W3OZ

Background:  My name is Larry Wassman, QTH is Lacey, Washington. Lacey is about 60 miles southwest of Seattle. I was first licensed as KN7EEF in 1958. I upgraded to Technician as K7EEF within the year limit that was allowed for Novices in those days. I went away for college and I am sorry to say, that my ham radio interests had to take a back seat for a few years.  After college I got married and had children and the demands these activities placed on me left little time for other things. I was inactive and had no amateur license until 1985 when I was again reacquainted with the hobby through an employee of mine. I had understood that you could only be a novice one time in your life and had incorrectly assumed that I would have to start as a General and pass the 13 words per minute code test. Much to my surprise, I found that I could start again as a novice and progress again as I had started as a teenager. I took classes at a local ham club, OARS (Olympia Amateur Radio Society). I started as a novice in November of 1985 and passed my final Extra exam in February of 1986. I was assigned the call NV7J and used that call until 1997 when I elected to change my call to W3OZ. My name is pronounced like WOZman even though it is not spelled that way. I have been known as the WOZ for years and this is why I wanted the call W3OZ. I really wanted W7OZ, but that call was already assigned to someone else and was not available. 

Interests: As a novice in 1958, we all had to use CW and crystals to control our frequencies. I had an old Johnson Viking Ranger and a Hallicrafters receiver. I don't remember the model number. My antenna was just a long wire stung out the window and connected to a tree in the backyard. The wire was probably not over 20 feet in the air. My usual operating practice was to call CQ for hours and hours every night. I was limited to very few crystals and did not have the ability to call most anyone else other than friends who would purchase crystals in the same frequency so we could communicate. One evening as I was incessantly calling CQ,  all of a sudden some very weak signal was coming back to my call. It was VK0TC on Macquarie Island and he was answering my CQ. In those days rare stations would sometimes answer a CQ and this particular ham must have felt sorry for a poor little novice and was considerate enough to give me a call. Macquarie Island is rare even today and I doubt that any station on the island would call anyone today. If one is on the air there is generally a massive pile up within just a few minutes. I actually got the card from this QSO and still have it. Needless to say, it was a prized display on my shack wall until I left the hobby to go to school. This started my love of working DX. This is my primary interest these days. I worked my first DX station this time in July of 1986 and was on the DXCC honor roll in less than 10 years. Currently I need only a good P5 and Andamam Island to have worked them all. 

Current Station: I don't have anything unusual as far as equipment in my shack. My primary radio is a Yaesu FT-1000MP. My backup radio is a Kenwood TS-850SAT. I use a Kenwood TL-922 amplifier. I build a home brew amplifier, but found the amount of work it took to keep a high power amplifier on the air was not worth the effort. It worked great and if I wanted to could run well over the legal limit. As I see it, if you can't work them with 1500 watts you can't work them anyway. Propagation is of course the great equalizer. Along with a good antenna system, I have found that I have worked all DX expeditions that come up on the first day anyway. I use all Cushcraft monobanders on 10, 15, 20, and 40 meters. My tower is 60 feet high with a 15 foot mast on top. I turn all this with an overloaded Yaesu G-800S rotator. The tower is protected by several trees that are at least 100 feet tall. This protects the tower and antennas from the wind in the area. A couple of pictures of my shack and the tower are below. Please excuse the poor quality of the pictures as my digital camera is more of a toy than a camera. At least you can get an idea of what my equipment looks like.

The Tower and Beams:

The beams are out of align because of the wind this past winter. I plan on making them more in line this summer, but they work just fine and have been real reliable and almost indestructible for the past 12 years they have been up. We do not have the severe weather that a lot of the rest of the country has, but we do have wind and some ice at times. We even have earthquakes which the tower thankfully survived. 

The Future: I am always looking to improve my station and learn new and fun things within the hobby. I am currently looking into ways to improve my signal by installing some audio equipment. I don't have enough knowledge at this time to say exactly what I am going to do, but I have heard many hams on the air who have, what I consider, outstanding audio and I would like to attain some of their attributes. Of course I am continuing to enjoy DXing and plan on making more progress on my 5BDXCC. 

Thank you for reading this little web page and if you have similar interests, experiences or would like to arrange a QSO or have any questions please feel free to contact me via email at:  [email protected]