Category Archives: HF DX Operating

HF DX Operation

Next AREG Meeting: July AGM and Grant VK5GR: The Flinders Island DXPedition

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The next AREG meeting will be held on Friday the 19th of July at the Fulham Community Centre – Phelps Court, Fulham. This will be the AREG’s Annual General Meeting, which will include the election of the 2024-2025 committee.

This months presentation will be from Grant VK5GR, on the Flinders Island DXpedition, which occurred back in April 2024:

Grant will take you on the journey the team followed to bring the VK5FIL IOTA and WWFF project to life and tell the stories of the fun had along the way. VK5FIL was the first time IOTA OC-261 had been activated since 2013 and so it was in high demand. Whats more, the three parks that covered parts of the island had never been activated before adding even more interest for the WWFF community.

Doors open at 7.00pm and the presentation kicks off at 7.30. Everyone is welcome to attend. If you’ve never come along to one of our meetings, we’d love to see you there, all guests are welcome. For our remote members, the meeting will be broadcast via Zoom, and will also be recorded for release on the HamRadioDX Youtube channel!

After the talks we’ll all be given an opportunity to have an eyeball QSO among ourselves whilst enjoying a tea or coffee and a biscuit.

73, Mark VK5QI

AREG AGM 19th August: 3Y0J Expedition – Preparing to visit the most remote place on earth

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AREG will be hosting a Zoom presentation by Adrian KO8SCA on the plans for the 3Y0J DXpedition to Bouvet Island planned for January 2023 as part of our Annual General Meeting. The presentation will be held at 8:00pm ACST (1030z) Friday August 19th and will be Simulcast live-streamed via the HRDX Youtube channel. We hope to see you there!

AREG May Meeting: FT8 DXing Q&A – This Friday 7.30pm ACST

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The May meeting of the Amateur Radio Experimenters Group will again be held online this month due to the COVID-19 social distancing limitations. It will be held on Friday May 15th starting 7.30pm ACST using the Zoom video conferencing platform for AREG members. A YouTube Livestream via Hayden VK7HH’s HamRadio DX Channel will also be available.

The subject this month will be “FT8 DXing – How to get Started, Tips and Tricks” and will be presented by Grant VK5GR. The format will be based on a live look at FT8 on the air with interaction from members welcome. We will discuss the basics including getting the software installed, but will also explain how you read and position your signals on the band to maximize your chances of a successful QSO, showing you on air as we go.

Non Member Access Planned!

This month, we will be introducing an extra dimension however, with the Zoom meeting also being Live-Streamed to Hayden VK7HH’s Ham Radio DX Youtube channel: (CLICK HERE – Hayden’s YouTube Channel).

This way we hope to make the evening accessible to a wider audience, not just AREG members. So if you are interested in some hints and tips for getting the most out of FT8 when DXing on HF why not tune in at 7.30pm ACST (1000 UTC) on Friday May 15th.

 

FreeDV HF Digital Voice Mode: Global QSO Party April 27/28th

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The Amateur Radio Experimenters Group is proud to announce a new event on the Amateur Radio Calendar. The FreeDV HF Digital Voice QSO Party!

The aim is to encourage as many Radio Amateurs as possible to learn about FreeDV and encourage as many FreeDV signals to be on the air as possible to help spread the word about this new mode.

If you can use WSJT-X for FT8 or any other digital modes software then, with the addition of Headphones and a microphone on your PC, you can switch to digital voice transmission in an instant! Its that easy! So why not give it a try? This is a great way to experiment with something new from the comfort of your own armchair. All it takes is a little bit of time to download, install and setup the software – nothing more!

What to know more? The QSO party rules are below, plus details of where to get FreeDV are included later in this bulletin. Read on!

The Rules

When: April 27th 0300z to April 28th 0300z 2019

Where: All HF Bands from 160m – 10m (excluding the WARC bands)

How: Work as many stations as possible using the FreeDV 700D or FreeDV 1600 modes in 24 hours. You can rework the same station once every 3 hours per band.

