Just received this QSL card via email:
Month: December 2005
A few more eQSL cards
This gentlemen was running the famous PSK-31 Warbler at only 3 Watts! His web site URL is shown on the card above and I decided to check it out. What it lacks in multimedia animated Flash whoop-dee-doo, it makes up in content. Bill has some serious talent – enjoy his version of the introduction to Money For Nothing with more of a amateur radio flavor (note to Sting – you have some competition!). Looks like Bill is the QRP (low power) guru.
I chatted briefly with Bob – he was helping steer me towards finding National Weather Service stations during SKYWARN Recognition Day.
How to make a CW contact
Making a CW contact is very similar to making a phone contact except of course you are using Morse Code. The process of CQing and exchanging information is about the same although CW operators use more abbreviations to make sending faster.
1. Call CQ as follows: “CQ CQ CQ de VE3BUC VE3BUC VE3BUC K” and wait for a response.
Note the abbreviations used. “de” means “this is” and “K” means “go.” You do not need to use phonetics in CW.
2. The other station may respond as “VE3BUC de PY1ANF PY1ANF K”
3. Now it’s your turn. “PY1ANF de VE3BUC GM UR RPT IS 599 599 NM IS DON DON ES QTH IS TORONTO PY1ANF DE VE3BUC KN”
To avoid confusion I have left out the punctuation in the above line. Normally punctuation is not used for casual contacts to reduce the amount of sending needed. It usually is quite obvious to both operators where the punctuation should go.
Notice the use of abbreviations. de, GM, UR, RPT, NM, ES, QTH, KN are all commonly used. The table shows the meaning of common abbreviations used in CW.
| Abbreviation | Use |
| de | this is |
| ES | and |
| GM | good morning |
| K | go |
| KN | go only |
| NM | name |
| QTH | location |
| RPT | report |
| R | roger |
| SK | clear |
| tnx | thanks |
| UR | your, you are |
| 73 | best regards |
4. The exchange of information continues as for phone except that CW operators will use the abbreviated form of words on a regular basis during their exchange.
5. At the end of the contact you might finish as follows: “… tnx Luis fer the QSO 73 es gud DX. PY1ANF de VE3BUC SK”
Again several abbreviations were used but these are obvious I hope. “fer” instead of “for” is simply less keying and “gud” for “good” also saves the wrist.
Amateur Radio Station NN3SI
From The Smithsonian: Natural Museum of American History web site
For nearly a century, amateur radio operators (HAMs) have energized the airwaves around the world. Exploring radio science and technology, providing emergency communications, or simply “calling CQ” to chat, HAMs are part of radio history. At the Museum’s HAM radio station, NN3SI, visitors learn about radio while they watch and talk with volunteer HAMs operating the station.
The unusual call sign, NN3SI, comes from the station’s origin in the Museum’s bicentennial exhibition “A Nation of Nations.” The FCC assigned a temporary call NN3SI for Nation of Nations-US zone 3-Smithsonian Institution, and later granted a request to make the call permanent.
The station participates in special events. During the dedication of the World War II Memorial on the National Mall, station operators made many contacts and taught children visiting the Museum how to spell their names in Morse code. Over the years, operators at NN3SI have logged contacts with HAMs in all parts of the world and with astronauts and cosmonauts in orbit.
The station operates on a range of frequencies from 3.5 to 450 MHZ. Licensed HAMs planning a trip to Washington, D.C., can sign up to operate the station during their visit.
Smithsonian Secretary S. Dillon Ripley (at left), ARRL President Harry Dannals and operator Joseph Fincutter inaugurate station NN3SI in July 1976.
Volunteer operators Stan Schretter (at left) and Don Sylvain making contacts during the 2004 Memorial Day weekend.
… I sent an email an asked how I’d go about arranging an appointment to be a guest operator at NN3SI and got the following response:
From : Carl Lagoda
Sent : Thursday, December 1, 2005 8:52 PM
To :
Subject : Re: NN3SI
Hello Scott:
You are certainly welcome to visit NN3SI and , while there, operate the station as a guest operator. We only ask that you present a photo ID to identify yourself. As you probably already know, the station is located in the National Museum of American History. I suggest that you enter the building by the Constitution Avenue entrance. NN3SI is in an exhibit called “Information Age”. The duty operators are there between 10am and 3pm with time out for lunch. Since the station depends on volunteer operators, we do not have continuous coverage so that you may not find an operator on duty. If you could name a specific date and time for your visit, we will try to have someone there for you. Regards de Carl w3cl
Maybe I can take a quick trip up to D.C. in late December when work slows down a bit. I think it would be really neat to be a guest operator at the Smithsonian’s amateur radio station! 🙂
What is an eQSL?
