![]() | NAQCC News |
Aug 7, 2010 | NAQCC Web Site | Issue #123_124 |
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In this issue: 1. August Challenge. 2. July Sprint Results 2a. August Sprint 3. General Club News 3a. Web Site Tour 4. Elmer Project 4a. CW Cartoon of the Month 5. Latest Award Winners 6. Member Spotlight 7. News Items and Articles by Our Members |
1. AUGUST CHALLENGE: Since this is a double issue, the August challenge is already underway. However even if you didn't catch the start of it, that's no problem, since all August QSO's (well those that you make with QRP) are used in the challenge and you can just go back through your log to see what you've gotten so far in the way of your 'poker' hands. Yes, it's our third annual poker challenge this month. The poker challenge is based on an idea submitted by Randy KB4QQJ. The rules may seem a bit complicated at first, but become straightforward when you read through and understand them. Rather than repeat them here, I urge you to read them on the challenge page before you get started seeing what kind of hands you've drawn so far and will continue to draw the rest of the month. NOTE: JULY CHALLENGE RESULTS WILL BE IN THE NEXT ISSUE. Don't forget to submit your astronomy picture(s) to Tom WY3H at ![]() Full Challenge info here. ![]() 2. JULY SPRINT RESULTS: Another excellent sprint this month that now stands in second place for number of logs submitted with 116. That's 4 straight months with 100+ logs. That may put us in previously unexplored territory for two hour QRP and/or CW sprints. I'm just so proud of our members for their dedication to the sprints and the NAQCC in general. Thank you. I'm going to share here comments from two participants that speak volumes about our sprints. Werner N8BB says in part, "..great job. I think everything you have done is staring to really show itself and not only am I more enthused but I think others are too. Give yourself a big pat on the back for me." The pat on the back goes to our wonderful members, but I do think Werner hit the nail on the head. Treating our sprints as important big contests by requiring complete log submissions and stringent cross-checking of those logs adds credibility to our sprints as well as teaching proper contest logging so that those who move on from our sprints to the big wide world of contesting know exactly what to expect there. We've said all along that our sprints are very user-friendly to newcomers to contesting. I think KC2VBU expresses that aspect wonderfully in his soapbox comments from the July sprint. It is so well written that reading it took me back vicariously to my early days in ham radio. If you don't take time to read our soapbox comments, you are missing a lot of great comments. I want to make sure you read this one especially if you are thinking of taking that first step into sprinting or contesting. Enough of a preamble. Here's Steve who says it much better than I do. "Last month I was playing around with my RockMite and heard all these CQ NA calls, many at a speed I could copy no less and I say HEY.. This could be fun!! So I acquire my brother's 40 yr. old $10 straight key, practice up with it (had to cash in on the xtra mul. pts. hihihi), find out the straight key messed up my tx/rc offset on my particular RM80 config. so get the paddle back on and am set to rock-n-roll, power up to an IMPRESSIVE level of QRN and mess around between 40M & 80M (both Rockmites----impressive shack!!) for 90 minutes. Couldn't seem to squeeze in a call (rockbound and all that) on 7.028MHz but then I ALMOST FALL OUT OF MY CHAIR when W2JEK comes back to me out of the blue on 80M and I am able to strike!! Don is so curteous he slows his CW down to my copy speed AND I think I am his only 80M contact so here you have it....... QSO#6 ever, 1st Sprint Log, and on a Rockmite no less. What fun and thanks for a great evening......have to get building on that SW40+ kit I have in the basement, don't know what I'll do with myself once I can tune around abit!" Now isn't that great? Does it send chills up your spine remembering when you were at that stage in ham radio? It certainly did for me. Now that 100 or more logs seems to be our norm, we've made a quick decision to abandon our time zone divisions and instead divide the SWA category by USA call areas and add a Canadian and DX division for a total of 12 divisions. I posted the July results in both the time zone format and the call area format. In August, and from now on, we'll use the call area divisions only. That means up to twelve certificates each month (plus one for the GAIN category), and since that could be expensive, we'll send the certificates via email as we do with the membership certificates now. However if for any reason, you can't print out the certificate yourself, we'll print and mail a copy for you free of charge as always. This will involve a change in the autologger. Instead of a field for time zone, we'll have a field for call area. That