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Update 29/12/2014: Early this morning I managed to work quite a few stations on 30m, seems like my new antenna is working well! One of the stations I worked was a TF (Guatemala) station that called me! A new one on 30m and a new QRP one! I have already received the QSL card via LoTW, hanks Juan!

Most of the rest of the day was spent building a Softrock Ensemble II receiver kit, you can read more about this project in Building the Softrock Ensemble II Receiver.

Here you can see the work for today, I have completed the 12V and USB power supplies as well as the Local oscillator (LO), so far everything works!

Top of PCB

Bottom of PCB

More stuff on the bottom.

 It has been fun so far but quite tiring as I have not done this kind of work for almost 30 years! Still a long way to go and then I want to build the Softrock Ensemble Transceiver next, I already have the kit.

After the building session I spent some time on 40m chatting to old friends, after that I had a look at the DX bands. 10m was open but not really great so I had a look at 15m, have not been on 15m for a while. I was surprised to find 1A0C (Sovereign Military Order of Malta) with a strong signal. After a few calls I managed to break the pileup running 5W, I am happy to have DXCC entity 273 in the QRP log!  

Update 27/12/2014: Ok, with the festivities over but still a few free days ahead it is time to get "radio active"! I have few things I want to do over the next few days. All the testing I have done over the last few days with WSPR proved to me that my G5RV is working really well on 12m, I kind of knew that, but the shock was how poor it is on 30m even though the SWR is not that bad. So the first thing I did yesterday was to put up a 30m dipole, on the same feed I also have a 12m dipole as a reference. A few hours of WSPR testing proved that the 12m dipole is inferior to the G5RV but the 30m dipole really works!

It also showed my what a great band 30m is after sundown! A few hours of WSPRing produced the results below, this was with 100mW!

WSPR running 100mW on 30m

 Since it was extremely hot last night and I could not sleep I got up and went to the shack at about 1am local. A quick listen across the 30m band quickly produced results and 3 new ones on 30m, Martinique, Namibia and Surinam! I am sure I could have worked more but I was interrupted by a thunderstorm, at least it cooled things down.

On a less pleasant note, I have had it with one or two local hams! Their condescending remarks, "know it all" attitude and jealousy is just pathetic! I have decided to distance myself from a few people as they add no value to my ham experience and just upset me..... Social media is a great thing, but it also seems to bring out the worst in some people.

Other projects for the next few days include building my Softrock RX and the TRX, looking forward to playing with the TRX! 

Update 25/12/2014: Merry Christmas everyone! Hope you will have a great time with your family!  

Update 21/12/2014: With the 2014 contest season over and no needed DX'peditions on the air I decided to try something different. I have been looking at WSPR for a while but just never got around to setting it up. Well, that was my project for this weekend and I am happy to report that it is up and running! I decided that I want dedicated equipment so that running it for long periods would not interfere with my DXing and contesting. For now I am still using my primary antennas but I will put up a dedicated fan-dipole for the bands I am interested.

The software is running on a old dedicated laptop and I am using an Icom IC-738 radio a the moment. The interface is a trusty SigmaLink, I think I need another one!

Here you can see the first spots the I created on the map.

First spots on 10m into Europe.

Later in the afternoon the propagation opened to North America. Also take note of the elusive 6O0O !

Open towards the west

 Great fun! All these spots were created running 500mW into a G5RV, WSPR is really efficient! I will keep the station running for 24 hours, lets see what it produces.....

Update 17/12/2014: I am always looking for a new "toy" for the shack, recently I have been thinking of a mini DX'pedition radio, yes, I do have a few radios that you can through into a small bag to take on a trip but I have to admit none of them are really great performers compared to my main station radios. It is mostly the receivers that I find rather bad. These radios include in no particular order the Icom IC-706mk2, Yaesu FT-897, FT-857 and FT-817. I have been doing some research on Yaesu's replacement of the 897, the new FT-991. What I really like is the fact that the receiver front-end seems to be similar to what Yaesu has used in top end rigs like the FTdx-5000MP. If this is true it should be a great little performer!

I also like the fact that the FT-991 is the first transceiver in this size class that has an internal tuner! Tuners are very useful when you are in a field station situation as your antennas are seldom perfectly tuned due to a changing environment. I can't wait for a technical review! The question is going to be if I will order it via the local supplier I go the one FTdx-5000MP from or should I order direct? Time will tell.   

Update 16/12/2014: Today is a special day, 25 years of being with my XYL Katti (ZS6KVR)! Thanks for the support and patience my dear! We had plans to go on a hike this morning but it is raining so the morning will be spent quietly at home, later we will go out for lunch and a celebration! She was in the shack yesterday while I was DX'ing, since she does not really do CW I moved to the SSB segment of 10m and worked a few stations including A62A. When I heard CN2JF (Morocco) and he came back to my first call she was really excited, I think it is time we do a 2 operator field station again like in the past, she really enjoyed that!

I did manage to make a few contacts in the late afternoon but conditions were not that great, other than an EA6 station I heard mostly USA and western European stations. Even the DX cluster was quiet. 

Update 15/12/2014: Today I am spending time on some work in the shack. I was hoping to do some antenna work but I managed to hurt my back a bit while picking my mother up from the floor after she fell. She seems to be a lot better today! At 85 it is not easy.....

I have now reverted my main operating position the Yaesu only configuration. Running two FTdx-5000MP's and a FT-2000 for spotting multipliers on other bands. I still need to find a spot for the FT-950 or maybe a FTdx-3000 for the days when I have to run from 12V. After having used the IC-765Pro3 for a while I am really enjoying the stunning receivers on the Yaesu's, the 5000's are really miles better than the Icom.  

Update 14/12/2014: Ok, today was a wash-out as far as the ARRL contest was concerned. I managed to work a few stations from the east in the morning but then I had many interruptions due to my mom being sick, she is now home but rather demanding! At least that is a sign that she is getting better!

I kind of lost interest in the contest, because of the interruptions but also because of the selections of stations that you can work, mostly Russian and a few other common European stations and lots of US stations, it soon becomes boring..... I don't think I will bother with any of the ARRL contests again, not only are they boring but the scoring system puts me at a huge disadvantage here in Africa. At least the CQ contests try to equal the field. I mostly compete in contests for two reasons, firstly to find some good DX, or to do well in the contest, the ARRL contests do not lend themselves to either....

After spending around 5 hours on air I managed to make 372 contacts with 108 multipliers, this included 49 USA states as I could not find anyone on Alaska.

Back to normal DX'ing, time to reconfigure my shack for DX'ing and not contesting. Since I will have lots of time between now and early next year I want to do some antenna work. Raising my A4S would be great and I need an antenna for 80 and 160m. Also something for 17 and 30m, even a wire antenna would be better than nothing, I will do some research.

On a side note, I temporarily rigged 3 small 12V computer fans to cool the IC-756Pro3, these are the quiet little "whisper" fans but they made a huge difference! The highest temperature I saw today was 28C! I will now see how I can mount 3 of the fans permanently, I have them setup to suck the hot air away and not blow. If you set them to blow they will counteract the internal fan and that could lead to higher internal temperatures. The way they are seem to work well! 

Update 13/12/2014: What is the saying about the best plans of mice and men? Well, I was hoping to at least spend most of today in the ARRL 10m contest, unfortunately my operating time got severely reduced. My mom had a small stroke last night, I only found out later in the day. She is ok but I needed to spend a lot of time with her, I will also be spending extra time with her over the next few days/weeks so I am afraid both my contest plans and holiday plans are going to suffer. At least it looks like she won't have permanent damage she is just very weak at the moment.

I did operate for a few hours, in the morning the band was not great but by 10am local it started to open to the east and Europe. Soon the band was filled from edge to edge. I was doing my normal search and pounce looking mostly for interesting contacts and trying to add to my QRP totals. The best capture was Vietnam and Greenland, both new QRP entities for me.

Packed band!

The evening produced a huge opening to the USA that went on till late. By 10pm local time the band was still open but we had a thunderstorm so I unplugged the antennas and went to bed. Most of the evening was spent chasing USA states, in the end I had 5 left to work, maybe if I get time tomorrow? Total contacts for the day was just over 300 with 100 entities/states,

All my equipment is working perfectly and I had many reports of my "big signal" mostly from the USA! Not bad for 4W (IC-756Pro3 at minimum power) into my very low A4S antenna! The one thing that I did find disconcerting was how hot the radio was running, even at 4W and 80% RX time the heat sink at the back so hot it was not fun to touch. My IR temp sensor reported 49C and above! The tiny internal fan in the radio does run but it produces very little air movement. Really Icom, what were you thinking!! In comparison all my Yaesu's run really cold to the touch!

I will rig a small fan or two to increase the air circulation over the heat sink.  

Update 07/11/2014:  A really hectic week at work, again, did not produce much in the way of DX but I did add a couple of contacts to the QRP log. Since we are now getting daily "Load shedding", so no power foe a few hours every day, I have converted most of my shack to run from 12V. The few pieces of equipment that needs 220V I run from a 12V-220V inverter, seems to work well.

A few nice contacts this week included Algeria, Chagos and Mauritania. Nothing special but all new for my QRP DXCC list.

I am busy going through my spare equipment trying to decide what I still want to use, what belongs in the museum and what I should sell/swop. Not easy as I tend to want to keep everything but I am running out of space!

SO far I have decided to keep the FT-850, it is perfect for field station use and very robust. It is also equipped with a CW filter. Plus we have a "history" so I just cannot let it go....

Old but trusty Yaesu FT-850 (Japanese FT-890)

 Another radio that will stay, again because it is perfect for field and portable use, is the Yaesu FT-897.

Yaesu FT-897, perfect for portable use.

 I also connected the Trans World T1000 solid state amplifier again, I seldom use amplifiers these days but again I decided to keep it, the robust "no-tune" operation is just too good to give up, maybe one day I will need a bit more power?

Trans World T1000 solid state amplifier.

 While testing the T1000 I also connected my "expedition/field station amplifier, the Metron MA1000, very similar to the T1000 but it runs from 12V with a max output of 600w (The T1000 is a 1kw with 100% duty cycle amplifier.)

The Metron is extremely well made and robust, they don't build the like this anymore! This sample is brand new, I took it out of the box. With it's switchable (manual or automatic) band pass filters, it produces a nice clean signal.

Metron MA1000 Solid state amplifier

Inside of the Metron MA1000, it uses 8 x MR 454 transistors, you can also see the relay switched band pass filters.

 In the above photo you can see that 2 of the relays are open. As standard maintenance I always clean T/R switching relays on all of my amplifiers on a regular basis.

Update 01/11/2014: The day after....

CQWW CW 2014 is history, and what a feast it was!! Yes, there were problems, for starters I did not feel that well, I have had a lingering cold/flu for a while that did not want to leave but it was not too bad. And then, as predicted, we had 2 "load shedding" sessions of around 2:45 each, as well as 2 thunder storms.... But the band conditions were really great so nothing else mattered much!

I was prepared. or so I thought, for the power outages, unfortunately my plans did no go that well. About 1:45 into the first outage the radio shut itself down due to low voltage. It seems like the battery was not fully charged, I need to look at my charging setup. I also noticed that the IC-756Pro2 was drawing more that 2A on RX! I also had additional load on the battery in the form of a 600W inverter that was needed to power the logging computer and the rotator.

Initially I was using an IC-756Pro3 but after a few hours it developed a problem, every now and then, after I transmitted, it would be deaf on RX, keying it a few times solved the problem but it was annoying and getting worse. I think the antenna switchover relay needed to be cleaned or replace. Since I did not have time to play with that I substituted my old Pro2 and continued. I should have used the FT-950.....

Eventually I ended up reverting to the little Yaesu FT-817 radio that is far more power efficient, this radio I ran from 6000mAh LiPo batteries so not all was lost. Unfortunately the 817's RX is not the best in the world and it suffered on the crowed bands. 10m was really crowded most of the time with strong signals and 40m had lots of noise. I need to check all my radios to find a decent radio with a low current draw for the next time this happens. I must say I was thankful I had installed the additional CW filter in the 817. Considering how tiny it is it did quite well taking me to a reasonable score.

The contest started slowly with some DX on 40m. Due to the fact that I wanted to enter 10m single band as my main entry but also single band 40m as a second entry I had to use a different call for 40m. I ended up using ZS/V51VE, rather long and it caused many repeats but it did the job.

40m only produced 61 contacts in the 3:50 hours I ended up operating on the band. This included 12 countries and 14 zones. Not great but ok for QRP I suppose. The Butternut HF2V is really working well and I managed to work everything I could hear. A notable contact was Mariana Isle, a new 40m DXCC for me.

10m was really amazing. On Saturday it opened around 6am and stayed open till around 9pm with wall to wall strong signals. The band was used all the way up to 28.200mHz. I ended up slowly scanning the band from bottom to top again and again working stations one after the other. With all the strong stations on the band I did not even try to call CQ, I could not find an open spot so the whole contest was spent doing search and pounce. On Sunday the band opened even earlier and by 11pm, when I was too tired to continue, there were still stations I could hear!

Start of the contest, running the IC-756Pro2 after the Pro3 had some issues.


The little FT-817 saved the day!

The totals were slowly climbing, most of the time I could work a station after a call or two but a few times the pileups were just too large and I saved the frequency in a memory and moved on. A few times I managed to return later to find that conditions had changed and I could make the contact.

There were a few times when I wished for more power but most of the time I hardly noticed that I was running only 5W!

Saturday afternoon I had an enforced rest period, first the power failure and flat battery and the a thunderstorm. The total lost time was about 3 hours on Saturday, unfortunately it was in the late afternoon, a time when 10m is usually at its best! Sunday was a repeat, this time I coped with the loss of power but the storm still forced me to shut down for about 2.5 hours.

Wall to wall strong signals on 10m! Saturday morning.

My initial aim was to better the African 10m QRP record that was set in 1984! That did not take long, I think I passed the old record before lunch on Saturday! I then moved my aim higher a step at a time, first 200 contacts, the 100K points and so on. Sunday just before lunch I noticed that I had worked 86 countries so the next, not so easy aim, was to get to 100 countries, a DXCC century, not that easy running QRP but it was a nice challenge!

Initially it looked like I was not going to make it, I was stuck for a long time on 87 countries but then propagation changed towards the west and South America. Slowly the countries started coming in again. Bu the time I was too tired too continue, and the band stated closing down, I had a total of 102 counties, just over 500 contacts and over 200K points. I was more than happy!

What worked well? The Butternut HF2V, the A4S antenna and just about everything else other than the IC-756Pro3 and the backup battery. For the next contest I will run a Yaesu only setup. I just need to decide on the model to use for the times when I need to run from 12V. My FT-2000 and the FTdx-5000MP's are AC only.....

Now the wait starts to see who scored what! I am hoping to at least win 10m QRP in South Africa, maybe Africa? :Looking forward to the next contest, this is addictive....    

Update 27/11/2014:  With CQ WW CW less than 48 hours away I have been doing some maintenance on my antennas and other bits and pieces. I am now happy that the antennas are fine, the yagi for 10/15/20 and the Butternut HF2V are resonating exactly where they are suppose to. I have also cleaned out the main operating position so now I only have 2 radios on the desk. The original plan was to run the one FTdx-5000MP (the second one is STILL stuck in customs) as well as the FT-2000. I have actually decide to run the 5000 and the IC-756Pro3, for the simple reason that there is a pretty good chance that we might have a power failure or even 2 during the duration of the contest.

