My quest to learn CW (9)

 Here I am again with the results ;-)

Unfortunately some days are missing, it was just a matter of no access to the internet. But practised with morsemania app on my phone those days. 

Managed to finish lesson 40 with a speed of 28/11 wpm. Now doing 28/12 wpm. Also doing word practise with 5 letters now. Getting better but very slowly.

If possible I try to decode some morse on the radio. A beacon I heard was very low signal on 10m. Had to listen a couple of times before I could get the complete text.

YM7TEN/B KN91RB KN91RB PWR1W YM7TEN/B as heard with signal RST 313 on 28.225 at 29 August. Stations that call or make QSOs have been heard but it is all gibberish to me, sending way to fast and to me it is like they don't have any pause between the letters. I really wonder how someone is able to decode???

2002 antenna work - 6 element logperiodic

  It has been in the ninetees of last century I started to experiment and build antennas. Sometimes together with friends. I had a friend which I spoke quite often on 11m back in those days. He was also living near the coast but about 60km west of me. We discussed experimenting and our dreams about great antennas. He was busy building a 6 element logperiodic from which he found some drawings. I helped him when visiting him but I can't remember if he ever had the antenna in use. When I moved out of my parents house in '95 I lost contact and I believe he didn't do anything with the radio hobby anymore. The logper antenna however was still in my mind. And finally in 2002 I decided to give it a try and build this antenna with information I got from some Swedish 11m DXers.

I lived in a very small house and some of the work has to be done just in my living room. Living alone at that time I didn't care. Outside was also small, all work had to be done on a few square meters. 

According to the building guide the antenna was fed by a balun. Detailed drawings and descriptions were found. 

This antenna was mounted first on a short pole to test and tune it. 

I didn't really care what people in the neighbourhood would think of it :-). I can tell that in this (low) position I made a QSO with a station from Indonesia, my report was 59+. I was happy with the result. But of course it should be in the tower. For that I got some help from a friend and his wife. Otherwise I couldn't get the tower up, it was too heavy.

At that time I was not allowed on 10m yet. So DX was made on 11m. I can tell that much DX was made with this antenna. Especially to stations in the pacific. Fun story is that after I mounted this antenna one of the first stations I spoke was the station from Sweden from which I had the design. Later on I bought the house across the street. I mounted this antenna on the versatower in 2006. Our licence system  changed and we were allowed on HF, I then discovered it was a solid performer on 10m as well. The balun however did not survive the weather, although enclosed in a box. I replaced it by the Diamond BU-50 which I currently use in my multiband squalo.

Last time I used this antenna was in the winter of 2011. 

https://pe4bas.blogspot.com/2011/12/beam-up.html

The antenna was demolished by a large storm in 2012. 

https://pe4bas.blogspot.com/2012/01/storm-damage-and-what-i-have-learned.html

Till today I still use parts from this antenna in other projects. For example some of the tubing has been used to fed the wires through in my solarpanel installation.

Changed 23-9-2024: Made some changes in the text. Did add some rememberings.

Denmark vacation

  Just ended our vacation (holiday) in Denmark. We have been on North Sealand, about 60km north of Copenhagen. Of course we visited Copenhagen, the little mermaid and Amalienborg. Well, we are not used to city live and it was all too crowded for us, but at least we can tell we have been there. We rented some bikes so we went outside the tourist zone as well. Found this very nice wall painting near a school. Of course we visited a lot of other places as well. Denmark is a beautiful country. 

  Upon request from my XYL I didn't bring a radiostation with me. But you know me, I have to bring some kind of radio. This time the Tecsun PL-365 shortwave receiver. I't tiny and even fits in your pocket.

  I only tried it inside the summerhouse we rented. Some stations have been heard on 20m and 40m. I only listened to CW which is in line with my current CW learning curve. Most stations are sending way too fast and all I can pick up are random letters. I only logged one Italian station on 14010KHz CW at 12:49UTC he was callling CQ CQ DE IZ4EKI IZ4EKI K. I had to listen very carefully since I could hardly detect any spacing between te letters. Although I think he was sending about 12wpm. After the 4th time CQ I think I had his call. At least one little success.

  I got a cable with me to connect the Tecsun with the computer to decode FT8. But hey, what's the fun of that? So, only CW this time...

  The only HAMradio antenna I saw this vacation was in Frederiksvaerk, just a few kilometers from our summerhouse. Very nice setup on a large tower. Unable to find the call of this HAM, he's not on QRZ.com as far as I could find.

2001 Antenna work - Avanti PDL2

 I obtained this cubical quad antenna late nineties of last century. It belonged to Erik PA7V long before he became a licensed radio amateur. Erik is still living near to me and active but we don't hear each other much.

I wrote about this antenna before in one of my first posts on this blog in 2008. The Avanti PDL2 is a well known 11m antenna. After installation I worked some incredible DX with it. Recently I rediscovered some old photos which were long forgotten but for some unknown reason stored on my dads computer. Why and how this happened cannot be asked because he died little over a week ago. Anyway, I want to share them with you on this blog. Photos are taken in 2001, 23 years ago.

PDL2 before assembly

Assembling the PDL2, notice my shack in the back

Assembling the PDL2

Several parts of this antenna are re-used in antenna projects still in use today. The boom was used to make a 10m HB9CV in the past. The glasfiber poles are still used in my experimental squalo which is still in my tower. The tower on the picture has been sold in 2004.

I remember it was a nice project. I used both vertical and horizontal polarisation. However I found the front-back rejection not that good. I think I used this on my tower for about half a year and replaced it by another antenna from which I also found photos. I will share them on this blog later...