Centre Frequencies: 1870kHz, 3630kHz, 7180kHz, 14130kHz, 21180kHz, 28330kHz (chosen in accordance with IARU Bandplans)

Exchange: Signal Strength + Serial Number starting at 001

Points: Stations participating can earn points per QSO

  • 1 point per contact within a continent
  • 5 points per contact between continents
  • 50 points per contact with VK5ARG

(AREG’s club station is planned to be manned for the 24hrs looking particularly for inter-continental DX on 40/20 and 15m)

Multipliers:

  • 1 per call area in VK/VE/JA/ZL per band +
  • 1 per DXCC entity per band +
  • 1 per inter-continental contact

Final Score:

  • Sum all points x sum all multipliers

You can work a station once per band.

Stations earning 50 points or more will be entitled to an emailed PDF certificate indicating their successful participation in this inaugural event!

Categories:

There is one entry per station callsign only.

Log Submission:

You MUST submit your ADIF formatted log via email within 7 days after the event to:

FreeDV.QSOParty (at) areg.org.au

What is FreeDV?

FreeDV is an open source digital voice transmission mode developed for HF Amateur Radio by David VK5DGR. It is founded on open source principles with the Codec2 specification and code fully available to the Amateur Radio community at no charge.

The latest development, FreeDV 700D mode has performance equivalent or better than SSB on HF – a remarkable achievement in only 700 bps!

Why FreeDV?

FreeDV 700D outperforms SSB at low SNRs – you can get an easy copy of 700D when SSB is unusable.

Amateur Radio is transitioning from analog to digital, much as it transitioned from AM to SSB in the 1950’s and 1960’s. How would you feel if one or two companies owned the patents for SSB, then forced you to use their technology, made it illegal to experiment with or even understand the technology, and insisted you stay locked to it for the next 100 years? That’s exactly what washappening with digital voice. But now, hams are in control of their technology again!

FreeDV is unique as it uses 100% Open Source Software, including the speech codec. No secrets, nothing proprietary! FreeDV represents a path for 21st century Amateur Radio where Hams are free to experiment and innovate, rather than a future locked into a single manufacturers closed technology.

FreeDV can be used on multiple platforms including Windows, Mac and Linux systems.

Where can I get FreeDV?

FreeDV software and more information is available from the FreeDV Website!

FreeDV.org

Supporting Events?

If you live in Adelaide, South Australia, there are two events planned prior to the QSO party to help you get FreeDV operational. AREG will be holding a “Tech Night” on April 5th at the clubrooms in the Fulham Community Centre starting 7.00pm. In addition, David VK5DGR (FreeDV’s creator) will be our guest presenter at the April AREG meeting on Friday the 12th. Doors open at 7.15pm for that event.

AREG is also looking to re-launch the FreeDV WIA News Broadcast. New times and frequencies will be announced soon! This provides a perfect opportunity to experiment with FreeDV reception while the broadcast is running for 30 minutes, plus you can participate in the callbacks afterwards.

At the April meeting a new version of FreeDV is also going to be released that promises significantly improved audio fidelity over the communications grade 700D and 1600 modes. Why not put it in your diary and come along – visitors are most welcome!

Want to know more?

Who can I Talk To?

Login to the K7VE FreeDV QSO Finder to find other Hams using FreeDV.

Support

Please post your questions to the Digital Voice Google group

Developers please subscribe to the Codec 2 Mailing List.

IRC Chat

For casual chat there is a #freedv IRC channel on freenode.net

We hope to see you on FreeDV!

August Meeting – Using the Bureau of Meteorology Space Weather Site in Amateur Radio

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This month AREG is pleased to present a talk by David Neudegg, Space Weather Physicist with the Bureau of Meteorology, on how Amateur Radio operators can use the resources on the BOM Space Weather website to understand HF propagation.

David will walk the audience through each of the resources and will show how the items available represent what people experience when operating on HF.

