NCRG - 2012 so far

Hey there,

Apologies for my absence, sometimes my life overtakes the opportunity to post here, other times Im too tired after a long day, sometimes a long week.

Since my participation in the Pfx contest, I have been busy organising a few more NCRG (North Cork Radio Group) activations.  Our most recent one was at Mizen Head Visitors Centre as part of the Marconi Day celebrations.  Five of the lads from the group made this a weekend of radio, socialising and laughs as they operated EI1NC/P on Friday 20th and Sunday 22nd April, and operated the Marconi station of EI0IMD on Marconi Day - 21st April.

Due to personal restrictions, I was only able to attend for Marconi Day itself, 21st April, but had great fun on the day.  There were 2 stations set up with an array of antennas to choose from, every band was adequately considered, and it was great to be able to get quite a few of our radio friends in the log.  The weather wasnt the best, switching from sunshine to fog in a matter of minutes, and the wind was enough to cause our antenna to become a wind powered rotator HI.  I even had the pleasure of providing our resident journalist with an interview on the YL view of the hobby (a "YL Eye" so to speak).

The drive from my QTH to Mizen is a long one, some 2.5 to 3 hours drive.  By the time I returned home, I was fit for bed, yet still managed a quick scan on the bands to see if I could work some of the other Marconi stations of the day.  I was quite impressed to get the Uruguay station on 15m but a bit dissapointed there werent more of the GB stations listed for the award on the air.  Maybe next time.

So, as previously stated, many more exciting events  coming out of NCRG planning with some new CASHOTA sites, as well as an old prison and a very popular fort!!  Now these I look forward to activating as to my knowledge they have never been done before, and this is always a bonus for me, the pleasure of an event together with a first timer location.

I have found however that although this is supposed to be a hobby, and although we put in our fair share of work and thought into bringing our events to our members (and sometimes the public where allowed), there is a lot of jealousy and bitterness to be found.  Our group has been the subject of ranting from operators using pseudonyms to slander the Group, not to mention particular members of the group.  I personally dont dwell on any of this nonsense but lately there has been a lot of interference, including going so far as to maliciously disrupt the Group activities/events (eg music played over Group calls continuously, keying up etc) and it amazes me how low and petty people are willing to be in order to try and make our group look inadequate solely because we are a lot more active than others ... and the insulting parties are supposed to be adults, not to mention EI operators, however it amazes me that these people are willing to put their licences on the line for the purpose of immature illegal activity!!!  Its a shame that there is this side of the hobby, although it is an ugly truth that does exist in particular districts, and can probably be found in many other countries than Ireland.

On the brighter side, congrats to our national society on celebrating 80 years this year.  These celebrations were held on the same dates as Marconi weekend so unfortunately neither I nor the other lads were in a position to attend but I look forward to seeing all the pics.  Congrats to Dundalk ARS for organising what was deemed to be a great weekend. 

Well thats all I have for the minute, enjoy the hobby!!!

Ciao for now

Lisa, EI9GSB

CQ CQ WW, CALLING ALL NEW pFX CONTACTS

This weekend, I took part in the CQ WWPX contest.  I had myself all geared up for it, in my head I was already making hundreds, if not thousands of contacts, and was all ready to operate at a rapid rate for a good few hours.  I positioned myself at the desk, correct frequency (check), logbook at the ready (check), mic and footswitch in position (check), refreshments close (check).  I decided not to tie myself down to any particular band yet and began on 40m expecting a nice little pile up of prefix hunters.

Unfortunately the reality of this was very different.

I found a clear frequency and began calling "cq cq test, cq test, EI9GSB, contest".......nothing. I repeated this quite a few times before I got an answer, and then it was another little bit before I got another.  Maybe my expectations were too high?

After a little bit of this to-ing and fro-ing, I decided to change band, surely 20m or 15m would be more active.  Boy was I right.  I could barely find a few KHz to myself without being trampled on (not literally but it felt like it!).  Here was poor little callsign on the band, just trying to get a few contacts when the "big gun" stations began to stomp all over me from a few KHz away, splattering me with 20+ (sometimes 40+) db of noise.  I couldnt hear myself, let alone anyone answering my call.

I did however decide I was going to answer some of the stations.  To begin at the start of the band and work my way to the end provided many contacts, as even a move as little as 0.50 KHz gave you a new station.  And this is the way I proceeded to work, I even left the rig after a while as I was so annoyed with the DX zoo, constant stamping, blatant overtaking of occupied frequencies and some stations using so much power they could sustain an estate.

On the bright side though, I did manage to get some nice new contacts and DXCC's, and lots of new pFX's.  I ended the contest experience with 261 contacts, but I much prefer operating at any ol time and working a little pile up of your own!!!

My HRD QSO map

Not bad for a Ham since Oct 2010!!!

Spotted all over the world!!!

I spent the whole of yesterday glued to my rig. Not because there was any major DX or because of any contests, but purely because of the fun I was having. Now this hasnt happened to me in quite a bit.

I had been using a Xmas pressie I got from Tony ( the hubbie). I had been using PSK31 on 40m all along with a dipole antenna, but was getting tired of the variation of stations I was receiving. Tony swapped the antennas, the beam was connected to the Kenwood and the dipole temporarily placed in the Icom. I couldn't believe the increase in activity on the bands!

