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Sunday wasn’t over after the last report. Instead of editing my last post a third time, I decided to save it for this post. I noticed LA5UF spotting KP4EIT on SSB, but I was too late. A few hours later, the band suddenly opened to northern OH. I heard and worked OH8UV and OH7HXH. Finally I managed to get OH7HXH in KP53. We have tried several times, but just not had any luck. Several of the northern beacons appeared one after another. JW5SIX, JW7SIX, JW9SIX, LA7SIX and OH9SIX were all in time to time. LA5TFA/p was heard from KP09. I have worked him before, so I didn’t bother to call. I noticed OH9VC from KP16 was on, but I didn’t hear him here. SM200PAX suddenly came in with a good signal. The distance is about 600km, quite short for auroral-es, but he gave me a new square with KP03.

When I came home from work on Monday, 6M was active with aurora. I got on quickly and the first station was SM200PAX, this time on aurora. A few minutes later, I worked LA3ANA in JP53 for a new square. I also worked several OH and SM stations and also one ES station called me. I tried to get LA7DFA in JP33 in the log, but he didn’t have aurora at the time he was qrv.

Wednesday morning I noticed aurora when I woke up. LA7DFA was cq’ing and this time I got him. I’ve been hunting JP33 for a long time. The signals this morning was very strong. I called cq and got called be several OH stations. One was OH7UE in KP52, which was a new grid. This brings my total grids on 6M to 566. The aurora was still active when I had to live for work. When I got home, Mick W1JJ was running on eme. When the moon got down to about 15 degrees, I called him. After a few passes I noticed he called me back, and the qso was quickly finished after that. Mick was quite strong with -16. That was my second eme qso with the 6m7jhv yagi.

On Monday, I uploaded my log to LoTW. I got K8MFO, ZC4LI and JM1KNQ confirmed, all worked during the weekend. Later JA5BGA uploaded his log too. All qsoes on 6M. Keep the confirmations coming!

Soundclips:

• 6M CW aurora July 20th – SM200PAX, SM2A, OH3SR, LA3ANA, OH7PI
• 6M CW aurora July 22nd – LA7DFA, OH7RJ

Good 6M openings has been missing lately. Most of the expeditions are qrt and I only managed 8R1DB of those who were on expedition. I had a miss with 3A2MD on the 8th of July. I heard Laura and called her, but she faded out. 3A seems to be a tough one to get. I did work one new grid with EA1KY in IN71.

On Friday after work, I noticed EU working lots of USA again. I turned the yagi and checked. The noise was gone but no signals. After listening for a while, suddenly WZ8D popped up. I gave him a call and logged him quickly. Nothing else was heard, so I decided to give a few calls. K8MFO answered my cq, and that was it. Nobody else. WZ8D was still in and stayed in for a few hours. I checked the band again later that evening, and suddenly heard AC4TO, so I gave him a call. I once again tried a few cq’s and were answered by K4MM. After the qso, I continued to call with no luck. I must say this opening was quite spotty.

Saturday didn’t produce any dx at all. I heard some europeans, but nothing I bothered to call. Later in the evening, I noticed Lance W7GJ was working EME. I checked my moon and it was setting, so I turned the yagi and started listening. I had some traces at around 13 degrees, but no decode. At around 7 degrees I got a cq from Lance. I started calling, but no traces until about 26 minutes later. I got the report from Lance and we quickly finished. After our qso, I had several good traces from Lance, and he peaked -15. I had his signal in until the moon went down behind a hill at around 2.5 degrees. Finally I got to test my 6m7jhv for eme work. As it turns out, GM4WJA got my signals via the moon as well. He uses a 7 element yagi, so it seems that I may be able to work single yagi stations via the moon. What an exciting evening. 

When I got up on Sunday, I noticed ZC4LI spotted. I connected the gear and started listening. I heard CN and EA, but no ZC4. I parked the radio on ZC4LI’s qrg and started writing this post. Suddenly he came out of nowhere. After a few calls, I got him for a new one. That makes #118 on 6M. Finally I have ZC4 in the log. I have several 5B4’s, but ZC4 has been quite difficult. Signals were up and down a lot, but he peaked S9 here.

I thought that was it today, but I had to edit this post for the second time 🙂 I heard F8DBF calling for JA’s. I couldn’t hear anything. Luckily my noise was gone today and I turned the yagi. No JA’s were heard, but since the path from F to JA are over my head, I went to 50104 and called cq dx. I called for a few minutes then suddenly JI2EVL showed up. My heart was pounding quite fast when the first JA was logged. I’ve never worked JA until today. That makes #119 on 6M. Several other stations followed and total number of JA’s worked was 23. The opening seemed to last around 40 minutes and I worked 8 JA grids. Earlier this week, I almost thought the 6M season was over. This weekend surely proved otherwise.

