QSO Party in Expanded 40m Band

From July, 10th till July 20th, Japan Amateur Radio League (JARL) helds QSO party in the expanded segment of 40m band.
Since March 30th, 2009, The Japanese amateur 40m band has been expanded from 100KHz (7.000-7.100MHz) to 200KHz (7.000-7.2000MHz) and the QSO party this time celebrate it.
Rule of the QSO party is shown in the JARL website [HERE].

I cannot find English version of the rule but DX station may participate this party.

Dear all DX amateurs!
Please tune your xcvr to 7.100MHz and up and please call JA stations, they are calling "CQ 7QP".
Required exchange is just RST only.

Thank you in advance and see you on 7.1MHz and up!

de JE1TRV, Atsu

A1 Century Club Award

QTC to all CW loveres!
On the day of 2009-06-13, A1 CLUB announced in their homepage that they starts A1CC (A1 Century Club Award).

There are two categories, Special and Original.
"Special" may be applied by all amateures, "Original" is issued for A1 Club member only.

The rule is very simple, in case of "Special" category, you should just make CW QSO as many as possible and in the application you must include at least 1/5 of A1 Club member.
Award is issued from 100 points by 100 point step.
In case you apply A1CC-100, you must make at least 100 CW QSOs with different callsigns, and at least 20 QSOs shall be A1 Club member.

In case of "Original", all QSOs must be made with A1 Club members only.
So you need to work with at least 100 A1 Club members for "Original-100".

For details please refer here.

New K3 arrived!!!

As I wrote the other day, my K3 #1070 had problem on receiving even after repair work in Elecraft.
I could not believe that, because the symptom is clearly observed only when decent real antenna is connected and receive real signals.
First I reported the fact to the person who carried out the repair work.
In response to my report he started to ask me "what is the symptom".
I thought "Oh please stop such story again?" so I just say the symptom is just the same as before repair and I sent same symptom report that was made before repair.
After that, no reply from that person.
Then I sent e-mail to a person in charge for the Sale department asking replacement of equipment. But no reply at all.

Then I deceided to sent e-mail to to-management both Eric & Wayne.
Wayne, N6KR replied immediately even it was midnight there in USA.
After several correspondences, Wayne decided to send new K3 for replacement.

It was arrived 3 days ago．
As soon as I opened the box, I connected power and antenna then received 40m band.
The receiver was OK!. But... transmit...problem again!! "END" message is always pop up on the sub LCD and cannot transmit.
What's happen!? Give me a break...
I read the operation manual but no instruction about "END" message.
I made initialize (EEINIT) but no change.
It was already midnight in Tokyo, so I took the symptom by video and reported to Wayne before sleep.
Next morning, new firmware version 3.15 had been arrived in my mailbox.
I installed the new F/W then the K3's transmit function became normal.
I sent e-mail telling everything seems OK to Wayne then rushed to work.

It was very log time and berden plus some extra expenses.
I regret why Elecraft could not find the symptom at the first repair.
It is clear that the repair return had been a wast of time and cost.
If they connect decent antenna placed outdoor and receive real world, I believe they could find the problem.

On the other hand, I really appreciate Wayne's great support.
He is really a trademark of Elecraft!!
Now I'm happy and can keep good impression on Elecraft.
Thank you very much Wayne.

PS. I hope Elecraft will not charge transportation cost for this case :-)

Spider-Beam Antenna (3)

This is the 3rd time post about the Spider-Beam after some months silent.
I've been no work on that antenna since it was cold for outdoor work. But after spring, I was reluctant to work with that antenna.
Beacuse I must measure and cut all 9 elements (3ele for 3 bands) from one signle wire reel. Also, instaruction manual is not so kind enough for me.
However, I managed to measure and cut and terminate all elements and other parts including KW bulun, etc the week before.

And finnaly, I found a nice wide open space near my home in Machida, Tokyo, So I tried to assemble the Spider-Beam on the ground.









All booms are assembled. It took more than one hour. And I gave up to continue assembly since the lenghth between blun and 15m & 17m band's radiator was too long and needs re-work on mounting of blun on th mast.


