pix_logo01 (5K)NAQCC News

May 12, 2007NAQCC Web Site Issue #046

In this issue:
1. May Sprint.
1A. Sprint Survey Results
2. April Challenge Results
3. Latest Bear Hunt News
4. General Club News
5. Member News

1. SPRINT: Our May sprint is coming up on Thursday, May 17 at 0030-0230Z. Remember that's Wednesday evening, May 16 here in the USA. Our Special Award this month goes to the one making the most QSO's on 20M. Of course, that is in addition to our usual awards for 1st place in our two categories, or 1st and 2nd if we only have entries in one category. We also offer a nice certificate to the one making the highest score who has never won a certificate in any of our previous sprints. It sounds a bit complicated but we want as many different hams as possible to win something in our sprints.

If you use paper logging for our sprints, we now have a log and summary form available for you to download and fill in with your text editor. Download here - Form - Instructions. If you use the form, let us have your thoughts on it - like it?, changes, improvements, etc.

If you're entering one of our sprints for the first time, we welcome you. Keep in mind the sprints are designed to be low key (no pun intended). So try to keep your speed down - we want to acquaint newcomers to CW and contesting with the procedures of operating in contests and sprints. Many are afraid to jump into a contest when they hear all the high speed CW, but they will try our sprints with the more comfortable speed. Everyone has to start somewhere in contesting, and if they don't, CW contesting will die out. So you contesting veterans keep that in mind and try to help out the newcomers in our sprints. Thank you.

Full Sprint info here.

1A. SPRINT SURVEY: I took a survey of all participants in our March sprint to find out how they logged our sprints. Thanks to the 30 of the 35 participants who responded. Let's look at the results.

Program is the name of a logging program, if any. Otherwise it's paper logging. Number is the number of hams using that method. Template indicates if the program has a ready-made template for our NAQCC sprint. Likewise with a Data File.
Program     Number     Template      Data File 
Paper         14          N/A           N/A
GenLog        10          Yes           Yes
ACLog          3          No            No
Logic8         1          No            No
NA             1          No            No
TR             1          No            No
One paper logger offered the great suggestion that we provide some sort of a standard log form and summary sheet that could be filled in and emailed by those who log with paper. We have done that as noted in the above item.

If you have a computer in the shack, it is definitely GenLog that is the most popular logging program. It is so very easy to use and is customized to our sprints. (Thanks W3KM). I love it and use it not only for the NAQCC sprints, but for all my contesting now. It is designed basically for the single op contester without multi transmitters and the other bells and whistles of the big contest stations. So it is ideal for me and perhaps for you?

When I get time, I intend to contact the authors of the other software loggers mentioned and see if they can provide a customized template for our sprints since we are growing rapidly in popularity now, and that popularity should continue to grow as we start the climb up to the next sunspot maximum.

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2. APRIL CHALLENGE RESULTS: K4UK simply blew away all the other competitors in this challenge. Stan pretty much does all his operating on the WARC bands, and has a lot of time to do it. It's folks like Stan who are going to save our WARC bands. We have to use them or we will lose them. 30 meters is still in very good shape even at the bottom of the sunspot cycle. 62 of Stan's 65 QSO's were on 30, and 3 on 17. Stan's DX - 3X, 6Y, C6, CO, CP, DL, EA6, EA8, F, FG, G, HA, HB9, I, PJ4, PJ7, T9, TI, TU, UR, VE, VP5, YN, YV. Impressive! K3WWP, spending less time on the band than Stan, worked YV, YN, XE, 6V, KP4 on 30M. KD2MX worked ZL on 17M in the challenge. Yes, the DX is there if you are there at the right time, especially if you find a DX station just starting to operate before the spotters bring on the huge QRO pileups.

Full challenge info here.

