Today I received CQ-QSO, the UBA's bimonthly magazine. I was shocked to read the obituaries and see ON6CW listed SK. I wasn't close with Rene but being CW addicts our signals often crossed on the air. With familiar callsigns we met a few times on local ham fairs. He seemed a very kind person and his verbal passion for ham radio and CW were reflected in his on air activities. I checked my log and ON6CW shows up 24 times - all CW.

Here's the obituary on his club's website: http://www.on6ll.be/ON6CW/skon6cw.htm

Here's a profile (in French): http://www.on5cft.be/CFT-E/pages/reportages.htm

ON6CW DE ON5ZO 73 ES RIP DR OM ...-.-

Another one in the books, my 8th already. I've come a long way since getting my HF license late 2000. Flash back... My "contesting elmer" ON5YR pushed me to participate in 2001. I knew I wasn't ready for that since I didn't make much CW contacts in those 3 months on the air. But I didn't want to disappoint him. Read: I wanted him to stop whining and I could only shut him up by entering the contest.   ;o)

That day I started CQing on 20m. You might wonder why I started running being wet behind the ears in CW and contesting. ON5YR convinced me to run because that way I called the shots. That is: set the the QRS speed. And if a QRQ hotshot called me I only needed to send 'PSE QRS'. So much for the theory. I remember being called by HA and UA9 at what seemed like WARP 6 speeds. That is my cruise control CW speed today but it was way too fast back then. Asking to QRS only made them QSY. I quit after half an hour with 8 QSO in the log. I felt stupid and I didn't want to give up CW so the disaster that day pushed me to become a good CW op. I'm not saying I'm "good" now but I can hold my own.

Fast forward to this weekend. Again stakes were high because I won 12h HP last year and I'd like to get the plaque this year too. I left the setup part for Saturday. I've had it now with cranking up towers, putting up low band verticals, lay out coax'es for 2nd antennas etc. I'm condemned to that but wouldn't it be nice to enter the shack right before the contest, flip the switch and start running? I am very happy to have a QTH where I can build this temporary setup. But sometimes it's so exhausting. Each time I wonder what will go wrong. Broken cables, crippled elements, wires entangled in trees... Last summer my 80m vertical fell over right in the meadow next to the garden - 15 minutes before the start of EUHFC! I pushed a section too far and... timber!

I had the figure of 950 QSO in my mind but I looked it up. That was in 2006 when I did 24h HP (and won). Last year I did 12h HP and made 870 QSO. The difference between 950 QSO in 24h and 870 QSO in 12h is pretty obvious so why do 24h when there are too many slow hours and you end up in bed or on the couch anyway? This year I made 827 QSO with about 10 mults less and claimed score 258k.

Biggest disappointment is 15m AGAIN. Last year 98 QSO and 19 mults, this year only 52 QSO and 11 multipliers. I tried moving a couple of strong guys from 20m to 15m but it almost never worked. No UR on 15m either. Go figure! I moved VE2FK and I was glad I had the multiplier. K3ZO and N3AM called in too on 15m Saturday afternoon with the beam to UA. I turned the yagi to NA but I didn't work a single guy. Weird propagation. YD1JZ was pretty loud on 15m though. Moved two locals to 10m for the ON DXCC multiplier. That's it. I didn't even try a PA, DL or F to move to 10m. Come on Sun, you've been hibernating long enough now! I was glad to work 1 ZL on 20, a VK on 40 and a PY on 80m. I should have asked the PY to go to 40m but I figured I was going to work one anyway. Turned out I didn't. Pretty good participation on 80m from USA too. JA only a handful on 20m.

I REALLY should stop promising beers to guys that work me. Local friend ON4BHQ is getting his feet wet in CW after much pushing and whining from my side (that rounds the circle, see first paragraph). I promised him a beer when we worked on 5 bands. Guess what? Cheers OM!

And saving the worst for last. Usage of the DX spotting network in ON is controversial but I've had it with some guys spotting themselves over and over again. Here is an example. FYI: ON4ZD = OS0S. I have absolutely nothing against this fellow ham but I wonder why he does this over and over again? Doesn't it make you look like a fool?