There will be plenty of opportunities for questions so come along! Everyone, visitors especially, is always welcome.

The club meets at 7.45pm Friday August 17th at the Fulham Community Centre, Phelps Court, Fulham. Help finding us can be obtained on the Adelaide VK5RSB 70cm repeater on 439.900 (-5MHz + 91.5 CTCSS tone).

Next Meeting: Chasing DX (or how to work 3Y0Z)

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Welcome to 2018!

The Amateur Radio Experimenters Group Monthly Meetings are starting up again with one of our Beginners Series  of talks, but this one will have a twist. We will be running it as a panel discussion with the topic “HF Operating Etiquette – How to Work 3Y0Z”, and wish to invite all of the active DX chasers and HF operators in the room to share their collective thoughts on what to do and what not to do when chasing HF DX in general.

The aim is to spread the collective knowledge about how to get through those piles for that special ATNO (All Time New One) like the Bouvet Island DXPedition (#2 on the most wanted list). Topics will be guided by moderators and will include HF operating etiquette, how to work HF split, how, when and where to call in a pileup, what to consider propagation wise and much more.

We will have a live scribe taking down all of the best ideas and will post them here after the meeting for future reference.

Where and when is the meeting?

Friday January 19th – 7.45pm (for an 8.00pm start)
Fulham Community Centre, Phelps Court, Fulham.

Visitors are most welcome to come and participate in the evening. We hope to see you there!

[wpgmza id=”5″]

 

VK5ARG on the air OCDX Contest 2017

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The Oceania SSB DX Contest is over for another year, and AREG again participated in the Multi-Multi category. The team set the bar very high for themselves this year with a new site and new antennas and equipment to try out. It has taken 4 months of construction work (since the Australian Contesting Technical College event held in May) but the results were worth it, with the club improving over our previous all time best scores. Hats off to the many members of AREG who contributed to this effort.

YearScoreCategoryOperating Location
20171,907,423Multi-MultiKoch Hill
20161,388,251Multi-MultiYounghusband
20151,662,552Multi-MultiPara Wirra
2014959,616Multi-OneYounghusband
20131,073,252Multi-TwoYounghusband

(Video by Gary VK5FGRY of activity inside the main station hut)

It was all made possible by Steve VK5SFA who negotiated access to the new site on behalf of the club at a dis-used microwave site ~70km north of Adelaide. Ordinarily we would have operated from Para Wirra conservation park but it wasnt available this year. Having seen what this site can do on HF now with noise and take off angles I suspect we have found a new home for AREG Club contesting

Theo VK5MTM has made the following summary video of what we ran at the station which gives a very good idea of what was going on (and the conditions we faced with the wind on site).

Band by band we had the following

160/80m – Led by Grant VK5GR and Steve VK5SFA

1x Elecraft K3 Transceiver + KPA500 Amplifier + KAT500 ATU
1x Dual-Band 80/160m dipole at 25m oriented NE/SW towards North America (resonant on 3790kHz/1850kHz)
1x Tri-Band 40/80/160m Trapped dipole at 27m oriented NW/SE towards Europe (resonant nearer 3640kHz and mis-behaving at 160m likely due to the microwave tower right next to it).

40m – Led by Andrew VK5AKH

1x Icom IC7600 + Acom 1000 Amplifier
1x Elevated feed 1/4 wavelength vertical (19m high to the top)
1x Inverted V (10m high for domestic NVIS coverage)

Both antennas were switchable via a remote WiFi link and were down range 250m to provide some isolation to the rest of the stations. Mark VK5QI provided the WiFi switching control while Andrew achieved a fantastic feat of engineering standing up a 6m mast with another 14m mast on top of it to support the 40m antenna.

20m – Led by Darin VK5IX & Peter VK5KX

1x Elecraft K3 Transceiver + Elecraft KPA500 Amplifier
1x 20m Monoband 3 element SpiderBeam
1x 20m Elevated Feed 1/4 wave vertical (designed by Steve VK5SFA)

Darin coordinated the construction of this station and allowed others to do much of the operating. We had some spectacular openings on 20m particularly short path in the evening hours to Europe with this setup with S9++ reports being received from Switzerland.