From the eQSL FAQ page:
Clever hams were sending electronic QSL cards by e-mail years ago. Back then, that was the only way to send them.
But e-mail is not a very easy way of exchanging cards. So, in 1998, we created the first eQSL exchange and called it www.QSLCard.com, and it has attracted a huge following. Our system does not use e-mail at all. So you really don’t “send” eQSLs. Instead, it stores your log in a large database. When another user uploads his log, we look at all the log entries that “match”, and allow you to display and print eQSLs from those matching log entries.
In April, 2000, we converted the entire system to a very robust and high tech database-oriented system and renamed our site www.eQSL.cc, the Electronic QSL Card Centre.
We are now the ONLY exchange for electronic QSL cards, with 56.0 million eQSLs from 302 countries currently online.
And, since virtually all of our technology is covered by patents pending, you can be assured that this will continue to be the place to maintain your online eQSL log!
——————————-
So far I’ve received the following QSL cards through eQSL:
Some amateur radio operators will only use eQSL as a method to exchange QSL cards – other won’t use it at all. I will admit, it is a little unsatisfying receiving an eQSL as compared to receiving an actual QSL card in the mail.
A Few Interesting Ham Radio Blogs
From The KØNR Weblog
One of the recent trends on the Internet is the use of Weblogs (commonly called “blogs”). Some of these are on-line journals; some are related to a particular topic or point of view. I’ve spent some time searching for ham radio related blogs and have come across these:
* KB6NU’s Ham Radio Blog http://kb6nu.com/
* Long Delayed Echoes (KE9V) http://ke9v.net/
* Hamblog (a shared blog with multiple contributors) http://www.hamblog.com/
* The Future of Radio (ham radio index) http://futureofradio.typepad.com/the_future_of_radio/ham_radio/index.html
* Amateur Radio and Scanner Blog http://wa3fkg.blogspot.com/
* Shedberg (Scott Hedberg KD7PJQ) http://www.livejournal.com/users/shedberg/
* W2LJ’s Blog – QRP and Amateur Radio http://w2lj.blogspot.com/
* K7VO Ham Radio Blog http://k7vo.blogspot.com/
Let me know what you find out there in the blog-o-sphere.
73,
Bob K0NR
Electrical engineer, ham radio enthusiast (KØNR), VHF Columnist for QRP Quarterly and FM Columnist for CQ VHF Magazine
My favorite amateur radio blogs are:
* KB6NU’s Ham Radio Blog http://kb6nu.com/
… from his website
Who the Heck is KB6NU?
I got an e-mail from a guy who noted that he couldn’t find my name anywhere on this website. I looked and he’s right. So, here’s a little bit about me. I’m going to figure out a way for a link to this post to appear on one of the nav bars so that readers can find it more easily….
My name is Dan Romanchik, and I’m just a guy who’s having fun with ham radio.
I’m 50 years old, and have been a ham for 34 years, although for most of those years, I wasn’t very active. I have been very active since the summer of 2002, after I got the bug again after working some CW at our club’s Field Day. Since then, I have:
* made more than 4,000 contacts, mostly on CW,
* increased my code speed to almost 30 wpm,
* built a bunch of kits and other stuff (including an Elecraft KX1 handheld HF transceiver),
* worked a bunch of contests and have even garnered a few certificates from doing so,
* taught a General Class license course the past two years,
* become president of ARROW, a club that serves ham in and around Ann Arbor, MI, and
* been appointed Affiliated Club Coordinator for the Michigan section.
I’m no “super ham.” I don’t have a 120-ft. tower with a three-element 40m beam on it. I don’t own a $10,000 transceiver, and I haven’t yet been on a DXpedition. I am having a lot of fun, though.
…. my other favorite amateur radio blog is:
* Stan Horzepa, WA1LOU, and his StanZapples web site (http://homepage.mac.com/stanzapple/Menu1.html).
Stan has been a regular contributor to QST magazine and also put out a pretty good book on APRS. I enjoy reading his Friday column on the ARRL web site: Surfin’.
2005 SKYWARN Recognition Day – December 3, 2005 (0000 – 2400 UTC.)
SKYWARN Recognition Day was developed in 1999 by the National Weather Service (NWS) and the American Radio Relay League. It celebrates the contributions that volunteer SKYWARN radio operators make to the National Weather Service. During the day SKYWARN operators visit NWS offices and contact other radio operators across the world. I attended SKYWARN training back in May 2005 – my Spotter ID is VHAM120.
