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Re: [HCDX] Dxers Unlimited's script for 9-10 January 2007



Radio Havana Cuba

Dxers Unlimited's mid week edition for 9-10 January 2007

by Arnie Coro

CO2KK

Hi amigos radioaficionados worldwide ! From Havana this is the mid week 
edition of your favorite radio hobby program, Dxers Unlimited, with 
Arnie Coro ... Stay with me for the next seventeen minutes listening to 
radio related topics that I am sure you will enjoy... Here is the first 
one: How Internet is actually helping to promote amateur radio, and also 
providing ham radio operators with a lot of information about many 
different aspects of the hobby, from specialized mailing lists aiming at 
earth moon earth communications to up to date propagation information 
that certainly helps to optimize your search for DX stations, without 
forgetting to mention those web sites that provide instant data on the 
DX stations that are actually on the air at any moment.

With the new concept by telecommunications administrations that the 
Morse Code tests are no longer necessary to issue an amateur radio 
license, we are certainly going to see a lot of newcomers to the hobby, 
especially among those persons to whom the Morse Code learning curve 
proved to be a very difficult challenge... But CW Morse Code 
communications won't disappear from the amateur bands, as many operators 
will continue to use it for weak signal work, and I am sure that many of 
the newcomers will "discover" CW by themselves and start

enjoying its fascination... Because, without any doubts , CW 
radiotelegraphy transmissions are capable of providing two

way communications with the bare minimum equipment requirements ...

Item two: Got plenty of feedback from Dxers Unlimited listeners 
regarding the QSLs topic, and they all agree in one way or the other 
that short wave stations should be encouraged to QSL to their 
listeners... As regards to Tropical Band, AM broadcast band and FM 
stations, QSLing is left very much to the existence of members of their 
staff that are willing to devote time to answering the QSL requests...

Item three: Using a very simple vertical antenna that looks

very much like a fishing rod... a Canadian radio amateur tells

me that he has worked DXCC,that is two way contacts with 100 hundred DX 
entities, so when he receives the last QSL card from

the 100th country worked, he will be able to apply for the DXCC award... 
The antenna is put up in less than two minutes by fitting it into a jig 
that he has installed on the balcony rail of his

eleventh floor apartment... And as explained in a recent Dxers 
Unlimited's edition, the ground system or counterpoise is a permanent 
installation. He has only to connect the ground to the base of the 
antenna with a butterfly nut, and start operating

less than two minutes after taking the antenna from the closet where he 
keeps it to the balcony.

He has made three loading coils for it, one to operate on 40 meters, the 
other for 30 meters and the other one for 20 meters. On 15 meters the 
antenna can be tuned with the antenna tuner without the need of a 
loading coil, because it uses a capacity top had loading device that 
artificially extends the length of the

three sections aluminum tubing antenna.

More about the Toronto Special Balcony antenna when Dxers Unlimited's 
mid week edition continues after a short break

I am Arnie Coro in Havana..

........

This is Radio Havana Cuba, the name of the show is Dxers Unlimited , and 
yes we do QSL, so you can send your requests

for the verification of reception reports to arnie@xxxxxx, or VIA AIR 
MAIL to Arnie Coro Radio Havana Cuba,Havana, Cuba.

Now, as promised early in the program here is more information on the 
Toronto Special Balcony Antenna... According to its designer and 
builder, the idea to make it came right from Havana, when he heard yours 
truly talking about balcony antennas and how they could make possible 
operating an

amateur radio station on the HF bands with very small sized

antennas. Our Toronto friend who wants to remain anonymous, said in his 
first e-mail that he had operated on two meters

and seventy centimeters from his eleventh floor apartment since moving 
to that building. He said that the antennas he had tested for 2 meters 
and 70 centimeters included ground planes, J poles  several YAGI and 
QUAGI designs and the only problem he had found was that signals from 
and to the other side of the building were heavily attenuated, so his 
coverage of the area behind

his building was reduced significantly. Nevertheless our Canadian friend 
says that he enjoys now also working on 6 meters , having made recently 
his first Auroral Curtain propagation two way contact... But, he wanted 
to be on the HF bands, and with absolutely no possibilities of 
installing a rooftop antenna due to the building regulations, after 
hearing my explanation of how short vertical or inclined antennas 
protruding from a balcony could prove to be efficient enough for HF 
work, he began to think about the project.

He has a very nice antenna tuner, with a built in Standing Wave Ratio 
bridge meter, and capable of covering a very wide

range of impedances... For this particular balcony antenna, the base 
impedances involved are rather low, that is they are much less than 50 
ohms, and that requires a very well designed tuner.