Or local power supplier, Eskom, have been doing "load shedding", in other words switching off the supply to certain areas on a regular basis. They are doing this since the load on the network is exceeding their generating capability. We are in this mess due to their criminal incompetence, lack of planning, laziness and theft of tax money! They should all be fired! Anyway, since our government is just as useless there is not much hope, soon we will become a banana republic like the rest of Africa.

Anyway, so the reason for the IC-756Pro3 is that I might well need to run from a 12v supply. I went out and bought a 100A/h battery today, I will be using them to power the radio if needed. I will also run a small inverter to supply power to my logging computer and rotator. This should give me enough power to compensate for Eskom's incompetence....

A  good few hours sleep before the contest starts tomorrow night and I will hopefully be ready!        

Update 23/11/2014:  This morning produced a few more good contacts on 40m with the new antenna, I am really happy with it!!

I did a bit of maintenance on my 2 TL-922 amplifiers today, I cleaned the band switches and the antenna change over relays. I have had a few problems with the relays in the past, when you change back from TX to RX the signals would suddenly be down, a few cycles of the relay would normally solve it but it is really irritating!

My 2 TL-922 amplifiers with the band switches and relays exposed for cleaning.

 While I had the amplifiers out of the way and on the bench I also cleaned up the wiring behind them again, it is amazing how quickly I can create a mess!

After working in the shack I spent a pleasant few hours working some DX and also competing, in a relaxed way, in the LZ CW contest. I am really happy with my station at the moment, everything seems to work well and I can work just about anyone who I can hear.

The only shortcoming was pointed out to me this afternoon, we had a 2 hour long power cut and I was off the air. Since this will happen a lot in the near future due to the idiots that run out power supply company being incompetent and unable to plan ahead I need to do something about this. With the CQ WW CW contest coming next week I cannot take a chance of being off the air for several hours. I have moved a 12V radio, the Ic-756Pro3, back into the main operating position so that I am not totally dependent on the 220V AC supply. I will buy a few 12V batteries this week, I think 2 105Ah deep cycle batteries will do the job. Since I will only be running 5W it should last me well. I will have to make a plan with my logging computer. It will run for a while on its internal battery but it might not be long enough. I will also get a small inverter to charge the laptop's battery if needed. I do have a 2kw inverter but that will be an overkill and also inefficient.

I am looking forward to CQ WW CW next weekend!    

Update 22/11/2014:  What a hectic few weeks it has been at work! Well, hopefully things should now slow down giving me more time for amateur radio. I have managed to make a few contacts every day recently but not nearly as many as I would have liked to! This is the first weekend in a while where I do not have other commitments. Band conditions have been good so I am hoping for some fun.

I have been postponing the installation of my Butternut HF2V for weeks, but today I managed to get it up in the air! I decided to mount it a bit away from my other antennas to minimize interaction, I also wanted it away from the house to lessen interference from electronic devices on the lower bands. My HF2V has the extra 160 kit installed so it covers 40, 80 and 160m. I ended up installing it on the roof of an outside building, with the base about 7m above the ground. It does pass through a few branches and leaves of a tree but from what I have read that should not have a bad effect. If it does prove to be a problem I will cut a few branches.

Butternut HF2V through a tree.

 For a start I installed 12 radials, 6 of 10m long and 6 that are 12m long, I will install a few more longer ones when I get a chance, for now I am mostly interested in 40m. The antenna is also grounded to a metal gutter and heavy metal water pipes.

An initial sweep with the MFJ antenna analyzer showed that it was resonating well on the lower ends of the selected bands. I could not wait to get the radio connected. Well, a few hours later and I had 5 new DXCC entities added on 40m, great results! Conditions were not great, most of the signals were only S2-S3 but even running 5W I could work everything I could hear! I also found it interesting that the noise on the vertical was actually lower than on the G5RV, as much as 3-4 S points, this is not what would normally be expected! I can only assume that in this case it is due to the quieter location it is installed in. The G5RV is right above the house filled with electronic devices.    

Update 12/11/2014: The last few days I have had lots of fun on 12m! With no major, unworked DX'peditions running at the moment I am spending time filling some band slots. Since I have never spent much time on 12m it is proving to be a rich hunting ground at the moment. I have also noticed that the G5RV is working particularly well on 12m. If I can hear a station, even with no S meter reading, I can normally work the station on 5W!

I have been moving the shack around again, this time I have moved a IC-756Pro3 into the main operating position to do direct comparisons to the Yaesu's. Well, after extensive testing I can say that I cannot believe I was happy for so long with the sound coming from the Icom, or the ergonomics, or the RX. The Icoms will now be used for rag-chewing only....

One Icom in the Yaesu "nest", it sure ended in third place in this shootout!

 Update 09/11/2014: How not to run a pileup! Look at how wide the FT4TA pileup ism more than 20kHz! Really guys, not efficient and very frustrating for chasers and other band users!

FT4TA "Band Fill"

 Update 08/11/2014: I have recently noticed that my G5RV refuses to tune on 40 and 80m. A fellow ham told me that he moved his open feed line, on a similar antenna, away from the metal tower. I did the same today and it made a huge difference! While I was up there I also checked my A4S, I had to use a tuner on the antenna since putting it up. A close inspection showed that there was a bad connection on the matching section. I fixed it and a scan with the MFJ antenna analyzer showed that all is well again with SWR of 1:1 in the CW sections of 10/15/20m. Good news!

DXing have been good recently with the 10m open most of the day and when it is not 15/20 is open. I am hoping the good conditions will last till the end of the month for CQ WW CW.

I have been using the ARRL LoTW for a while now and I must say I am impressed! No longer the long waits for QSL cards and the lost cards in the local useless postal system! Every morning I log in to have a look and usually there is some new interesting QSL card waiting for me! Below is a snapshot of the last 25 QSL's that have come in, some good DX there.

 Update 06/11/2014: I have been really busy at work the last few weeks but I do find time every day to make a few contacts. I only look for new or interesting contacts so some days only produce 5-10 entries in the log but most are special.

A nice surprise yesterday was a bunch of FT4TA QSL cards on LoTW, well done guys! I am trying hard to work new ones, seems like the next All Time New One, Narvassa Isl. will be on the air in January. Things slow down as you get closer to the ultimate 340 DXCC entities. I am sitting on 326 at the moment but only 264 on QRP so still lots to work on QRP.

The new radio is really working well, it has already become and "old friend" that produces the results, thanks Yaesu! 

Update 03/11/2014: Well, finally some good news! The Yaesu FTdx-5000MP is finally here and in the shack! It did not take me long to get it connected and up and running. The best bit was the first contact, FT4TA on 15m CW, what a great start!

I still need to spend some time to setup the radio but I already love it The ergonomics is great and what a great receiver! Quiet and sensitive, cannot wait to use it in a contest!

FTdx-5000MP up and running in the shack, working FT4TA on 15m CW


Temporary setup, the FTdx-5000MP and FT-2000 running on 2 different bands. Will still move things around a bit.

 Update 02/11/2014: What a feast of DX! Recent captures include 5R8M (Madagascar) on many bands, VK9XSP (Christmas Isle) on a few and the big one, FT4TA (Tromelin Isle) on a few bands as well. Tromelin was great but also frustrating, it is a large expedition with huge pileups and not all the operators are that good. Some spending hours without sending an ID, others calling for specific areas for a long time when there is no propagation and the worse, allowing the pileup to spread as much as 30kHz wide and very high going right over other DX stations!

But it is not all bad, some of the operators are really good!

My DXCC totals are slowly rising, All time worked sits at around 323 and QRP on 263 worked, still quite a few to go...

Update 31/10/2014: The FT-2000 has been the primary radio in the shack for a while now, I have really fallen in love with it's ergonomics and sound. It might not have the best RX out there but I prefer it to any Icom any day! The sound is so much less tiring and the control layout seems natural. With the NS 3kHz roofing filter the performance is also better than many other radios. 

Update 25/10/2014: I have been away on holiday for a while so I have not worked much DX recently even though conditions have been really good. Got back just in time to work the end of the CQ WW SSB contest, almost wish I did not get back in time! What a mess, I have not heard so many "crocodiles" in many years, all mouth and no ears! Stations who keep on calling but never replies, or stations calling on top of others! Now I remember why I dislike SSB....

Our local postal strike is still going so I am still waiting for a few things, a few computer interfaces, Harbach upgrades for my TL-922 and SB-200 amplifiers. And the FTdx-5000MP is still stuck in customs.  

Update 07/10/2014: I have not been updating this page often lately, not because I have not been active, I have been, but because I have been so active all my spare time is going into DX'ing! My QRP DXCC total since May 2014 now stands on 258 with 156 confirmed on LoTW. The last few days produced lots of band slots mostly on 12m but also 3 new DXCC entities. If conditions stay good like this we should have a good time during the CQ WW SSB and CW contests. I won't be competing in the SSB leg as I will be on leave only returning the Sunday morning. I am hoping to make a few contacts later on Sunday but the CW leg is going to be a serious effort! I just wish my new radios will be here by then! The local Post Office strike is still in full swing....

Update 01/10/2014:  A new month, I managed to spend some time in the shack today, 10m was wide open to the north, the same with 12m so I had some fun making contacts. No notable DX was worked but I did have a nice chat with Ian, G3ROO whom I last talked to when he was on holiday in Cape town. After the contact I had a nice surprise in my inbox, a SWL report from Ruud Vos, NL 13562 complete with a recording of my contact with G3ROO. Thanks Ruud, love your web page as well!

While sitting in the shack I realized that I have now been using the same radio setup for DX'ing for a few weeks, something that is strange since I normally chop and change all the time. I think this is because I am really comfortable with the Yaesu setup I am currently running, a level of comfort and ease of use I never had with my Icom equipment. I am only planning on changing again once the FTdx-5000MP's are here. I love the Yaesu ergonomics! 

I am enjoying this radio combination!

Update 30/09/2014: I had no time to even switch on a radio today, worked late and then I had to help someone with his car. That is the bad news, more bad news is that I have not managed to collect my new HF-2V antenna yet, hope I can collect it before the weekend.

The only good thing that happened today was that I managed to find a pristine Collins 30L-1 amplifier complete with a new set of 572B tubes! This is a nice, compact and quiet amplifier build to mil spec, many people claims it is one of the best build amplifiers ever! I cannot wait to get it going.

Update 29/09/2014: The weekend was busy but I did get some time to work a bit of DX. With the CQWW RTTY contest in full swing the CW bands were relative quiet, not always a bad thing! 10m opened on Saturday and Sunday with good openings on 12, 15 and 20m as well. I managed to bag 3 all time new entities! First Bermuda (funny that I never worked Bermuda before) and then later an even better catch in Guyana and then to top it all Nauru. People say this solar cycle is not great, maybe they should listen a bit more (or get better antennas/receivers hi!)

Taking about band openings and things, almost every day I see people posting on the internet how dead the bands are. This makes me wonder what the yare doing wrong, the bands are open every day and to all parts of the world so I do not believe that I am the only "lucky" one.... 

Update 26/09/2014: I did not have much time to operate today but the few contacts I made were worth it! I managed to add an All Time New one, Bermuda (VP9/WW3S) as well as Columbia (HK1MW), both on 12m with 5W.

In a quick deal I bought a Butternut HF-2V vertical antenna for 40/80/160m. I want the antenna specifically for it's good DX capabilities due to it's low radiation angle. I used one on 40 and 80m years ago on a DX'pedition to Swaziland and I was impressed. Hoping it will help me add to my low band DXCC scores. Time will tell...

I am still waiting for the FTdx-5000MP, it is still stuck in customs due to the strike.  

Update 24/09/2014: What a DX feast today! The public holiday started with W1AW/5 on 40m and then only got better! I did not go for volumes but spent my time looking for juicy ones. Captured stations include Fernando de Noronha, St. Kitts and Nevis (V44KAI),  Chile (CE2/CX1EK) and Kuwait (9K2MU) to mention a few!

Seems like the G5RV is really working well on 24MHz, I seem to have a good signal even on 5W, so far I have managed to wok every station I could hear. 

Update 23/09/2014: More time wasted waiting for the garden services! And still no movement on the FTdx-5000MP, still stuck in customs!!!! Anyway, while hanging around waiting I did manage to work an all time new one, Market Reef (OJ0AM) is now in the log on 15m CW QRP! I suppose the day was not that bad!

Tomorrow is a public holiday here (Heritage day) so maybe I can spare some time for a few contacts, these days time seems to be a problem.....  

Update 22/09/2014: Another hectic day at work, and then at home with garden services messing me around while doing some major work in my garden. On top of that I had some good news and some bad news. The good news is that one of my FTdx-5000MP's is now in the country. The bad news is that due to a postal strike, already a month old, I have no idea when I will get it, could be months! Sometimes living in a third world banana republic sucks!!

While all this was happening I did manage to make a few contacts, nothing special other than Faroe Island (OY1CT) on 10m, a new QRP entity. The band scope on the FT-950 is now calibrated and working well, really a great addition to any radio. I am hoping for a better day tomorrow, as long as the garden service guys do what they are supposed to do.... (and don't even mention the postal guys!) 

Update 21/09/2014: Today I had lots of fun on the air! In the morning the bands seemed rather dead with just a few SAC contest stations to be worked but soon things improved and the contacts flowed in! I worked a quick 200 plus contacts before I decided it was time to install the SDR band scope in the FT-950.

Installing the band scope turned out to be easy so soon I had the radio closed up and ready to calibrate the scope. Below you can see the connection to the PCB and the joint in the coax cable going to the SDR receiver.

Coax connection bottom left that connects the SDR receiver to the IF stage on the FT-950

Simple solder joint protected with shrink tubing

 Before long the scope was running and I could see what was happening on the band! The IF output level on the FT-950 seems to be quite a bit lower than on the FT-2000 but it is not a problem as I could increase the gain on the SDR via software to compensate. Here you can see a quick snap shot of the band with a few CW signals (and a few people tuning up!)

FT-950 SDR band scope with waterfall display

Playing with the new scope setup later in the afternoon produced a few good contacts including two new band-countries on 12m, Uruguay (CX2BR) and the Azores (CU4DX), the FT-950 is growing on me! The IF based bandwidth filer really works well with steep skirts. When you cut-off a strong signal by narrowing the bandwidth there seems to be no residual dynamic range compression or AGC "pumping". The Yaesu DSP band width filter implementation seems to work a LOT better than the Icom version, I have seen this on the FT-950 and the FT-2000, well done Yaesu!

Having fun on 24MHz CW.

My current setup in the shack with the FT-950 for 80/40/30/17/12m and the FT-2000 for 20/15/10m seems to be working well. Adding the band scopes really made a huge difference. I briefly used my Icom IC-756Pro3 this afternoon, suddenly the Icom's band scope seems quite pathetic, I am now spoiled....

Update 20/09/2014: And so the shack upgrade continues, it is almost where I want it (for now! Only the FTdx-5000MP's are still missing) I picked up the new Yaesu FT-950 today. It is going to replace my great but aging FT-990AC doing duty most of the time on the WARC bands. I have tried it on 24Mhz CW so far and it seems great. I still need to make up a cable to connect an amplifier to it. I wonder why Yaesu changed the DIN connector for the amplifier to a new and obscure type of min-din? And then they don't include one as standard? And while we are on the subject, why did they change the 12V power connector to a non standard one? All of  the major brands have used the same power connectors for many years, now Yaesu tried to get clever? Shame on you Yaesu!

Anyway, once setup the silly new connectors will soon be forgotten! The radio seems great so far, I like the ergonomics and the receiver seems to be decent. The bands have been bad so far today but when they improve I will test the RX in a pile-up, that will tell the real story.

Here she is (on top) with her bigger brother the FT-2000.