Object For all amateur stations to exchange QSO information with as many National Weather Service Stations as possible on 80, 40, 20, 15, 10, 6, and 2 meter bands plus the 70 centimeter band. Contacts via repeaters are permitted. SKYWARN Recognition Day serves to celebrate the contributions to public safety made by amateur radio operators during threatening weather.
I was able to make two contacts on 20 Meters using PSK31 to NWS stations: WX8MQT in Marquette, MI and WX7GGW in Glasglow, MT – indicated by the red circles above. I passed through Glasglow on my road trip earlier this year.
Got another QSL card!
This QSO was from Thanksgiving evening. WD9HZI (Albert) was waiting for the Rotten Apples Group Net. I heard Albert call CQ – I answered and he came back to me right away.
What’s A Rotten Apple?
The Rotten Apples started almost 20 years ago. The Founders use to check into the “Classroom Net”, which starts at 7am, then they started meeting on 7.238 earlier and having a “Round Table Chat”. Later on, they started to drop out of the Classroom Net, Joe WB2JKJ called them a bunch of rotten apples and after that the name stuck and the Rotten Apples Group was born – hihi. The Original Group (what we refer to as “The Original 43”) had a RAG Certificate that AL, W9QHN put together. They had to earn the “certificate” by confirming three (3) QSL’S with other RA’s and to him. When Al died, the rest of the Original “43” Rotten Apples decided to discontinue the certificate in his memory and that’s where that saga ended. And now the saga of the “Drivers Permits” begins…
The Driver’s Permit Award: Donn WY5I got his drivers license after a 10 year injury. To celebrate the occasion, Donn received a RAG Driver’s Permit, then Leon, one of the other founders wanted one, then another and so on and so on, and the “Driver’s Permit” came about. NOW, to qualify for a Rotten Apples Group “Driver’s Permit” you must check in to the Rotten Apples Group between 6am-7am est. OR 7pm-8pm est. (these are the Official RAG Hours on the air) on a regular basis for a few months to indicate that you will be a faithful Rotten Apple participant. All “EARLY BIRD” check-ins will be accepted only if they stick around and check into the regular RAG sked hour. You will then receive a Driver’s Permit and a special welcome and that’s it. Everyone who checks in is already a member of the Rotten Apples Group but Driver’s Permits are given out as an Award to those stations who have become faithful Rotten Apple check-ins. It is really not like an Membership Certificate. This is no membership requirement, this is not a club and there is no dues. This is just a GROUP of guys and some gals that meet everyday on 7.238mhz. There are lots of visitors on the RAG morning and evening sessions, they come & they go never to be heard again.
CW Nets 101
40m CW Net Coordinator
One thing that’s confusing to a newcomer to the CW nets is the protocol used. The CW nets operation is different than the SSB nets, so I thought I’d provide some information to help you understand what’s going on when you check in for the first time.
Generally, the Net Control Station (NCS) comes on the net frequency ten or fifteen minutes prior to the published net start time. The NCS will transmit “CQ CQ CCN CCN DE W4BUR/NCS {or whatever the NCS call is} QNI QNI K”.
This is an invitation to stations to get on a ‘prelist’ – “QNI” is a request for net stations to check in. The NCS will assign check-in numbers as stations respond.
At the published net start time (or a couple of minutes thereafter) the NCS will transmit an abbreviated preamble, similar to the following (note that “BT” is a CW abbreviation for a break between sentences): “WELCOME TO THE 3905 CENTURY CLUB CW NET FOR WAS AND AWARDS BT ALL ARE WELCOME BT FOR MORE INFO PSE VISIT OUR WEB SITE AT WWW.3905CCN.COM BT PSE QSL VIA WM9H BT NW QND PSE QNZ (series of “V”s followed by a steady carrier) BT NW QNI DE W4BUR/NCS K
The abbreviations may require some interpretation… “NW” means ‘NOW’; “QND” means that this is a directed net; “PSE” means ‘PLEASE’; “QNZ” means to ‘zero beat’, or make sure your frequency is the same as NCS – the “V”s and the steady carrier enable stations to fine tune their transmitters to the NCS frequency.
Following the abbreviated preamble the NCS will look for more check-ins and will continue to assign check-in numbers. Depending on propagation the NCS may ask other stations to look for check-ins using the following CW abbreviation:
“AA1NZ DE W4BUR/NCS PSE NET CALL K”.
At this, AA1NZ will transmit “DE AA1NZ QSP (QSP means “relay”) QNI QNI K”. If AA1NZ gets any check-ins he will give them check-in numbers and then relay the information to NCS.