After trial assembly, I found the base hub plate had damaged as shown in the photo below. The hub plate seems too thin to support moment during installation.

K3 returned after repair but...

On May 3rd, my K3 #1070 has been arrived from US after repair.
The TAT was 39 days including go & return transportation lead time.

According to the Elecraft's repair report, they replaced RF Board and confirmed all performances meet their published specifications.

HOWEVER, UNFORTUNATELY, I found that the K3 still has problem.
Very high noise and terrible intermodulation interference on all bands except 20m band is still observed.

I was totally disappointed.

Yesterday, I reported this info to the Elecraft's enginner who wrote the repair report.
Today, I received reply from Elecraft engineer and he is asking symptom. I sent all correspondences that I communicated with another Elecraft man before repair, since the symptom is not changed at all before and after repair.

Google Top Page changed for S.Morse's B-Day

Today April 27, 2009 is the 218th Birthday of Samuel F.B. Morse who is an inventor of Morse Code.

What QRJ stands for?

I read an article written by JK1OPL on the latest Japanese CQ Hamradio magaizne (May 2009 issue). In the article, he introduces Q-code "QRJ".
I've never heard such Q-Code "QRJ".
In the article it is explained that QRJ means "Your signal is too weak to continue QSO." something like that.

I searched "QRJ" by internet and found the site where ITU regulations are listed:
Here
According to this site, QRJ stands for
"How many radiotelephone calls have you to book?" in question style.
"I have ... radiotelephone calls to book." as answer.

Which one is correct?

K3 Forced Repatriation

After one week investigation at local K3 holder's shack with Elecraft engineering support by e-mail, my K3's trouble is found as serious.

Following video clips are the comparison of bad K3 and normal K3 submitted to Elecraft engineer for their reference.

[Case-1]
my K3 upper, my friends' K3 lower.
receiving strong signal out of filter bandwidth.
First upper then lower and repeat.

[Case-2]
Same setup with receiving strong signal within thefilter bandwidth.
Swiching bad K3 and normal K3 vice versa.

I appreciate Elecraft enginner's patient support everyday.
But unfortunately, no improvement obserbed.
I deceided to send my K3 to the factory.

Marconi TRX1A

After long silence since Hamfair 2008 (Aug/2008), Marconi-Japan has finally announced their first products on 2009-03-08. That is a HF Transceiver Case Kit "Marconi TRX1A".
http://marconi-japan.com/default.aspx

It is Not a Transceiver kit but a Case kit.

It includes prefabricated case, knobs, fly-wheel drum, meter, connectors for RF and AF signals, power socket, cooling fan.
No PCB, electronic components for transceiver is included!

At the time of Hamfair2008, the guy at the Marconi booth explained that they will provide transceiver kit.
Since I have been interested in their presentation at Hamfair2008, I've been confirmed the progress of their preparation time to time and I saw that they have been reducing their plan guradually and finally they decided to sell only CASE KIT.
It's disappointing.

The sales price of the CASE is 88200JPY. Expensive!!
They are going to sell 30 sets only without having stock.

I've been confusing the company name with the famous telecommunication company of "Marconi plc" in UK that had been bought by Ericsson few years ago.
But Marconi-Japan seems no relation with that. It looks like a private workshop or personal company.

My K3 should go to hospital

Yesterday I took my K3 to a local friend Aki, JA1NLX who also has K3.
We made side by side comparison and found that my K3 is something like a compeletely different radio.
I left my K3 at Aki's home last night, according to Aki's report today, my K3 has too much distortion on all bands except 20m band.
He guess DSP board is suspicious and he suggested to contact Elecraft anyway.
So, I sent an e-mail to the Elecraft support today.

My K3 is very poor

I made apple to apple comparison between K3, FT2000 and K1.
The band is 40m and the time is eveing in Tokyo Japan.
Above shot is a band scope snap on 40m band when I made the test.
The biggest peak around 7330KHz is a Broadcast whose signal strength is +60dB over S9 on my FT2K s-meter.

And here is the comparison movie, 1st one is K3 vs K1, and the second one is K3 vs FT2K vs K1.