means the call area you operated from, not necessarily the number in your call. Just as an example, K3RLL who operates a good part of the year from Florida would enter in the 4th call area when he is down there, and the 3rd call area when he is up here in PA. I think that will make for better competition as results depend in part on just where you live in the USA. The time zone divisions took care of that pretty well with eastern stations only competing against other eastern stations, central vs. central stations, and on out to pacific vs. pacific stations. Now the call area divisions will make results even more equitable and also set up more friendly rivalries like the geographical divisions in sports do. I'm excited about the change, and I think you will be also. It's wonderful we have grown this far and fast so that we can do that. Maybe someday we can have divisions for each state like the major contests from the ARRL and CQ Magazine do now. Since this is a double-issue newsletter and we don't want to make it too overly long (but I guess I have already - HI), we are going to move along now and get right to the stats although we really could say a lot more about our sprints. STATS - current month, previous month, all time record, mo/yr (blue indicates a record set this month): Logs - 116 121 121 6/10
Stns in logs - 180 179 180 7/10
Hour 1 QSO's - 831 982 982 6/10
Hour 2 QSO's - 734 921 921 6/10
Total QSO's - 1565 1903 1903 6/10
20M QSO's - 595 1000 1000 6/10
40M QSO's - 960 829 1003 4/10
80M QSO's - 10 74 765 2/10
WINNERS:1st SWA East - N8BB 1st SWA Central - W5YDM 1st SWA Mountain - N0TA 1st SWA Pacific - KA6AIL 1st Gain - K7RE First-Timer Certificate - N4IY Knob/handle drawing: N8BB Congratulations to all including winners and non-winners. Actually everyone who participated and sent in a log is a winner because you have helped show the ham radio world that there are many folks still using and enjoying CW on the ham bands. That's one of our main goals here at the NAQCC. Very special thanks to those who reported their results even though they made only a few QSO's. Your reports are important also. We had a total of 14 stations who didn't submit a log show up 5-22 times in the 116 logs we received and cross-checked. Hopefully they and many others will be back next month AND submit a log. Remember submitting a log doubles the strength of your statement that you support CW operation. We welcome these hams who submitted a sprint log for the first time. We hope they will continue to participate and report their results: AA6ZJ AA7VW AE4RV G0AZR K0AE K0FTC K6KQV KA5TJS KB3RBC KC2ROF KC2VBU KC9MTP KF7EST KG4YLZ KI4WXI KK1X N1DN N2YI N4GX N4NM N5EM N6GA N7YY N8IW VE1BA W7PAU W9DLN WV1N. GOLDEN LOGS. Everyone who submits a log with exactly the correct format as defined in the rules plus has every bit of info (numbers, states, etc.) correct in the log gets a listing in the GOLDEN LOGS section in the results. Many clubs penalize mistakes in logging, some to the point of disqualification if there are too many mistakes. We don't do anything like that other than fixing a score if a mistake changes it. Instead of penalizing errors, we will reward perfection. There also is going to eventually be some sort of prize in conjunction with the GOLDEN LOGS. We haven't decided the details yet. We hope that is an incentive to run a fine-tooth comb through your logs before submitting them. GOLDEN LOG's were submitted by 42 participants this month. To see if you were one of the 42, check the results page. Most GOLDEN LOG's since we started keeping track in March 2010: 5 WB8ENE. 4 K0HJC K4JPN KD5MMM N8XMS W9CC Thanks to all GOLDEN LOGgers for making my cross-checking job that much easier. Full sprint info here. ![]() 2a. AUGUST SPRINT: Our regular monthly sprint is this Wednesday, August 11 0030-0230Z. If you're new to ham radio and unfamiliar with Z or UTC time, that's Tuesday evening at 8:30 PM Eastern Daylight Time. Will we continue to top the 100 logs mark this month? Will the new Call Area Divisions encourage more folks to participate? Only time will tell. Once again I'll send out a reminder on our mail list the morning of the sprint as that seems to have been very effective in increasing activity since we started doing it in April. Remember our special First-Timer certificate that goes to the highest scoring participant who never before submitted a log for one of our sprints. July's winner was W9DLN with 3,864 points which was also good enough to win the Central Division. Also the prize of custom made bug/paddle handles or straight key knobs that goes to the one chosen in a random drawing among ALL participants who submit a log regardless of score. The July winner was Werner N8BB. This prize giveaway will continue through November. If you are entering one of our sprints for the first time, we welcome you and hope you will be a regular participant from now on. Last month we welcomed another large bunch of new participants - 28!! Remember this is