ON4ZD     14222.0 OS0S        UBA contest                   1029 27 Jan 2008

ON4ZD      7047.0 OS0S        WPX RTTY                      1036 10 Feb 2008

ON4ZD      7037.5 OS0S        WPX RTTY                      2001 10 Feb 2008

ON4ZD     21017.0 OS0S        uba test                      1345 23 Feb 2008

ON4ZD     21017.0 OS0S        test UBA                      1520 23 Feb 2008

ON4ZD      7013.5 OS0S        uba test                      2132 23 Feb 2008

ON4ZD      7013.5 OS0S        uba test                      2132 23 Feb 2008

ON4ZD      7013.5 OS0S        uba test                      2305 23 Feb 2008

ON4ZD      7013.5 OS0S        uba test                      2305 23 Feb 2008

ON4ZD      3532.5 OS0S        uba test                      0027 24 Feb 2008

ON4ZD      3537.5 OS0S        uba test                      0635 24 Feb 2008

ON4ZD      7023.5 OS0S        uba test                      0653 24 Feb 2008

ON4ZD     21017.0 OS0S        uba test                      0914 24 Feb 2008

ON4ZD      7019.7 OS0S        uba test                      1110 24 Feb 2008

This coming weekend: UBA DX Contest, the CW Part. Plan: enter 12h category HP like last year. I've won that one too last year just like the SSB leg so I hope for a repeat. The urge is gone after taking a good shot of CW last weekend in ARRL DX CW. I'm not really looking out to setting everything up once again. I want to do SO2R so I'll need to deploy the vertical vor 10/15/20 too.

The latest issue of the ARRL's biweekly newsletter Contest Rate Sheet mentioned K6MM's QSL card collection and guess what? My OO5ZO card is on display under the ON DXCC listing! Nice to see that all those cards we send out sometimes serve a higher purpose than just sitting in a box.

I noticed NN4ZZ has made his tilt plate commercially available. That is a GREAT tool for people like me with a tilt over tower. It makes the beam rotate when the tower is being tilted so that the element always remain parallel to the ground in stead of hitting the ground and penetrate the soil. I face that problem too, especially with the KLM (10m boom) I had before the Optibeam (6m boom). What strikes me is the retail price: 750 US $. Now if you put up an expensive tower with a precious yagi this might be a relatively small surplus amount but still a lot of money. On the other hand: quality parts and labor don't come cheap.

My friend ON4CCP / OT1A has the same tower as I have and he also had a KLM and he used a basic version of this principle. We came across the plans NN4ZZ displayed on his site (early 2005) and I showed them to my dad, who is a retired craftsman and all-round handyman. I made a drawing with the right dimensions, went shopping for parts and a couple of retired afternoons later, I had my own 'bomb proof' tilt over plate. It has served me well but I didn't install it on the Optibeam yagi since I needed to adapt the plate to fit the square boom. Here's what my dad's model looked like.

The results for the IARU 2007 contest are published on the ARRL website. This edition was my personal best so far topping 2000 QSOs in 24h. It was big fun and I was very satisfied with that result. However, it doesn't even bring me into the top 10 box. Only a 14th position. Nevertheless I am still happy with the result and I'm in good company.

If you start with simple targets and lower the bar so that you can walk over it, contesting can be a quite relaxing experience. So I decided not to chase some position in the rankings - which is useless in a DX contest from my location and with my setup. In stead my goals were to have fun and try to work some new goodies for 5BWAS. Mission accomplished! In retrospect I wonder why I have gone assisted. With no intentions to S&P and actually ran about all the time, cluster wasn't needed. Though it makes for some moving words on the screen and I could follow VP6DX and try to work them in between. Anyway here's the result:

Last year I made over 300 QSO on 15m. Most of them in a very fast run late on Sunday afternoon. It wasn't meant to be this year. The 15m band let us down. I didn't even check 10m. Rich NN3W @ N3HBX summed it up nicely on 3830: "...and took comfort in the fact that conditions cannot. possibly. get. any. worse. than. this.". Right on! Even 20m was so-so. It was good but of course it can be much better.

I tried 160m on my Sunday sunrise. No go. I CQ'd away until KB1H spotted me BEFORE he worked me. A small pile up followed in which KB1H was the first caller but I am deaf on 160m so I couldn't capitalize the spot. Sorry for those who called. K3LR was in there but I picked another call and he didn't return after that QSO. K1ZZ asked to move from 80m to 160m just after my SR when I had QRT'd on Top Band. Hey, it worked! N4YDU asked the same earlier but his proposed QRG on 160m was occupied so that was a show stopper. I don't think either Nate or myself have the signal on Top Band to make this happen.

80m was a nice surprise. I think I was about the only ON on that band. Maybe on 160m too? There is a handful of guys in Belgium with VERY BIG low band setups both for RX and TX but if it's only this little shrimp that shows up you'll have to settle for that. The problem is that each spot generated a packet pile up but with most signals zero beat and of the same level it was hard copying so I tried to get them to call up. The rate was halved because of the QRM on my QRG. I picked a call and sent the report but in the mean time people kept calling cluttering my signal so I had to repeat.