K3 is obviously very noisy and poor. FT2000 is much better than K3 and K1 is the best in three radio.
200-dollar raido beats 4000-dollar raido!
Is this only on my K3?

Graduation Ceremony

My son graduated from the high school today.

HEXBEAM works on 6m band

I've been a happy user of Traffie Hexbeam for about 5 years.
It works pretty good without any adjustment and any maintenance upto now.

This antenna has very unique hexagonal shape but realizes both very small foot-print and high gain at the same time.

Although the price for 5-band type is around 1100USD not so cheap, but it is reasonable when you consider the total system cost including tower, rotator, coaxial feeders, etc. You can enjoy 5 band with one antenna, one coax and small tv rotor with very low height! (see photo above which is extracted from Traffie's website)

In addition not only specified 5 bands (20, 30, 17, 12 and 10m), it can be used on 6m too! See the SWR plots for 6m below;


Amazing!

SWR Plot by DMU-2000

The DMU-2000, a band scope for Yaesu FT-2000, has a function to plot SWR of the antenna connected to the FT-2000.

This is SWR plots for 40m band, antenna is Create Design AFA-40, 2-el HB9CV.

The left edge is 7000KHz, the red line is 7100KHz.
The SWR seems pretty low between 7000-7100. But above 7100KHz, it becomes very high.
So, I must use antenna tuner when I will QRV at above 7100KHz from coming April after the 7100-7200 band is permited in JA on 2009-3-30.

Here is the SWR of 20m band , antenna is HEXBEAM.

I bought normal setting HEXBEAM so that the SWR is optimized for phone band.

FT-2000 new firmware

The latest firmware has been released in Jan,2009.
Firmware update procedure is not announced officially in JA market.
That means Yaesu dose not allow Japanese cutomer to update the firmware of FT-2000 by themselves. If we did it, warranty of that equipment is terminated immediately, e even if the warranty period has not been finished yet.

Besides, in US it is opened and the latest firmware can be downladed free of charge from Yaesu America Website.

Update procedure is little bit complicated, but the step by step procedure is described in the Yaesu website, and my local friend, Jun/JQ1BWT who is an active electric engineer kindly helped me to do it.

After istall of the new firmware "PEP2000", my FT-2000D has been re-born.

FISTS/SKCC SKED page by K3UK

K3UK's SKED page for FISTS, SKCC, etc. is very nice!
I could hook up with some of FISTS and SKCC members in USA with help of this page.

This is the screen shot of this morning.

FISTS page is always almost empty;


On the other hand, SKCC page is always crowded.


Why?

A Happy New Year 2009

As a CW operator I must send new year greetings by Morse Code, Hi Hi.
Sorry for my rusty fists...at last I gave up sending by straight key...

New Year's Eve

Today the last day of year 2008 has been passed peacefully here in Machida, Japan.
On the way back from a local hot spa which is located just 10 min drive from my home, I could see beautiful silhouette of Tanzawa mountains and head of Mt.Fuji on sunset.

Unconsciously I thanked to the god for our health and safe in this year and prayed for good luck in 2009.

Fine Paddles

There are many kinds of fine paddles in the world.
So, I've been collecting some of them.
Among those paddles I've ever used, following two paddles are the best of bests and it is hard to decide which one is better than the other.

Chevron Morse Key
Begali Graciella Vertical Paddle

I wrote some report on these paddles before.
http://a1club.net/je1trv/key/

Spider-Beam Antenna (2)

I'm enjoying assembly work of the spider-beam antenna.
It takes time but it's also a kind of fun to measure and cut from the scratch.
At a very initial stage, we must fabricate the Guy Lines.
A special fibre rope "Kevlar" is used for the guy line.
Once Kevlar is cut, the end of rope become feazing. Like photo below;


The instruction manual says to melt the ends with a lighter.
However I found that the melted ends became thicker than original diameter then it will not go through the 3mm hole of the plastic insulatiors.

So, without melting the ends, I wind thin & tough wire like photo below;


Then go it though 3mm hole of the plastic insulator then pulled it out.





I needed to make this kind of work 16 times, (^^;;