DU1/JJ5GMJ
Today the postman brought me the QSL of DU1/JJ5MJ.
This confirms the first ever and only contact made between the Philippines and Iceland on 160 Meters.
Long live the Arctic King !
Posts by: TF4M
PJ4C – Bonaire 2012
PJ4C – Bonaire 2012 by F6KOP´s Team was extremely weak on 160 Meters due to Auroral conditions when I first heard them, and when I managed to get his attention he got my call wrong as TF3M and I was unable to correct him because signals were so weak. It turns out that both TF3M and TF4M were logged as can be seen from their online log.
I continued calling and on the next QSB peak we had a solid QSO.
The first recording runs about 15 minutes and demonstrates the extremely deep QSB and has our QSO at the end – even with 30 dB of amplificaton from the Beverage antenna, PJ4C almost disappeared completely due to the deep fading – the station was mostly inaudible on my transmit antenna – the Arctic King which fires straight into a mountain in this direction :
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The second recording is edited to have only the QSO between PJ4C and TF4M.
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Even when PJ4C was the strongest, this is really only a RST 519 signal – but due to my quiet location, I can cascade two 15dB amplifiers when needed to bring signals up to readable strength.
Bonaire was a part of the Netherlands Antilles until their dissolution on 10-10-10.
The political change resulted in four new DXCC entities (Curaçao, Sint Maarten, Bonaire and Saba/Sint Eustatius)
This is entity #177 worked on Top Band.
The operator at PJ4C was Kenneth, OZIKY – I worked him the following day on SSB on17m and he mentioned the contact.
The Arctic King continues to amaze.
I have made a few additional contacts with as shown in their online logs which are updated very quickly – apparently in real-time.
PJ4C continue to churn out the contacts and I have now worked them on all bands more or less…
This is a recording of our 80m QSO:
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This is a recording of our 40m QSO:
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My four-legged friends
Birta – Magyar Vizsla and Skuggi – Labrador enjoy the fine weather in the snow.
Old Photos and recordings from my Whaling days
I found a few photo albums since the Whaling days of my youth.
These photos were taken by a work colleague (Siggi?) around 1978. I took the liberty of processing the images in HDR.
TF4M cuts a Fin whale tail
Sperm Whale Blubber
The following recordings were discovered on an old Reel-to-Reel tape in my possession.
These recordings are possibly the only ones in existence from this period of History.
The first recording takes place around 1980, Hvalfjörður Radíó calls the Whaling Ships and receives their reports.
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The second recording takes place around 1980, Hvalfjörður Radíó (2153 kHz ?) instructs the Whaling Ships to return as the Season is over due to bad weather.
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160 Meter QSL cards
The PostMan brought me some new QSL cards for my 160m DXCC.
OD5NJ´s QSL card brings my country totals to 176 Worked, 170 Confirmed on Top Band.
Winter
With conditions on Top Band detoriating due to Aurora, I went outside to capture the view instead.
Quadrantid Meteor Shower 2012
The annual Quadrantid meteors entered our atmosphere at 250 miles per second on the morning of January 4, 2012.
They typically vaporize about 50 miles above Earth’s surface, creating the streaks of light we see as a meteor shower.
I got up very early, went outside in the freezing cold and took hundreds of photographs in the darkness.
I witnessed several beautiful meteors, but only one of those was caught by the camera.
Quadrantid Meteor Shower January 4th, 2012
This is a heavily processed image I made from merging 20 photos and playing with RGB levels…
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Arctic Power
This is a photo taken during the construction of the Arctic King. I think it gives a good idea of the size of the antenna.
TF4M is the climber – those were the days, now gone.
TF4M working on the Arctic King
DK1CE is on a DXpedition to Namibia 26 December – 16 January.
This is a recording of our QSO on 160 Meters.
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Note: I have discovered that the recording audio leads from my transceiver were in the wrong sockets. Since I have not touched these for months, since installation at least, it appears that the mischievous Elves of Otradalur may be to blame. From now on both channels should be present in the recordings.
The Arctic King once again showed his tremendous power.
According to this they are even using Rhombics for their operations!
This is my country #176 Worked on Top Band.
Nice Conditions 02 January 2012
I recorded a small pile up on 160 meters. The recording is in stereo, reception is full diversity with various receive antennas switched into circuit as needed.
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Note: I have discovered a mistake in audio connections…the recording is only the left channel, the diversity effect is therefore lost in the recording.
Booming signals from Europe, Russia and the Middle East and even one QSO with Japan.
The Arctic King showed his power yet again.
