Propagation Prediction Websites

December 4, 2017 by akemmerer1

Is 20 meters open to the location of the latest DXPedition on the bands? When is 6 meters open for Sporadic E? Looking for a weak signal 2-meter contact with a specific grid square? There are websites you can visit that give you a prediction of whether the band you are on is open to a given destination.

HF Propagation

N0NBH Propagation Widget

The simplest HF propagation prediction is the widget that is seen on many Amateur Radio Websites – QRZ.com, DXSummit.fi, and more. This gives you a rough idea of what bands are open day and night. Data is based on the Sunspot Number, A and K indices and other indices. But this doesn’t take into account many factors like your location, the DX location, the characteristics of your station and the DX station. Just because 15m says Poor doesn’t mean you won’t hear anything on the band.

VOACAP – HF Propagation Prediction

VOACAP Point to Point Prediction

VOACAP, is the Voice of America Coverage Analysis Program, and provides detailed information about the HF propagation. You can choose transmitter and receiver locations from many cities around the world. It also provides choices of Antennas, Power, Mode, and more for each end of the contact. You can look at several different views of propagation. If you spend some time delving into the details of propagation visit this site.

VOACAP Prediction from DXSummit.fi

For a faster view of whether you will be able to contact a specific DX Station that is currently on the air, the DXSummit.fi spotting website has incorporated propagation predictions on their website. If you find a DX station spotted there that you contact, just right click on the DX callsign and select VOACAP from the drop-down. You just need to choose whether you are a Basic (100 watts and a Wire) or a Super station (Amplifier and Directional Antenna). You can also look at views of Short Path or Long Path. It will give you a good view of when you need to be on which band to contact the DX station.

6 Meters – The Magic Band

DXMaps – 6 meter openings

The best website that I have found for 6 meters is DXMaps.com . It provides a map view of the world or you can select a continent. Based on spotting network data, it shows 6 meter contacts and color codes them by Sporadic-E, Multihop ES, Meteor Scatter, etc… even Aurora. You can also get a view of 10 meters, 2 meters or 70 cm. If you sign up for a free account, you can subscribe to real time notifications when there is an opening near you.

2 Meter Propagation

VHF Propagation Map

Looking for a tropo opening for a weak signal 2-meter contact? Visit the website http://aprs.mountainlake.k12.mn.us/ to see a VHF Propagation map. This shows tropo openings as color-coded clouds – with brighter colors for the longer openings. This is based on APRS data.

These are the websites that I like to visit to understand the propagation forecast for the day. If your favorite site is not on the list, add a comment so that the rest of our readers and we can check it out.

Anita, AB1QB

DX Alarm Clock Part 2 – Hardware

November 28, 2017 by akemmerer1

The Raspberry Pi-based DX Alarm Clock

I recently wrote a blog article about the DX Alarm Clock software – here is Part 2 of the Series on how I built the hardware for the DX Alarm Clock.

DX Alarm Clock Hardware Components

The DX Alarm Clock is based on a Raspberry Pi 3 computer and an Adafruit Pi-TFT Touch Screen Display. The list of components, along with links, is below. Since I built the initial DX Alarm Clock almost a year ago and technology is always advancing, some of the parts are no longer available or have better replacements available. I’ll provide information on what I used and a recommended replacement. Approximate prices are included.

Raspberry Pi 3

Motherboard: Raspberry Pi 3 ($35) – includes a 1.2 GHz 64-bit quad-core ARM CPU, Built-in WiFi, Ethernet, 4 USB Ports, an HDMI port and audio port (3.5″), and Bluetooth.

Also, you will need a power adapter ($10) and a Class 10 Micro SD card ($15) for the Raspberry Pi. Ours is a SanDisk Ultra 64GB Micro SD Card.

Pi-TFT Touch Screen Display

Display: Adafruit Pi-TFT 2.8″ Display with Capacitive Touch Screen ($45). A slightly larger, 3.5″ display is now available.