only a brief overview of the coming sprint. Be sure to read and understand the full general sprint rules and any specific rules for this month's sprints here. ![]() 3. GENERAL CLUB NEWS: ![]() ![]() However, even though the club has spread widely, many of the benefits of membership enjoyed by American amateurs are not available to those separated by the barriers of time zones, geographical distance and language. Different time zones make universal participation in sprints impossible - if a UK member wished to take part in the upcoming August sprint, it would mean operating the key between 1.30 and 3.30am (local time). Large geographical distances make delivery of awards prohibitively expensive for those outside America. It is perhaps for these reasons that the majority of members are in the US and Canada. ![]()
To unite these members and add an extra front to preservation of CW this side of the Atlantic ocean, it is with great pleasure that I can announce the formation of an NAQCC European Chapter (NAQCC-EU) that all members currently residing in a European country will automatically become a part of. In addition to everything they can currently do as part of the NAQCC, there will be a European sprint and all chapter members will receive a specialised chapter newsletter. We are striving for as much uniformity between the new European Chapter sprints and the current sprints that so many members on the western side of the Atlantic enjoy. The new European sprints will be held at 18.00-20.00 UTC. In the summer, this translates locally to 19.00-21.00 in the UK and the rest of Western Europe, 20.00-22.00 in Central Europe and 21.00-23.00 in the Eastern parts. To start with QSOs will be spread across a 5kHz range, on each of three bands, so that it will be easy for members to find each other. As the chapter grows, it is likely that more frequencies will be used. Apart from this, pretty much everything is the same as for the US sprints. To avoid confusion between the two, we have changed the days of the European sprints. As such, the first European sprint is planned for Monday 13th September, full details of which will be published in the next newsletter. As this first European sprint is certain to be a historic event in the future of QRP and CW, special '1st NAQCC-EU Sprint' certificates will be mailed to the competitors who come 1st, 2nd and 3rd. Finalised rules will be published closer to the date of the sprint. Although only members in Europe would be eligible for awards in the European sprints, they may also be of interest to members in Israel and South Africa, for example, where the time zones are similar to those in Europe. The European sprints will take place early in the afternoon in the US, so any US members who could be on the air to increase the number of QSOs and help get the European sprints off the ground would be very welcome indeed. At the moment, only 2% of members submit logs for each sprint - the new additional European sprints could make this number double or even triple. The additional European newsletter that members of the new chapter will receive will contain the results of the new sprints and hopefully some regional columns. We are looking for volunteers to write such columns in their own language, and then hopefully language will no longer be a barrier to anyone with a passion for QRP and CW but for whom English is not their first language. It is expected that the EU chapter will just be a start. There are many other areas where participating in sprints may be difficult due to time zones and where members may feel cut off from the rest of the community due to the large geographical distances. For example the NAQCC has members in Australia, who operate on UTC+10, Japan (UTC+9) and Thailand (UTC+7). Anyone interested in helping out with the European Chapter, whether writing regional columns for the newsletter, setting up a QRS Elmer net suitable for European time zones or donating or distributing awards in Europe, would be hugely appreciated - please get in touch with either John or myself. My email address is ![]() ![]() QRP GET TOGETHER Anyone living in or near western Pennsylvania should please keep Sunday, Aug. 22 in mind. On that date the NAQCC will have (an informal) QRP get together at the Sky View Radio Society, 2335 Turkey Ridge Road, New Kensington, PA. Sky View is celebrating its 50th anniversary and on Aug. 22 the club will have a Swap and Shop with vendors and tail gaters, There will also be an ARRL WPA Convention and an ARES meeting later in the Day as well as a NBEMS demo for anyone interested. The NAQCC will have use (for a time) of Sky View's radio room. The room is enclosed in glass and therefore isolated from most sounds (yes, air conditioned too). There is a well equipped kitchen and an outdoor cooking pavilion. All NAQCC members are welcome and we hope the participation by NAQCC members is good. (If you have one, please wear your NAQCC hat). Here are directions to the club (It is in a