James Stevens ← M0JCQ's Ham Blog

Activating Mount Davidson (W6/NC-423) 1

Dec

21

2018

Work recently took me back to California, and specifically to San Francisco, which I’d not visited before. Naturally enough I checked the nearby SOTA summits to see if I could sneak in an activation. Mount Davidson (W6/NC-423) seemed to fit the bill nicely, it’s easy to get to with public transport, not too much of ...

VHF Tropo Opening (November 2018) 3

Nov

26

2018

I’d been watching the tropo forecast with anticipation for the 17th-18th of November 2018 and had planned to go out portable to see what I could work on 2m VHF. In the morning I’d had a scan on 2m from home (using a Diamond V2000 colinear) and I could see conditions were up, as I ...

Worked All Britain Awards so far 2

Oct

25

2018

Of late I’ve been focussing on working stations across the UK for the various Worked All Britain (WAB) awards, for me this adds some incentive to work local stations on both HF and VHF. It’s especially convenient as I spend more time working with NVIS and ground-wave propagation than I do regular F layer DX. I’ve ...

Icom 7300 Contest Keyer

Oct

15

2018

I’ve recently been building out my contesting capabilities at home and I’ve just added the SOTABEAMS ContestConsole to my shack. I’m also going to receive the K1EL K44 CW Keyer & Reader, for use in CW contests. But here I will focus on the ContestConsole. SOTABEAMS have continued to impress me with their innovations. I’ve been ...

Building the DX Commander Lite multi-band vertical 2

Oct

3

2018

The other week I was casually researching how to make a multi-band vertical for the HF bands, initially I was thinking of a single length of wire, with traps, to separate the bands. My primary reason for wanting a vertical was to work a bit more DX, taking advantage of the low angle takeoff offered ...

FT8 – A personal critique 20

Sep

22

2018

FT8 (or Franke-Taylor design, 8-FSK modulation) has taken the amateur bands by storm and for better or for worse, it’s changed the profile of activity since it launched in 2017. It doesn’t garner universal love from the amateur community, in fact it seems to polarise us; you either love it or you hate it. I ...

Applying for data mode awards (the easy way)

Sep

16

2018

Recently I discovered a really easy way of applying for the various Digital operating awards, and I thought I’d share it with you all. If you’ve done any PSK or FT8 operating, you may have already earned quite a few, but not even realised it. There are a number of Digital operating clubs that run ...

Activating Southern Britain’s Highest Mountain on Top Band (Pen Y Fan) 4

Jun

25

2018

Having activated Pen Y Fan (GW/SW-001 – 886m ASL – 8 points) four times previously, I was looking for something new to do. My wife was taking part in a Mountain Midnight Marathon again, which runs up southern Britains highest mountain (and then back down), so I’d have a few hours up at the summit ...

2m QRP Contesting in the Sun and DX

Jun

14

2018

On Sunday the 10th of June I took part in the RSGB 2m Backpackers contest. I like this contest because it combines portable operating and QRP, some of my favourite things! I entered the 5B section, which means you’re limited to 5w output and a mast height of 4m above ground. With this restriction I ...

Tropospheric DX on 2m SSB (with video) 1

Jun

8

2018

On Tuesday 5th of June I entered the RSGB UKAC 2m SSB contest from the back garden. This is the second time I’ve entered from this QTH and both times I’ve been surprised at what I can hear and work. I knew based on the Hepburn tropo forecast that there was a chance of slight ...