New FT-950 on top of my few weeks old FT-2000

 Now I am just waiting for the FTdx-5000MP's then I will be happy, no more new radios for a while.....

Ok, let me go and find some DX, the bands are awfully quiet today. I wanted to do some antenna work, adding dipoles for the WARC bands, but my back is so sore I can hardly move, it will have to wait for another day.

Late afternoon produced some good signals on 15m, mostly Scandinavian stations competing in the SAC contest. I worked quite a few but became frustrated because you are only allowed to work SAC stations, other juicy DX is off-limits. I think all contests that limit you to only making certain contacts are plain stupid and frustrating! A far better solution is to simply give higher multipliers to the stations you want people to work but they can still work any station...

The RX on the FT-950 seems to cope well with strong close signals but I will still do the NS 3kHz roofing filter upgrade. One thing I found rather frustrating is that you have to go and search through more than 100 menu options to change basic DNR (digital noise reduction) settings like switching it on and of. But Yaesu though it is a good is a to have dedicate controls for moni volume and keyer speed? Hello Yaesu, WAKE UP!!  In this respect the FT-2000 and even the old FT-990AC is superior.

I still like the radio but I can see that it will never be a main contesting radio for me, more a rag-chew and casual DX radio and because it runs from 12V a field station radio.   

Update 18/09/2014: In a quick deal I added a second Kenwood TL-922 amplifier to the collection today. Now I have two identical amplifiers for the main contesting position, makes life easier!

Then there were two - Kenwood TL-922 amplifiers

Update 17/09/2014: While waiting for my new FTdx-5000 to arrive I have been looking at some other interesting radios, it looks like I might be adding a little Flex 1500 QRP SDR radio to the shack. It will also be great as a portable QRP digital station. If I do make the deal a 300-400W solid state amplifier will be included in the deal. (Update 20/09/2014 - Seller cancelled deal because he decided to keep the radio. I do know where to find a Flex 3000 locally but only after end November, maybe I will rather buy that?)

Another radio that crossed my path is a brand new Yaesu FT-950. This is the smaller brother of the FT-2000. The advantage is that it can run from 12V so I am thinking it would be a great addition to the shack as I field station. That way I won't be disappointed when I operate a field station with basic "field station" equipment. After using top-end radios it is often a bit of a let-down when you have to use basic equipment. I realize the FT-950 is not a FTdx-5000MP but it is a LOT better than an IC-706 or a FT-857. I am hoping to fetch the radio on Friday, hope things work out..... I think after this lot the shack is officially full!   

Update 15/09/2014: Conditions have been good so far this week. I have been busy at work and have not had much time to operate but I am slowly adding interesting calls to the log. 10 and 12m have been really productive. With the great conditions I mostly get a reply after a call or two, even on 5w. 

Update 13/09/2014: I managed to find a new USB-RS232 converter this morning after the one I bought 2 weeks ago stopped working. I use this converter for rig control. Unfortunately the new one lasted less than 2 hours. I opened it up only to find that it uses the same PCB as old one. The standard of soldering is pathetic! It also looks like they used acid core solder resulting in corrosion! I really need to find a decent converter!

I picked up some amplifier spares this morning, I now have 2 almost complete Henry 6N2 amplifiers for spares and also a Heathkit SB-200 that is complete other than a damaged band-switch. I also found a whole bunch of brand new 811 and 572B valves to add to the spares collection.

This afternoon produced some good DX. I managed to work Benin - TY1AA running QRP in spite of the huge pile-up. I must say with some pile-ups being huge and staying that way hour after hour it is not easy running QRP, I have heard a few stations that could have added to my collection but I simply could not make the contact....

Other than the stupid USB-RS232 converter my station is working well. One thing I will need to do with summer now heating things up would be a nice fan to get some air movement in the shack, things were getting a bit hot this afternoon!  

Update 12/09/2014: A busy week at work but I still have time for a few contacts in the afternoon. Conditions have been great with daily openings on 10m. I have managed to add a few more band/countries to my QRP log but no all time new ones. I have decided to get a bit more scientific about this so I have printed a list of countries I need, on this list I have noted the calls and active times of upcoming DX expeditions so that I can try and work them, hope it works!    

Update 10/09/2014: The bands were in great shape again today, I spent a few hours in the late afternoon on 10m, later moving to 15 and 20m. My station, mostly my antenna, seems to be working well, most of the time I can make the contact even in a pile-up in only a few calls running QRP. I did find a few pileups today that were so deep that I could never figure out who was at the bottom of it! I also saw a few occasions where an incorrect spot on the DX cluster caused a huge pile-up! ZD9 was spotted a few times on frequencies where they never were. I know there are a few hams on their way to Tristan but I am sure they are not even there yet! I am also pretty sure the incorrect spots were done on purpose, NOT funny guys!!

A few nice captures were Western Malaysia - 9M2TO, Bosnia Herzegovina - E7100GP and Canary Is - AO88WC, nothing special but still fun with QRP.

I managed to get time to play with CWSkimmer, looks like a really worthwhile addition to the shack, I was just running it via the mike input on the laptop but it coped well! Now I need to get it working with my SDR based IF band scope, that will be great!   

Update 09/09/2014: More fun on the band! The openings were may be not as strong as yesterday but 10m did open and that was great! On 10m nice captures were 5E7R - Morocco and 3B9FR - Rodrigues Is, 15m also produced a few nice ones including T77C - San Marino and A47RS - Oman. May the good propagation last a long time! Summer is definitely here, the day time temperatures have been above 30C the last few days, soon I will need to look at cooling in the shack again.

The FT-2000 with pan-adaptor is still doing well and I am learning more tricks everyday. The way the FT-2000 operates split with the 2 receivers really works well. I tried headphones today for the first time, I do not normally like headphones but they do help with weak signals and hearing the 2 receivers in different ears really works well. I used my aviation headset with gel ear-pads and active noise cancelling, it is like entering a different quiet world with only the signals popping out.

The last few days produced 3 new QRP DXCC entities and 5 new band spots, the totals are growing..... 

Another 6-7 working days before my FTdx-5000MP is in the country......  

Update 08/09/2014: I managed to find some time to operate this afternoon and WOW, what a feast of DX! 10, 15 and 20m were open with some very strong signals! I managed to add a few new ones to my QRP DXCC, including Pakistan and Chad plus Canada on 10m. I must admit I am not so sure about the Canadian station, the band faded and appeared to be quiet when suddenly this VO1 station came up S9+20. I worked him but later looked up the call and could not find it, I have a suspicion it is a local station (or a station operating a remote station) having fun with me....

One or twice I had really bad interference on 20m, not sure what it was, I even changed radios to make sure it was not inside the FT-2000 but the interference disappeared before I could check.

I have to admit I am really liking the FT-2000, and the new superb spectrum display, more every day! The receiver is so nice and quiet with a great sound and the noise cancelling features really work. The ergonomics is also great, Icom and Kenwood can learn something from Yaesu!

Update 07/09/2014:  A quiet day on the radio front, for a change I did not get up really early, I was simply too lazy as I went to bed very late last night. A listen around the bands produced a few stations on 20m but soon that faded. The only noteworthy contact was with New Caledonia, FK8CE, not a new one but still nice to break the pileup with a QRP signal. I also heard W1AW/7, I wanted to turn my antenna as it was pointing completely the wrong way, I setup the split and as I started to turn the antenna I quickly sent my call sign to make sure the keyer was ok, I was quite amazed when W1AW came back to me at once on the side of the antenna!

I listened to all the normal Sunday nets and bulletins on 40m, I even reported into one after a frantic search for a microphone!

In preparation of the FTdx-5000MP arriving I spent more time re-arranging my shack but I soon realized my "prime" contest operating position is simply too small to house the FTdx-5000MP and the FT-2000 that I want to run as main radios. I added my old FT-990AC for now on top of the FT-2000 and it almost does not fit, there is no way I can get the 5000 and the 2000 into that position. I need to rethink my plans.....

Here you can see the 990 on top of the 2000, easy to operate but with no space left on top!

The old and the new, FT-990AC and FT-2000

While I had the FT-990 in position I called CQ on the local 40m QRP "waterhole", 7.020MHz, Monk, ZS4SF replied immediately and we had a nice long chat, QRP both ways, at about 28wpm, it is great to meet a good CW operator like Monk on the air! The old 990 is still a great radio with good filters (aftermarket) and a quiet receiver.     

Update 06/09/2014: Lot of CW activity today with the CWOps contest running. I was fun playing with the new spectrum scope on the FT-2000, it really does make contest work easier as you can see other activity while you are busy working a station. On the waterfall you can actually ready the dots and dashes to get call signs without listening to them. My next step will be to get CWSkimmer running, then you can actually see the call signs as the call. There were some really strange calls on the air like HG100ATOM! At least I managed to add the Seychelles to my QRP log, slowly but surely the totals are climbing.

I have now also connected the FT-2000 to a linear, just to make sure it works but I am not expecting to use it often! I have noticed that the 3kHz roofing filer on the FT-2000 is no better than the 6kHz one, but from reports I expected that. I hope my NS 3kHz filter arrives soon! What I have realized thou is that you can use the "Width" control very effectively to get rid of strong close signals, since it operates in IF it is really effective, more than I expected so maybe the new roofing filter is not that critical? I am still learning new features all the time, this radio really is versatile and with the spectrum scope a real winner.

Here are examples of the filter in "Wide" and "Narrower" mode, notice the complete cutoff outside the filter. Sorry about the yellow reflections on the screen from the light in my shack, only noticed it when I posted the photos!

Wide/normal


Narrow

Here you can see a few CW signals on the 15m band

21MHz CW signals on the spectrum scope.

I have now made up a cable and connected a SigmaLink USB digital interface to the FT-2000, expect some digital QSO reports soon....

Yaesu FT-2000 with Sigmalink USB digital interface.

I have to admit that I am really enjoying this "full size" radio! The poor Icom's seem very puny and un-ergonomically designed compared to the 2000, I cannot wait for the FTdx-5000MP, I just know I am going to love her!    

Update 05/09/2014: After a hectic week with work and family commitments I managed to spend some time with a soldering iron and the FT-2000 on the bench. I did manage to spend a lot of time this week doing research on how to build a pan adapter for the FT-2000. I also managed to source the components I thought I would need.

For a change the planning paid. I installed the SDR receiver inside the FT-2000 and managed to connect it to the 69.450Mhz IF output. I also managed to find a route out of the radio for the USB cable without having to drill a hole in the back plate.

Here is the very quick installation in the FT-2000.

SDR receiver installed in the FT-2000

In a moment of high confidence I closed the radio up and re-installed it into it's operating position, normally I would have tested on the bench first but today I was running out of time! I connected the USB cable to the computer and patiently waited for the system to boot! Great was my joy when the SDR# software produced a nice spectrum and waterfall display! A quick calibration and I had the display synced with my radio. What a great sight to see all the great CW signals on the 15m band!   

There she is! Signals on my new spectrum display!

I still need to play around with the software, there are so many option! I also want to try other programs than SDR#, hope I will get some time this weekend to play a bit, and also make a few contacts.

Update 03/09/2014:  Today I took a drive to collect my new Yaesu FT-2000. I could not wait to get it home and on the air! Once connected it took me a few minutes to figure out how everything works and then I was scanning the bands. Unfortunately conditions were not really great but soon I had the first contact in the log, only a local (well, still about 800km away) ZS2 station but I was happy that the keying and delay worked fine as well as the "spot" function to ensure I was zero beat to the other station. I immediately noticed how quiet and "smooth" the RX was compared to the Icoms I have been using recently! The Noise Blanker is also very effective, best I have ever seen!

A few more contacts, this time DX, first on the 20m band and then on 15m convinced me that I am going to like this radio. Soon I had V85TL, Brunei in the log, nice catch and a new one on QRP for me. Talking about QRP, I love the way the radio shows you the power output in Watts on the screen when you adjust the power. I also really like the graphic on the screen that shows you when you a zero beat to the other station.

Now I cannot wait for the SDR bits and pieces that I ordered to arrive so that I can add a pan adapter to the FT-2000. I have not had a chance to check the close in dynamic range but I can see from the little effect the 3kHz roofing filter has compared to the 6kHz roofing filter that it is not going to be great. I knew this so I have already ordered a NS 3kHz roofing filter that will give an around 23db improvement. 

Here she is while I am having CW fun on 15m

New Yaesu FT-2000 (PEP enhancement version) while making first contacts.

Update 02/09/2014:  Today I made payment on the FTdx-5000MP, the order and stock was confirmed with the wholesaler in Germany, now I have to wait patiently, I should have it in the shack in about 3 weeks.

On a side note I struck a deal on a backup radio today, a new Yaesu FT-2000 (PEP-2000 enhanced version). I have already ordered a NS 300kHz roofing filter for it to increase the dynamic range by about 23db, this replaces the useless standard 300kHz roofing filter that comes with the radio. The standard filter, as measured in the lab, is actually a 600kHz filter. This makes an average radio a decent radio, not as good as the FTdx-5000MP but at least as good as an IC-7800. I have also ordered the components (A SDR receiver) to add a pan-adapter to the FT-2000, it will make for an interesting mini project. Once complete it will provide a great spectrum scope and it will also allow me to change frequency with a mouse click, just like on the IC-7800. I will document the conversion and publish it as a mini article here.

The plan is to collect the radio tomorrow, hope I get time to do it, having the FT-2000 in the shack will make waiting for the FTdx-5000MP easier.

New addition to the shack, and backup to the ordered FTdx-5000MP, a Yaesu FT-2000 (PEP-2000 enhanced version)
This radio reminds me of my much loved Yaesu FT-1000D

This afternoon produced good conditions on 15m, I managed to make quite a few DX contacts while negotiating the deal on the FT-2000, amateur radio is providing me with lots of fun!

Update 01/09/2014:  After months of research, looking at test results, talking to many people and going from one model to the next my decision has finally been made! I placed an order for a Yaesu FTdx-5000MP today. It will take around 12 working days to arrive from Germany, the price is right and it comes with a full local warrantee. Now I just have to wait! I will study the manual while I am waiting. I am also considering ordering a DMU-2000 from HRO in the USA, they seem to be a lot cheaper than the German source. If I like the radio, and I full expect that I will, I will look for a second one to complete the contest station, till then the IC-756Pro3 will have to do duty as a second radio.

DX conditions were quite good today, I did not have much time but I did manage to work a string of stations on 15m CW and later on 20m, I did a few comparisons between the A4S and the G5RV and they are worlds apart, the G5RV is really pathetic on the higher bands, on 40 and 80m it seems to work well though.    

Update 31/08/2014: I had so much fun today during the SARL CW contest! The bands were noisy but propagation was good. I ended up with 104 contacts in the 3.5 hours. I tried to only work local stations but a few DX stations called me so I did work them. There were a few surprises like 5R8SV calling me and a few Japanese stations joining in the fun with serial numbers.

The standard of operating was mostly good, maybe the CW speeds were lower than heard during international contests but it was great hearing so many local stations joining.

Having fun, 2 x Icom IC-756's, one classic and one a Pro3. I used the classic in preference to a newer Peo2 as it has superb CW filters installed.

A few things became obvious, I need better antennas for 40 and 80m! And I need a better radio (See Selection process here). I had one very strong station close to me and the radios took a hammering, this is where close in dynamic range counts, so much for all this local "experts" who say down here in quiet South Africa dynamic range does not count, it is obvious that they are not serious CW contesters!

