Direct
to home call.Please include self addressed envelope with $2. **NO IRC**
W6GHF
Al Danis
P.O. Box 220164
Chantilly, VA 20153
USA
or Bureau
to home call.
13 - 27 March 2011 DXpedition
to Miquelon Is.
Grid GN17tc
CQ Zone 5
ITU Zone 9
IOTA NA-032 DIFO FP-002 WLOTA 1417
I operated from FP, St Pierre - Miquelon from about 15 March
to 27 March 2011 The operation was digital, mostly RTTY,
but some psk125 when time allowed. QSL were all uploaded through
Logbook of the World each
evening, and paper QSL cards received have all been responded to as of May 2, 2011.
Many Thanks to Jean-Pierre, FP5CJ, Eric, KV1J, and Paul K9OT,
whom have all been very helpful with information on
this location, and their past operations there. It makes it so
much easier to have a little advance knowledge when going to a new
place for the first time.
It looks like there were about 4100 QSO's made during this operation,
which included the BARTG RTTY Contest, and the operation was conducted
on all bands 160-10, although only a few contacts were made on 160
before the antenna tuner failed, and while I did call CQ many times on
10, it was open only a few times, 12 seemed a much better band.
So far it looks like over 2500 QSO's have been confirmed by LOTW which
is pretty good, and more keep coming in each day. That is a lot
of postage saved. All Paper QSL's received have been responded to
as of May 2, 2011, so if you are missing a confirmation, please email
me with details, so I can check and see if it can be fixed.
This picture was taken looking from my operating position out the
window at the antennas blowing in the snow. You can just barely
see the 10 meter mast in the distance that first had the Granite States
multiband dipole, and later had the 80/160 dipole antenna on it because
of the blowing snow. The wind was at least 30 knots, with
constant gusts higher so the antennas were in motion all the time, it
was a thing of beauty to watch from inside while the pile-ups were full
blast. You can see the water edge just beyod the antennas which
is the ocean. The antenna closest is the Steppir Vertical, which
was donated to the site by Nigel, G3TXF (who did make a contact with me
during this trip), some years ago, and is still working fine, although
Eric, KV1J, and I are improving the top section with Steppir Factory
help.
After the Tuner failed, I tried to put up a resonant 160 dipole, and
since I had the wire available, I put up a double dipole for 80/160,
but after getting it up, it would not resonate anywhere on 160, and I
only had the radio to find a point to work from, along with the cold
and blowing wind, and no antenna analyzer, so I just gave up on 160 for
this trip. I felt bad, and had high hopes, but it was not to
be. The dipole did work just fine on 80 and 40 for the rest of
the trip, and while cut correctly for 160, there was some other factor
at work that I did not understand. Next trip I will take the antenna
analyzer and not have that problem again.
When a pile-up is in progress please follow
my lead and if I am only sending signal reports, that is all I need
from you. If you are using macro's just make them small
please. If it is very slow and I send name and qth, then it is
ok to send the same back to me. This will allow a pleasurable
experience for all of us following the conditions.
This operation will be a 1 person effort, so expect lots of breaks, I
do not have the contest staying power I once had, but I expect with
high winds, and cold temperatures outside, to have few distractions
outside of plain exhaustion to keep me off the bands. This is my
first DX operation in many years, and is something I have been looking
forward to for some time. I plan to make as many RTTY QSO's as I
can
while there. My strategy is to work on the WARC bands during the
week when possible, and then operate in the BARTG contest over the
weekend as much as I can. I will try to work on the highest band that
is open, and follow them down in frequency as the day fades. I
plan to be watching the cluster, and when I can, to keep my eye on
the K3UK LOTW sked page
to help keep the qso count up. My
goal ts to make as many QSO's as possible, this is not a vacation, but
I will need a full night of uninterupted sleep, so expect very little
operation between 0300 and 1000 Z
