Radioactivities weekend.

1. RaDAR event....went wrong again. I'm definitely not ready for it yet.

2. Hunting the WRTC 2018 special calls, ex-DDR callsigns.

3. Participating in the IARU HF contest SSB 80m Low power.

4. Working S01WS on 6m again...and again.

Wow, it was a weekend with ups and downs.


And at the same time of course household duties and other important things because life is not only radio.

1. The RaDAR event. Setup my "lightweight" station and it worked on SSB. Made one QSO with UA4M in the contest. But since you need a locator exchange contacting contest stations doesn't work. My intention was working digital. I use my broken W10 tablet with a wireless keyboard, However, I can't get any signal out and receiving is a pain. I tried everything in "soundcard" configuration but till now I'm unable to get it right. If all would work well I'd make 5 QSO portable at home planning a trip with the car to the harbour nearby and set this station up again to make another 5 QSO. Then the RaDAR event would be a success for me. But again like last year it didn't happen.


2. Hunting the ex-DDR special calls. Those calls are special and this might be the only opportunity to work Y8 calls this time. There was a downloadable list on the WRTC2018 site. Did work a couple, see the list. They were all easy to work, good listeners and excellent handling of the pile-ups. I've heard about the WRTC but never worked one of those contesters. A first time for me.

3. Summertime is no contesting time for me. I can't remember if I ever participated in the IARU HF contest. A few of my enthousiastic radio friends activated PA6HQ. Lit by their enthousiasm I thought I do some running on 80m saturday evening and sunday morning and in between I search for the WRTC stations. In the end I made about 100 QSOs on 80m about 20 QSOs on other bands. However so far I think there is no single band section in this contest. It doesn't matter, I had some fun.

4. S01WS from Western Sahara seems to be a struggle for me. Early in the evening I saw him calling CQ DX on 6m. I tried but in the end another station took the frequency again and I couldn't see the RR no matter what I tried. A 3rd QSO busted again? Very frustrating! At the time I was downstairs writing this blogpost I check 6m regularly via remote (teamviewer). Suddenly I see S01WS coming up again and then going down.....I decided to wait fully charged to shoot when the signal is coming up again... The waiting was rewarded, My shot was right into the eye....(eye on the screen ;-)). Finally I got the RR.