Update 30/08/2014: After spending a few (wasted) hours on the road today it looks like an IC-7800 is not going to grace my shack after all. This might not be a bad thing, I have done more research and even spoke to one of the people involved with the ARRL testing. I was told that Icom made changes to the IC-7800 after the tests were done on the 7800, these changes included adding the important 3kHz roofing filter. I was told the ARRL tests reflect the radio before the roofing filter was added and that it now has a 117db close in dynamic range. It turns out this is not true, the ARRL tests were done with the 3kHz roofing filter installed and V2 firmware.

So the 87db 2kHz dynamic range as reported in the ARRL test stands for the IC-7800, unfortunately this puts the IC-7800 way down the list. The newer V3 firmware only added a few new features for the scope and operating, it did NOTHING for the RX. So I have to admit that I would not be happy with the IC-7800's RX, no matter how great the rest of the radio is. The Yaesu FTdx-5000MP's 106db 2kHz dynamic range makes the IC-7800 look stupid..... Icom have promised a 20db increase in performance for the coming, limited production, commemoration edition IC-7850. Unfortunately it will be a while before this radio is available in limited qualities, and at a huge price and I would like to see ARRL tests before believing Icom's sales talk.

So I am back to looking for a FTdx-5000MP, I am actually glad since I really like the radio. Looking at the pricing I can almost buy 2 x FRdx-5000's for the price of the IC-7800, and ultimately I need 2 identical radios for contest work. The only question is do I source it locally or do I import, that decision will depend on availability and cost locally, I do not want to wait! I know I can get one from HRO and have it in a week, at a lower cost that locally, seems like my answer is already there but I want to give one local guy a chance, I have asked him for a price and delivery time, he has a good reputation.

After the disappointment in the morning I had a great time on the air! Both 15m and 10m were wide open in the afternoon and I worked a lot of stations competing in a YO contest, great fun!

I have now setup the shack for SO2R (single operator, 2 radio) contest work as the SARL CW contest is tomorrow afternoon. My only problem is that there is a problem with my G5RV, seems like something went wrong as the SWR is off the scale on 40m, I cannot even tune it with a manual tuner. I hope I get time to fix it tomorrow else I won't even waste my time competing unless I only enter the single band category on 20m. The contest is only on 20,40 and 80m, a bit strange, there is also no QRP category, shame on you SARL!

Maybe I will just ignore the contest and work some DX if the bands are open! Unfortunately I have to say that there (still) seems to be some cliques in the SARL and if you are not part of them you get ignored. I saw it recently in discussions on some local contests, I was involved and the next thing it went quite, on the forum and on email. Then suddenly a draft rule-set appeared, seems like a group decided to exclude others and do their own thing, I then asked a question but it is 2 days later and I have been ignored. Seems like nothing has changed in the 11 years I was not active, quite sad...... But I do not really care, this is an international hobby so no need to be concerned with a few locals.....  

Update 29/08/2014: 20m was quite good today, I did not have much time to operate as I had some wedding photos to process and the shack to clean but a good catch was 3B9FR (Rodrigues Isle) on 20m CW QRP. I am hoping the good conditions persist for the weekend.

I am not really prepared for the SARL CW contest on Sunday. My 40m dipole is on the ground and my trusty G5RV refuses to tune on 40m, not sure why! I hope I will get time tomorrow or Sunday morning to sort out at least one antenna for 40m as it is normally the most productive band in local contests. If I do not get around to fixing an antenna and preparing a bit I will still compete in the contest but just for fun, not trying to win.

Update 28/08/2014: Good news, well I hope so! Looks like I might have found a pristine IC-7800, and at a reasonable price! It is 450km away but I think I must take a drive and go and look, hopefully I can make a deal. It is a MK 3 with the 3kHz roofing filter and the newest (3.01) firmware. Maybe the search for a new radio will be over soon.....

Is this the new flagship radio in my shack? Time will tell...

Icom IC-7800 MK3

I still need to consider what I will use as a second radio in contests. It makes sense to at least stay with the same brand to make things less confusing in the heat of the moment. I think for now I will use the IC-756Pro3 till something else comes along, maybe a 7600 or a 7700?

I also added a Yaesu FC-20 tuner to the shack today, it works well with my FT-847, I find it tunes very fast and silent, it will make the FT-847 far more practical for day to day use. While testing the new tuner I did realize I need to neaten up my shack again, way too many cables behind the radio, many net even connected, it is amazing how quickly the cables seem to accumulate.

Update 27/08/2014:  A quick update on my selection of a new main radio. I discovered something rather important. Initially I wrote off the Icom IC-7800 due to it's poor close in dynamic range performance. As low as 87db on the Sherwood list. I did notice that the test was done in 2004 but did not take much notice of that. Today I found out that that was with a 6kHz roofing filter in the Mk 1 version. Since then Icom have added a 3kHz roofing filter and several software upgrades. The close in dynamic range is now 117db! That is better than any other radio on the list.

I have always liked the Icom scope and layout plus the 7800 has some really great features, suddenly this radio is back in the running! The only problem is where to find one that is affordable, it has to be the latest MK 3 with the new brighter screen and 3kHz roofing filter..... Watch this space! 

Update 26/08/2014: Yesterday and this afternoon I managed to spend a bit of time on HF, I am really having fun with the new antenna, I am hearing and working stations so much easier now. Suddenly the bands, even 10m, seems to be open every day. New QRP DXCC entities are bagged every day!

I have also started setting up my station for 2 radio operation in contests, just a few cables and I will be ready for some contest fun. I am using AALog logging software at the moment, I now need to setup a server so that I can run 2 stations at the same time with consecutive serial numbers. 

Update 24/08/2014: So I finally got the A4S in the air, about time! It is fine on 10 and 15m but on 20m it resonates very high in the band, around 14.5Mhz so I need to sort that out when I have the time. For now it is working fine with the internal tuner.

Within 30 minutes of getting the antenna in the air I bagged 3 new QRP countries including an all time new one, Cambodia, what a great start with the new antenna! It is a lot quieter than the G5RV with stronger signals! I spent quite a bit of time comparing the antennas, often a S5 signal on the A4S could not even be heard on the G5RV.

I am looking forward to working lots of new ones with the A4S.

Update 23/08/2014:  Saturday and not a single contact! Sad hey? Well, not really.... I had a magic visit to a food market early morning. When I got home (tummy full of great food) I had a listen around the bands, they were really pathetic! This solar cycle has been really a bad one so far, hope it still holds a surprise or two for us.

I then decided it was time I got a decent beam antenna up in the air. I have been thinking of putting up a 5 or 6 band hex beam but I have not been able to find decent fiber glass spreaders locally. I have all the other hardware ready so if I find spreaders I will build one. I do have 3 yagis in pieces on the ground. A TH5DX, TH11DX and a A4S. I have had problems with the 2 TH antennas in the past, I think they are very old and the traps need to be rewound. The A4S gave me great service the last time I used it. With a 8.9 dbd gain and 25 db F/B ratio it is not too shabby, better than most 3 element tri-banders..

I spent most of the day cleaning the antenna, replacing hardware and measuring and setting the elements. In the past the antenna was set to the SSB portions of the bands but I wanted to re-tune it to the CW portions. Just before the sun set I had the assembled antenna up on the roof, ready to go onto the mast. I then extended the rotator control cable (it has to move to accommodate the large turning circle of the A4S compared to the 2m and 70cm antennas I have up at the moment). I also made up a RG213 feed line and coax balun for the antenna. I am planning on getting it up and running in the morning. I am hoping the SWR and resonance points are where I want them to be, I would hate to have to take it down again.... My back is giving me lots of trouble these days, need to go for an operation soon.

On a happier note: I just had DXCC entity (QRP) number 150 confirmed this morning. This was since May this year when I became active again and started with a QRP only DXCC quest. I have actually worked around 180 but I have 150 confirmations via LoTW. Number 150 was Reunion on 40m as a matter of interest.

Yaesu just announced a new radio, the FT-991, it looks to me like it might be a replacement of the well loved FT-897 that was discontinued recently. It is looking good, a nice 3.5" display with a real-time band scope. I want one!!

New Yaesu FT-991!

Hoping for better conditions tomorrow!    

Update 21/08/2014: The last few days the conditions have been rather poor. The only band that has produced any DX has been 17m. At least there is something to work and I need PLENTY more DXCC entities on 17m. I am amazed at how well the G5RV works on the band.

I promised myself to do some work on my HF antennas this weekend, just hope I get time.... 

Update 19/08/2014: Playing around in the shack this afternoon I decided to test my old Yaesu FL-2100Z with my new amplifier keyer circuit. The radio I used was the Icom IC-746. looking around 20m and 15m only produced a few very weak signals. I decided to have a listen on 17m, nice surprise! Lots of European signals on the band, just about every call I answered resulted in a QSO on the first try. I really need to spend more time on 17m! The amplifier and keyer worked perfectly. Later I dropped back to my normal 5W and still managed to work stations.

It looks like my G5RV tuned with the old FC-901 tuner (The tuner in the IC-746 is still intermittent) seems to work well. One thing that I did notice was that the FL-2100Z seems to run quite hot, the fan seems to be very quiet, I will have to open it up to check the fan, maybe replace it with a more modern muffin fan?

Having fun with amateur radio at the moment, just wish I had more time. I am not only enjoying the DX'ing and contesting but also the fiddling with equipment, think I need to find a nice project to build. I would love to build something I could actually use in the shack, maybe a SDR pan-adaptor or an Elecraft QRP radio?

The CQ WW contests are around the corner, I really need to make time to get a better antenna up in the air, maybe my old yagi but I am really keen on building a hex beam, it looks like a really interesting compact antenna that could even be built so that it could be used for a field station.

The FC-901, this old tuner will tune anything!


My ancient FL-2100Z amplifier, it still produces full power after all these years.

Update 17/08/2014: Since it is my birthday today I did not have that much time for amateur radio, had to attend to some social matters! I did get time to give the new keying circuit a workout, was funny to run high power again! It seemed to work fine after a few hours.

This afternoon I reverted back to QRP and looked around the bands. Signals were not great, they were far better yesterday but I am glad I tried! 15m CW produced an all time new one, OA4DX (Peru) is a nice addition to the QRP log! Nice Birthday present!

I am hoping I will get a bit of time this week for some DX'ing..... 

Update 16/08/2014: After spending some time with the Icoms on the workbench I have had some success. The one with the "no external AF output" is sorted, turned out it was a bad solder joint. The sick tuner in the 746 now works on some bands and some not, I think I need to open the tuner motors at some point, maybe when I have some time.

The main victory for me was building an external amplifier keying circuit that works from the ACC socket. At first I tried to do it with a transistor that will handle up to 300V, thinking that I can key even older amplifiers directly. I used a simple circuit comprising of 2 x 1K resistors and a 2SC1507 NPN transistor. I run it from the 13.8V (pin 7) and "TX SEND" (pin 3) pins on either ACC socket. It keyed perfectly but the moment I plugged in ANY amplifier it ended up keying the radio. Pin 3 on an Icom will go to ground when the radio is keyed but if you pull it to ground the TX will be keyed. I suppose there was just too much leakage in the transistor under load that it pulled pin 3 down. It tried a few combinations using diodes trying to solve the problem but it turned out not to be reliable......

I decided what was needed was to isolate the amplifier from the radio (pin 3 specifically). I added a small 12V relay (up to 250V AC on the contacts). I used the output from my transistor circuit and the 13.8V from pin 7 on the radio. SUCCESS! It now keys all my amplifiers, even the old HL-2200 with it's 160V AC relay, without any issues! I tried it on all my Icoms and it works fine. I ended up building 3 copies for use in the shack. Problem solved, I hope..... If anyone is interested in the circuit please let me know and I will publish it.

I was hoping to DX a bit in the afternoon but a violent thunder storm stopped that! Fortunately I unplugged all my equipment when the storm got closer as a sudden VERY close strike took out my cord-less phone system in a puff of smoke! At least it seems like it was the only damage.    

Update 15/08/2014: Icom, you suck!! Ok, sorry about that but really, I own 5 "7 series" Icoms, 1 746 and 4 different 756's. at the moment ALL of them have an issue of some kind or the other. All of them still RX and TX but there are tuner issues, amplifier keying issues and no external sound output on he ACC sockets. The amplifier keying relay is a real bad one. According to Icom it will key an amplifier @ up to 16V an 2A (or .5A in some manuals). Well, I can tell you even at 12V and 100ma it is still not reliable, I now have 2 that does not work. One relay is dead and the other is stuck in key mode.

I will try to fix some of the problems this weekend, but I must say I cannot see myself EVER buying another Icom, and it does not matter how nice the display is....

Update 10/08/2014: Another fun day on HF with the bands really opening in the late afternoon. At some point the CW section of 20m was filled wall to wall with S9 signals. By getting the timing right I managed to bag quite a few stations on first call, good propagation helps when you are running 5W!

Nice additions to the QRP log, and both new QRP countries, were Vietnam and Thailand.

I found a couple of stations running really high speed (for me) CW, matching their speed by ear my keyer reported speeds of 60-70 wpm. I am glad to report I managed to work a few at this speed. It is great when a station can actually receive as fast as they send, all to often you hear this high speed station but when you reply at the same speed they struggle till you drop the speed a lot. I also hear the normal stations with huge signals calling with hardly any gaps but never coming back to anyone's calls, often Russian and sometimes Italian stations. Funny since many Russian operators are really good. You will never find this with most European (German etc.) or US stations.

The bad thing with the recent good conditions on weekends is that I spend all my spare time operating and not fixing and getting my HF yagi in the air. But when conditions are good who needs a yagi?

An update on the new radio selection: I have read in depth reviews of every single top end radio in production. If I look at all the pro's and con's the FTdx-5000MP is still the clear winner, and when combined with a pan-adaptor like the L-PAN it seems unbeatable. Now I need to shop around for a good price and also after sales support! Unfortunately the local lead-time seems to be 4-6 weeks, I am not known for my patience so I might just end ordering it myself from the USA or Japan and then paying extra to get it earlier via courier.

Update 09/08/2014: Band conditions are a lot better this weekend! I had some fun today working the "Worked all Europe" contest. It is fun but also VERY frustrating that you cannot work stations outside of Europe. I have decided that I will ignore contests like these that limit who you can work in the future! A couple of new band/countries on QRP were worked, worth the fight to be heard on QRP. I think it is funny that some local "experts" think that QRP is easier than QRO in a contest, and that you can have runs, even in bad conditions of more than 100 per hour running QRP. Obviously "arm chair" QRP operators who have not actually tried... One promised a log to prove that he can do that, now weeks later nothing, not surprised!

A nice addition to the QRP log was Greece on 40M and the US Virgin Islands on 15m as well as St Kitts and Nevis on 17m.

While playing with different radios I noticed that the IC-746's internal tuner no longer get's a match in most cases. I have had this problem before, the motor drive for the caps needed cleaning, it is a real pain to get to them as you need to unsolder the HF antenna connectors. Will do it when I have some time......

Update 07/08/2014: After a hectic few days at work recently I am hoping for a quieter spell, I have started looking at my new radio selection again, back in the lead is the Yaesu FTdx-5000MP, I recently had the opportunity to acquire a pristine Icom IC-7600 but after looking at the receiver specifications again I decided the receiver is no better than my current IC-756Pro2/3 so it was not worth it. It is a shame, I love the Icom screen! A bit more research and then I will commit, exiting times!