Soundclips:

• 3A2MD 6M CW – I heard the cq, called, then gone
• K4MM 6M CW – Weak but workable
• WZ8D 6M CW – Spotlight propagation
• ZC4LI 6M CW – #118 on 6M
• JI2EVL 6M CW – My 1st JA on 6M, #119 on 6M

KB6NU posted a story from this years field day on his blog. I read the story some time last week, and I found it quite touching. The story is about Stuart making his first radio contact. Stuart is a young boy 13 years of age who get’s his first shot at a contact on a field day. This boy learned the morsecode on his own and have been listening to ham radio operators on his handheld scanner for several years. His mother brought him along to the field day so he finally could meet some hams and see them operate radio. It turns out his morsecode is so good he manages several CW  contacts on his own with very little guidance.

Go here to read the story for yourself. 

I have been thinking about visiting LA8YB for several years now. We have always been talking about it on the Nordic VHF meetings. This year I decided that now is the time. After meeting Finn at Knottebo, we found a date in July. I asked several friends if they wanted to join us. When the day arrived, we were 8 people ready to visit this big station. Participants were LA1QCA, LA6LCA, LA8AJA, LA8AV, LA8HGA, LA9DM, LA9FLA and LB8IB.

The station lies at Finn’s cabin, in the middle of nowhere. There are no regular roads going there, so we parked on a sideroad. We walked for about 15 minutes till we reached the cabin. The antennas can’t be seen until you reach the cabin. As the antennas emerged, we just stood there and gazed. The one thing that came to my mind was; how did he manage to get everything here and build it up? The giant 2M antennas consists of 32 17 element 2M5WL antennas stacked together providing a theoretically gain around 29.5dBd. The losses in the system are only 0.5dB and the feed coax to the entire system is thicker than my arm. This 2M EME array is one of the worlds biggest.

Finn started this project back in 1986, when he bought the cabin. Transporting the material to the cabin, was done with a little tractor. He took a break for a few years around 2000, where he mostly worked 160M. The system was finished a couple of years ago and Finn can hear his own echo with as little as 10W. If you think Finn only works on 2M, you are wrong. About 100M away, he has a tower with a TH6 antenna up at 22M. He also has 3 inv-l antennas for 160M and beverage listening antennas. 

On the wall in his shack he has 2M diplomas for WAC (Worked all Continents) and WAS (Worked all States). Finn currently has about 85 countries worked on 2M. Working new countries are slow with only 6 new ones the last 2 years. We also asked him if he was thinking about going digital, but the answer was no. "I don’t need to go digital when I can work them on CW with my setup".

A lot of pictures were taken, but getting a good shot of the antennas aren’t easy. You can’t get far enough away to get a good shot. The forest is too close to the antennas. I have uploaded all the pictures I have. They can be seen here. As I get pictures from the others who joined, I will upload them as well.

A big thank you goes out to Finn for his hospitality. Oh, almost forgot, Finn had his 80th birthday last weekend, so we gave him a big cognac bottle as a birthday gift. Happy birthday Finn!

6M hasn’t given me much dx lately. Last Tuesday, I worked ON4IQ on tropo. Johan has 4 x 9 element yagies, and is easy to work from here. I tried with PA0RDY, but Rob was too weak, and had some MS enhancements on his signal. Greg SP3RNZ asked if we could try, and he was also easily worked. The propagation was probably tropo. Last Thursday, the band opened to TZ6EI. I started hearing him around 16Z. I was in and out of the pile-up, but never had the chance to get him in the log. I know a few LA’s did. I’m glad I got TZ back in ’99. The opening lasted around 2 hours here. The only thing I did work, was CT3FQ. On Friday, I heard TZ6EI for 2 minutes. I called, and he came back, but he faded out, and I never heard him again. Nothing was worked this weekend. On Monday, the band came to life a little bit, but not too much exotic. José EA7KW had a strong signal here, so I gave him a quick call. Costas SV1DH in KM27 was worked for a new grid. He had a very nice signal into LA. EB1LA/P gave me a new grid with IN63. I gave EA1YV a new grid on 6M. He asked on ON4KST chat if we could have a go, since the band was open to Scandinavia. And the last qso on Monday was IT9PKO in JM76.

On LoTW I got WP2B confirmed for a new one on 6M, thanks Brad.

Soundclips:

• TZ6EI IK62 6M CW
• CT3FQ IM12 6M SSB