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With headphones clamped to my ears, the past two Saturday nights have been spent in the Bruce Kelley 1929 QSO Party. Before I was hit with the '29-bug, these two weekends were usually taken up with the ARRL 160 CW Contest, and then with the ARRL 10m Contest the following weekend. Perhaps it's just as well that the BK has taken priority as I'm not sure if I could hang-in until 0100 or so anymore for the topband affair....or sit all weekend for the 10m fracas. At least the BK action finishes up early here out west, as by the time 10pm rolls around, most of the guys further east have hit the sack...my kind of contest!

Courtesy: http://www.spaceweatherlive.com

This year's conditions were rather dismal, on both weekends, as...once again...the planet was whacked with more coronal hole streaming. These things are ionospheric-killers from what I can see, as the level of signal absorption shoots way up, and quickly...not as much however, the further you get from the auroral zone.


Not to disappoint, the usual BK winds came up, right on schedule as well, almost coincidental with the start of the Party. Thankfully, weekend number two saw no wind whatsoever....a rare event in December....but, from the sound of many other notes, I wasn't the only one having windy weather.
  
More information on '29 building may be found here in previous "'29-style blogs" and good project discussions always abound at the Yahoo "AWA Group" builder's site.

It's really not too early to start building for next year's BK!

10' x 20' LF Loop

As is usually the case, conditions deteriorated rapidly as the CLE weekend approached. Conditions varied throughout North America as those listening from the south-eastern regions of the U.S. reported much better propagation than those further to the northwest. Friday night appeared to be the best of the lot but all three nights were very much less than stellar.

The three-night event produced a total of 39 NDBs, with a couple of surprises.






DD UTC    kHz     Call       mi   Location
----------------------------------------------------------

22 05:00  370     YBV        1169 Berens River Apt, MB, CAN
22 06:59  370     OUN        1611 UoOk Westheimer Apt, OK, USA
22 05:00  371     YK         211  Yakima, WA, USA
23 09:00  371     PUR        1629 Marshall, MO, USA
22 05:00  371     ITU        558  Great Falls, MT, USA
22 05:00  371     GW         1946 Kuujjuarapik, QC, CAN
22 05:00  372     ZPA        824  Prince Albert, SK, CAN
22 05:00  372     YCO        1340 Coppermine, NU, CAN
22 05:12  372     FPN        675  Petersburg, ALS
22 07:00  373     TF         1191 Pueblo Mem Apt, CO, USA
22 05:00  373     MF         444  Table Rock, OR, USA
22 05:00  374     LV         776  Livermore, CA, USA
22 05:00  374     EX         190  Kelowna, BC, CAN
23 09:00  374     EE         1319 Forada, MN, USA
22 05:00  374     BOD        942  Bowman, ND, USA
24 09:59  375     PSN        1854 Palestine, TX, USA
22 05:00  375     FS         896  Fort Simpson, NT, CAN
22 10:59  375     DW         1629 Owasso, OK, USA
22 07:00  375     CP         900  Casper, WY, USA
22 05:00  375     BD         803  Moose Jaw, SK, CAN
22 07:00  376     ZIN        3326 Matthew Town, BAH
22 07:00  376     YAG        1345 Fort Frances, ON, CAN
22 13:59  376     PVQ        1690 Deadhorse, ALS
22 06:59  377     EHA        1350 Elkhart, KS, USA
23 06:59  378     ZFA        1000 Faro Municipal Apt, YT, CAN
22 05:00  378     OT         381  North Bend, OR, USA
22 10:59  379     ZEG        526  Edmonton Intl, AB, CAN
22 05:00  379     YBE        945  Uranium City, SK, CAN
23 12:59  379     IWW        1360 Kenai, ALS
22 09:00  380     OEL        1297 Oakley, KS, USA
22 05:00  380     GC         899  Gillette, WY, USA
22 05:00  382     YPW        86   Powell River, BC, CAN
22 05:00  382     YE         686  Fort Nelson, BC, CAN
22 12:59  382     JNR        1731 Unalakleet, ALS
22 12:00  382     GRN        1522 Guerro Negro, MEX
22 05:00  382     AW         75   Marysville, WA, USA
22 06:59  383     PI         658  Pocatello, ID, USA
22 05:20  383     CNP        1146 Chappell, NE, USA
22 05:00  384     3F         792  Ile-a-la-crosse, SK, CAN
-----------------------------------------------------------------

This particular frequency range (370-384.9kHz) is a tough one for me, since my local pest signal, 'AP' is on 378kHz, smack in the middle of the listening range. 'AP's antenna is just .4 miles (2100') from my antenna and its signal is about 60db over S9.... Very loud!

AP to me...Courtesy: https://www.google.ca/maps/

The new 10' x 20' rotatable loop continues to work well. When pointed towards the east, it offers significant nulling of AP's signal and when carefully aligned to the deepest null-point, reduces the signal by almost 30db...but still leaves a very strong signal.