Update 06/08/2014: I was happy to see that the results of the SARL QRP contest were released! There was quite a lot of activity on the bands during the contest so it was a bit disappointing that only 8 logs were received and one check log. I suppose most of the other stations were QRO or did not consider their scores to be competitive. I have copied and pasted the results as published by the SARL below.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

The results are as follows:

Home Station

ZS1WWW - Wicus - 12 points

Field Station

ZS6WR - West Rand ARC - 406 points
ZS6PTA - Pretoria ARC - 182 points
ZS4BFN - Bloemfontein ARC - 96 points

Ultra Light portable field station

ZS6DX - Rudi - 1260 points
ZS6A - Pierre - 306 points
ZS5J - John - 204 points
ZS6BNE - 90 points

Check log - ZS2JO - Johannes

Congratulations to the winners

Geoff Levey ZS6C 
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

I think the results are quite encouraging for me! I will be spending even more time running QRP in the future and I will be spending time (and money) on improving my QRP station. The two main areas I want to improve on are a better radio (better RX) and better portable antenna. The little Yaesu FT-817 I am using is great but I think I should at least upgrade to the 817ND version, the added DSP filter will help a lot when bands are noisy like during the QRP contest. I might also consider an Elecraft radio....

On the antenna side I am considering something that will give me some gain and as but of directivity to "turn away" from noise. I suppose the only option would be some kind of wire beam? I have something in mind, will report back if I decide to build something!

The above is for portable and field use, for QRP from the base station I am now looking at a Hex beam antenna as well as the as yet not complete search for a new radio. I have figured out a way to reduce the output power on the FTdx-5000MP to 5W or below (using ALC feedback) so it is back in the running as the new main radio in the station! I am looking at making a purchase in the next 4-6 weeks.

Here is a photo of one (not mine!) She will look great in the shack!

Yaesu FTdx-5000MP

Update 03/08/2014: So I ended up not competing in the SARL phone contest, being SSB and with no QRP class it seemed too much effort for something I am not really interested in. It is also primarily a local contest as DX contacts do not count as multipliers. I did spend a while listening bad the bad operating procedures from some operators and some stations being so over driven that they were splattering all over the place helped me make up my mind to give it a miss. The upcoming Digital and CW legs I might consider, time will tell.

After listening to all the noise on 40m during the contest I looked for DX higher in the bands, it was well worth it as it produced a few new band-countries on 18Mhz!

Update 02/08/2014: While listening around the bands today I heard a contest running on 15m CW. After listening a while I figured out it was the European HF contest. I made a few contacts just for fun, unfortunately stations outside Europe could only contact stations in Europe, a rule I really dislike in many contests as it is frustrating to hear DX that you cannot work! I make a point of NEVER sending in a log for a contest that has this rule!!

The good news is that the contest did produce a new "all time first" DXCC entity for me. Montenegro (4O3A) took a long time to work, I chased him around the band as he moved frequency every now and then till I managed to work him. Some days QRP can be so frustrating but also so satisfying when you finally complete the contact!

One thing I have noticed is the more and more Russian stations seem to hear worse than they can transmit, used to be typical of Italian stations.....

Tomorrow afternoon it is time for the SARL HF phone contest. I am not really interested in entering but will hand out points. The main reasons I am not really interested in competing it that it is a phone contest AND there is no QRP category! Shame on you SARL...... I think for a change I will use the Kenwood TS-870 for this contest, the main reason being that it has a voice keyer so no need to shout CQ CONTEST for hours on end.

Update 27/07/2014: The IOTA contest was fun even though conditions were not great. It did not produce any new DXCC entities but it did produce a few new islands! I will, when I get time, write a full report and post it in the contesting section.

Update 25/07/2014: I have been so busy, no time to update this page! I have been making a few contacts every day while checking the bands. Conditions have been particularly poor recently..... I hope conditions will be better for the IOTA contest this weekend!

Update 19/07/2014: So today the long awaited SARL QRP contest finally happened! I arrived at my spot with plenty time to spare, only to realize that it was not ideal with too many trees. I ended up not using my normal fan dipole as it would have been difficult to put up. I just threw the end-fed wire over a tree.

The antenna, or the location, turned out to be very noisy. I had a S9 noise floor on 40m!

A wire in a tree is not ideal....

The end-fed antenna I build quickly needs to be optimized and also made neater, look at the construction (blush blush)

The station mostly worked well. I can improve on the antenna and the paddle needs a firmer base or a strap to attach it to my leg. The LiPo batteries worked well.

My station on a rock in the "forest"

I made a few SSB contacts but soon realized that I am not used to shouting CQ so spent most of the 3 hours on CW. I could hear a few stations in the noise I could not work, sorry guys!

I ended with 12 ZS stations in the log, actually 11 as I worked ZS6PTA on cw and SSB. I just missed division 2, worked the rest.

After the first hour I QSY'ed to 15 and 20m, conditions were really poor with most signals S1 or below, at least my noise level was lower here. There was some contest running with lots of Russian stations exchanging RST and IARU zones. It was hard work but I managed to work a few stations, it is always satisfying to work weak DX with QRP from the bush!

I will only know later how I did compared to the other competitors. I logged 12 local stations and 18 DX stations.  a low total compared to my usual QRP efforts but this time I was running a portable field station and conditions were really bad! The DX was mostly Russian but did include 2 Japanese stations and a lonely USA station. A nice capture was EA8ZS (Canary Islands)

Update 17/07/2014: Feeling so much better today! Spent some time cleaning up all the cables in the shack, also listened to the bands but did not really try to make any contacts. Did work a Saudi station on 15m yesterday so I knew there was DX around. Today I heard a few very strong stations on 20m chatting in Japanese but not a single call sign, listening to their radio procedure, or lack of it, I am not convinced they are radio amateurs, they might well be pirate fishing vessels on the west coast!

Listening on 15m for DX

On a different note. I have been thinking of taking a dual band hand-held radio, set to cross-band repeat, up in a Multicopter (Drone) and parking it a couple of hundred meters high. It would be interesting to see how far I could work on 2m or 70cm with this setup. Just some fun!

Update 16/07/2014: I managed to find a nice tiny little LiPo battery monitor today at my local friendly hobby shop. Now I am all set for the QRP contest this coming Saturday, now all we need are spectacular conditions. I realize that even though I worked more than 400 stations QRP last weekend it was with a high antenna and over about 16 hours. This coming weekend I will only have a low end-fed wire antenna and the contest only lasts 3 hours. I wonder what is a realistic target to set for number of contacts? 40? or maybe 50? Time will tell....

Update 15/07/2014: So far it has been a hectic week and I am still not feeling well. The good news is that it seems like the bands are improving slowly. I am hoping it is the start of good things in the near future. For the first time since I became active again I can hear stations with decent signals on 20, 15 and even on a few occasions on 10m in the afternoon. 40m seems to open to the USA and Europe most afternoons. Unfortunately most of the activity seems to be on SSB

I am busy making up connectors and cables to run my FT-817 QRP station on LiPo batteries. I still need to buy a battery monitor as it is important not to discharge the below a certain level.

Update 13/07/2014: Ok, that was fun!! Just spend about 16 hours out of the last 24 competing in the IARU HF championships!

Lots of CW activity. I managed to work most but not all that I wanted to work (since it was not a competitive effort I got tired of working some countries, a few good ones escaped but that is the way it is with QRP. I did fill a few new band slots but no new DXCC entity's for the main logbook. The QRP logbook did gain a few though.

Yes, also found a few weaknesses in the station. I need better antennas! But that is work in progress at the moment. Secondly I need to find a new contest logging program. I the past I used N1MM's software with good results. I tried the same again only to run into a problem! The software is not connected to my radio so it refused to change bands, it insisted on logging all contacts for 14.200Mhz.

So I wasted the first hour trying to sort it out, that will teach me to COMPLETELY test everything before the contest! Anyway, I gave up in disgust and reverted to another non contest logger. That had disadvantages like to showing dupes in real time.

I am also more sure than ever that I need a radio with a better RX. My old IC-756Pro3 got trampled on big time in a few pileups. A few times the front end was so desensitized that the station I was trying to work just disappeared.... At one point I played around with a few radios and ended up working the rest of the contest on my old FT-990, it's main advantage is the bank of Imrad CW filters installed in it.

40m was fun early this morning, added a few band/countries but QRP really struggles on the lower bands.

Still had lots of fun! I did not do particularly well, spent too much time playing with radios and logging software....

So what did not work well: The N1MM logging software! I am sure it is just a (obscure) setting that will allow me to actually log the frequency I want! Will investigate further....

What worked well: My trusty Yaesu FT-990AC, I still think it has a better receiver than any Icom, but it lacks a band scope and dual RX. I love he spotting button, the solid Imrad filters and the amazingly effective "digital" filter. It might be old but it is still a solid performer. My little G5RV also really worked well, now if I can only get the time and energy to put up a yagi things will be even better! The hunt for a new radio goes on, if only the FTdx-5000MP could run QRP.....

Update 12/07/2014: I have been sick in bed for a few days so not much activity on this side! I am planning on taking part in the IARU HF championships that start today at 12:00Z but I am not sure I am up to it. Anyway, I will give it a try, even if I just make a few contacts it will be better than nothing.

Update 08/07/2014: Sick in bed today, would have been great to work some DX but I did not really have the energy for it. I did manage to do some reading, I am still doing research on a new radio. I have pretty much decided on a Yaesu FTdx-5000MP. I did discover two things today that is a bit disconcerting about this radio. The first thing is that the minimum power setting on the radio produces 10W, NO QRP contacts on the 5000! Since I love QRP this is quite a blow. The second thing is that a local supplier, whom I contacted to find out about pricing and availability, told me that the last few FTdx-5000MP's are being sold, form September it will be replaced by a FTdx-5000LT! I cannot find any confirmation on this on the internet, could it be true? Time will tell but I might delay ordering the radio a bit.

Since the 5000 cannot run QRP I have now restarted the search for a new QRP radio. So far I have investigated the FTdx-3000, it is not as good as the 5000 but it does have a few advantages like a 5W low power setting and USB interface for digital modes and rig control. The price is also quite attractive.

One of the things I discovered in my research is that there are nice band scope adapters available that uses the IF output on the radio, a PC with a sound card and some software to produce a band scope, and other features, far better than found on any radio. This includes full SDR (Software Defined Radio) functionality as well. So a new addition to my "must have" list for a new radio is an IF output. That eliminates all Icom's as far as I can see. Most top end Yaesu and Kenwood's are fine, I see my old TS-870 and ancient FT-901DM even have IF outputs, but none of my Icoms, shame on you (again!) Icom!.

More research is needed, like if the Kenwood TS-590 (Great RX) has an IF output? I must say there are some many nice radios out there, wish I had an unlimited budget and lots of space!  As it is my shack is already crowded. Lets see where this goes. Update: No, the TS-590 does not have an IF output. Looks like I will be buying a FTdx-3000 and a LP-PAN adapter as my new QRP setup......

Front view of FTdx-3000


And the back of the FTdx-3000 with the all important IF output.

On a different note, the IARU world radio championship take place this weekend, I am quite keen to compete, just wish my yagi was up already! I think I will enter the Single Operator QRP category. Hoping for good conditions......

Update 07/07/2014: All work and no play, not good! I did spend a bit of time operating today but conditions were not great. Only interesting catch was a Chinese station. Also had a great chat on 7.020MHz with a local amateur, he was testing a new keyer and it was working great!

After some urging from fellow hams I made a few notes on the way I operate QRP contesting and DX'ing. You can read these notes, to be added to in the future, under the heading QRP notes and Expeditions.

I have recently spent a bit of time on the local SARL web forum. Lots of interesting posts and knowledgeable posters, but unfortunately also a bunch of thick skulled "operators" plus the usual arrogance you find on internet forums. Not sure I will stick around, at least I think I will stop posting...... Funny, after 11 years of being out of the hobby I return only to find the same people pop up from the past still acting like they know it all and own the bands.... Sigh..... 

Update 05/07/2014: Had great fun with amateur radio today!

I decided to get another one of my museum radios running today, I chose the Yaesu FT-107M, a radio that is dear to my heart as it was the radio that I used when I first started competing in CW contests. It served me well for quite a while till I upgraded. I cleaned it and connected it up, all seemed well till I transmitted, total power output is less than 500mw. Ok, when I have time I will have a look, it could be blown finals or maybe something like a bad connection or biasing issue, time will tell. Here is the old lady, I also have the matching power supply and external VFO for her.

Yaesu FT-107M, museum piece!

 I finally found time to go and fetch my new 70cm amplifier. It is a Fischer F70. It runs a single 4CX250 for a maximum output of 500W, more realistically would be 300-400W. It seems to be well made (German) and in a great condition. Here she is.

Fischer F70 amplifier

Since it is a monoband amplifier there is no tuning to be done. Since I have no documentation I need to trace the circuit to ensure that I get the keying part right, oh why are these VHF/UHF amplifiers so complicated?

Here are a few photos of the inside, more can be found on the amplifier page.

Top view

Bottom view

After playing with the amplifier I spent some time listening around the bands, I could hear a lot of very weak CW signals sounding like a contest. A search on the internet showed that it was the annual Marconi Memorial Contest. I waited a while and soon conditions improved and I managed to make a few contacts running 5W into the G5RV. As the afternoon progressed the conditions improved and my contact rate started going up, soon I was doing more the 100 contacts per hour, and that with 5W and a long wire antenna!

Conditions became rally crowed and the old IC-756 (Classic) had a hard time coping with all the signals, for the first time in a very long time I started using the 500hz CW filter, it sure helped but every now and then the front end would get overloaded and de-sensed. I am starting to look forward to a new radio, the FTdx-5000MP looks like just the radio I need!

I have not checked my logs but I might have one or two new DXCC entities towards my 5BDXCC QRP. I am pretty sure Kuwait is a new one. I really need to decide on a decent contest logging program that can generate ADIF files to be imported into my main logging program after the contest.

I am hoping tomorrow will bring some more DX, unfortunately I won't be able to DX in the afternoon, normally the best time for an opening as I will be visiting my sick aunt again. Maybe I will be back for a few contacts early evening......

Update 04/07/2014: Friday again and I am feeling a bit better. Time in the shack this afternoon produced a few nice contacts on CW including a 9J2 and a few Russian and European stations. Conditions are definitely improving! Many of the signals on 20 and 15m actually lifted the S meter, looking good for the weekend!

I need to do some work on the station and the antennas this weekend, soon it will be contest season and I will not be ready! Hoping I will feel better to do some hard work.

I have now done lots of research on the new radio subject. You can see my notes on how I am making this decision here: New Radio Selection

Update 03/07/2014: Still stuck with the flu but a visit to the shack produced a few contacts on CW, local and DX. The bands are sounding better every afternoon, I am hoping for a good DX weekend.

I have now started to seriously look for a new top-end radio for the shack, I have some nice radios but they are all a bit old now and there are better radios out there. I am considering the top 2-3 models from Yaesu, Icom and the Kenwood TS-990. I will also look at the Elecraft K3, but since it is such a small radio with a few tiny controls I somehow don't think I will like it. I will report my findings as I do research.

Update 02/07/2014: A developing flu and a hectic day at work limited my time and energy for operating today. I did spend a bit of time moving some equipment around to make my operating position more comfortable. Then I worked a few stations, first on 15m and then on 20m CW. Initially signals were strong but they soon faded. I found 2 stations, on an A45, that kept on calling but never replying, not even leaving enough time between CQ's to get a call in. Heard many replies to his calls that he could not hear. He was also sending at about 40wpm but when he did hear a station it was obvious that he could only read around 12wpm, and still struggled.... Anyway, his call is now on my "ignore" list!

I also had a long chat on CW with ZS1JX, Peter is a great operator and I am looking forward to more contacts with him in the future!