rather remote and beautiful location). For 2-Meter users the club frequency is 146.64/04 PL 131.8 DIRECTIONS TO SKYVIEW RADIO SOCIETY GPS=40(degrees) 31' 03" N / 79(degrees) 40' 37" W From Apollo / Leechburg: Take rt. 66 S to rt. 380. Take 380 W to rt. 366. Take rt. 366 W (toward New Kensington) to the end of the 4 lane. Go 1/4 mile past the end of the 4 lane. Turn right on Whitten Hollow Road. Go about 1/2 mile to first stop sign. Turn right on Turkey Ridge Road. Go about 1/2 mile to top of hill. Skyview is on the left. From New Kensington: Take rt. 366 E. Go about 5 miles from the Parnassas area. Look for the Hannan Building on the left. Go about 100 yards past the Hannan Building (If you get to the 4 lane, you went too far). Turn left on Whitten Hollow Road. Go about 1/2 mile to first stop sign. Turn right on Turkey Ridge Road. Go about 1/2 mile to top of hill. Skyview is on the left. From Monroeville / Parkway: Take rt. 286 E to rt. 380 E. Take rt. 380 E to rt. 366. Take rt. 366 W (toward New Kensington) to the end of the 4 lane. Go 1/4 mile past the end of the 4 lane. Turn right on Whitten Hollow Road. Go about 1/2 mile to first stop sign. Turn right on Turkey Ridge Road. Go about 1/2 mile to top of hill. Skyview is on the left. From Greensburg: Take rt. 66 N to rt. 366. Take rt. 366 W (toward New Kensington). Cross over route 380 and then go to the end of the 4 lane. Go 1/4 mile past the end of the 4 lane. Turn right on Whitten Hollow Road. Go about 1/2 mile to first stop sign. Turn right on Turkey Ridge Road. Go about 1/2 mile to top of hill. Skyview is on the left. ![]() We need operators to man those calls for the week of October 11 through 17. Many who operated the calls in previous years know how enjoyable it is and have signed up again this year. We've also gotten a few new ops as well. Here's a list of our ops so far. There's still plenty of time to sign up if you haven't done so already. N1A - W1OH, N1LU N2A - KA2KGP, N2COD N3A - K3WWP, WY3H, KC2EGL, WA3HIC N4A - K3RLL, AJ4SB, AA4W, K2UFT N5A - W5YDM, K5JYD, KC5FM N6A N7A - WY7N N8A N9A - W9BOK, W9DLN N0A - KD0VThere's no limit on the number of ops for each station. You just have to work out a schedule among yourselves in each call area to avoid conflicts in operating times and frequencies. Come on, you members in W6 and W8 land. We know you're out there. Don't be shy. Basically all you need to do is to operate as you normally do, but use a N#A call instead of your own. More info upcoming in future newsletters, as well as here. ![]() ![]() ![]() 3a. WEB SITE TOUR: We're continuing our tour this newsletter with a look at the QRP Works section of the web site. This section just emphasizes the fact known by everyone that QRP does indeed work, and work very well. It has some pictures of tiny little QRP rigs and some 'trivia' about QRP operation. One snippet tells about a QSO that rated a MPW (miles per watt) of 1.6 billion. Check ![]() For more info visit the QRP Works section of the web site. ![]() 4. THE NAQCC ELMER PROJECT: ![]() ![]() The Elmer project is co-ordinated by Karl N3IJR (L) and Ron K5DUZ. If you are interested in helping out or need help with any CW and/or QRP matters contact: K5DUZ - ![]() N3IJR - ![]() Elmer's tip: If you're new to CW, don't be afraid to ask the other station to QRS (send more slowly) if he/she is sending too fast for you to copy. Most (but unfortunately not all) stations will be only too happy to oblige and help you in pursuit of improving your copying ability. Also don't be afraid to ask for repeats if you missed something. If you did miss something, never send 'R' which has the meaning 'I copied everything you sent perfectly'. It's a contradiction and makes you sound silly or stupid if you start a transmission with 'R BUT I MISSED YOUR NAME AND MY RST'. Also never send more than one 'R' if you did copy everything. Many more examples of good operating practices can be found on the Elmer Project page of the web site and on K3WWP's Web Site NAQCC QRS Net Report
Date(UTC) NCS Participants 7/19/10 WY3H 3 - WY3H, K3WWP, K1IEE 7/26/10 WY3H 3 - WY3H, K3WWP, K1IEE 8/1/10 WY3H 7 - WY3H, K3WWP, KM4QQ, K1IEE, KX1E, W4DHH, AC8APFrom Tom WY3H - We had a great turn out for last week's Sunday evening net, including two first-time checkins. Our net frequency is 7.114.5 and the net begins at 0030 Z (8:30 p.m. EDT). The net is quite informal and everyone is invited to check in. If anyone is not familiar with net Q-signals that's OK too (we really don't use them much). The NAQCC would also like members to step up to volunteer as Net Control ops. You don't have to commit to every week. What we are asking members is to try being an NCS just once. Please contact Tom, WY3H at: ![]() We need YOU to make our Elmer project work. If you need help with any ham radio matter ![]() K5DUZ - ![]() N3IJR - ![]() WY3H - ![]() Also see Elmer Project on the web site. ![]() 4a. CW CARTOON OF THE MONTH: ![]() Let's take a comedy and/or nostalgia break now courtesy of