Category: HF

Working JA via long path grey-line propagation on 17m.

I’ve never been one for morning TV but quite often, before I go to work in the morning, I’ll switch the wireless on and work a few stations using FT8. This morning I tuned to 17m, pointed the aerial towards Europe and started calling CQ. It took a few shouts before an EA4 (thanks Antonio) […]

100 QSOs to work 100 DXCC entities

On the 1st January 2025, I renamed my wsjtx_log.adi file and told JT-Bridge to only show me QSOs from 2025, effectively meaning that every station I heard using WSJT-X was flagged as new. After I’d made a few QSOs, I wondered how long it would take to work 100 DXCC entities. After I’d been operating […]

200 DXCC entities worked on 17m FT8

In 2017 I set myself a little mini challenge to work 100 DXCC entities on 17m FT8 and when I started, I described FT8 as a new mode. In 2017 it really was a new mode and I wonder who could have predicted back then how big it would become. I reached 100 entities in […]

A tip for adjusting the Pwr slider in WSJT-X

I’ve been using WSJT-X for a very long time, since it was called JT65-HF and one thing I’ve always found a little tricky was making fine adjustments to the Pwr control slider. I often want to make small adjustments and I’ve found that clicking on the slider itself can cause much larger adjustments than required. […]

New RTTY contest – Friday 4th October 2024

I have been emailed details of a new RTTY contest which will run for the first time this year on Friday 4th October 2024. It’s scheduled for the first Friday of October each year going forward. It’s called the URC DX RTTY Contest and the rules are pretty standard in that everyone works everyone. The […]

That’s N5J in the log for DXCC #304

Anyone who chases DX can’t fail to have noticed that the Jarvis Island DXpedition is now on air and has been for less than 48 hours. I did have a listen yesterday but didn’t hear them anywhere. I set up HamAlert notifications specifically for N5J with the source set as G, GM and GW in […]

How to set up a HamClock for your shack

Note: this entire process was tested and re-validated on the 2nd January 2025 using a Raspberry Pi Zero 2W, the ‘recommended’ version of Raspberry Pi OS and HamClock 4.12. I appreciate that the last post here was about the HamClock and I said I wouldn’t be providing a guide to building one but I’ve been […]

HamClock

For some years I’d been aware of HamClock and around April last year I decided to investigate further and built one using an old Raspberry Pi 3B that I had spare.If you’ve never heard of HamClock, it’s described on the authors page thus: “HamClock is a kiosk-style application that provides real time space weather, radio […]

I’ve worked 300 DXCC entities

It’s been a while since I posted any updates here, not because I’ve got nothing to say but because I’ve been busy working on the station and playing radio. My new aerial is up but I’m not going to say anything about that now, that’s for a future update. I’ve had a good year so […]

A sked with the Falkland Islands

VP8 isn’t especially rare in amateur radio terms, it’s currently number 206 in the ClubLog list of most wanted DXCC entities but although I’ve worked it on SSB and various data modes, I’d not managed a CW QSO until recently. I made a post on the Chiltern DX Club reflector which mentioned it, and shortly […]