Using this 'deep null' position, I was (somewhat surprisingly) able to log another Canadian NDB (ZFA  Mayo Airprt, Yukon Territory) on the same frequency as AP. The ident-tone modulation frequencies are separated by 10Hz (408Hz vs 418Hz) which was enough to allow the very narrow ~3Hz Perseus filtering, combined with two notch filters, to reveal the 'ZFA' identifier between the 'AP' identifier. Listen for the weak 'ZFA' ident after the loud keying artifacts of 'AP', when they are transmitting just a steady tone.



The other surprise was the logging of 'PVQ' in Deadhorse, Alaska, way up on the extreme northern slope oil fields.

Courtesy: https://www.google.ca/maps/

My last reception of this beacon was in March and conditions usually have to be very quiet, geomagnetically, to hear it at all. The coronal-hole streaming of this past weekend, putting the damper on LF propagation, makes this path very unlikely and surprising! See if you can hear the weak 'PVQ' identifier during its short appearance early on Saturday morning:


CLE organizer, Brian Keyte (G3SIA), reports 51 participants worldwide and over 2100 reception reports. All reports have been added to the RNA/REU beacon database.

As well, Brian will be publishing all results on the NDB Information page shortly.

All-in-all CLE188 was another enjoyable event....hopefully conditions will be better by this time next month and if you did not participate, maybe you will give it a try next time!

My recent 'Building For The BK' blogs have tempted at least one ardent homebrewer, John (VE7BDQ), to dig into his junkbox stash to create a nicely-working BK rig....it's a Colpitts oscillator using a pair of 45's in push-pull. His lash-up is now working and ready to go on both 80 and 40m and he is contemplating 160m operation with it as well....very nice!

1935 ARRL Handbook. Source: http://www.arrl.org/

Although John did not have every period-appropriate component available to him, it didn't discourage him from building his BK rig. For too many, this is often a stumbling block that leads to nothing being built....as the boy's of '29 no doubt would  have done, he put something together completely from his junkbox.

It will be super to have another left-coast station in this years '29 Party...and a Canadian station to boot!

Anyone else building for the BK?  ....there's still a few weeks left.

March 1926 QST. Courtesy: ARRL

The year's premier operating event for '29-style transmitters (well pretty much the only one) is fast approaching. The Bruce Kelley QSO Party runs during the first two weekends of December and hopefully catches some good early winter conditions. In a preemptive attempt at eliminating my normal (and usually justified) pre-contest wind-angst, I have begun work on a small '29-style amplifier for my Hull Hartley oscillator.

Every year as contest time approaches, I anxiously follow our local weather patterns in hope that the winds remain quiet for the event. For the past few years, the wind has been non-existent...right until zero-hour, when, almost as if a switch were thrown, the wind ramps up to gale-like conditions. Now if you've never heard a self-excited oscillator directly connected to a wind-blown antenna, then be sure to take a listen to this year's BK. These '29 rigs are often not very pretty-sounding, even into a dummy load, but couple them to the wind and things get very 'nostalgic-sounding' quickly. Frequency shifts in the order of several hundred Hertz between letters are not uncommon, making copying a weak signal difficult and almost impossible if listening with a narrow filter. The amplifier will effectively isolate the effects of a shifting antenna impedance from the oscillator stage, making life very much less stressful, come BK time.

My plan is to follow the wisdom of the '29ers themselves, carefully explained in "More Power With Better Frequency Stability" by George Grammer and published in the February 1931 edition of QST. I'm always impressed at how quickly those folks back in the 20's figured out so many of the important "basics of radio" that have withstood the test of time. It must have been an exciting time to be a ham! A glance through any of the numerous  radio magazines from the late 20's and early 30's reveals a vibrant market for the homebrewer, with every type of component available. Whether the average ham could afford to buy them in the hungry-thirties is another question.

I've chosen to use another type '10' power triode as my amplifier, as shown below.

Courtesy: ARRL

I see the main challenges being coupling conveniently from the oscillator as well as neutralizing the triode amplifier...I wonder, will neutralizing it on 40m (for example) also make it stable on 80m?

As well, since the type '10' uses a directly-heated cathode, if I wish to let the oscillator run while I key the amplifier, a separate filament supply will be required for each tube. With this in mind, I've got the ball rolling this week with the construction of a dedicated '29 rig filament supply. The supply uses two center-tapped 5V transformers with their secondaries in series and brought out to the back panel. This will allow me to use tubes with 2.5V, 5V, 7.5V and 10V filaments...up to 3A.

New filament supply

The amplifier will be breadboarded, likely with mainly newer parts, to shake-out the circuit and see how it performs during this year's BK event. If things go well, I plan to rebuild the amplifier using '29-style components and physical layout...maybe a vertical panel that the Hartley can slide into.  Hopefully I'll get the breadboard version done in time for the Party.

Are you building or planning anything for this year's BK Party?

It's time to dust-off that precious old Vibroplex, or any other type of bug, and give it a work out! The W6FSM Bug Roundup will take place on Saturday, November 15th at 1800Z through 0600Z on the 16th (10:00 AM to 10:00 PM Pacific Time)...a full 12 hours of old-time CW delight.

Sponsoring the event is the Samuel F. Morse Amateur Radio Club (W6SFM) of Sacramento, CA. Detailed information may be found at their website, located here.