Dick Sylvan W9CBT. Dick has been a long-time QRP/CW operator. One of his many talents is being a cartoon artist, and he is supplying a cartoon each month for the newsletter. The NAQCC is very honored to be one of just two organizations to feature Dick's cartoons. In addition to our newsletter, Dick's cartoons appear monthly in The K9YA Telegraph, an on-line only Ham Radio E-zine where he is the staff cartoonist. Dick has also authored a book entitled "Hi Hi - A Collection of Ham Radio Cartoons" available via his web site. A new cartoon will be appearing in each of our even-numbered newsletters. ![]() ![]() 5. AWARD WINNERS THE PAST TWO MONTHS: CERTIFICATES: ENDORSEMENTS and/or WEB SITE LISTINGS: KMPW 100 Honor Roll: NU7T - 205 6/2 Friendship Club: K3WWP - 1500 pts. 6/11 Rather depressing. I hope it's just the summer doldrums that has slowed our award applications to virtually none and it will pick up as fall and winter come. Remember our awards provide the only income for the club besides your donations which also have dropped off during the summer. We may have to cut back on some club features without that income. FEATURED AWARD: One award that hasn't had any activity in almost a full year now is our 30-30 award. It's available in two styles - for a single month and 3 months. It's not hard to achieve as all you need to do is to get 30 QSO's on 30 meters during a month. Granted activity has been declining on 30 meters in recent years, but conditions remain good on this band during the entirety of a sunspot cycle, especially for DX work but for rag chew style activity as well. Skip can also get quite short at times on this band with very strong signals. I think if you have a rig and antenna that operate on this band, you'll be pleasantly surprised if you give it a try. Remember to make QSO's, someone must initiate them by calling CQ. If the band sounds dead, CALL CQ yourself. I've often done that and come up with some nice QSO's when I didn't hear anyone else on the band before my CQ. You don't need QSL cards for this nor for any of our awards, so that's not a hassle. As an extra incentive, we'll give a free certificate to the next person who applies for this award. All you have to do is mention you heard about the free offer in newsletter # 123 when you apply. Full List of all award winners here. ![]() 7. MEMBER SPOTLIGHT: ![]() This section is managed by Paul N8XMS and any questions about it should go to ![]() Thomas Giella NZ4O #1723 ![]() I've been a ham since 1989. Immediately I was drawn to CW and eventually passed the 5, 13 and 20 wpm code tests. Between 1989-2003 I used CW around 90% and since 2003 around 75%. I first got interested in QRP operation while living in California in 1993. Ramsey Electronics sent me an unsolicited product catalog and I was immediately drawn to and purchased their QRP40 transmitter and HR40 receiver kits. I had been building Heath kits since 1979 as an SWL and weather observing enthusiast. I was living in a large apartment on the second floor. I ran a stealthy end fed 1/2 wave #20 coated stranded wire tuned with a home brewed parallel network outside between two of my bedroom windows. With one watt and a U.S. Navy flameproof key I made many 40 meter CW contacts around the country at both day and night. Eventually I bought and built Ramsey's QAMP40 20 watt amplifier kit. I ran 4 watts then and just had a blast. In 1994 I moved to Golden, Colorado and joined the Colorado QRP Club. The club was very enthusiastic and monthly meetings were a lot of fun. One of my favorites was the rig and key show and tell that we did. I moved to Florida in 1996 and have continued with CW QRP operation. For a good number of years I used an Icom IC-718 rig for QRP as it put out as low as 700 mw. Currently I'm using an Icom IC-746 Pro which puts out as low as two watts. The main QRP antenna is a 300 foot long square horizontal loop up at 40 feet with 75 feet to each side. It's fed with 450 ohm window line to an old Johnson Viking link coupled antenna tuner. The setup really works well for QRP. My current key compliment is the U.S. Navy flameproof key, also a Vibroplex Vibrokeyer and Vibroplex blue racer bug. For more info about my hobbies and interests check out www.nz4o.org . ![]() ![]() ![]() DISCLAIMER: Any views expressed in this section are those of the member submitting them, and may or may not be those of the NAQCC or its officers. ![]() ![]() ![]() | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Club email address - ![]() The publication of our next newsletter will be announced via email to all members for whom we have a valid email address unless you specifically have unsubscribed from the email. Past on-line newsletters beginning with issue #042 are now archived on the site. So if you missed seeing any past issues, you can check them out in the archives. Unless otherwise credited, all items are written by K3WWP. If you came directly to this newsletter, we invite you now to browse the NAQCC Web Site. |