Update 01/07/2014: I only had a little bit of time for amateur radio today but it was fun! After making up a new paddle too radio cable for the FT-817, it uses a small plug for the key, I decided to try it on the bands. 20m produced a few JA stations and a bit later a few US stations, signals were weak but workable. After the band closed I moved to 40m for a few local contacts. I found 5R8UI calling on 7.153 SSB, a call at 5W secured the QSO for a new one on QRP, wish it was CW....

After that I worked a few locals stations on 7.020, the local CW "water hole", it was nice to see so much local CW activity! After this it was back to 20m where a CQ resulted in a small pile-up, have not had one of those for years! The 20m band was behaving strangely, it seemed to close and the a while later there would be strong signals again only to fade again after a few minutes. A final opening produced YU1DW (Serbia) before it seemed to close for the evening.

I also connected the AT-180 tuner to the IC-706 again and made a few contacts running around 4W according to my watt meter. After all these years she still works well!

IC-706 with AT-180 tuner having CW fun on 20m

 Update 30/06/2014: A hectic day at work was followed by some time in the shack. The DX bands seemed quiet today, but I have noticed that they often are quiet on a Monday. I was playing with the little FT-817 when I heard a S5 CW signal on 20m calling CQ. A call from my side and soon I was having a nice chat with Scotty, W7SW. It was a pleasure to have a real conversation not just the normal exchange of signal reports. We ended up have a long chat, I will look out for Scotty on the bands again!

The FT-817, what a great little radio!

After the nice CW contact the DX bands were quiet. I moved to 40m to look for any local activity. I heard my old friend Ed, ZS6UT and we also had a great chat about equipment and antennas, again a great change from the usual hectic contesting or DX'ing I am used to. I will spend more time "rag-chewing" in the future. There are many technical discussions going on the bands that I find interesting. There are also the guys sitting for hours taking but not saying much of value, think I will skip those nets.....

I tried to go and fetch the 70cm amp today but I ended up working later than usual and then I could not get hold of the person I have to collect it from, will try again tomorrow.

A nice surprise awaited me when I checked on my QSL cards on eQSL.net this morning, DXCC entity 100 confirmed, this is for contacts since I returned to amateur radio on 25 May this year, all contacts were on CW and running QRP power. Now the challenge is to get to 300+ DXCC entities running only QRP, that won't be easy!

I need to sort out my LOTW accreditation, it seems to be taking long.....

Update 29/06/2014: Today was a quiet day with no great openings that I am aware of. 20m produced a few CW stations in the morning, it was HF field day in the USA so lots of activity but mostly weak signals. The only exception was the ever present W1AW/9, I wonder how much power they are running?

Later in the day, early afternoon, I worked quite a few more stations, mostly from the USA and a lone BD8 calling CQ DX. It was not easy to work the USA stations, even with high power. I am not sure if it was due to lots of strong local signals on their side or maybe lower performance "field station" antennas? Either way, only managed to work 90 running QRP, high power, up to 400w, produced around 70 more.

Just before sunset conditions started improving, and then something unusual happened. We had a thunderstorm in winter! By the time I decided to unplug my antennas they were sparking nicely, really high static!

I did spend more time with the IC-756Pro3 and I like it, I now need to move it to the normal operating position as I eventually ended up using the FT-990 today, the only reason was that the 756 was sitting high on the radio stack and it turned out being tiring to operate lifting my arm to tune all the time! The first thing I noticed when moving back to the 990 was how great it sounded, but that the DSP noise (in this case static) cancelling on the 756 worked better, and that it has no band-scope!

Update 28/06/2014: Today one more radio was added to the shack. I collected the Icom IC-756ProIII this morning. A quick check of features and operations showed that it is working well. After a bit of a wash I moved it into the temporary working position to check performance and accessory compatibility.

Here it is in the workbench stack.

The new radio.

All seems to be well, it is working correctly with my CW key and it keys the T1000 amplifier without any problems.

When I get time I will run a few comparisons between the 2 versions of the IC-756 and report it here. I will also compare them with some of the other radios in the shack.
Here is the current version of the ever changing shack.

Workbench testing shack.

A sick aunt will prevent me from doing much DX'ing today, need to go visit her in hospital. So far not a single contact in the logbook for the day. Maybe tonight will produce some activity.

Update 18:00: Family duty done and back into the shack (the aunt is doing well). Heard some CW activity on 21MHz but soon realized that the 3 CW filters on the new radio are all far too narrow, I actually prefer a wider filter for CW as I prefer hearing what is going on around the station I am working, that way I can identify other stations around, helps in a split pile-up and for picking the next station to work in a "search and pounce" situation.

I actually had to read the manual (does not happen often!!) but soon I figured out how to setup the filters the way I prefer them, firstly with less sharp edges and secondly wider, I am now running 3.0kc. 2kc and 1kc filters in CW. If I need a narrower filter it is as easy as twisting a knob, I am starting to like this radio!

After playing around I managed to work a few stations on a fading band, also heard and worked W1AW/3 on 14MHz, he had a HUGE signal.

Update 27/06/2014: Everything is set to collect the IC-756ProIII tomorrow morning, looking forward to the 300km drive, the new car needs to go for a leg-stretch as well!

I managed to move the T1000 amplifier into the shack and got it connected, it seems to be working well. I have noticed that all my radios and amplifiers seem to be outputting only 50% power starting with the IC-728. Since I only have one external power meter it is now really suspect! Maybe there is nothing wrong with the IC-728? Now to find a local power meter, we no longer have real amateur radio dealers in this banana republic......

Think it is time to go and watch TV and only play with my toys again in the morning, hopefully propagation will be good, the sunspot numbers are climbing.

Update 26/06/2014: Again a busy day but better than yesterday. After listening around the bands I decided to check my T1000 amplifier and prepare it for use. I decided to connect PTT and ALC cables internally to the controller rather than the 12 pin external plug, I plug I could never find and I was not happy with my previous temporary arrangement. I must say I forgot how heavy the amplifier is, around 40kg, everything is super heavy duty including the internal 120A 28V power supply!

This amplifier is a thing of beauty, I normally prefer tube amplifiers but this one is special. It can run any mode full power with 100% duty cycle for as long as you want.

Here she is with the top cover removed

I cleaned the inside and made sure everything is ok, the insides look like new. A quick test showed that the PTT and ALC connectors are working. Now I need to make space for her in the shack, not yet sure where to put her due to her weight and size.

Band-pass filters.

I have not connected the auto band switching yet, might do it sometime but it is easy enough to push the correct button on the front panel.

Huge transformer on the left, look at those capacitors!

I have now made arrangements to collect the Icom IC-756 Pro III early Saturday morning, looking forward to having a new toy in the shack. Lets hope the bands are open this weekend, I feel like some CW DX'ing. I also want to start assembling my HF Yagi, need to get it up in the air soon before the DX season starts.

Update 25/06/2014: Only had a little time for amateur radio today. I did get time to print a few manuals and put them in a file. The HF bands were really quiet, I heard W1AW/9 but he was too busy with USA and Japanese stations, funny how W1AW can generate such a large pile-up, I did not really try hard as it seemed kind of pointless.....

I have now started setting up the contest part of the station, I installed 2 x 60A power supplies and an antenna switch. For now I only have an IC-756 and TS-870 in this position. I want to connect a large LCD screen sitting above the radios to the laptop and connect a keyboard then I can close the laptop and have space for more equipment. Here is the TS-870 listening to a local net.

Kenwood TS-870, still one of the best sounding radios out there!

At the moment it looks like I will be fetching the new Icom IC-756 Pro III (made the deal this morning!) Saturday morning. It is about a hour's drive away so I don't really have time for that during the week. I have decided that I will connect it to the TW-1000 solid state amplifier for now as that only needs 3.6V and 3ma to key.  The silly relay Icom uses in their radios should be able to handle that......  I might use this combo in CQ WW if conditions are bad, else it will be a QRP entry running 2 radios at 4W. Before that time I need to get a Yagi up for the higher bands, will use the G5RV for 40 and 80m.

I did not really plan to acquire an IC756 PRO III but the radio is available and the price is right, if I don't like it I can sell it or stick it in the museum.

I also still need to go and fetch the 70cm amplifier as well, maybe on Friday else Saturday as well.

Update 24/06/2014: So far the week has been really hectic at work so I have had little time to play with my radios. I have not even had time to go and pick up my new 70cm amplifier, and I know tomorrow will be just as bad. Hopefully Thursday will be better!

Yesterday the bands were really dead, after the nice openings on 15 and 20m on the weekend it was quite discouraging. It did allow me to do some more work on the station. I am making more space and re-setting up the primary contest station. I want to only have the few radios in the position that will be used and not lots of equipment. The equipment will be rotated from the other operating position depending on the contest requirements. For now I will set it up with the 2 IC-756's and maybe linear amplifiers. I still need to decide what power class to run in the CQ WW contests later in the year. I would prefer to run QRP but if the bands remain as bad as they are that could be a really frustrating exercise! Time will tell.

Today I also had little time but the bands, at least 20m, did sound a bit better. I managed a few DX CW contacts on 20m before it closed just after sundown. I also worked on the shack, I sorted out another power supply and made new cables for my CW paddle. I also added a switch that will allow me to change the antenna feed from one radio to the next as I want to do more receiver performance tests.

Update 22/06/2014: After having so much fun yesterday I was up early this morning looking for some more CW fun. Listening around the bands at 04:30 I could only hear a few faint signals on 20m, I managed to work on, a USA station but I realized QRP was not going to produce much here.

I then listened out for the group on 144.300 SSB, I could hear 8 stations well so between trying to work some DX on HF I reported into the net and took a few rounds. Today I was only running 100W from the IC-746, no amplifier connected but my signal seemed to be fine and everyone could hear me.

After listening to the normal Sunday morning national and club bulletins I decided since I was having so much fun on CW I should upgraded the radio I am using to something with a better receiver. I chose one of my 2 IC-756's and set it up in my current favorite operating condition. As I am also planning on running a bit more power for 80 and 40m DX work I connected the Heathkit HL-2200 amplifier as well.

The old but gold IC-756, still has a better receiver than many more modern models.


The stack after the IC-756 was re-commissioned, it did not last long.....


One of the reasons I like the IC-756 on CW, the 500Hz CW filter.

The first few tests on different bands went well, but after tuning up the amplifier and working  few stations running QRO suddenly the amplifier would not un-key. Closer examination shower that the relay in the IC-756 was stuck.... Not good, the relay is rated at 16V and 2A, My modified HL-2200 needs 12V and 500ma so it should be fine!!

The cause of the problem, the red object is the silly TR relay!

I sometimes wonder about Icom... When you use a solid state amplifier with an Icom radio you often have a problem due to the famous AGC "spike" when you key the radio. I have measured a 120W spike on key with the radio set to 5w. This will at best cause the solid state to go into protect mode or at worst destroy the finals in the amplifier. When you connect a tube amplifier the key relay in the radio is not really rated high enough to key the amplifier. Shame in you Icom!

I will fix the relay in the 756, and replace it with a decent relay like the ones used in Yaesu equipment.

Being upset with Icom after this little episode I moved the 756 to the workbench and replaced it with my trusty old Yaesu FT-990AC, a real workhorse, and it has a relay that will switch 220V AC!

The FT-990AC, I love this solid performer, and it keys the HL-2200 without problems!


The ever evolving radio stack.....

After messing around with radios the whole morning I decided to spend some time working a few stations in the All Asia CW contest in the afternoon. Then I had an interruption again, we had a car stolen in the area and the community policing forum were asked to help, I ended up spending 2 hours driving around looking for the suspects, we found the car but not the perpetrators....

Back in the shack I switched on and the first station I heard was W1AW/7 that came back to my first call! This was followed by a string of JA and other Asian stations, first on 15m and then later on 20m. Great fun!

I had forgotten what a great CW radio the FT-990 is, it is a real pleasure to use after doing most of my recent CW DX'ing using the (horrible for CW) Icom IC-728. The FT-990 has a great selective RX and I have extra 500 and 250hz CW filters installed.

When the bands finally died I looked around and heard some musical broadcast on 80m AM, I just had to call in and get a signal report. Running 10W AM from the FT-990 into the HL-2200 amplifier gave me a solid 100W AM. I managed to get good reports so I am happy.

In another late evening development (this seems to be becoming a habit) I secured a Fisher FE-40 linear amplifier for 430-440MHz. It is a really well made unit running a 4CX250B producing 300W output when fed with 5-10W, finally I will have a better signal on 70cm! I am hoping to fetch the unit sometime this week, I hope it is not too difficult to get it running, I am feeling guilty because the Henry 6N2 is still not in service....

 Update 21/06/2014: The shortest day and longest night for us down south!

I had a listen early in the morning on 160m as there is a local contest on the go. I did hear 3 relatively local stations but only one heard me, looks like they have a lot of noise. I was only running the IC-728 into the G5RV, the SWR seems to be fine. Something I did notice was that the IC-728 is only outputting 50W at full power, since I have never really used full power on it, mostly running QRP CW or up to 25W for local SSB I don't know it has always been like this. I do have the service manual so when I get time I will have a look at it.

While in the shack I also listened to the local 2m SSB net, I heard 10 stations, most of them ok copy but I again did not report in. I think the main reason why I have not reported in recently is because when there are many stations it is difficult to hear everyone plus you can often get left out and not called in for an hour or so, it has happened to me....... I think the way the net is run needs to be looked at with maybe a more official "round robin" approach. I know some other local stations have given up on the net for the same reason. I know it is difficult and I am not blaming the "net controller"!!

I went to my friend to have a look at the Yaesu FT-200 he had from a SK estate. It turns out that it is the later black model complete with an external VFO. It seemed to be in a good condition so a deal was made. Now I have two FT-200's in the collection, one silver and one black.

When I got it home and gave it a quick clean and check before firing it up. All seems to be well and the receiver is working. I have not tried the transmitter yet as I want to run it for a few hours to reform the capacitors and re-condition the tubes. Here she is.

FT-200 Station


FT-200 inside, all seems to be well.

While looking at the FT-200 I spotted a radio I have never seen, it is a FDK Multi-2000. It turned out to be a 2m all mode set, and quite a few years old. Soon a deal was made and now she resides in my collection. I have not tried using her yet. It seems, from a front panel label, that she is wired for 115V, will need to sort that out!

A quick search on the internet secured the manual, I can now see that the Multi-2000 can be run from AC or 13.8V DC. I will make up a cable and give the DC option a try soon.

 
FDK Multi-2000 2m all mode set


Inside the FDK Multi-2000

Late afternoon I moved the IC-728 to the workbench to check out why it is only outputting 50W. Since it was in use as my "rag chew" radio I decided to put another radio in the same position till later. I gave my trusty old Yaesu FT-850 (Japanese version of the FT-890) a wash and a test. Once it was connected I looked around the bands and found some CW signals on 20m, sounded like a contest with signal reports and zones.

I connected a key and soon I was having great fun running 5W into the G5RV. Eventually the band closed down but by then I had more than 100 contacts in the log most from Japan, the far east and eastern Europe. Great fun and running 5W makes it even better. I am feeling a lot more comfortable running high speed CW, I am really looking forward to a full CW contest in our spring or summer with good propagation.

FT-850 in action having some CW fun

Update 20/06/2014: Friday at last!

I listened around the bands this afternoon. Other than a few Japanese stations on 20m rag-chewing it was rather quiet. I did spend some time listening to some locals on 7.085MHZ, they seem to be there most afternoons and often discuss interesting technical subjects. Maybe I will talk to them sometime.....

