Friese 11 steden contest: PE11W (nov. 2023)

A small contest meant to promote our radiohobby in the province Friesland is the Friese Elfsteden contest (Frisian Eleven Cities contest). It’s an only 3 hours lasting contest on 2 meter (FM) and 80 meter (LSB). This year Hans PE1KWH, Gerard PH3T and myself will activate one of those cities in Friesland. To be precise, the city of Workum. For this activation the special call PE11W will be used: the 11 because of the Eleven Cities, W for Workum. The contest will take place on Sunday 19 November. More info on the PE11W QRZ-page.

PI4AMF/p in the IOTA contest 2023

Members op the PI4AMF contest crew will be active again during the IOTA contest, 29 and 30 July. Activity will be from the island of Schouwen-Duivelands (EU-146). Operators will be PA3EYC, PA3GRM, PH3T, PC3M, PE1KWH and PA2LO. The team will be active in both CW and phone on all IOTA contest allowed bands (10-80 meter).

Update July 31th: We had a great contest-weekend and made 2.650 QSO’s in the contest. What a great team of hams we had on the scene. Skilled operators, very capable team players. I’m pretty sure the QSO’s we made and the multipliers we worked are about the max from this location and the set-up we used. The whole station was set-up half a day before the start of the contest and completely (!) teared down within one hour of the end of the contest. Amazing! QSL cards have been ordered (thanks Gennady UX5UO!) and will be send out (by bureau) to all stations who worked us.

Hunting FT8WW and 3Y0J

Let the hunt begin: Crozet (FT8WW) has started activity December 24 and in January the 3Y0J team will make their travel to Bouvet. Exciting times for DX hunters, let’s see if we can put them in the log!

Update: FT8WW is in the log. Together with VK0MQ a total of 2 new DXCC’s worked in 2022. Also worked 3Y0J. “Only” on 2 bands (12 and 30m) and “only” in CW. But knowing only 8.590 unique calls made this Bouvet adventure, I’m very grateful for this two QSO’s. Both made on the first day of their activity.

Hunting T33T

Banaba Island, a rare DXCC (#21 most wanted in EU according to Club Log). First QSO I made was a SSB QSO on 20 meter. Also some FT8 QSO’s were made. The QSO’s on 12, 15, 17 and 20 meter were all made in the morning and “long path”. The QSO’s on 30 and 40 meter were made in the afternoon with the antenna pointing short path. At the moment of writing over 75.000 QSO’s were made by the two-man team. Only a few hundred phone and cw QSO’s. Although Banaba is not a new one for me, I’m happy to work this dxpedition.

DX-ing remote from SV9

In October we traveled to Crete (SV9) for a family vacation. A good opportunity to test the remote set-up. The internet connection in our hotel was perfect and the FlexRadio 6300 in combination with the remoterig boxes for the SPE Amplifier, Spid Rak rotator and Steppir antenna worked flawlesly. Besides some ragchewing I did some DX hunting. With D60AE, TY0RU, TO2DL and TX7G on the air not a hard job to do. Before my remote station was a Kenwood TS-480 in combination with the famous remoterig boxes, but the FlexRadio makes it so much more fun.

February 2023: J8/AJ4YX

In February 2023 I will be active as J8/AJ4YX from Ratho Mill, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines (IOTA NA-109). More info here

SSB Fieldday 2022

The weekend of 3 and 4 september I was active in the IARU R1 SSB Fieldday contest as crewmember of PI4AMF(/p). Conditions were bad this year, but we managed to work over 850 QSO’s.

A week of ham radiofun in the sun

Waiting for confirmation of a temperary licence for an activity from 15-21 February 2023, including participation in de ARRL International DX CW Contest. Stay tuned for more information.

The homebuild vertical fan antenna

Callum M0MCX, provides a lot of information about the vertical fan antenna he offers under the name DXcommander. Based on his info I build a six-band (10-30m) vertical using the 7m Spiderpole. First results look promissing (and it was a lot of fun to build!).

IARU R1 CW Fieldday Contest 2022

Of course we – PI4AMF/p – did participate in the CW Fieldday Contest this year: we are defending our 1st place of last year in the MOST section. Could we win also this year? We’ll find out later. For the first time we were joined by a former spark and operator of Scheveningen Radio: Ad (PA2PCH).

J8TT (dec. 2023)

I will be back at Saint Vincent at the end of this year. NTRC granded me the call J8TT. I will not be able to operate fulltime: I’m not on the island for hamradio but for other purposes. But in my spare time I will do my best to provide QSO’s to them who need.

J8/AJ4YX (feb. 2023)

Over 7.200 QSO have been made during my activity on Saint Vincent. It was great to be able to work from the island and experience nice pile-ups. During my activity I tried to be QRV as much as possible for parts of the world where J8 is high in demand. Very happy to see many, many stations from JA/Asia in the log. It was great fun and I hope to see you all again in the future. QSL card has been ordered (UX5UO) and will be send as soon as possible.

Hamvention 2023

This year we will make another trip to Dayton/Xenia for the annual Hamvention. Let’s hope this year the number of visitors and exhibitors will be from before the covid era. This year I’m traveling together with PA3EYC, PE1KWH and PA3GRM. Together we hope to be also present at many of the activities around the Hamvention. See you in Dayton?

PI4AMF/p in the IOTA contest 2022

Yes, we did it again: during the IOTA contest we were QRV from EU-146 Schouwen-Duiveland as a Multi-Op two radio station. Over 2.600 QSO’s were made. Thanks for the nice pile-ups and all the QSO’s!

Read more (in Dutch)…

Hamvention 2022

It was a pleasure to be able to visit Hamvention in Xenia again after two years no show. We (PA5NN, PA3EYC, PE1KWH, PA3GRM, PA0PIW and myself) had a blast (and four of us got Covid…).