When I came home today I found a package from the Friese 11 steden contest organisation. The package contained a huge and heavy trophy. Wow, I won the contest...
A dutch review of last years contest can be read here:
Last year I wrote about using the PE1BVQ 3 band endfed in the PACC contest. Because of large winds the antenna kept sliding in. But overall it did actually just as well as the HF5B on the tower except for about 3dB more noise. A vertical antenna in a contest is a good choice if propagation is good around you, but if you need extra gain it can't compete. However, I don't have a large multiband beam at the moment so I have to think about something else to improve my 20m signal. I would prefer to setup a antenna that does equal or better as my endfed and has a lot less noise. I was thinking about a phased vertical system first, but what I want is too complicated to setup at this time. I also thought of my endfed put up higher in the air with radials beneath. But I doubt it is any better as my vertical on top of the tower. So, I came up with the idea to use my GFK mast to make a delta loop for 20m. You can find a lot of drawings and designs on the internet about this antenna but they are all different, I posted a question about these different designs on a dutch hamradio forum and I got even more confused since everyone had other views on it. However, through the forum I found this link to some interesting delta loop designs and a usable formula. It is in dutch, and they use 1:2 balun instead of 1/4 wave 75Ohm coax, but what is left is the same in all languages. My thought is configure my deltaloop with one corner up in the mast. Fed at the corner at the north side to get the best radiation to the south. This way I have minimum interference from my neighbours solarpanels. Most of my QSOs on 20m in a contest are in the southern direction on 20m. A few are to the east and west but almost nothing to the north. The plan is to construct the antenna saturday or sunday depending on the weather. More about it hopefully in the weekend.
After a post from MW1CFN John I got interested in this event. Most radioamateurs never ever use AM mode to make QSOs with. Except those who are collecting old WW2 equipment. A(mplitude) M(odulation) mode was the original way to make phone (voice) QSOs over the air waves till SSB and FM would become more populair after WW2. However there is a dutch AM net most time every sunday morning, most of the participants are using old or homebrew equipment. There are still a lot of AM enthousiasts all over the world...
I was planning to be active saturday late in the afternoon, but as you can read in my previous post I ran into problems with a defective fuse. By the time it was all fixed there was no time left to get on air. So, I attended the AM QSO party sundaymorning. A good test was to receive some AM stations in the dutch AM net. I have to write that the stations with the best signals and excellent modulation were the users of old WW2 equipment. Those old BC669 and GRC9 radios sound really good. I also heard some with Geloso radios, but I liked the modulation from the old radios better.
First QSO was on 20m with CT4RK Carlos from Portugal. Carlos told he had some problems the day before. And from the sound of his modulation I think something was still wrong, though it improved a little along the QSO.
My goal was to work fellow blogger MW1CFN from Wales. We tried on 80m first, but there was no propagation. When I was calling on 40m John told me he could hear my signal but had to change antennas. Anyway, we managed to make a QSO on 40m AM after all....mission accomplished.
John also made a recording from my signal after the QSO.
I was not really impressed by the AM modulation so far. But had a QSO with M0XTK which went a lot better. At least his modulation was very good understandable...
Well, I had a lot of fun with all these AM QSOs. But I didnt have the feel you could have with an old tube radio. The sound is just too clean with all these filtering features. The radio audio setup is for SSB and digital modes. For AM receive you should have your audio a bit wider, as wide as possible I think actually.
Last year I wrote about using the PE1BVQ 3 band endfed in the PACC contest. Because of large winds the antenna kept sliding in. But overall it did actually just as well as the HF5B on the tower except for about 3dB more noise. A vertical antenna in a contest is a good choice if propagation is good around you, but if you need extra gain it can't compete. However, I don't have a large multiband beam at the moment so I have to think about something else to improve my 20m signal. I would prefer to setup a antenna that does equal or better as my endfed and has a lot less noise. I was thinking about a phased vertical system first, but what I want is too complicated to setup at this time. I also thought of my endfed put up higher in the air with radials beneath. But I doubt it is any better as my vertical on top of the tower. So, I came up with the idea to use my GFK mast to make a delta loop for 20m. You can find a lot of drawings and designs on the internet about this antenna but they are all different, I posted a question about these different designs on a dutch hamradio forum and I got even more confused since everyone had other views on it. However, through the forum I found this link to some interesting delta loop designs and a usable formula. It is in dutch, and they use 1:2 balun instead of 1/4 wave 75Ohm coax, but what is left is the same in all languages. My thought is configure my deltaloop with one corner up in the mast. Fed at the corner at the north side to get the best radiation to the south. This way I have minimum interference from my neighbours solarpanels. Most of my QSOs on 20m in a contest are in the southern direction on 20m. A few are to the east and west but almost nothing to the north. The plan is to construct the antenna saturday or sunday depending on the weather. More about it hopefully in the weekend.
