RadioBanter - View Single Post - How was your year radio-wise ?

December 20th 04, 12:48 AM

On 19 Dec 2004 19:32:32 GMT, (J999w) wrote:

Time for some reflection on 2004 .... as far as shortwave radio, how did it go?

Did you get a new radio, make some interesting catches, new QSL's, learn
something new?

Me? I bought a couple new radios: Palstars R30 and MW550sp, Yaesu FT767gx and
FL2100b. I made a few interesting loggings ... nothing spectacular ... but
interesting: R. Sonder Grense 3320khz, Zimbabwe 3306khz, ZIZ St. Kitts 555khz.
In ham radio I started and completed 6m VUCC and started 2m VUCC, worked about
40 countries on 40m, learned alot about greyline propagation on 41/40m.

Goals for 2005: I plan on sending out more reception reports to SW broadcasters
with a focus on the low frequencies (below 10mhz) since we are approaching the
solar cycle minimum. Ham-wise I'd like to polish off a few awards (6m WAS, WAC,
2m VUCC) and upgrade to Extra class.

I've been playing with radio's since 1974 and I still find things to keep it
all interesting !

73 and good DX,

John Wilke
K9RZZ
Milwaukee, WI USA

Not my best year for radio, didn't spend as much time with the
radio(s) as in some years past. However, I did nail down one noise
source this past week - faulty street light, now I've got to do battle
with the city department of pubic works to effect repair.

Did gain more familiarity with my R75 and was able to pull a few more
signals out of the noise - including Australia on their 4910 domestic
service, though some might claim that too easy for a Southern
Californian 8-} I'm not into sending for QSL's and am actually
fairly poor about logging in general; however I did install a nice
logging program on my Palm Pilot and am using that a bit more often.

Congrats on the 6 meter VUCC, while not a 'paper chaser' I have been
keeping track of where I stand in relation to that award and have been
stonewalled for almost two years with very few new grids added to my
list. Now that you're chasing WAS I hope to run into you and give you
California - there've been a few times I worked that neck of the
country, not easy but it can be done with the right conditions. BTW
John, we started our radio pursuits within a couple years of each
other - my interest was kindled in 1971 while growing up in Michigan.

My goals for 2005 are simple:
1) spend more time listening to shortwave
2) pay attention to logging more than in the past
3) use my ham radios more often
4) more comfortable/usable/ergonomic setup for my radio

Happy Holidays to all,
Howard