I made the most of it. I even got CA and OR coming in with pretty good sigs. It was a thrill to hear my friend Denis K7GK calling me for a new state for 5BWAS. I owe him a beer now. Note to self: stop making these pre-test bets or stop underestimating the force of your 80m vertical. Speaking of which: I couldn't put it up on Friday so I skipped the lower bands the first night. That fitted my "easy does it" approach for this contest. Two weeks of ab-so-lu-te-ly no wind but on the afternoon you want to set up your station a strong wind shows up. Strong enough to mess with my flimsy 80m vertical. It consists of telescopic aluminum tubing and another 7m of fishing pole. I have been thinking to replace it with something more sturdy but a) it is such a killer antenna for its size and low cost and b) I have limited space. Hence each contest @ ON5ZO is a fieldday.

The sloping vertical dipole on 40m once again did its job. I didn't bother to put the second one up with the switching unit to make it work for LP openings but I couldn't resist checking out the 40m LP propagation to the west coast on Saturday. I heard a bunch and was excited to hear Denis K7GK @ K7ZSD calling CQ. He was weak (would return way stronger on 80m) and I called for quite some time. I even thought of going outside and move the sloper to the other side of the tower so that the sloping angle would favor LP. But it was so cold I decided to call a few more times. Bingo! If there had been a pile up I wouldn't have made it. A bit lower in the band was K7RL with a better signal and a MUCH bigger pile up. In the end the LP opening died and K7RL just CQ'ed in our faces until QSY. I heard a few more W6/7 but I only remember these two because I worked one and the other had a pretty good signal. I wasted some good 20m time but who cares when you're in it for the fun. I can work 20m any day but 40m LP to W6/7 does only work for me when the Big Guns are on.

I can be brief about the higher bands: Ten is not even born, 15m is still dead and 20m is having a midlife crisis. Nothing special there except for some good runs on 20m Saturday afternoon. It was very boring and slow on Sunday so I quit around 1700utc and lowered the tower. With the beam at only 9m high I can tell you that it's hard to get beyond the east coast. The big West Coast guys were S7-S9 or more when the yagi sat 21m above the ground but they were gone when it was down.

Where were SD and ID? Not worked. I only worked 1 DC station. Thanks to all the W/VE stations for an enjoyable contest.

It's been quite a while since my last post but I wasn't active at all in the hobby. Professionally I was too active but I think the pendulum is about to swing the other way. Less duties, more ham! Last Saturday we went for a long walk in the woods including pick nick and late in the afternoon I fired up the rig and made about 160 contacts in CQ WPX RTTY. I would have made some more on Sunday but suddenly I felt ill and sick and took a raincheck. Quite honestly I was fed up with RTTY after two hours on Saturday.

This weekend is ARRL DX CW. I will be on but I will maximize fun and try to relax. Like last year when we were working in the garden and I made just over 1000 QSO's in between. That was fun and I want to do that again this weekend. Except for the working part  ;o)   So I won't be on for 48h - I don't even think there will be 48h of continuous propagation between EU and NA. I won't be pushing the limits and if I'm tired or things get too slow I will bail out and get back later. I'm hoping for some nice runs, a couple of 100+ hours would be welcome. It's been over 6 weeks since I did some CW. So I need a quick fix. And bagging some nice new states for WAS on 40/80 would be thrilling. And what about 160m? I don't have high expectations for that band so each QSO is a victory on Top Band. We'll see what gives.

Oh yeah... Ducie VP6DX is on! I missed VP6DI in 2002 (living at my folks' place: no antennas) and missed VP6D in 2003. We just moved here and I didn't have any real antennas. I'm not sure about the dates but missing these two expeditions to a new DXCC was a traumatic experience so retaliation was at hand. During lunch I looked up the peak times when they logged ON in the previous days. Great info on the site, just like 3B7C last year!

Then I raised the tower this afternoon. The tribander and WARC dipole are 21m above the ground. They were on 20m with quite a loud signal (S8 or more). Three calls and OQ5M was logged. A couple of minutes later ON5ZO got logged too. The sweetness of owning two calls. Hey, I pay almost 120 Euros (180 US$) to the Belgian equivalent of the FCC for those 2 licenses! No you can't have a 2x1 vanity call (OQ5M) without paying for a regular call (ON5ZO). It's a package deal that costs twice as much. But I digress.