When the NCS believes that all stations wishing to check in are on the list, s/he will transmit the following: “DE W4BUR/NCS (or whatever the NCS call is) QNC (all stations copy) QNS (following stations are on the list) BT LIST FOLLOWS BT”. The check-in list will then be transmitted by NCS in a manner similar to the following: “NR 1 AA1NZ AA1NZ BT NH NH BT OP TOM TOM NR 1 AA1NZ BT BT NR 2 N1RR N1RR BT MA MA BT OP CHAS CHAS NR 2 N1RR BT BT”.
The NCS will continue through the numbers until all checked in stations have
been listed, and will then again ask for check-ins by transmitting “DE W4BUR/NCS
QNI QNI K”. Additional stations will be checked in and assigned check-in
numbers. Following this NCS will transmit “DE W4BUR/NCS QNC NR (followed by
the check-in number, station call sign, location and name).
The NCS will then place him/herself on the list and will notify the net of check-in number, location and name.
When the check-in list is complete the NCS will transmit “DE W4BUR/NCS LETS ROLL” (or “LETS GET STARTED”, or something similar) to let the stations on the net know that it’s time to begin making contacts. The NCS will transmit “DE W4BUR/NCS NR 1 AA1NZ K” (may also add “UR TURN”, although this isn’t necessary – stations are expected to realize that it’s time to start making contacts and that it’s their turn to make a call).
A typical exchange of information goes like this: “DE AA1NZ GE (good evening) ALL BT NR 2 N1RR N1RR DE AA1NZ AA1NZ UR 599 599 K”. The response from N1RR will be: “AA1NZ DE N1RR TU QSL 599 599 UR ALSO 599 599 K”. Then AA1NZ will transmit: “DE AA1NZ QSL ALSO 599 TU BTN K”. What has just gone on is that AA1NZ said good evening to everyone on the net and then called check-in number 2, N1RR, giving him a signal report of 599.
At this, N1RR will say thank you, I QSL the 599 signal report, and you are also 599. AA1NZ will identify, acknowledge the ‘also 599’, say Thank You (TU), and turn it over to the net control (“BTN” means “Back To Net”). The NCS will transmit “CFM” (confirm) to let the net know that the contact was a good one and will call the next check-in on the list for his/her turn to make a call.
You’ll note that the signal reports exchanged in the example contained three digits. The first two digits are the same as is used on SSB, Readability and Strength. On CW, the third digit is used to let the other station know what kind of ‘Tone’ is being transmitted. A ‘9’ is the best, indicating a perfect tone with no distortion. Ordinarily you won’t hear anything except a “9” as the third digit, but occasionally someone will have a transmitter problem and should be made aware of it. The following is from the ARRL Handbook for Radio Amateurs describing the numeric codes used for tone (the third digit in a CW signal report).
1 – Sixty-cycle ac or less, very rough and broad.
2 – Very rough ac, very harsh and broad.
3 – Rough ac tone, rectified but not filtered.
4 – Rough note, some trace of filtering.
5 – Filtered rectified ac but strongly ripple-modulated.
6 – Filtered tone, definite trace of ripple modulation.
7 – Near pure tone, trace of ripple modulation.
8 – Near perfect tone, slight trace of modulation.
9 – Perfect tone, no trace of ripple or modulation of any kind.
The above examples are just that – examples. Actual exchanges of information will vary depending on the operator and what s/he has to say or add to the signal report data.
I hope all this is helpful and will give you some encouragement to join us on the CW nets. Don’t worry about making mistakes – we all do that. The last perfect man died 2000 years ago…..
CU on CW
Hello All… I hope this info will be helpful to some who are not familiar with Net “Q” signals. These are from the ARRL Net Directory with a couple more included. This is not a complete list, but a collection of the most popular…
| QNA | Answer in Prearranged Order |
| QNC | All Net Stations Please Copy |
| QND | Net is Directed (has NCS) |
| QNF | Net is Free (not or no longer Directed) |
| QNG | Take Over as Net Control |
| QNH | Your Net Freq is High |
| QNI | Net Stations Check In |
| QNL | Your Net Freq is Low |
| QNN | Net Control is _______ |
| QNO | Station is Leaving the Net |
| QNP | Unable to Copy_______ |
| QNS | Following Stations are in the Net (list) |
| QNX | Station is Excused from the Net |
| QNZ | Please Zero Beat ur Freq with Mine |
We also use:
| QRU | Do You Have Anything for Me ? |
| QSP | Please Relay |
| QSX | Please Listen for _____ |
And a couple of my personal Favorites ( which are seldom heard on the 3905 Nets )
| QPP | I Have to take a Nature Break (sometimes when I’m NCS) |
| QTT | Same as QPP |
| QLF | Are You Sending With Your Left Foot ? |
| TOF | Try Other Foot (Only used if answer to QLF is yes) |