PiBow Case for the Pi and Touch Screen Display

Case: Pimoroni PiBow Case for Raspberry Pi and Pi-TFT Display($20)

Kinivo Portable Speaker

Portable Speaker: Any small portable/rechargeable speaker will do. Mine is a Kinivo, but it is no longer available. Any small speaker will do as long as it is Bluetooth or has a 3.5″ stereo connector.

Raspberry Pi Development Environment

Pi Development Environment

After constructing the Raspberry Pi case and TFT Display, the next step was to connect it to a monitor via the HDMI port, a mouse via one of the USB ports, and a Bluetooth keyboard. Then I loaded the Raspbian Operating System onto the Pi via the micro SD card. I first copied the OS to the Micro SD card using a PC or Mac and then inserted the card into the Raspberry Pi and booted from it. You can find a good tutorial on how to do this at https://www.raspberrypi.org/learning/software-guide/quickstart/.

Once Raspbian is installed, you will have a windows GUI (Graphical User Interface) environment with a web browser and several additional applications included.

This gave me a development environment that I could use to build and test the DX Alarm Clock software. I used Python language to develop the software. I used the Python IDLE development environment, which is included in the Raspbian OS.

Interested in Raspberry Pi Amateur Radio Projects? See the article on a Raspberry Pi Satellite Rotator Interface.

Anita, AB1QB

Why Ham Radio?

February 20, 2017 by akemmerer1

Fred’s Truck with Antenna

Every so often, I drive Fred’s truck to work and people ask me what that big antenna on the back of the truck is for. I explain to them that it is for Ham Radio. But the reply is usually, why ham radio – isn’t that outdated technology? We have cell phones and IM, etc…what do we need Ham Radio for? So I thought I would put down my thoughts as a relatively new Ham about why I enjoy spending so much of my time with Ham Radio.

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Amateur Radio for Public Service

Public Service

The number one reason we still need Ham Radio along with all the other technology we now have is for public service. When there is a disaster and cell phones, television, etc are all not working, Ham Radio operators provide the critical communication.

Ham Radio operators help locally to keep hospitals and first responders in contact with each other to help those affected by the disaster.

Hams also use our ability to communicate around the world on HF bands to help family members around the world to get in touch with loved ones affected by a disaster.

Ham Radio operators have been on the scene helping in every disaster from the earthquakes in Nepal to the recent flooding in California.

Amateur Radio Cube Satellites

Technology and the Maker Movement

I only became a Ham 5 years ago but many of my fellow Ham Radio operators got their license when they were in their early teens and used what they learned to launch their careers. Many have had very successful careers in STEM fields, all launched by their interest in Ham Radio at a young age. As technology advances, so does the technology used in our hobby. We even have a nobel laureate, Joe Taylor K1JT who is a ham. Joe has developed weak signal digital communication modes that let us communicate by bouncing signals off the moon!

As technology has advanced, so has the use of it in Ham Radio. Most Ham Radio operators have one or more computers in their shack. Many also have a software designed radio (SDR), where much of the radio functionality is implemented using Software, we use sound cards to run digital modes, which are a lot like texting over the radio, and we use the internet extensively as part of operating. We can also make contacts through satellites orbiting the earth and even the International Space Station.

Most hams love do-it-yourself technical projects, including building a station, home brewing an antenna, building a radio or other station component. In my day job, I am a program manager for software development projects, but its been a while since I have built anything. As a Ham I taught myself how to code in Python and about the Raspberry Pi and I built the DX Alarm Clock.

QSL Card from VK6LC in Western Australia

International Camaraderie

One of the coolest things about being an amateur radio operator is that you can communicate with other hams all over the world. Ham Radio is an international community where we all have something in common to talk about – our stations and why we enjoy ham radio. The QSL card above is from a memorable QSO with Mal, VK6LC, from Western Australia, who was the last contact that I needed for a Worked All Zones award. I must have talked to him for 1/2 hour about his town in Australia and his pet kangaroos!

