PA0O ham radio

After being in Germany for QRL during some weeks. In Schladen in the Hartz area. Last week we stayed in the small beautiful middle-age city Hornburg close to the former Ostgrenze.  Not far from the Brocken 1050m.  I can recommend this pension *** http://www.reinhards-pension.de/    nice place quiet, wlan free. Now finally some time for finishing this. When away i let WSPR running remote i can control it even from the HTC phone but I could not switch to 160m The K3 has ANT1 and ANT2  + some RX TX ports It can handle 2 antenna/bands in WSPR  ANT 1 is connected to 6M 7eleLFA or  160m vertical  through a   manual switch. ANT2 was connected to the 80M  vertical. To be able to switch more antenna's  I made a relay controlled ANT switch. A small professionally made chromium-plated brass box was resting in my junk-box for years. ...

This is partly radio related.. Crash after short fire.  15 Juli 2011 Smilde Tower   An unbelievable crash  Friday 15 July. Same time the 2nd other highest TV Tower had a fire emergency and had to be switched off some time. Almost all Radio services in the northern part of the country where shut down. The  MW transmitter at 747kHz  was suddenly the only way left to transmit Radio1. The emergency radio where citizens have to tune in when a disaster happens..  The level of our emergency  system is perfect demonstrated (in Dutch) by our comedian Freek de Jonge. rampen instructies The MW  had to be powered up again and  I could listen again while travelling in Germany the next week. Once upon a time travelling by car in EU one could receive this MW very good at night. At this almost 300m high  TV tower in Smilde no one is 100% responsible for operating this radio tower.  Our public services for Energy communication hea...

CQ World Wide VHF Contest Lot of activity   this afternoon. Band open to east  and  EA  EA8  CT3 Later in the evening we also could  hear 9Y4D and 9Y4VU then again PV8ABC FJ92  came in  also PV8AZ  PV8AX all FJ92 PV8ABC still did not hear much .    Strange  again only those 3  in FJ92 where heard and only  9Y4D and VU  for long time  2 hours . Strange band 6m... FJ92 is deep inland  why no spots of PZ  or FY? I remember the dxpedition to 8R  few years ago  they where heard every day.  Close to the seashore they where that was the explanation of their extreme good signals.    

In west and south PA JO22 weather emergency warnings  In Groningen JO33 no wind,  nice temperature  no rain all day We had very pleasant quiet evening. Same time in SW Netherlands flights where canceled and streets flooded. Just 200km away. 1 evening 5 decodes by VK7DIK 1 by VK2XN  next day zero.. And yesterday again no dx decode during greyline peak ~19-20UTC at 80m although  my neighboring ham had a decode earlier  2011-07-14 20:14   PA0HCK   3.594029   -27   0   JO33ld   5   VK2XN   QF59ar   16105 But much later  at 22:02   the latest decode I have seen. 2011-07-14 22:02   PA0O   3.594141   -25   0   JO33hg   5   VK7DIK   QE28sf   16731   84 some  propagation disturbance must have been there that recovered later i guess...

50.180 MHz yesterday evening om Apollo SV2ASP/A  was active S5 -6 max  deep fading. He hears well. New for me. many strong Balkan signals    EA/EA8/CT SV Also heard  EA8MT A92IO    50.034 D4C  HM76MV 50.034 CS3BSM IM12OR  G3USF beacon list entry differs in call and freq 50035 CS3BSM Santo de Sierra IM12OR 40 Horizontal A1 24 0711 50034 D44C HM76MV 40 Vertical Omni A1

After the short and last weeks only? opening here Friday afternoon and evening. the band returned to default noise. Only sometimes SV CT beacons where in. Not even  decoded by VK7DIK last night on 80m Crisis! 6m WSPR running all day not a single decode or trace. WSPRnet.org  is offline tonight for unknown reasons again.  The bands are abandoned everyone is camping in France ? Still could not use the Versa tower.  cable's are rolled out to the other end of the barn. The obstructing tree is trimmed. All is prepared  but the top rotor section can not be found to test the cable. The 6m season is going to an end soon  as far as it was ever present .. The only  usable opening to BA4SI   was missed..  XV1X  not heard TJ not heard here J88ARC only the beacon. Just a few interesting DX locations active WSPR 6m   T61AA  4X4 OD5 CN8LI  KP4 WA1. Noone in CT2 CT3 EA8 D4 PJ     most om's prefer QRT instead ...

Just arrived home for the weekend from Germany again  like last Friday  found 6m open.. First signal heard was N3DB at 50.107   Good signal heard 1 hour   and later the evening W3LPL called   both worked before Then heard NW0W at .093   good signal from EM47 best dx heard    some time good signal  easy to QSO Then the band shifted back to South - east EU again. It is easier for W to work 1000-2000 km more as long it is in the south like SV9  NW0W 2011-07-08 15:06:01 6M CW 50.09300 already confirmed  1 hour later  WSPR was on when in DL Still  decoded by VK7DIK  regularly on 80m greyline. 160m was by mistake switched to the dummy load  that is still a bit worse than the real antenna nowadays. I need to have  a  remote antenna switch   to be able to switch between  6m and 160/80