What, he's not allowed to rely on this group to elmer him? What if
there ARE no elmers where he lives?

Greg,

QRP is arguably the very best part of amateur radio. It really
combines the best characteristics of both building and operating.
And, if you have the right conditions, it is also the most fun
and has a very low impact on our neighbors' reception.

I myself, I am more of an experimenter than an operator, because I
love spending researching circuits and trying to get them to work.
But others love buying and building kits and playing with them.

I'd first suggest building your confidence first and learning normal
operation on the HF CW bands, if you can't do this at home, try a club
station or a ham neighbor.

After you feel comfortable working 100 watts into a well matched dipole,
you can start gradually going down in power. While QRP is officially
defined as 5 watts or below, I myself prefer to operate about 20 watts
when I have the equipment for it.

The most critial part of a QRP setup will be your antenna. Hardly
anyone living in a city or a suburb has the priviledge of being able to
put up even an 80 meter dipole without the neighbors complaining to your
apartment manager or homeowner's association.

What you need is the best antenna that can still look inconspicuous, but
that's also part of the challenge of QRP.

The thinnest wire I have found that can stand 5 to 20 watts CW is number
30 kynar insulated wire-wrapping wire. Its extremely tough on its own
and won't snap in a storm, but on the other hand it will break under
determine pressure and is easy to take down on a moment's notice.

I live in an upper floor with wood patio balcony, and what I do is trail
wires on opposite sides of the balcony from upper floor to lower floor
and anchor with a brad a few inches from the dirt. This gives me about
a dipole 25 feet on each side, matchable to the 40, 30, 20, and 17 meter
bands. It works pretty well.

Another good possibility is if you have a tree right next to your
window, you could throw the kynar wire over a branch to give yourself a
sloping dipole.

Another piece of advice is to not expect miracles from your setup. You
can likely work anyone in CONUS or Canada with good technique, and have
a lot of fun. True DX on 5 watts with an apartment antenna is
extremely rare.

Start with a calibrated shortwave receiver, an active CW filter,
headphones, a rock crusher and a few crystals, and then tail end a
conversation. That's how you get started.

Good luck!

The Eternal Squire
(I have a call but I prefer my privacy)



JOE wrote:
Good grief. Have you even TRIED looking? Type 'qrp' into
google and see what you find. Plan on lots of time sorting
through the THOUSANDS of useful links.

You'll get a lot more out of your 'journey' if you take some time
to put a little effort into it.


"Greg Doughty" wrote in message
...

Hello to all!! I am beginning the qrp cw journey and would like to know

where

to begin. I have the rigs and have built a rockmite 20 but need to find
resources for things like qrp swr meter. Is there a group and magazine or
other things that support the qrper?

Thanks

73
Greg