Amateur Radio Map of the World

Geography Lesson

I have learned much about geography from being on the air and trying to contact as many countries as I can. There are 339 DX Entities, which are countries or other geographical entities and I have learned where each one is in order to understand where propagation will allow me make a contact. I have learned a great deal about world geography. Through exchanging QSL cards often get to see photos from so many areas of the world.

DXCC Challenge Award Plaque

Achievement – DXing and Contesting

DXing and Contesting provide a sense of achievement and exciting opportunity for competition. Many Hams work toward operating awards. You can get an operating award for contacting all 50 states, contacting 100 or more countries, contacting Islands, cities in Japan, countries in Asia, or anything else you can imagine. Each of these operating awards provides a sense of accomplishment and helps to build skills. Contesting builds skills through competition among Hams to see who can make the most contacts with the most places in 24 or 48 hours. Contesting also improves our operating skills and teaches us to copy callsigns and additional data accurately.

Teaching a License Class

Teaching Licensing Classes – Passing it On

Recently I have joined a team of club members who teach license classes to others who want to get licensed or upgrade their existing Amateur Radio licenses. Teaching provides a way to improve my presentation skills and also helps me to really understand the material that we teach about Amateur Radio. It is always a thrill at the end of the class to see so many people earn their licenses or upgrades.

There are so many interesting aspects of Ham Radio which is what makes is such a great hobby. Getting your license can open up a world of possibilities. Upgrading to a new license class provides more opportunities to communicate over longer distances. Ham Radio clubs, including our local club, the Nashua Area Radio Club, provide many resources to help you get your first license, upgrade to a new license class and learn about the many aspects of our hobby.

Anita, AB1QB

The DX Alarm Clock – Part 1 Software

January 29, 2017 by akemmerer1

The Raspberry Pi-based DX Alarm Clock

I have been a Ham for 5 years and my favorite thing to do is chase DX. As a new Ham, it was always a thrill to work a new DXCC, but now that I have over 280 DXCCs and over 1000 band points, it is a little more difficult to find a new one. Add to that the fact that I am trying to get a DXCC in 80m and 160m., which are usually open when I am asleep. I created the DX Alarm Clock as a way to get notified that there is something new on the air when I am not down in the shack. This article will talk about how I developed the software for the DX Alarm Clock. Part 2 will talk about building the Raspberry Pi-based Hardware and loading the OS.

The DX Alarm Clock is a Python software program running on a Raspberry Pi that gathers data online about my log and what is on the spotting network and uses that data to alert me when there is a “new one” on the air.

DX Alarm Clock and Raspberry Pi Architecture

DX Alarm Clock Architecture

The ClubLog website provides a light DX Cluster website called DXLite, which has an XML Interface. The DX Alarm Clock uses this interface to get the current spots. The software uses the Developer API from ClubLog to get a JSON matrix of all DXCC entities by band indicating whether I have worked, confirmed, or verified each band-entity. The software loops through all of the spots returned by DXLite and looks each DXCC up in the JSON ClubLog matrix. I also use the QRZ.com XML Interface to get additional information for each callsign that is spotted, like the state.

DXCC Configuration Screen

The DX Alarm Clock uses tkinter/ttk for the GUI. I used the Notebook widget to create a multi-tab GUI. There is a tab for configuring filters for DX Entity. The user can choose all New DXCCs, as well as specific bands and nodes to provide alerts for.

WAS Configuration Screen

There is another tab for configuring filters for WAS. ClubLog has no log look-up capability based on US State so the WAS filter lets you create a list of States and associated bands to provide alerts for.

Notification Configuration Screen

The Notification tab allows the configuration of what notifications the user would like to receive. The user can specify a separate email address for New DXCCs, New Band Points, and New US States. This allows alerts to be sent to email accounts or as SMS texts. You can also configure the sounds the DX Alarm Clock itself makes to “wake you up” when that ATNO or new Band Point is spotted.