The Toronto Special Balcony antenna is built in three sections that 
telescope into each other, with the one closer to the base

providing a very good mechanical strength, so that even under

heavy winds the antenna will not break up and fall into the

ground, something that must be avoided by all means as it

is a potentially dangerous problem. So, the first section is

made using 50 centimeters of 50 millimeters or two inch

diamter heavy wall aluminum tubing, followed by a second

section of 25 millimeters or one inch tubing that is two

meters long, and the final section is a stainless steel whip

antenna cut to a length of about one meter, making the

overall length of the antenna from the insulated Teflon

base of three and a half meters, and that's why it loads

up so well directly on the fifteen meters band without the

use of a base loading coil... The mechanical construction of the antenna 
, as shown by the photos sent to me, is of an extreme

high quality, using sleeves that enclose the less diameter sections that 
are held using Allen type bolts distributed in

such a way as to assure a very reliable mechanical assembly.

A later model instead of using the steel whip as the last section, uses 
a length of three quarters inch heavy wall aluminum tubing to which a 
top capacity loading aluminum disk is attached to

artificially increase the length of the antenna, making operation

on the 40 meters band more efficient.

At the base of the antenna there is an area that is used for

installing the loading coils for 40 , 30 and 20 meters band

operation and the copper link that is used for 17 meters,

15 meters, 12 meters and 10 meters band operation.

The antenna tuner is located right at the base of the antenna,

and according to the designer and builder, he is able to

achieve a one to one standing wave ratio on all bands from

40 meters to 10 meters without any trouble. Normally he runs his 
transceiver at around 20 Watts power output or less,

a well thought practice if you consider that operating an HF

amateur radio station from an apartment building using high

power can create problems with neighbor's TV sets, stereos

and computers...

So far , he says that at the 20 Watts power level , no one has 
complained....

As you may realize this was not a single weekend project

and it did require a lot of mechanical work, but it was

worth the effort, and it made possible to enjoy operating on

the HF amateur bands, and as a bonus, much better short

wave reception,as he tells me that the antenna is also used

for that purpose, providing much better reception on the

short wave broadcast bands from 6 megaHertz up... His

amateur transceiver has a wide range HF receiver covering

from 100 kiloHertz all the way to 30 megaHertz, and he

tells me that now he listens to Dxers Unlimited on

6180 kiloHertz with much better quality than when he

uses his portable radio with the telescopic whip.

If you live in an apartment building and have a balcony

or terrace, think about the nice possibilities that building

a similar antenna from readily available materials may

mean for you... both for ham radio and short wave listening!

......

Si amigos, you are listening to Radio Havana Cuba, the name of the show 
is Dxers Unlimited and here is our next item today..

amateur radio satellites and how they are becoming easier

and easier to use ...but with the still not solved problem of

very short access periods.... After the now non operational Oscar 40 
satellite failed to provide the world amateur radio operators with one 
more ellyptic orbit spacecraft that could be accessed

for hours at a time, the satellites available for ham radio 
communications are only low quasi circular orbit ones, that due to their 
low altitude are only available for short periods of time, usually not 
lasting more than fifteen minutes at best...

Anyway, even with a hand held FM dual band transceiver

and a simple dual band antenna you can make two way

satellite contacts in many parts of the world...they won't

last long, but can be made using several communications modes, from 
voice to digital ... Amateur satellite communications are one of the 
more than 80 ways that you and I can enjoy this

wonderful and even low cost hobby amigos !

......

ASK ARNIE, is the most popular section of Dxers Unlimited

and today I will be answering a question by listener Mario

from Turin, Italy. He wants to know more about gray line propagation, 
that is the optimized propagation conditions

that happen along the line that separates day and night,

the so called terminator line that is so nicely seeing by

astronauts and cosmonauts from space... Well amigo Mario

terminator line propagation, as it is also known among radio

hobbysts, is a unique mode, of which we still need to learn a lot 
about... I am sending you via e-mail an information package that I 
compiled some time ago about this topic, that may help you

to better understand how this mode works... Included in the

package are a list of Internet websites that have information

about gray line or terminator line propagation for you to visit

and enjoy !!!

And now as always at the end of the show , here is our

exclusive and not copyrighted HF plus low band VHF propagation update 
and forecast... Abnormal tropospheric

ducting, totally out of the usual tropo DX season is happening in the 
Northern Hemisphere due to the unusually high temperatures registered 
during this winter... Here in Cuba

we have seen tropo ducting earlier than at any previous year,

as early January brought a wide reaching tropo opening to the Gulf of 
Mexico... Now the HF update...

Less than 50 percent probability of Class C solar flares

expected during the next three days
The geomagnetic field is expected to be QUIET

Solar flux will be very near 90 units and the A index

or planetary geomagnetic disturbance indicator is expected

to remain at very nice and low levels , making possible

good propagation conditions on the lower frequency bands

during the next three days
The estimated Catania , Sicily solar observatory WOLF sunspot number has 
increased to 61...and the smoothed sunspot number

is now around 35, and that is the figure, 35, to use for making

your HF propagation forecasts using the typical software

programs for that purpose.

See you at the weekend edition of Dxers Unlimited amigos !

 

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