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3. LATEST BEAR HUNT NEWS: From our Bear Master Ron, K5DUZ:

Bear volunteers have roamed the NAQCC forest in relative safety during the past few months. The consensus of a number of Hunters is that the conditions in the forest during this minimum period between solar cycle peaks is often so poor that the Hunters are staying in the hunting lodge and swapping Bear Hunting stories of past hunts rather than spending time hunting in the forest. There are signs that with the coming of springtime and the increasing amount of daylight, conditions are now improving in the forest and it is once again time for the Bears to prowl and the Hunters to hunt.

Bear volunteers have the chance once again to get some fresh air and long delayed exercise by roaming the forest and teasing the Bear Hunters. Becoming an NAQCC Bear for anywhere from one day to one week is as simple as falling off a log. Read the rules posted on the NAQCC website in the WAS Bear Hunt section. Send an e-mail to the Bearmaster as stated in the rules. If you have ever called CQ you are qualified to be a Bear. The Bear Hunt is not a contest, but just a fun way to spend some time using QRP CW and hand out a bit of Bear fur to the Bear Hunters. Give it a try next week. The Hunters are waiting!

Full bear hunt info here.

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4. GENERAL CLUB NEWS: Fanfare!! It's time to make our secret public since it is also being announced in WorldRadio magazine and CQ (I believe) magazine around this time. We have a very special prize for our June sprint, but you may have known that already. You may not know what we are giving away though.

Thanks to the generosity of K4TWJ, and the generosity of you who have donated to the NAQCC, we are giving away two of K4TWJ's excellent books on key collecting. One to the overall highest score and one to the second highest overall scorer (club officers not eligible). Dave kindly donated one of the books and we used your donations to purchase the other. In case you don't know (shame on you), Dave is the author of the QRP column in CQ magazine. An article about the NAQCC and our President Tom Mitchell, KB3LFC is in his column in the June issue of CQ magazine.

Speaking of write-ups, the NAQCC is also being mentioned in the July issue of Popular Communications magazine thanks to Tomas, NW7US who writes about the club in his propagation column for the magazine.

We are working on setting up our WARC bands activity days which will also include days for the non-WARC 160 and 10 meter bands. You'll find out first about it here in a future newsletter.

We've implemented the simpler Worked Members Award mentioned in the last newsletter which should appeal to those who didn't feel up to the WMA's somewhat complicated point system. We now have the new Basic level as well as retaining the original rules as the Advanced level of the award.

Surprisingly (well, maybe not) we've had only one ham respond to our plea to help out a fellow blind NAQCC member. Thanks very much to Bob, N9SJV who is working on getting a club near to our blind member Lou, WA9TPZ to help out, but so far as I write this, the club has not responded. Bob is willing to try to help out himself, despite the fact he is retired on a fixed income with some medical problems. We admire Bob very much for taking an interest in the matter.

Remember if you have a ham radio email signature to proudly include your NAQCC membership number in it. That is a great source of publicity that is often overlooked.

Our sincere sympathies to the family and friends of Peter Davies, M0DDX who became a silent key on March 11, 2007. Peter was our member # 0600.

If you read this in time, be sure to join in the FISTS Spring Sprint Saturday afternoon, May 12. Mention the NAQCC in your Soapbox when you report your results. Details on the FISTS web site.

Tom KB3LFC & John K3WWP will be setting up a NAQCC table at the Butler, PA hamfest on Sunday, June 3rd. Karl N3IJR will be helping to man the table. If you're within driving distance, it's a great annual hamfest to visit. Of course, if you do attend, stop by and say hello at our NAQCC table.

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5. MEMBER NEWS: This is YOUR section of the newsletter. We want to know what our members are doing with CW and QRP on the ham bands. We will only present POSITIVE news here. Brag about that new rare country you worked last week. Tell how you finally worked KL7 to finish your 40 meters WAS. Share your excitement in working halfway around the world to Australia with 100 mW. Tell us how you built that new little QRP rig or keyer paddle from scratch. Give us the URL to your brand new CW/QRP web site so we can all take a look. Do a review of your K1 you just finished building. I think those are enough examples to let you know what kind of news we want here. Basically anything POSITIVE that concerns CW and/or QRP. Nothing about other modes or QRO please.