Logging them so soon on 20m wasn't satisfactory so off to 17m. They were weak and I tried for almost one hour and a half. Normally my limit is 15 minutes. If the DX isn't in the log by then, I'm gone. The online stats say 1700utc was the time when they logged the most ON on 17m and 5 minutes before that time mark I worked them and a few minutes later I worked them with the second callsign. On 15m they were also weak but I managed to work them twice in less than a minute. Having some gain (3 el full size) compared to the dipole on 17m pays off. So I've worked them on 20, 17 and 15 in CW with both my callsigns. Next target to bomb my Ducie frustrations away: 30m, 40m and I wonder if I can work 'm on 80m? I didn't put up the 80m vertical and the 160m dipole yet. Too much wind this afternoon and motivated lacked. I will do that in the morning when 40m fades to the US of A.

Yes, a big box full that needs to be processed. I think that'll be a job for next month when it's Easter holidays. I must remember to charge my GlobalQSL account with 2000 (3000?) cards before they'll raise the price. There are quite some OO5ZO cards that come through after more than 2 years. Those are still labeled. I limit my job to printing labels and leave the sticky part to my mom and aunt who do that job for me while having coffee.

The XYL and I went to buy a frame for my WAS award. It's framed and on display in the shack. Yesterday I got a direct QSL from a KI4 with a kind note that I was his first European contact. It was on 20m SSB during the UBA contest. First EU... Hard to believe - not that I don't believe what he says it just feels weird that it's me of all hams who brings him his first EU contact. Oh well, it happened before ("First ON", "First ON on 30m" etc) and each time I wonder where everybody else is. Granted: 30m CW when it's open for DX seems to be exclusive terrain for OQ5M (me) and OT4A who must be louder because he was plenty of gain there.

Yet another direct QSL from Japan today, also 20m phone in the UBA contest. Strange. Is there really so little DX activity from Belgium? There are a lot of guys with bigger antennas and more power. Yesterday I went to visit a ham friend to offer him my old VHF 11 el yagi. He said he wonders why I always get spotted and he doesn't. It must be that I'm not too weak. I didn't get spotted in my barefoot-low-wire days. I was listening to K5ZD's CQ WW 2007 audio recordings. We had contacts on 20, 40 and 80m. I can assume that I rock on 20m. But I was surprised about how loud I sound on 80m at K5ZD's. I shouldn't be ashamed compared to the other signals he recorded. That cheap and simple vertical! Too bad I can't deploy it when the wind blows. Speaking of which: yesterday and last night were bingo again. Strong winds, I'd label it a minor storm. I'm watching TV news as I type this: two towns were hit by tornadoes. One of those is Lier, home of the OT5A M/M contest site. I hope they didn't suffer any damage! WX has been VERY bad since end December. Fingers crossed for the upcoming contests (ARRL DX CW and UBA CW).

I am in a foul mood. Hence the spiced up language.

I have a pretty high "breakdown voltage" but the fuse is about to blow! I had a really hectic week at work. Last week before mid-term break so the kids were pretty anxious and restless. Too bad this energy doesn't translate into a studying / working frenzy. It felt like kindergarten at times.

My Thursday was a killer with 14 hours 'on the site' where someone almost got hurt in a voltage related accident. I couldn't help it. All is well in the end but it was a nasty situation. On the domestic level company A was supposed to call me this week to solve a problem that has been here since they installed the device 5 weeks ago. Nothing heard - problem persists.

And today craftsman B came to do a job ordered over 7 months ago for which we begged him to come several times in the past half year. He came... and left. To cut a long story short: I was so stunned I couldn't even be angry and raise my voice. But he said he'll return by noon which is less than 3 hours away. My problem is that the XYL isn't here to be a soundboard for my rants and raves. That's about to become HIS problem: I hope I will be so F* P* Off that I finally will settle this once and for all. Right now I am so hyped up that I'm a genuine Menace II Society!

The good thing about this state of mind is that it helps you to make decisions. Maybe rage isn't a good advisor but I ordered my K3. Yes: a K3/100 kit, the transverter I/F to use the RX antennas and a 500Hz roofing filter. Read my lips: THE ORDER HAS JUST BEEN PLACED. I asked not to ship before June to stay focused on my professional duties.

To end with a brighter note: my LotW WAS standings now say "zero contacts submitted". I got a mail from the LotW help desk that they're on the case. Nevertheless I got a true blue nice paper WAS award in the mail. Now I only need to buy a frame to display it on the wall. Good thing I can do that myself and not have to rely on some silly lame @ss bozo!