A Diary of Technology Pursuits
I have been considering automating a 2X6 antenna switch using the Broadcast Antenna Selection Data from N1MM+ (which I may refer to as simply N1MM from here on). Most Ham Radio contesters use N1MM+ for contest logging and many are now using it with two radios in a Single-Operator-Two-Radio (SO2R) arrangement. N1MM Broadcast Data for... Continue Reading →
I wanted to get on the air for the CQ 160 contest this weekend but my Inverted "L" is down. I have a ZS6BKW that I have used on 80m before and wondered if I could do it on 160 meters. The two legs are around 45 feet each and the ladder line is about... Continue Reading →
The 2024 VA QSO Party (VAQP) is over and I would say it was a great success. But there is always room for improvement, and VAQP is no exception. Here are some of my thoughts and some suggestions. VAQP Activity and Contest Notes There was a great deal of activity on day one - Saturday,... Continue Reading →
I had a great time working the ARRL CW November Sweepstakes contest this year. I know that many Hams do not care for SS with the long, complicated exchange but I think it is a great challenge. After many years of trying and hoping, I finally managed to work all 84 Sections for the "Clean... Continue Reading →
The 2022 Virginia QSO Party took place in early March. Now that the dust has settled, I wanted to post a summary of my planning and activity in the contest. The short summary is that 2022 was a great year to participate in VAQP. Activity levels were high and the Band conditions were mostly favorable.... Continue Reading →
I have decided to revive a project that I started over a year ago, but had put on hold. My Station is setup for SO2R operation but I do not have automated antenna switching in place. I have 3 or 4 antennas, depending upon the contest, and manually connect and disconnect them as the contest... Continue Reading →
I recently bought an Icom IC-7300 SDR transceiver, and finally got a chance to start looking at it. My hope is to use this as a Mobile rig, although it is a bit large. Not sure how I will mount it in my F-150 yet, but I will give it a try. Since I have... Continue Reading →
The VA QSO Party will take place next weekend, and I invite you to participate if you have the time and interest. We would love to see the number of participant increase this year. There has been a pretty good turnout recently, and last year it seemed like we had a higher-than-normal number of out-of-state... Continue Reading →
I participated in the NAQP RTTY contest this weekend. I normally use 2 radios in contests. In this one, I setup for RTTY and started the contest. Nobody could hear me with one radio (IC-7600) using an all-band dipole/doublet that normally works quite well for US contacts. The Radio was setup using N1MM+ with the... Continue Reading →
I have been using the IC-7600 on RTTY with N1MM+ and the MMTTY application for a couple of years now. There are some good directions for this in the N1MM+ documentation, so I am not going to go through all the details. Here is a quick summary, and a screenshot of my setup, including all... Continue Reading →
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