The DXAlarm clock wakes up every 5 minutes and gets the latest spots from the DXLite Cluster. It checks each spot against the ClubLog log and if there is a match based on the configured filters, it sounds the alert, and then speaks the alarm, giving you the Callsign, DXCC Entity, Band, and Mode. A simple text-to-speech package called flite (festival-lite) was used to implement the speech on the Raspberry Pi.

Alert Screen

It also puts a message with these details and the Frequency, UTC Date/Time, Spotter, and Comment on the display.

Text Notification to iPhone

Additionally, it sends this information as an email to the configured email address, which results in a text or email.

Apple Watch Alert

I can even get the alert on my Apple Watch.

Filtered Spots Display

Once all spots are processed, it keeps a running list of all spots that resulted in alerts on the main screen. Spots are aged out if they do not recur over time.

DX Alarm Clock Hardware

The DX Alarm Clock just alerted me that ZC4SB is on 20m – that’s an ATNO! Got to go down to the shack and work him! Stay tuned for Part 2 of this post on the DXAlarm Clock Raspberry Pi-based hardware and on setting up the Raspberry Pi OS.

Anita, AB1QB

Thanksgiving Weekend NPOTA Fun

November 27, 2016 by akemmerer1

Fred, AB1OC, Operating Mobile in Minuteman National Historical Park NPOTA, HP27

With only 1 month to go in the ARRL NPOTA event and some free time this Thanksgiving weekend, Fred and I decided to hit the road with our Mobile HF Station to activate some new parks. We activated two nearby parks, each less than 1 hour away from our home, Lamprey Wild and Scenic River, WR23, near Epping, NH, and Minuteman National Historical Park, HP27, near Concord, MA. There were close to 900K QSOs made overall in the NPOTA program as of Thanksgiving day and we also wanted to help the cause to get to 1 Million NPOTA QSOs by year’s end.

Map of Lamprey Wild and Scenic River

On Saturday, we drove to Epping, NH, where we activated Lamprey Wild and Scenic River. It was a rainy day, but we still enjoyed the scenic drive along the river. We drove along the river until we found a place by the river to park and operate. The bands were not great, with a K-index of 4 and a high A-index. Despite the conditions, our activation was a success. We operated on both 20m and 40m SSB and made a total of 307 QSOs over 3 hours.

View of Countryside in Minute Man National Historical Park

I work in Burlington, MA, and often travel between Burlington and Waltham, MA for meetings. Each time I passed by Lexington on I-95 I saw the sign for Minute Man NHP and thought it would be fun to do an NPOTA activation from there. We activated the park on Saturday. We entered the park from the Concord, MA end and were pleasantly surprised to see some nice countryside in the middle of a suburban area of Massachusetts, not far from Boston.

AB1QB logging for AB1OC/M during the NPOTA activation.

We operated from a parking lot in the park from mid-afternoon until dark. The bands were a little better on Saturday and we were able to get 239 contacts into the log, mostly the US but also worked stations from Spain, Jamaica, Aruba, and Puerto Rico.

We have enjoyed activating 8 National Parks so far in the NPOTA event. We are planning another activation between Christmas and New Year of multiple parks before the end of the event on December 31.

Anita, AB1QB

NPOTA Fun – Activating a New Park

August 31, 2016 by akemmerer1

Eastern Branch of the Penobscot River in Katahdin Woods and Waters NM

Ever since we built our Mobile HF Station, we’ve talked about taking it to Acadia National Park in Maine and operating from the top of Cadillac Mountain. The 2016 ARRL NPOTA event gave us the motivation to plan the trip for the week before Labor Day. The week before our trip, we saw an article in the ARRL Letter encouraging operation from the newly declared National Monument, Katadhin Woods and Waters in Maine, which had just been designated as NPOTA MN84. Visiting the NPS website, we learned that the park is only a 2 1/2 hour drive from Bar Harbor, where we are staying. We decided to accept the challenge to be the first to activate the new park.