Tomorrow I am going to look at a few old radios for the museum. I am not sure what to expect, I know there are at least 2 old Yaesu FT-200's, one complete with external VFO. I already have a FT-200 but without an external VFO and not working very well at the moment. I will see what will be added to the collection.

I spent some time in the shack this afternoon and evening cleaning up radios, making patch cables and in general trying to get things more organized. I think my problem is that I have too many radios in the shack competing for a place in the main operating position, I need to "retire" a few to the museum or the backup shelf. Here are a few that need to be moved....

My old trusty Icom IC-706MKII.

It has served my well over the year for mobile, field, SOTA and mm operations. These days it is mostly replaced by the Yaesu FT-817, FT-857 or FT-897 depending on the task. I also have the AT-180 auto tuner for it.

The Yaesu  FT-850 top and Yaesu FT-897 bottom.

I acquired the FT-850 in 1998 complete with a full set of CW filters. It is a wonderful compact radio with a great RX. I have used it extensively in many setups, I am sure it is the radio that I have made the most contacts with. The only problem I ever had was a bad capacitor in the VFO causing frequency drifting. I managed to find the fault and fix it, only finding out years later it is a common problem.

The FT-897 is now my favorite portable radio with a great receiver even on VHF/UHF. It is fitted with a FC-30 auto tuner.

The trusty Icom IC-746

I still love this radio for general chatting and often use it on 2m SSB/CW as well. The 100W on 2m works well! It might just stay in the main operating position.

Update 19/06/2014: I did not get much time for amateur radio today but I did get around to re-commissioning another of my radios from the past. This time it is the superb Yaesu FT-990AC, a great radio that can still hold it's own today against some of the best. My specimen is equipped with a full set of CW and SSB filters making it even better.

Scanning the bands with the FT-990AC

I also cleaned up the Icom IC-701 and tested it for the museum. I checked the band changing solenoid as well, it is known to cause problems with this model but it seems to be in a great condition.

IC-701 before the wash and check.

While working in the shack I had help today!

"Let me check the SWR while he is tuning the radio", Kazimir

I played with the Yaesu FT-817 today, I am really looking forward to using it on a mini QRP or SOTA activation soon! I need to make up a connector so that I can run it form my multi-rotor LiPo batteries, and then I need to still make a plan with an antenna, cannot decide between a "fan dipole" or an end-fed random wire.

The great little FT-817

 Update 18/06/2014: A quick trip this afternoon secured the few bits and pieces I needed and the Yaesu FT-726R for the collection. I also found another rotator controller so now I have a controller for each rotator just incase I want to put them all up! Here is the FT-726R after I moved her into the shack, she is still dirty and someone stuck a label right on the display, I need to remove the glue....

New addition to the museum, Yaesu FT-726R


The growing stack of radios I am playing with at the moment. In my main operating position it is not easy to play with cables and connectors so till I am happy with a radio it lives in the stack on the workbench.

The bands were quiet today but it does look like life is slowly returning to 15 and 20m, maybe by the weekend there will be some DX to work.

After playing with the new radio I decided it was time to clean and service another of the museum radios, today I chose the Yaesu FT-901DM, a classic workhorse built like a tank. I opened her up, cleaned where I could and checked capacitors where I could.

Here Thandi (ZS6CAT) tells me to sort out this radio next.

All seemed well so I closed her up again, connected power and an antenna and fire her up. No smoke and soon I had her tuned up on 80m. She is putting out 100w+ and everything seems to work. I received good signal and audio reports on one of the 80m evening groups.

Yaesu FT-901DM running again after many years in storage.

Update 17/06/2014: A quick scan around the bands only produced a few local stations, the recent solar storms really did disrupt radio communications! I dug out an old Yaesu FL-2050 2m amplifier. I want to use it with the FT-726R I am hoping to pick up tomorrow. The radio only outputs 10w but the FL-2050 will boost this to 50-80w, more than enough for satellite and local work.

I am picking up the radio from a local ham that also runs a small shop selling connectors and components, I need to remember to get a few bits and pieces while I am there. I also want to ask what else he has, maybe something for my museum collection.

Update 16/06/2014: I spent some time today opening up the Heathkit HL-2200 amplifier to find out why the output had dropped again. It turned out that I was correct, the one tube was dark, the one I did not re-solder last time. A quick check with a multi meter showed an open circuit filament. I carefully re-soldered both pins and the open circuit went away! After putting the tube back all was well again with the power output restored to previous levels!

Back in action, HL-2200 is all lit up

I also opened up the homebrew amplifier today and checked everything, no problems were found and when I applied power she worked perfectly like the day I finished building her. More information on the amplifier work I did today can be found here.

PS: In a late evening deal I acquired a Yaesu FT-726R radio with 2m, 70cm and satellite modules for my "museum" collection. I think I need to start documenting my collection!

Update 15/06/2014: I was in the shack early this morning again. I tuned into the 2m SSB net but ended up not reporting in, it was the same mostly local guys as yesterday and I decided to rather look around the HF bands. It turned out to be a waste of time but hey, that is the way it is. The rest of the morning was filled with bulletins and club reports. Between the bulletins I also managed to work another SOTA summit, MP-007.

Later, after lunch, I had a look at my Heathkit HL-2200 amplifier that intermittently won't key. I turned out to be a faulty standby switch. Since only one side of the switch is used I simply turned it around and now she keys well! A few tests shows she produces almost 500w with a 10w input!

I found some really weak CW signals on 15m and decided to try to work a few running 400w, turns out it was a piece of cake, almost too easy compared to my normal QRP power levels. After working a few stations I noticed that suddenly it became more difficult, a quick look at the output meter showed the output intermittently dropped down a lot. Closer examination showed that only one valve was lit up, AGAIN! This time it was the other valve.... I will check tomorrow but I am quite sure it is the same "self unsoldered" heater element pins as on the other tube. I should have re-soldered both! It is a real pain (in the back!) to remove the amplifier from the bottom of the amplifier stack.

I worked a few more stations late afternoon on CW but just after sunset the bands closed. I wish summer was closer for better conditions! I can feel my CW speed coming back, it is getting to the point, like in the old days, where I can pick out my own or other call signs from a pileup without any problems, my love for CW is back!

Tomorrow is a public holiday, I am hoping to spend at least part of it playing with amateur radio!

Update 14/06/2014: I Started this morning by working a bunch of stations on 2m and 70cm SSB, that was followed by lots of fun working via and tracking a High Altitude balloon carrying a parrot repeater and APRS tracking equipment. I went into the shack just before 6am thinking I will spend an hour or two but I only left the shack after 1pm! More about the Habex balloon fun can be read under the Habex notes.

After the Habex fun I also worked a few SOTA (Summits on the air) stations on HF, most of them running very low power but still managing to make contacts.

After my great VHF/UHF morning, and being too lazy to work on antennas (my excuse was that it is too cold...) I decided to practice my CW a bit. Initially I only heard a few weak signals on 15m, slowly they started picking up till they were workable with low power (I am still loving QRP, running 4w out of the IC-728 according to my Bird watt meter). I quickly realized that there was some kind of contest going on! Soon I was in the swing of things and working stations one after the other, having fun! By the time the band started going down again (and I really wanted a glass of wine) I had around 50 stations in the log. What was way more important was that my CW is really picking up! Both in speed, accuracy and "filter" capabilities on a crowded band. I was using my old "rag-chew on 40" IC-728 that has no CW filters or DSP, time to move the CW paddle to a better CW radio.

What I did find interesting was that even though the bands are not great and signals were low, most hardly moving the needle, I still managed to work all the stations I called, and quite a few on the first call. I was using the G5RV antenna at about 20m so the antenna was not the greatest. QRP does work, and when you combine it with CW you can work the world!

I wonder what tomorrow will bring, today was good..... 

Update #2 12/06/2014: A quick update, finally managed to make a contact on 70cm SSB! Thanks Carl, ZS6CBQ for testing with me on 432.200 MHz! At least I know the antenna works, now I need to move to a higher spot.

Update 12/06/2014: After the last few hectic days I had some time for amateur radio today. Initially I was planning to finish the work on the 6m yagi but when I got home I decided to have a quick listen across the HF bands. It was pretty quiet, just some local chatting going on 40m. What I did hear was some really weak CW signals at the bottom end of the 15m band. My CW is really rusty after 11 years of no CW but I was fascinated and spent a few hours just listening around trying to pick out a few call signs. Slowly it was coming back..... I also wasted time looking for my CW paddle, and then having to make a cable for it, I have no idea where the original cable is. Anyway, then I spent time practicing sending again till I felt I was ok to do a basic contact.

So there I was all connected up and ready to try a CW QRP contact only to find out that the band was just about closed, but I was not giving up! After a few tries I managed to work 3 stations before the band really closed, two 4Z stations and a LZ. Nothing special about these 3 contacts but I am really happy, I know my CW will be back up to speed soon, I was scared it was all gone! Managed 25-30wpm and I know I will soon read faster than that again. Sending will need some practice but that is fun. Long live CW!   

Update 11/06/2014: Hectic day! Hoping to have a 70cm contact tonight, will be testing with Carl, ZS6CBQ a bit later. Will be using the FT-847 tonight running in un-linked satellite mode so that I can monitor 2m and 70cm at the same time. We will be using 3.725MHz as a backup and coordinating frequency. 20:00 update: Does not look like the contact is going to happen, power failure on Carl's side and also a short one on this side, welcome to dark Africa.....

The FT-847 in action, waiting waiting....

Update 10/06/2014: I did not get time today to work on my antennas, and I know I won't get time to do anything tomorrow either, well, that is the way things are..... I did get a bit of time to clean the Henry Tempo 6N2 amplifier, it is now looking new again! I was hoping to connect it up today but after studying the manual it seems to be not that simple! The amplifier does not have an internal antenna switch over relay so you have to add an external relay to switch the antenna over AND switch the tube bias, wonder why they did not add an internal relay? Anyway, I have a few relays but need to make sure I have one that can handle 1kw of VHF RF! So it will take a while to get it going.....

I have still not made a 70cm SSB contact, there seems to be no activity on the 70cm band around here, not even on FM or the few repeaters, quite sad. Well, hopefully the early morning session on the weekend will produce some results.

Considering the low local activity on the VHF/UHF bands I am considering working a few satellites, and maybe even have a look at EME but for that I would need to upgrade my antennas and find an elevation rotator.

I can also feel a QRP expedition coming up, I feel like combining a hike and a camp in the bush with a bit of QRP operating, but I suppose I need to wait a bit for spring, the nights can get cold this time of the year.

Update 09/06/2014: Again had a great early morning session on 2m SSB, this morning we had 15 stations reporting in. We also had a great technical discussion. Today I could hear and work everyone. I managed to do some work on my VHF antennas today. The 70cm antenna is almost ready, I just need to redo the matching balun and replace the feed line then it is ready to go up the mast. The 6m antenna is posing more of a challenge, there are problems with the joiners on the driven elements, it has 4 driven elements, but I am fixing that and replacing all the elements. Hoping to finish it in time for next weekend, it is a long weekend and I would love to try a few longer distance 6m  contacts.

This afternoon we had a local "sprint" contest on HF, only one hour long. The idea was to contact as many division 4 stations as possible. It was fun, I did not compete seriously but just looked for call signs I have not worked before. Overall an very active amateur radio day, having fun!!

I used the TL-922 amplifier quite a bit today and it is working very well, It produces lots of clean power with low drive and low noise, I am glad I added it to the equipment list.

08/06/2014: Had a great early morning (6am) session on 2m SSB. Eventually worked 12 stations on 144.300 USB, mostly ZS6 stations but also a few ZS4 stations. It looks like my antenna is working, just need to put it a bit higher sometime. I used the Icom IC-746 running 100w most of the time but did use the TE 1452G for a while, limiting output to 250w (about 12w drive) because that is the highest my VHF watt meter can read.

Having fun on the 2m SSB early morning weekend net.

I manage to find tubing this morning to fix my 6m yagi. Unfortunately work was interrupted by an unplanned family visit. Hopefully I will get time tomorrow!

Looking around the HF bands in the afternoon produced a few interesting stations like TJ3AY (Cameroon) on 21Mhz and 7Q7GIA (Malawi) on 14Mhz. The bands sounded quite dead but still had a few strong signals. I managed to work both stations on the first call on the G5RV.

07/06/2014: A huge effort this afternoon resulted in me fixing my 2m, 12 element on a 6.5m boom yagi, I also managed to put it up about 15m high on a rotator. I was a bit worried that the antenna might be way off tune after replacing elements and working on the matching section. Well, there was no need to worry, she still resonates with a very low SWR right in the SSB/CW portion of the band. We have a South African net on 144.300 Saturday and Sunday mornings so I really tried hard to join this weekend, looks like I will be there!

I have not connected an amplifier yet but might connect the TE Systems 1452G to boost my signal if needed.

The plan is to also put up my 70cm yagi this weekend, and hopefully fix the 6m yagi, it is going to be a busy weekend but I am having fun! Something else I need to do is setup some weak signal software and connect the radio to a computer, I need to do some research first as I have lost touch with what is popular at the moment.

06/06/2014: I did not get much time to work on my station today but I did find all my coax feed lines, rotator cable and I did get a rotator working! While going through old antennas in storage I found a 18 element 70cm yagi in perfect condition. So now I only need to fix 2 elements on the 2m yagi and replace the elements on the 6m yagi. I am still planning on putting up at least the 2m yagi, and now the 70cm yagi by the weekend. The 6m yagi might take longer as I have not sourced tubing for the elements, maybe over the weekend.

I have also started sorting out the TH7DX antenna for HF but I will need to move the mast I am using for the G5RV to get the TH7DX up in the air.

Hopefully I can get the Henry 6N2 running this weekend as well, if not I will run the TE Systems 1452G on 2m for now as I want to join the net on 144.300 Saturday and maybe Sunday morning if the weather is still bad (a huge cold front is on the way) that will keep my from going flying Sunday morning.

Band conditions seem to be quite bad at the moment, for DX at least with only weak signals when the bands are open, I am hoping this will get better soon....

05/06/2014: I managed to do some more work in the shack today, connecting up all the radios and amps in my normal "Contest configuration" allowing Single Operator, multi radio contesting. In this configuration I normally run 3 radios at the same time with 2 radios on the most productive bands and the third radio moving around the other bands looking for openings and multipliers.

I also practiced some CW, my speed is still way down but call signs are starting to pop out of the pile-ups I found today. Conditions seem to be reasonable on 15m, I heard 5R8UI working a pile-up and he came back to me on my first call.

Tomorrow I want to go and find rotator cable, U clamps and some tubing to fix my 2m and 6m antennas, hoping to join some of the local VHF operators on the weekend!

04/06/2014: Fortunately I managed to make time today to go and fetch the new amplifiers, once I had them home I started by stripping the Kenwood TL-922 and cleaning it. After the cleanup, it was really dusty, I could see that it is in a great condition. I left it running for about 2 hours in stand-by before applying 5W of power to it. I am happy to report that all is well and it is producing lots of clean power! Good news! Now I need to tackle the Henry 6N2. That will be a bit more complicated as the previous owner added a rather complicated automatic antenna switch with 4 outputs to the back, and I have no documentation on the mod. I think for now I will simply bypass the mod..

Added in the deal I also received 2 old radios for my collection, a Yaesu FT-221R (2m all mode) and a Yaesu FT-620B (6m all mode). The FT-221R is working well but the FT-620B has no output. Will have a look t it when I get time. These 2 radios came as a nice added bonus!

I also managed to have a look at my Heathkit HL-2200 that suddenly stopped keying. It looks like the problem is simply a faulty standby switch! Now I need to find a replacement.....