There were many firsts for me yesterday including using all of the bands 20-6m. I was elated, the amount of calls to be answered, so much so that at one point the waterfall looked like a swimming pool, signals everywhere!

A major first for me was the use of 30m, a band that I had never considered using previously but I was pleasently surprised at the amount of ops on seeking contacts. I had great fun and was like a child at Xmas.

The only drawback for me was having to collect DXCC'S from the beginning all over again as no doubt I shall be looking for a digi award into the future. The biggest surprise to me though was seeing the map on psk reporter highlighted with a rainbow of colors from all parts of the globe !! I was in my element!

In all I made close to 70 contacts yesterday on PSK, my furthest being Brazil and Argentina. It was a really fun radio day, wih my signal being spotted all over the world!

HAPPY NEW YEAR .....or is it?

Hey there peeps,

Firstly, let me take this opportunity to wish you a very happy 2012, hope this one is better than the last few.

In relation to weather, what the hell is happening at the minute?  Storms, winds of up to 120km per hour and broken antennas.  Mine avoided any major damage, well partially because its been sitting in its cradle position for the past few weeks but my poor co-linear on the roof had died a poor death this winter, the poor things needs to be retired and laid to rest..... and to be replaced by a new one.

My news evenings have gone by the wayside for the present time due to this bereavement but all shall be restored once we manage to get a new one up there!

A few of my friends (both on here and Facebook) have suffered at the hands of the ferocious winds.  Poor Anthony's antenna snapped and had to be replaced and I have to say Im impressed with the speed in which he had it up and running again, if I had blinked I would've missed it lol.

Other than that, all is good on the western front, xmas was a quiet one, apart from the mental kids of course, by the time the 28th came I was ready to go back to work for a rest!!!  New Year's Eve came and went and even on New Year's Day I was impressed with the amount of posts of DXCC's being worked by hams across the board.  I haven't gotten back into it yet, but the year is young.

One of my xmas pressies I got were data cables from my hubbie (amongst other things of course).  I think they're brilliant.  I was playing with them for ages, and since I like typing too, this is even more up my alley, you can "macro" away whilst doing other things!!!! Thanks Tony!

So I'm off now to relax for the rest of the evening, hope to catch some of you in the very near future!

Ciao for now
Lisa

Open Sesame!!

Hey there peeps,

Well, I had finally decided to hog the rig officially (sorry Tony) over the past weekend, and as luck would have it the bands decided they were going to open for me lol.

I decided to operate over Friday night and during today (I had to take a break on Saturday lol) and made about 100 contacts over the few hours.  A few new DXCC were up for grabs for me to include St. Pierre & Manquelin, Uruguay and Malaysia on 10m and Market Reef.  I have never even heard of the first and last one.  I had to consult Google Maps to locate them. 

I have yet to upload them to HRD so im anxious to see how many DXCC's I have worked (not to get this confused with confirmed).  I am now coming up to my first anniversary of being a licensed ham (30th Oct) and to date I have worked about 1,197 contacts and approx 110 DXCC's ( on the last count).  It will be interesting to see how many Ill have in the log by the time the year is up.

In saying that, there are a few DXCC's I missed out on, despite trying and trying.  4W6A is one I had been trying to get, a DXepedition to Timor Leste which a few of the lads I know have managed to contact.  It seems that any time I spot them on the cluster, they are too light for me to hear, yet I have tried to see if, by complete act of god, they might hear me. 

African stations also seem to be elusive to me, I have heard a number of them on this weekend, Central Africa, Madagascar, Congo, but I have yet to manage to work them.  As with the VK's and the ZL stations, maybe there is a certain time of day when activity is plentiful, and its probably when Im at work HI.

So back I go to see if I can manage to scrape another few into the log.

Ciao for now,
Lisa, EI9GSB

Another Rally Good Success!!!

Hey all,

So we had our annual rally last Sunday and it was a brilliant day.  Everyone was ready to go at about 11.15am so we opened the doors and let the bargain hunters in!

There was a great turnout again this year, and everyone was in high spirits.

I got the great job of admission, so it gave me a chance to meet everyone coming in.  Because Im new enough to the hobby (11 months) I am still not familiar with some of the people I speak to, now give me a callsign and Id know you a bit quicker.  I had people chatting to me and it took me a few minutes (or them to tell me) to realise who I was speaking to, but nevertheless I managed to meet some of the lads I chat to on a regular basis.

I also had a mission, to get myself an antenna for my car and the mount to go with it.  See as a YL operater, I have encountered a problem that most hams wouldnt be aware of.  Since I am also a mother and a wife, I need to be able to do things like food shopping, picking things up for the kids for school etc so the problem I was running into was that when I had Tony's car, the antenna was too high for the car parks, barriers on certain roads etc and used to bang something ferocious when I drove to Tesco etc, so much so I had to pull the car over and either bend the antenna (which it is capable of doing) or take it off altogether.

So my hunt was on and it didnt take me long to come across the perfect antenna for 2m and 70cms.  It is a little 1/4 wave antenna, only about 30cms long maybe, and fits perfectly on my car.  So now I dont have to worry about banging.  I also got a Watson mount for the boot and hey presto, Im set to go on 2m & 70cms.

So I was happy with my purchase.  When the rally came to a close, and the traders had packed away, we went for a few drinks in the bar and had a great finish to the day.  I have to say congrats to all the people involved in the day, it was another brill time, and I went home smiling.

Ciao for now

73, Lisa EI9GSB