KG4HF Guantanamo Bay, Cuba
February 20 - 6 March 2015 2nd Trip with Bill KG4WV
Grid: FK29kv CQ Zone: 08 ITU Zone: 11 Lighthouse:
LH-0358
IOTA: NA-015 WLOTA:0358
GTM-001
Guantanamo Bay Radio Club Website:
http://members.visi.net/~verb/
QSL Direct to W6HGF
Al Danis
Po Box 220164
Chantilly, VA 20153
USA
Please include $2 and SAE. No Stamps or IRC's can be accepted
from DX. US stations send SASE with "Forever" please.
I plan to upload to LOTW and ClubLog when I can during the trip.
Plans:
Bill KG4WV and I will be operating from the Club Station on
Guantanamo Bay for two weeks this Feb - March 2015 I plan to
fly there as Space-a, and stay in the Guest Lodge. I will
focus on RTTY, and other digital modes, and then work some CW when
time permits. I will be somewhere within the RTTY segments of
all bands, and will operate split once things get going. My
software is Fldigi, and so I will have about 3Khz of spectrum to
choose a station from. When I say UP, please transmit up
1-4Khz up from my frequency, and I will find you. If you move
around a lot, there is a good chance I will call you, and you will
have already moved, and I will not hear you, with the qso lost.
Equipment:
Elecraft K-3
IC-735 backup
Elecraft KPA-500 Amplifier
Multiple antennas on site, that I will use.
Dunestar Filters, since two of us will be operating.
Software for digital modes and logging is FLDIGI
Here is a picture of our daily evening sunset.
Current Operation Updates
3 March 2015
Only a couple days left, we pack up on 5 March,
and depart on the next day. This has been a
great time, and I have enjoyed all the QSO's along
with the CW contest, the RTTY NAQP, and even tried
the 160 test without much luck, (broken antenna
and noise). I have some log problems that I
am working on, if you are missing a confirmation,
please write me a note, so I can investigate.
Propagation has not been the best with the two
solar storms this week. I continue to
improve my CW skills, which are actually memory
exercise for me. I can easily keep 4 letter
callsigns in my working memory long enough to put
them in the log, but I still have to hear the 5
letter or more callsigns several times to get them
in the log correctly. Even then I make many
mistakes, but improving. I can keep 5 letter
calls complete about 30 percent of the time.
Progress. Big Solar storm this past week,
has disrupted the propagation, and it has been
hard to know where to work, because it is not
following the prediction charts. See chart
below. The Red is bad, and Green is good.
22 Feb 2015
Participating in the ARRL CW contest, and having a
lot of fun. CW is not my strong mode, but I
am improving. In this contest we only
contact US and Canada, but since my call KG4HF
looks like a US call, many US stations ignore my
CQ's, and many DX stations call me. However
there has been only short periods of no activity,
and as the spots indicate GTMO once in a while, it
keeps the excitement going. I planned to
operate 160 this evening, but both antennas are
showing high SWR, and so no luck tonight. We
have a new antenna for 160 that Bill brought down,
and will try to get it up in the air in the next
day or two. I was disappointed not to enter
the CW contest on 160 tonight, but there will be
other days.
19 February 2015
Arrived in Norfolk, awaiting the Space-A flight
down to Guantanamo Bay very early tomorrow
morning. I hope to be set up and ready for
the CW contest in time.
From our past
October 11 - 25, 2013
Operation;
UPDATES:
25 Oct 2013 Now QRT. The logs have been uploaded, and we
are heading home. Very satisfied we had a good trip. The
sunspot numbers exceeded 200 the last few days, and provided
phenomenal propagation on 10 and 12 meters. Now to get the QSL
cards taken care of.
23 Oct 2013 Have been very busy getting up at 0430am and not
getting back to bed until almost midnight. Not much sleep, and
lots of operating. We have had two big rain storms, one with
lightning that hit a power pole somewhere, and our lights went out,
so we quit early that day. The rain comes down very hard but
only for short durations, so we get some fast flooding around the
radio shack. I have concentrated on the higher bands since
this is the peak of the sunspot cycle, and the next one is not
predicted to be as good. So this may be the best time for 10
and 12 meter work from here. The statistics page on ClubLog
show the results. https://secure.clublog.org/charts/?c=KG4HF#r
We will operate today, and tomorrow morning, then take down the
equipment and begin packing tomorrow afternoon for our flight home
Friday morning. This has been a lot of fun, and I have made a
lot of contacts on all the bands including 160. I am sure some
are disappointed in not getting a certain band, but I have tried
hard to be on all of them at some point. My personal
disappointment is the lack of RTTY contacts on 80 meters, I had
hoped there would be more. I made more CW contacts than RTTY
on 80.
Here is a picture of the Beam with our 2 meter repeater antenna on
top and the moon in the background.
14 Oct 2013 All is well, we arrived got settled, unpacked and
set up the stations. Then got down to business of working as
many contacts as possible. I spent some time on 160 late this
evening, but the noise level here is over S9, and it was real hard
to copy anyone. I did get a few in the log, but it was
painful. We had a Bay wide power outage today, and so I got a
late start today. Tomorrow is another day, and we will start
early on the higher bands.
9 Oct 2013. Everything is tested and packed, and ready to
go. I plan to drive down to the airport tomorrow and spend the
night there. The flight will leave very early in the morning,
and I would rather sleep nearby. I am optimistic there
will be extra seats for the standby folk like me. It looks
good today, but you never know. We should be on the air
and settled in by 12 Oct, but if possible get on the air in the
evening of the 11th. If you find us operating, please give a
call, and then spot us on the cluster.
