20 meters was going nuts today.....

[WX2MIG]

Started off this morning with strong north / south propagation with stations from Florida to Mississippi coming in 10 over S-9.
Had to leave the shack for a couple hours, then came back and checked into the OMISS net on 14.290.0 Mhz, by the time my turn came up I could barely hear net control from all the QRM on 14.292.0 & 14.288.5 Mhz all coming in from the Caribbean and South America.....

If I spoke Spanish I could of had a lot of DX contacts......:blink:

The band definitely opened up some today, that's at least a step in the right direction.
Anyone make any good 20m contacts today.....???

 

[bobcat115]

20 Meter contacts

Contacts
dl5ai Germany
es7gm Estonia

 

[M3JZT]

I heard one VK3 at 20 over crazy.

 

[WX2MIG]

I ended up with a good solid contact with EA2VE Antonio in Northern Spain on 14.245.0 Mhz, then hit W5XX who was operating 20m for the Mississippi QSO party on 14.275.1 Mhz, then about a half hour later I got N5UCF (also with the Mississippi QSO party) on 7.225.0 Mhz (40m)....

By the time I made the 20 meter contact with the Miss, QSO Party, the band had faded to the point where I wasn't getting killed by Spanish speaking stations, but they were starting to fade as well. The 40 meter contact was solid as a rock and easy to make.

If I didn't have to spend most of the morning fixing a buddy's gas heater, then part of the early afternoon fixing my daughter's car, I probably would have racked up a few more contacts.
I also heard 10 meters opened up for a while today, but I never ventured up there.....

 

[WX2MIG]

20 meter DX window this morning....

I love it when I'm in the right place at the right time.....

Started off this morning looking for the OMISS net that's supposed to be on 7.185.0, but I couldn't hear a thing. I can only assume there was no net operator for this morning because I was getting plenty of other stations all over the country booming in on other 40 meter frequencies.

Then I switched over to the 20 meter band, and started spinning the dial, passed over a few of the usual morning round table rag chew sessions, hear the U.S.C.G. Amateur Radio Club taking check-in's on 14.325.0, one or two west coast mariners on 14.300.0, then I just happened to catch an "ON4" station calling out "CQDX" on 14.313.0, I called back and made contact with a fellow named Gerard in Belgium, he gave me a 5X9, I gave him a 5X5 report, exchanged names and locations, and he was off to gather more contacts. Turns out he's in some sort of contest over there. Once we 73'ed with each other the pile-up began, I hear 20 stations at once all calling for "ON4AXU".....I just happened to be there for his first CQ call, and jumped in before the rest of the country heard Belgium on the line......

Gotta go to the post office later this morning, so I'll drop a QSL card in the mail for him......

 

[WX2MIG]

add another 20 meter DX contact to the list.....

Had to leave the shack for a while to go pick my daughter up from school early....(she's sick)......

Got home, hit the shack, and lucked into another 20 meter DX contact with LY2ZZ in Lithuania.....

Looks like things are opening up a little today.....

 

[ajm1571]

Hey I got LY2ZZ also today one 20m. Congrats on the contact!

 

[ajm1571]

talked to UR5UC from the Ukraine this morning on 20m. It's alive again!

 

[WX2MIG]

Cool.....

I spent the morning on 40 meters while fabricating a new 20 meter dipole. The one I have up right now was built with marginal quality materials, and I used bungie cord for my end insulators, this recent snow proved that bungie cord does not make for good end insulators. When it was covered in snow I couldn't get it to tune up worth a damn.......
I built the new one with wire I gutted from 10 gauge extension cord, and it has PVC pipe insulators on the ends, I'm also going to shorten the coax running to it since it's too long and I have a coil of it wire tied up outside the shack....

I'll be at work tomorrow and away from the radio, and that sucks since there's going to be contests galore all weekend, hopefully next week I'll pick out a couple more first call DX stations and beat the pile-ups.....