Our F150 Mobile Station at the entrance to Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument

Tuesday, August 30 was our first full day of vacation, we left our hotel room and parked by the Acadia visitor center and called “CQ National Parks”. We ended up with 76 contacts in the log from NP01.

After that we got on the road and headed toward Katadhin Woods and Waters, activating counties along the way including the county line between Penobscot and Aroostook Counties.

NPS Map of the Park

As a newly designated National Monument, Katadhin Woods and Waters does not yet have a visitors center or any signs showing you when you enter and exit the park. We just had the map (above) to determine where the park boundaries were. All of the roads in black on the map are gravel roads that are also used for logging trucks.

Entrance to Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument

We entered the park from Swift Brook Road off Rt 11 in the lower right corner of the map. We drove through the lower section by the entrance and then headed north along the Eastern Branch of the Penobscot River and operated near the Loos camping area. The sign above confirmed that we were within the park’s boundaries.

Scenic View of Katahdin Woods and Waters NM

The scenery along the river was beautiful with views of the mountains in the distance.

Operating at MN84

We started operating on 20m and the pileups were huge! Everyone was excited to get this new NPOTA into the log. Fred, AB1OC/M ended up going split on 20m due to the size of the pileups. After a while, he moved to 40m to give the close-in folks a chance at MN84. We went back and further between 20m and 40m until the pileups thinned out. We also made 18 QSOs with the club callsign N1FD to also give the club credit for the activation. We really enjoyed activating the park and the people we talked to were great! We made a total of 350 QSOs from MN84.

Friendly Sign at Katahdin Woods and Waters NM

We also plan to activate Acadia National Park NP01 again from Cadillac Mountain this week. We will also activate Saint Croix Island, HS01, and Roosevelt Campbello International Park, AA21 in Canada (as AB1OC/VE9 and AB1QB/VE9).

Activating MN84 for the first time was truly a memorable experience. We enjoyed it so much that we will be back on Saturday to give more NPOTA chasers a chance at MN84! Hope to talk to you on the air!

73,

Anita, AB1QB

Dayton Hamvention 2016

June 1, 2016 by akemmerer1

Anita Preseting in Contest Forum Fred, AB1OC, and I just returned from the 2016 Hamvention in Dayton, OH.

Our first day in Dayton was spent at Contest University – this was our 5th year in attendance but each year we learn more from the contesting experts. This year, we attended two presentations from Frank Donovan, W3LPL on operating techniques for the declining solar cycle and on 80m and 160m antennas. We also heard a talk from Val NV9L from Ham Nation on Log Analysis tools and another session on SO2R (Single Operator 2 Radio) Operating.

Slide from W3LPL Contest University Presentation

Friday was the first day of the Hamvention, and we spent most of the day visiting all of the vendor exhibits. We visited the Icom booth and looked at the new Icom 7851. It has an incredible display as well as one of the best receivers on the market.

Icom IC-7851 Display on a Large Screen TV

We also saw the new KX2 Transceiver at the Elecraft booth. It is even smaller than the KX3 and is perfect for SOTA and other portable operations. I would expect to hear some NPOTA activations using this radio.

Elecraft Kx2 on the Right, next to a KX3

Friday evening was the Top Band dinner, where we learned all about “Top Band Disease” from Larry “Tree” Tyree N6TR. Hams with this disease are nocturnal, and love the bottom of the sunspot cycle. They are constantly improving their 160m antennas – when you upgrade your receive antenna, there are people who can’t hear you, so you need to improve your transmit antenna – and the cycle continues…

2016 ARRL Rookie Roundup SSB

May 31, 2016 by akemmerer1

ARRL Rookie Roundup Ops

A team of newly licensed members of our club, the Nashua Area Radio Club, came together to enter the 2016 ARRL Rookie Round SSB Contest, using our club callsign, N1FD. We held a training session at our QTH the weekend before the contest to allow our operators to learn about contesting and to become familiar with our station. We put together a training package to introduce the operator team to contesting in general and to the ARRL Rookie Roundup. You can view the training package here..