Send your news items to our news editor Paul KD2MX at pix_email_kd2mx (1K).

pix_blueball (1K) From John K3WWP #0002 - I got back to mW QRPp work this month for the first time in ages because of our May Challenge. I used the QRP+ rig I have here and my old homebrew tuner with the built-in SWR/Power meter to operate at 600 mW. My first QSO was with KS1J in RI which turned out to be a new mW state for me - #37. Hopefully I'll get the time to do some more mW work this month and perhaps get a couple more new states towards a mW WAS.

pix_blueball (1K) From Rod W5GZT #1705 - A friend of mine who has been my field day (qrp-cw ) partner for several years picked up a KX-1 in a trade and brought it to me a month or so ago to "play" with. He liked it but didn't use it much due to his spending most of his time on the road. After using it for a while, I managed to swap him for it and I have enjoyed it so much that I am getting the 30/80 module, which will give me 30m & 80m as well as the other two bands. I will have more to report after I get the module board built and installed, and will let the group know how well it works.

pix_blueball (1K) From Ron K5DUZ #0005 - I'm in the process of pulling together the parts to build a portable transceiver so that I can get away from the high noise home station QTH and participate in the NAQCC Sprints. I'm really looking forward to operating portable. I finally tired of using a dipmeter to determine L & C values so in a weak moment I ordered the AADE LC Meter. The kit went together in about one and one-half hours. I tested it by measuring a few 1% capacitors that I found in my capacitor box and found the calibration to be at least as good as the tested capacitor tolerances. Really glad that I made the investment as it makes quick work of measuring L's & C's. Save me a place in the Sprnts!

pix_blueball (1K) From Giurgiu YO6EX #1822 - (From our QRP friends in Europe comes this info on the Pro-CW Club. Some of you might be interested in supporting QRP activities in Europe and helping this small club grow. - KD2MX)
The Pro-CW Club is dedicated to the preservation and encouragement of the art of CW communications. Members are welcome from all around the world in two categories: 1) FULL MEMBER - any amateur who is a present or former professional CW radio operator in any service (commercial, military, etc) and provides recommendations from two other amateur radio operators will be confirmed as full member. 2) ASSOCIATE MEMBER - any amateur radio operator who enjoys the use of CW. Applicants will receive a very beautiful certificate. Dues are 10 Euro or 12$, or 20 valid IRC. Fees only in cash. No other cost. Our club has award and contest programme. Send your application to: Vasile GIURGIU, YO6EX, P.O.Box 168, SIBIU-1, RO-550450, ROUMANIA.

AWARD PROGRAM
WORKED PRO-CW-CLUB
For members worked: Class I: 12 points, Class II: 8 points, Class III: 4 points. A QSO with members in same continent count as 1 point, with DX count as 2 points. Valid QSO's after 01.01.2000, only CW.
THE CHIRPERS AWARD
For worked different stations (members or not members) only in CW. QSO's are valid after 01.01.1970. Class I: 10,000 QSO's, Class II: 5,000 QSO"s, Class III: 1000 QSO's.
GCR. Log undersigned and certified by an award manager or two hams. The cost is 5 Euro or 6 $ or 10 valid IRC/ award/class. At demand it will be issued for multi or single band. Application to: Vasile GIURGIU, YO6EX, P.O.Box 168, SIBIU-1, RO-550450, ROUMANIA.

Active members:
YO2BB YO2CY (sk) YO2RR (ex. yo2beh) YO2ARV YO2CJX YO2LIN YO3APG YO3BWK YO3GIC YO3KAA YO4ASG YO4DCF YO5OHO YO6EV YO6EX YO6ADW YO6DGI YO6DHE YO6KAL (sk) YO7AWQ YO7BKU YO9IF YO9OC YO9XC YO9AGI YO9BPX YO9CFR DJ5IO DJ6SI DK1WER DK6AP DL2HQA ER3AC ER5AA EW1AD HA5BR HL5AP I6HWD LY1FM N2YO OE9SLH ON4RU PA3CLQ SV1EDY YK1AH.


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