15m & 10m SO2R – Led by Matt VK5ZM and Peter VK5KX

2x Elecraft K3 Tranceivers + 2x KPA500 Amplifiers
1x MicroHam MK2R+ SO2R Controller
3x 25A SMPS PSU’s
2x RFSpace SDR’s (SDR-IQ & CloudIQ)
3x HP i7 SFF PC’s & 24″ Monitors
3x StackMatch (designed VK5ZM)
1x 6×2 Crossbar Remote antenna switching matrix (designed VK5ZM)
1x Low Band Systems 20/15/10m Triplexer
3x Low Band System 500W Filters
1x Tri-Band 20/15/10m SpiderBeam + Alpha Spid rotator + 7.5m pump-up mast
1x 15m elevated feed vertical (by VK5SFA) + 1x 10m elevated feed vertical (BudiPole)

This station would not have been possible without borrowing equipment or assistance from the following AREG members; Chris VK5CP, Peter VK5KX, Matt VK5ZM, Scott VK5TST, Steve VK5SFA & Andrew VK5XFG.

This was by far the most complicated of all of the stations, and the most fun as you can see in the following video showing the “Dueling CQ” call pattern to have one operator run both 15 and 10m simultaneously.

Everyone wanted a turn at running what can best be described as “The Beast”. You certainly had to have your wits about you when operating it. The addition of antenna control where combinations of beam, vertical or both in parallel on both 15m & 10m also added additional spice.

Once you got the hang of it however, it was a lot of fun and helped keep VK5ARG visible and active on both 15m & 10m. A more detailed description of the setup will be on Matt VK5ZM’s personal blog soon.

On top of all of the radio activities was the logistics of supporting the nearly 20 person team on top of a very exposed hilltop for 4 days.

The first setup day was Friday before the contest. On site we battled 20-30 knot winds all day over very rocky terrain. To offset the hardships, Scott VK5TST volunteered to lead the camp logistics, and in conjunction with Sharon VK5FSAW (offsite) undertook the catering and most importantly the coffee supply role (the team consumed over 1.5kg of coffee beans over the weekend). Portable toilets, tents, cooking facilities and most importantly on Sunday a TV viewing area to watch the Bathurst 1000 motor race (an iconic race on the Australian motorsport calendar) were all part of Scott’s domain. No one went hungry and everyone was very happy with the facilities!

It was great to see some members also come up for the afternoon on Sunday to see what we were all up to. We hope to coax Olga VK5FOLG and Ben VK5BB to do more operating next year!

Conclusion

Everyone who took part had a fantastic time. I will attempt here to name everyone who contributed and apologies if I missed someone out:

VK5AKH, VK5ZM, VK5KX, VK5GR, VK5SFA, VK5FDEN, VK5MTM, VK5TST, VK5NAL, VK5IX, VK5QI, VK5CP, VK5FGRY & VK5FSAW. Thanks also to our visitors VK5BB and VK5FOLG plus VK5DGR and Sheree and most importantly thanks to the land-owners (3 of them) who allowed us to sprawl our station across the top of the hill for the contest.

Finally thanks to everyone who worked us and made the effort constructing the station worthwhile!

AREG operating WIA HQ Station VK5WIA in IARU HF Championships

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UPDATE: Over night crew working hard, band conditions difficult as usual…

AREG is pleased to announce that it will be fielding the operators to again run the WIA

VK5WIA in 2016

Headquarters Station for the 2017 IARU HF World Championships. The station will be run from the QTH of Chris VK5CP in the Murray Mallee region of South Australia. It is planned to have 2 transmitters on the air continuously at least. This year we are also hoping to get a 160m antenna and a couple of options for 80/75m antennas working from the site as well.

So look out for VK5WIA during next weekend and work us for headquarters station multiplier points! The Contest Rules are available from the ARRL Website.