Station Setup for the Contest

We entered the ARRL Rookie Roundup in the Multi-Op, Single Transmitter category using the club’s N1FD call sign. This gave everyone a chance to operate in the contest and contribute to the team’s final score. Fred, AB1OC spent some time setting up and checking out our station ahead of time. Our operators used the N1MM+ logger and operated using 100w of power on the 20m and 40m bands.

We had a total of 13 Nashua Area Radio Club members who attended the preparation session and/or operated in the contest. Folks worked as teams during the contest with one person operating while another person logged. Our operators had nice pileups to work for a good portion of the contest. All of our Operators did really well.

As you can see from the video above, we definitely have some future contest stars in our club!

2016 RR SSB Score

The table above shows the results of our operations during the 6-hour contest period. Our team did really well! Of particular note is that they were able to work 45 of the 70 available multipliers. It will take some time for the ARRL to put together the results for everyone in the contest but we believe that our team did very well.

Abby and her Dad Jamey Operating in the ARRL Rookie Roundup SSB

The results are in and N1FD took first place in the recent ARRL Rookie Roundup SSB in the Multi-op Category. The N1FD team was also #1 in area one and #5 overall in the contest. Congratulations to all of our operators – they did a great job operating in the contest. You can find all of the scores for the contest here.

2016-ARRL-RR-N1FD

We are planning to host recently licensed club members again for the ARRL Rookie Roundup RTTY and the ARRL Rookie Roundup CW contests later this year. We hope to see many of our operators back again for these contests.

Do you have a contest station? If so, we’d like to encourage you to host and Elmer some new hams and challenge us in the ARRL Rookie Roundup RTTY on August 21.

Anita, AB1QB

2013 Contest University At The Dayton Hamvention

May 26, 2013 by akemmerer1

Contest University Session

One of our favorite things to do at the Dayton Hamvention is to attend Contest University. Fred (AB1OC) and Anita (AB1QB) attended Contest University for the first time in 2012 and found this to be a great learning experience about Amateur Radio in general and Contesting specifically. The instructors are the same people who consistently place highest in contests. They share their knowledge with the rest of us at Contest University.

Here are some of the sessions that I attended at Contest University 2013:

Radio Sport Contesting, It’s More Than Rules – K5GN – The message from this presentation is that with contesting, everyone is under the honor system – there is no referee in your shack making sure that you follow the rules. Technology has brought even more innovative ways to cheat than in the past. But the best contesters do not cheat – your time is better spent learning to improve your skills.
Tips on Being a Better Single Operator – K5ZD – Randy Thompson is the director of the CQ WW contest and is an excellent speaker. In this presentation, he shares many tips on improving your contesting skills based on his experience contesting and analyzing logs. I would highly recommend this presentation, which can be viewed from Icom’s YouTube Channel at http://www.youtube.com/IcomAmericaInc. Some items that I learned are:

1. Automate as much as you can – band changes from your software, rotator control, PTT output to the radios, etc. It is possible to set up your station so that you can click on a spot and your rotor will turn your antenna, your radio will tune, and the entry window of your logger will open with the callsign filled in.
2. Station layout is important – make it easy to reach the items you go to most and difficult to reach the ones that you should not (eg. don’t accidentally switch antennas while transmitting)
3. Have a strategy – look at your past logs and the logs of your peers (Logs are public for some contests, like the CQ WW contest).
4. Understand the rules and use this information to determine when to change bands, when to run, when to hunt for multipliers
5. Get your station ready 1 week before the contest and get a good night’s sleep the night before.
6. There is a real-time score reporting website – cqcontest.ru – See below for an example showing AB1OC’s score midway through the CQ WPX CW contest.
7. Don’t give up if it’s not going well – keep pushing – the next QSO could make the difference.