The club page describes the event as :

"a special time to bring bug operators together on the air. In the same spirit as ARRL's Straight Key Night, participants are encouraged to make simple, conversational, “chewing-the-fat” QSOs using their bug type key. This is an opportunity to exercise, share and exhibit your personalized fist. This is NOT a contest. Call "CQ BR" so folks know you are a Bug Roundup Participant."

You may have guessed by now that I love CW and always have, since learning the 'code' as an eleven-year old in Scouts! Our Scoutmaster had procured several sets of beautiful boxed Aldis signalling lamps, the same as shown below:

Image Courtesy: http://www.museumoftechnology.org.uk

As it turned out, I was the only one in the group that stuck it out long enough to learn any code and was thusly appointed the 'chief operator' of the lamp. Unfortunately, learning the code visually with flashcards, made it even harder to later learn CW by sound as, for many months, I had to convert the sound of the CW back to the picture of it in my head, before identifying the letter...thankfully my brain was still empty enough at the time, that I was able to overcome the unintended curve-ball.

Our leader worked in the Marine Building, the tallest building at the time, in downtown Vancouver.

Marine Building circa 1947. Courtesy: http://searcharchives.vancouver.ca/

The extra sets were distrubuted to several of the other local troops and numerous evenings were spent, at the very top of the building, working all of the other stations. It was usually cold and windy and most of the guys just wanted to go home but I loved it and could have stayed all night....it seems that there was little hope for me, even at that age! When it came to CW I was hooked and even today, almost 100% of my operating is on CW.

It nice to see events like this and the ARRL's "Straight Key Night" along with clubs like the, "SKCC" , "FISTS", "FOC" and "The CW Operators' Club", all doing their best to keep CW alive. Hopefully you will have some time to play in the 'BR' this weekend.
 

Friday evening's 630m crossband activity was 'interesting' in many respects. Propagation, which had been improving slowly, chose to follow Murphy's Law. The K-index, holding at a quiet '1', rose to level '3' by the time our event had concluded, as the geomagnetic activity ramped up. Additionally, lightning pocketed various areas of the continent, making listening noisy for many.

From here on Mayne Island (CN88iu), good two-way CW crossband contacts were made with the stations in the following order:

• N7IO (Seattle, Washington)
• VE7CA (North Vancouver, BC)
• KK7UV (Missoula, Montana)
• NW7E (Bend, Oregon)
• KU7Z (Ogden, Utah)
• VA5LF (Saskatoon, Sakatchewan)
• K7SF (Portland, Oregon)
• VE7BKX (North Vancouver, BC)
• K6TOP (Los Gatos, California)
• ABØCW (Westminster, Colorado)
• NO3M (Saegerton, Pennsylvania)
• KB5NJD (Duncanville, Texas)
• W7MTL (Independence, Oregon)

'Heard' reports were received from:

• KØSBV (Tucson, Arizona)
• WB6DCE (Seaside, California)
• KO6BB (Merced, California)
• K6CLS (Palo Alto, California)
• WY3B (Kaneohe, Hawaii)
• AA7U (La Grande, Oregon)

More than one of the DX contacts mentioned using just their HF dipole for listening to my signals on 630m and simply 'A-B' switching their transceiver's frequency while two of those sending 'heard' reports were using 100' longwires. Mike Tuggle (WY3B) in Hawaii was using his amazing 1-MOSFET regen and small inverted 'L' !

I was also more than excited to exchange signal reports with Pennsylvania and Texas. Considering conditions, this distance was far beyond my expectation but both of these stations have very efficient, dedicated 630m antenna systems.

John, VE7BDQ, worked the following stations on crossband:

• VE7CA (North Vancouver, BC)
• W7DRA (Seattle, Washington)
• N7IO (Seattle, Washington)
• NW7E (Bend, Oregon)
• KK7UV (Missoula, Montana)
• KU7Z (Ogden, Utah)
• VA7JWS (Delta, BC)
• VA5LF (Saskatoon, Sakatchewan)
• WB6W (Oysterville, Washington)

'Heard'  reports were received from:

• K5HK (Reno, Nevada)
• KØSBV (Tucson, Arizona)
• WY3B (Kaneohe, Hawaii)

It was gratifying to see all of these fellows making the effort to listen for our signals or to attempt the QSO.

This exercise taught me a few things about our new band.

• It is not necessary to have huge antennas and acreage to make this band work. Good solid contacts can be easily made with small backyard antenna systems.
• With good systems on both ends, transcontinental QSO's can be made.
• There really should be more interest by Canadian amateurs in their newest band as so much work has been put into securing this portion of the spectrum as a ham band. It was very disappointing not to work any stations in VE6, VE4 or VE3 land.
• There is already much interest in this band by U.S. amateurs, many of them anxiously awaiting the day that they can also call it a ham band.

I would like very much to continue this type of crossband activity to try and generate more interest in our new band. I'm presently considering a weekly, one-night crossband operation, similar to Friday's event, perhaps running for one hour per week. The main difficulty will be in getting the word out to those that might wish to participate.