August 30, 2005
August 26, 2005
August 21, 2005
First Contact Ever! EA8AM
Spent all yesterday struggling to make some contacts on 40m. No success. I screwed around some more this afternoon. 40m was still dead. I even tried 10m (definitely dead). So I retuned for 20m. Lo there were many 599 signals around 14.060 cw, mostly Japan callsigns. The problem was they just wouldn't QRS (SLOW DOWN) when I'd try to hail them. They returned my call, but at 35wpm, which doesn't do me much good when I can copy perhaps 10wpm.
After two hours of this torture I decided to goto a phone band on 20m. I saw 14.195 described as "Rare DX and DXpeditions frequently operate SSB here -- generally listening up-split." I called CQ a very few times and heard a very garbled return, something ending in AM. I turned on the RIT and tried to find the guy while simultanesouly hailing him back. Under very bad conditions we swapped callsigns 9v1vk (me) and EA8AM (him). He asked for a signal report. I didn't very well know how to evaluate him. So I said something like 2/3-4-5 (or something close to that). I was just reading out of my handbook -- "barely readable to readable with considerable difficulty" and fair signal and "strongly ripple modulated." Now that I have time to think about it, it probably should be a 3-6-?7? Basically his signal was strong but it was hard to understand him. I think he sent me a 557 but I am not so sure, again it was hard to hear.
Anyway, thanks to the wonder of the internet, I know exactly who EA8AM is and I'll be sending him the first QSL I've ever made.
Update before I even could post this article: A few more CQ's and my next callback was P29VR out of Papua New Guinea. This signal I could copy well enough to 'ragchew' a bit. Pretty damn fun. I guess now I need to get a logging program running.
Update before I could upload the P29VR update.... Just heard a cq and replied to yb0az 'wis' from Indonesia. Ok, definitely need to get a logging program now.
August 20, 2005
Dog days of August
This month has been marked principally by grinding days and fatigue.
Luke has eyelashes so long that Ling is jealous of him, however, they cause a problem in that he's got a case of conjunctivits. Long eyelashes attract dirt and sometimes fold under his eyelid. Currently he's on some strong eye drops to kill the infection/virus/whatever it is. Should be ok in a few days.
Dad will arrive in just a few days, just in time for Singapore Amateur Radio Transmitting Society's "Field Day." I'm sure he'll be excited to play with my new toy, an ICOM IC-746pro base transceiver.