AB1OC CQ WPX CW Real Time Score Display

Setting Up for RTTY Contesting/Operating a RTTY Contest – W0YK – The presenter, Ed Muns, operates as P49X from Aruba in the major RTTY contests and consistently has stop scores. I attended this talk last year, but with some RTTY contests under my belt, I was able to get much more out of the presentation this year. He provides alot of good technical information about how RTTY works, how to set up RTTY, comparisons of hardware and software for RTTY, and what the various program options do. Some learnings:

1. Using multiple decoders for a given signal helps to get a good copy on at least one. The new 2Tone decoder from G3YYD can decode signals under some conditions where other decoders (MMTTY, etc.) cannot. This avoids asking for repeats and increases your QSO rate.
2. Using Super Check Partial, a database of active contester callsigns, can also help to accurately pick out call signs
3. Callsign stacking – waiting for 2-3 callsigns after calling CQ and then working them in sequence can speed up your QSO rate.
4. RTTY is easier than other modes, since the callsign is already decoded for you on your screen. Take advantage of this to multi-task to increase your rate. Use Single Operator Two VFO (SO2V) to find stations via search and pounce while running. Or do search and pounce on one VFO and while you are waiting for your chance to respond to a CQ, look for another station on the other VFO. If you have 2 radios, and are good at multi-tasking – use SO2R to increase your QSO rate even more. This is how the best RTTY contesters win.

Post-Contest Log Analyzers – K6MM – As mentioned by K5ZD in his talk, analyzing your contest log (or your peers’ logs) is a good way to improve your score in the next contest. This presentation was about several software packages that can help you to do this. The most full featured of these is SH5 , which provides 50 different reports on your log. Some of the reports include QSO rates per hour, number of hours operated, QSO break down by band, and number of countries worked. It even provides a Google map plot of the QSOs that you worked! I ran SH5 on my log from the 2013 BARTG HF RTTY contest and a couple of reports are shown below.

AB1QB QSOs from 2012 BARTG HF RTTY Contest – from SH5 generated KML file

AB1QB QSOs Per Hour 2013 BARTG HF RTTY Contest – From SH5

Some other topics presented at Contest University included Contest Antennas and Coaxial Cables, Propagation Trends, RFI and Ham Radio, VHF Contesting, Design and Maintenance of Antennas, Towers and Rotators. There is so much good information, I wish I could have attended multiple sessions at once!

We also attended the RTTY contesting forum at the Dayton Hamvention where we learned about the Reverse Beacon Network and CW Skimmer . These tools are beginning to be available for RTTY. The CW Skimmer works with participating stations running software that decodes and collects information from received CW traffic. That data is collected by the Reverse Beacon Network website and displayed like spots from a spotting network.

AB1OC Spots On Reverse Beacon Network (CW Skimmer)

Next year, Contest University will be held around the ARRL Centennial which will be held July 17-20, 2014 in Hartford, Connecticut, USA. Contest University has also been held in Germany, Italy, and Australia.

Several of the contest university sessions were recorded and can be found on Icom’s YouTube Site: http://www.youtube.com/IcomAmericaInc. The Hamvention RTTY Contesting Slides and Videos can be found at W0YK’s website.

There is also some good contesting information at http://www.rttycontesting.com and the CQ-Contest and RTTY email mailing lists at contesting.com.

– Anita (AB1QB)

Our HAM Station

Notes on the construction and operation of a multi-op Amateur Radio Station

Author Archives: akemmerer1

Propagation Prediction Websites

HF Propagation

VOACAP – HF Propagation Prediction

6 Meters – The Magic Band

2 Meter Propagation

DX Alarm Clock Part 2 – Hardware

DX Alarm Clock Hardware Components

Raspberry Pi Development Environment

Why Ham Radio?

Public Service

Technology and the Maker Movement

International Camaraderie

Geography Lesson

Achievement – DXing and Contesting

Teaching Licensing Classes – Passing it On

The DX Alarm Clock – Part 1 Software

Thanksgiving Weekend NPOTA Fun

NPOTA Fun – Activating a New Park

Dayton Hamvention 2016

2016 ARRL Rookie Roundup SSB

2013 Contest University At The Dayton Hamvention

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