03/06/2014: I managed to do some work on my station today. Firstly I "recovered" my 15 element 2m yagi from storage, unfortunately it suffered some damage, but not too bad, the front 2 elements are broken, will be easy to fix. I also retrieved my rotators from storage, I remember having 2 rotators, forgot that I also had 2 spares so now I have 4 to choose from. What I cannot find is the rotator cable but that is easy to replace. I also need some more RG 213 feed-line, only one unused piece left, sure I had more....

I really need to get my 2m and 6m antennas up, looking forward to some weak signal work! I also know there is a local weak signal net on 144.300 SSB running, would like to join soon and say hello to some old friends.

I also re-arranged the shack a bit to make more space. First additional item to be moved into the shack was the Heathkit HL 2200 amplifier. I connected it up, tuned it and made a few contacts. I had headphones on as signals were weak Worked TM5FI on IOTA EU-095) when I noticed the output power on the external meter was suddenly well down. After removing the headphones I realized the amplifier is no longer keying. A change of cable, and then radio, proved that it was the amplifier. So, I had to remove it again and back to the workbench. I suppose it is the relay or maybe the 12v driving it. There seems to be no voltage on the key-jack. Never a dull moment in amateur radio! I am not sure when I will get time to look at it, maybe the weekend. For now the Yaesu FL-2100Z is back in service.

I am hoping to fetch my new Kenwood TL-922 and Henry 6N2 amplifiers tomorrow, hope I can get the time.....

02/06/2014: My new G5RV is really working well, on 40 and 80m noise has been reduced by at least 4-5 S points and signals are mostly 2 S points stronger. I am starting to think there is something wrong with my dipoles! Maybe feed line (common) problems? The new antenna bagged me 2 new band-mode-countries on 21Mhz PSK31, Uruguay and Mauritius as well as Lesotho on 40m SSB (Don't know how I missed that one in the past!) in it's first day of use, looks promising....

On a different note, I made a deal today to acquire 2 new amplifiers. A Kenwood TL-922 for HF and a Henry Tempo 6N2 for 2 and 6m. I have always wanted a TL-922, they are so well made and will supplement my Kenwood collection nicely. The 6N2 is an interesting amplifier. It uses 2 x 3CX400A7 (8874) tubes, operating in push-pull mode for 2m and parallel for 6m. The amplifier is capable of 1kw output (I will only use 400w to stay legal) so it should add some punch to my signal on 2 and 6m. It has independent controls for the 2 bands and you can have 2 radios and 2 antennas connected at the same time.

I will be fetching the amplifiers during the next few days, need to make space in the shack for the new toys!

31/05/2014: I had some fun today with a parrot repeater carrying balloon! It was operating on 437.900Mhz and reached a maximum altitude of 36000m. Even with a handheld radio and a rubber duck antenna I could get into the repeater from more than 100km away! There was not much activity on the repeater, I think the launch was not well advertised, but I did make a few good contacts. Another launch will take place in early June.

30/05/2014: In the quest for better contacts on 80m, always a bad band for me, I managed to find time today to install a full size G5RV antenna. It is up at 20m with the ends at around 15m. First tests seem to indicate that is working really well, not only on 80m but also on 40m. Signals are up to 2 S points stronger and the noise is quite a bit down compared to the dipoles I used before. The 450ohm ladder line feed seems to make quite a difference!

26/05/2014: It is about time I update this bit of the page! I have been active on and off since the last entry in 2009 but have not updated the page at all!

Over the last few months I have been revamping my antennas and re-setting up my shack. I have also been more active on the bands. My main yagi antennas are still down so I am only using dipole antennas at the moment but still working DX and having fun.

My CW is VERY rusty but it is slowly coming back. My main interests are still CW and QRP operation with some digital modes for fun along the way.

I have also decided to start a radio collection, initially looking at radios from around 1970 to 1990, I already have quite a few radios of that vintage but have recently added an Icom IC-701 and IC-728, both in great condition. Now I am looking for more radios from my youth that I could maybe not afford back then.

Look out for me on the bands, mostly 15m at the moment.

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2/1/2009-25/05/2014: The silent years.........
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1/1/2009: Lets hope 2009 brings good conditions and lots of DX !!

31/12/2008: I now have resonant dipoles on 20 and 40m along with a long wire running. I am also working on getting my mast ready to accept the TH7DX. Once that is up I will add 2 and 6m yagis and then the big job starts with the mono-banders. Conditions are still very poor on HF but things should improve.

30/12/2008: With only a (non resonant) dipole for 40m I have managed to work 2 new DX entities on 40m with only 100W. Now I need to start on the antenna farm!

28/12/2008: With some bad weather limiting my flying I have managed to get my station going again, even if it still needs a lot of antenna work. I am only using dipoles at the moment but I did manage to net a new one on 40m ! Now the Yagi's must go up, first a TH7DX and then monobanders as needed. I also want to put up a large 6m yagi and one for 2m as well. Initially I am planning on concentrating on the digital modes and CW, I need to get my CW speed up again to where it was ! The long absence from the bands have made me hungry again for DX and maybe even contesting again.

23/12/2008: It looks like the sunspot cycle is finally starting to pick up so I decided it is time to get my station sorted out again. I first checked all my equipment, everything is still working ! I have decided to first use the equipment I have since some of it is still brand new, even if not the latest and greatest, if I find a shortcoming I can always upgrade as needed.

16/09/2007: Things have been quiet on the Radio Amateur side, I am looking forward to the sunspot number picking up in the near future and will step up operations once conditions are better. I am also planning some /am (aeronautical mobile) operation in the near future with a few flights planned into the bush including a visit to Namibia. I will be issuing a special QSL card for the /am contacts.

10/06/2006: Some of my new equipment has arrived, the FT-817D, FT-857D and FT-897D with FC-30 is now unpacked and running. These radios are amazing value for money and great fun to use. Once I have used them a bit I will write reports. I have noticed that on 2 and 6m the RX on the FT-897D is quite a bit better/more sensitive than the IC-746!

21/05/2006: In spite of the bad propagation conditions I am getting more active on the bands. I have ordered some new equipment so there will be new "toys" to play with soon!

23/03/2005: Well, a year after my last entry I am back ! A new business and career has kept me busy over the last 12 months but things are getting better now so I will have time for amateur radio again! I am looking forward to talking to all my old friends again!

21/03/2004: I have had great news, the results from the 2003 WPX SSB contest has been released and I have won the QRP section! I knew that I had a good score but I never thought that it was THAT great! Now I am really inspired to do even better in the future...

18/02/2004: I have not been active in amateur radio for a while due to work pressure and a move that meant that I have to rebuild my antenna farm. The move was needed because of ill health on my fathers side. Things are looking up now so I am hoping to be on the air more in the near future.

23/07/2003: I am looking at a new antenna for 40m, this is mostly aimed at DX'ing and at the 2003 CQWW SSB and CW contests. I am planning on trying my best for these contests running a high power station for a change to try and give the "big boys" a go! I have not decided on the design of the antenna yet as I am still doing research but I will publish my findings here on the web. 

18/07/2003: The results of a local contest, the HAMNET 40m simulated emergency contest, was published and ZS6DX/p, consisting of myself and Katti - ZS6KVR, took top honors, for the second year running in the multi operator field station category.

11/07/2003: Things have been very quiet on the radio front, I have not had much time to spend on the air but DXCC entity 300 finally appeared in the log !. Conditions on HF have not been to great but seems to be getting better now with summer approaching. We have a few local contests coming up in August so I am hoping to have some fun.

28/05/2003: Well, the WPX contest is now history. I must admit that I had to work really hard for my contacts this time but it was still fun! It took me a few days to recover from the contest as it left me rather tired, the fact that I had a light flu did not exactly help! I was very happy that again my station proved to be reliable without any technical problems. When I started contesting a few years ago I always seemed to have problems with equipment during a contest.  As far as future contests go I am starting to think about participating in the IARU HF World Championships, it should be fun! I have also redone a few things on the this web-page. The fancy JAVA buttons that I used proved to be to slow to download and did not work correctly on all browsers so it is back to the old, boring, text buttons!

22/05/2003: I have just started a revamp of this site, I got tired of the old look! This is a "work in progress" as I am still playing with different looks so don't be surprised if it looks totally different the next time you visit. There are only 2 days left before the CQ WW WPX CW contest. I have already noticed lots of rare activity on the bands so it looks like lots of stations have been set up in semi rare places. This always makes for an exiting contest! Even just working a few stations casually before the contest while checking every thing in the shack produced contacts with stations like 4W3DX, P40Q and a few other unusual ones. I will be happy with 1 new DXCC entity for the contest to get my total to 300! I have still not decided on final strategy like power level and bands to be worked. I will probably only make that decision a few hours before the contest based on conditions. My current choice is low power all band but I might change to high power if conditions are poor. The last few night the lower band have been in great shape with very little static (only S5 and not the normal S9 +20db !) so I am also hoping for some good contacts there to add to my band totals. My station will be setup for SO2R (Single Operator 2 Radio) but even the choice of radios has not been made. I will be doing the final configuration tonight and I will then make the choice. It might be the 2 x IC-756's or I might use one of them for the higher bands and the FT-1000MP or TS-870S for the lower bands. I must still regain trust in the FT-1000MP on CW after a recent problem with the side-tone that is now fixed!

20/05/2003: It looks like 6m have now finally closed for the season. I still listen whenever I am in the shack but I have not heard anything the last few weeks. The next season starts in September but with the solar cycle winding down it might not be all that spectacular with probably only a few weak openings into Southern Europe. I am considering taking my 6m beam down from the tower after the PEARS digital contest in June. I believe I can make better use of the space on the tower with a beam for 12/17/30m or even a small 40m beam over the next few years. I am still thinking about my level of participation in our upcoming VHF/UHF digital contest. I will be on the air making a few contacts but I must admit the right now I find digital operation rather boring. I believe it takes very little technique or skill as the computer does all the work. The person with the best location/biggest amplifier is sure to win this contest even if he/she is not such a great operator !, maybe I am wrong, I will give the contest a try before I make a final decision on the digital modes. I believe they are useful to allow you to make contacts that you would not normally be able to make but I find that after a contact like that I feel rather empty and not exactly exited or proud of my accomplishment. Not like making the same contact on SSB or CW would have felt! I suppose different strokes for different folks :-) 

18/05/2003: Just had an interesting weekend with the bands in good condition and a bit of time to work them. Saturday brought a few new band-countries including a new one on 40m and a new one on 30m but Sunday was really great with an all-time new on  15m CW. 4W3DX was bagged after quite a few calls. He was working 3khz up but he never announced that. It was relative early in the morning so the band was not really open. Because of that I could not hear the pile-up for the first 30 minutes or so. I had NO idea where the guy was listening till the conditions improved and I could hear a weak pile-up, then it did not take long! I spend some time over the weekend doing some maintenance on antennas and equipment in preparation of the CQ WW WPX CW contest next weekend. I hope conditions will be as good as they were this weekend! See you in the contest.

14/05/2003: I have finally raised my dipole antennas up to about 22m, only to have a storm the next night that broke one of them !, at least it is done as the next major contest, CQ WPX CW is getting close....

09/05/2003: I have started preparation for the CQ WW WPX CW contest, I will be raising my 40 and 80m antennas by about 5m and giving the yagis and rotators a service over the next few days. I have not decided what category I will be entering as that depends on the conditions but at the moment it looks like it might be a single band high power entry.

07/05/2003: Conditions on HF have not been that great the last few days, the bands are quiet even when there are openings, the few stations I hear are loud. I am not sure why this is, maybe everyone in the northern hemisphere is enjoying spring !. I hope conditions are going to be better for CQ WW WPX CW!

05/05/2003: It looks like the best part of our 6m season is over now, I have not heard any signals for the last few days. I have acquired a new radio, a Yaesu FT-990 will all the filters as a backup contest radio along with a Yaesu FL-7000 solid state amplifier that will also be used for contesting. It runs our legal limit, 400W, all day without getting hot.

29/04/2003: We had 2 more big openings on 6m over the last few days, the openings were so good that it was actually bad !. The pile-ups were unruly with operators not listening. Many operators insist on not giving a complete call, THEY WILL NEVER GET INTO MY LOG!!, some stations, after a call or 2, if they did not get a reply, would start calling CQ right on the pile-up! I ended up going QRT twice in the middle of the openings because of this. I have also added a few new calls to my black list, the guys who will never get into my log.... The best thing to do when it gets like that is to go QRT or hunt for some new ones but not call CQ. I have also found that if  I wait for the conditions to deteriorate I can then make a few good contacts on CW. Shame on all those bad operators, you spoil it for everyone!

25/04/2003: We are having almost daily openings on 6m into Europe, I am working mostly CW and every time I give a CQ call I end up with a small pile-up. Many stations don't even move the S meter but copy is 100%. There are always a few stations that are 599+, they must have great stations !. I am now mostly collecting grid squares and things like Italian provinces on 6m. On HF, even with the solar cycle supposedly winding down, there are great openings , even on 10m I can still work good DX till quite late in the evening.

23/04/2003: Easter weekend provided 2 6m openings, Thursday evening we had a small opening into the Mediterranean and western Europe but on Friday we had a major opening into Europe, I had a nice pile-up going with many new calls appearing in the log. stations were worked from I, 4X, F, G, YT, SM, OM and PA. I also heard a SU station and a few other weak stations. Saturday I also had lots of fun working stations in the Holy land contest.

16/04/2003: We had a short opening into Europe on 6m last night from about 1330 UTC. Signals were strong but it did not last long, at one point the TV carrier on 48.250MHz was up to a S9.

14/04/2003: I have now, finally installed my new 6m antenna. My old homebrew log-yagi has been slowly falling apart over the last few years, it got so bad that I did not even bother to put it up at the new QTH. When the chance came along to acquire a 6 element yagi on a 8m boom, a Hy-Gain model 343 I could not resist. Within minutes of the antenna going up we had a short opening into Europe and I could not believe how well the antenna works. This antenna with combined with the FT-847 with its hot receiver and the converted SB200 should help me to put out a good signal on 6 in the future. Hope to work you all soon!

13/04/2003: We, my YL Katti and myself competed in the low key Hamnet simulated emergency 40m contest today, running a multi operator portable station. Conditions were not to great with lots of noise on 40m but we still had fun. We used our normal field station mast with inverted V dipole, driven by a FT-890 at 25w running on a 102Ah battery, enough power for the 2 hour contest. The totals were not great but we did exceed our last year's (winning) total by about 30%. This is a contest that Katti really enjoys so she ended up making most of the contacts with me doing the logging. Apart from all the normal ZS stations we also had 2 7P8 stations and a lonely A22 station.

03/04/2003: Tonight I spend a hour or so giving some points out in a local 80m QSO party, amazing how active the band can become when we have a contest. It was nice to work some old friends and make some new. If I look at my logbook I see that some guys are only worked one a year during one of the local contests. It was good to hear some 3DA stations joining in the fun as well. 

30/03/2003: I have just had the most fun I have had for a long time (on the air!) during the WW WPX DX contest. Running QRP I managed 1094 contacts, many pileups and 2 brand new countries. Not bad for a weekends work during a time of the solar cycle when things are supposed to be quiet! Can't wait for the next DX contest! My DXCC combined total now up to 298.

The beginning.

Hi Everyone! In the past I kept a running commentary or diary on my radio activity but during the time I was sailing it sadly got lost, I have now decided to start doing it again and to keep it here on the web, both to secure it from getting lost again and also making it available for others to read. If you have any comments or questions please feel free to contact me on the email address provided on the front page.

Thanks for reading this!