometimes I try my hand at building antennas with some modest success.
Ham radio provides a framework to learn many interesting things about our world. When I talk with someone in a distant place, I often look on a map to find where the other person lives. Radio waves obey physical laws, some of which we know little about. Some days I can talk easily with people in Denver, or Atlanta, and other days all I hear is static from the atmosphere energized by our sun. During a single day, I might hear east coast stations for several hours, and then as they fade away, stations from the Great Plains replace the east for a while before those stations, too, fade away into the noise. Is it magic? I still think so.

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!

Ham webinars

Earlier today I ran across a reference to webinars on ham radio subjects presented by the Potomac Valley Radio Club (www.pvrc.org). At the top of the page there is a link labelled PVRC Webinars. Click on that and it will take you to another site with several (currently 7) webinars. I partly watched and mostly listened to three of the presentations. I was impressed by the expertise and knowledge of the presenters, and learned some things I did not know. The three I watched were:

• Cycle 24... and more by Carl Luetzelschwab, K9LA
• Welcome to contest antennas: DX or domestic. What's your pleasure by Dean Straw, N6BV
• When giants first walked the bands; the early days of multi-multi by Doug Zweibel, KR2Q

The first presentation gave me just enough information to encourage me to learn more. There is a related presentation that will be available soon. Dean Straw demystified some aspects of antenna arrays, but I doubt I will ever have the real estate to create some of the large antennas he discussed. The third presentation was a history lesson on large contest stations from the 60's to mid-80's. Interesting photos and the speaker knew many of the folks shown personally.

The webinar idea intrigues me, and I plan to explore ways that our club might consider doing something like this. Technically it should be feasible, but whether there are folks who could pull it off is another topic.

Keep learning.

Northwest ham populations

The ham radio ranks continue growing in the Northwest. Over the past several months I've analyzed the number of ham licensees as the basis for a class project in school. I found the analysis both interesting and challenging.





The ham population roughly tracks the general population in the Northwest (defined and Oregon and Washington for this purpose), although there are anomalous pockets.


The map above shows the high ham concentration in three Puget Sound counties. The Portland metro area and Spokane also have high ham numbers. Two counties in SE Washington and three in North Central Oregon have very low numbers. These counties might be places to operate during state QSO parties or during county hunter activities. I expect quite a few folks would appreciate a few stations operating from those counties.








I found the map below much more interesting. The map shows the number of hams per thousand in the general population (based on the 2008 US Census county estimates). On the low end, many counties with low ham numbers also have low numbers per thousand. This may simply be the result of few hams who talk about their hobby, so few folks in the county get interested.

On the other side, the coastal counties of NW Washington and NW Oregon stand out. I know several clubs along the coast actively seek out hams for emergency communications, and local newspapers wrote several stories on ways hams helped their communities during storms.


Both Oregon and Washington have some of the highest ham population growth over the past several year, surpassed only by Utah, Idaho, and Nevada.

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.

Ham Basics Workshop

Last weekend our radio club held a workshop entitled "Ham Basics" with the concept to teach beginning principles on a variety of ham radio subjects. I did most of the planning and prep work behind the scenes, but asked for help with publicity and logistics for the building. In all, we had nine instructors who taught 13 classes: one general session (45-minutes) and 12 50-minute classes. We all met together for the general session, then separated into four classrooms where the other classes were held. I am grateful for the willingness of the instructors to prepare material and teach to the attendees.

We started at 9 AM in a large hall with about 80 attendees who watched several of us solve a projector problem early in my session. Most attendees were licensed hams, but there were some who came to "kick the tires" and learn a bit about the hobby. Many of the presentation outlines are available at http://www.w7aia.org/class.htm in case you are interested in the subjects. [Note: the workshop web page is not well-organized yet, but hopefully I can negotiate with the webmaster to improve it.] The slide that shows how few hams reside in some counties surprised many folks; the large ham population in the Puget Sound area and in the Portland metro area should not surprise anyone.

After the general session, attendees were able to choose from four classes. During the first class session, we offered "How to get the most from your handheld", "Simple VHF/UHF antennas", "Communications during an Emergency", and "Getting started with HF".

During the second class period, we offered "Operating mobile and portable", "Connectors and grounding", "Digital communications", and "Simple HF antennas".

During the third period, we offered "Station types from handheld to HF", "Contesting", "Using your radio for public service", and "Care and feeding of batteries".

In all, we had between 85 and 100 folks attend for all or part of the workshop. Attendees ranged from unlicensed to extra, although I think most attendees held either technician or general licenses. We received numerous thanks for the session, enough to seriously consider doing it again next year. I learned from preparing the classes, and sitting in on one class.