 

[hookedon6]

I love it when I'm in the right place at the right time.....

... I hear 20 stations at once all calling for "ON4AXU".....I just happened to be there for his first CQ call, and jumped in before the rest of the country heard Belgium on the line......

congrats on "opening the band"

like we were discussing in another thread, ..... he was spotted on a dx cluster.
at least the dx hounds waited for you to sign clear

one of the major differences between AR and cb.

 

[WX2MIG]

at least the dx hounds waited for you to sign clear

one of the major differences between AR and cb.

That's not always the case Hookedon6, I've been listening in on the DX hounds trying to get Roberto in Milan, Italy just about every night this week on 40 meters, once the hounds have him spotted they climb all over each other trying to get his attention, and some of them keep calling out over top of the contacts he's working, and a few call out while he's still transmitting.....

I think it was Tuesday night I was in the pile-up trying for him when he stated he only wanted mid-west and west coast stations, I backed off and stopped calling, I can't say the same for a few others....

AR is deffinitely better in those respects, but it's not what I would consider a clean house either.....we still have LID's fouling up the place.....

 

[WX2MIG]

Racked up two more today without even trying......just in the right place at the right time again......

Got ZX2B in Brazil on 21.367.0 Mhz, and that's the first contact I ever made on that band.......and did while testing my new random wire antenna I had just erected......

Then hit another contest station, this time on 20 meters, EE7E...no listing on QRZ, so I Googled the call and got some information that lead me to a HAM in Spain that handles QSL cards for that call, don't know if the contact was actually in Spain or else where, but the card is going to Spain, and I'll log it as such til I learn otherwise......

Then I went fishing, had my HT on me, and listened to a couple of local HAM's trading Information on all the DX contacts they were making through the grey line.....

Then it hit me.....I have two hobbies where the prime time to enjoy both happen at the same time (or position of the sun)....this is going to cause some internal confusion here......

 

[Beetle]

The "EE" prefix would seem to be Spain.

You need to get a list of the international call sign series list - the ARRL logbook usually has the whole thing in either the front or the back pages of each log.

I remember my first Spain QSO: EA7CP.

 

[WX2MIG]

The "EE" prefix would seem to be Spain.

You need to get a list of the international call sign series list - the ARRL logbook usually has the whole thing in either the front or the back pages of each log.

I remember my first Spain QSO: EA7CP.

Thanks Beetle, still being fairly new at thisHF stuff I appreciate any and all advice....

What I have discovered in the few DX contacts I've made during contests is that some of these stations over seas are actually club stations with a special contest call sign, many have been listed on QRZ as such with the call sign of the club member that handles the QSL's for the club....(when they're operating as a club contact during contests)
When I send them a card, I always put whatever call sign I was given during the contact, but sent the card to the adress associated with the call sign listed as QSL manager for that club call.
One of my First was a contest group in the Netherlands, I'm at work right now and don't have my log in front of me, but there was a second one like it in Spain, and this one I hit yesterday in Spain....

BTW....I just got a QSL card from my very first 20 meter DX contact in Slovenia, from the photo on the front, this also has to be a club station as it has two monster size towers with huge log periodic antennas, located on a mountian top with a log cabin shack. Beautiful sight over looking a mountain range......

 

[Beetle]

Back in the '60s through the '80s, and probably still, many then-USSR ham stations had suffixes beginning with the letter "K", like UAØKAA, UD6KAX, UA9KBY, and so forth. That "K" indicated a club station. Most private Soviet citizens could not have any sort of transmitter, and only certain kinds of receivers, on pain of ... well, pain. Those who could have a complete ham station at their homes were probably pretty well located in the Party hierarchy, and generally had 2-letter suffixes.

And for QSLing a club station outside of a contest, it's generally a good thing to indicate the name of the guy you worked. The club will probably sort their incoming cards by the name of the club member.

http://www.arrl.org/awards/dxcc/itucalls.html -- this is that list I mentioned earlier.