Posts by: TF4M

 During my recent travel to Sussex, England, I was served with a heavenly fried egg for breakfast.

My wife and I stayed at Millers Bed & Breakfast in the beautiful historic town of Lewes.

I can recommend Millers without hesitation – we had a wonderful stay.

On the last morning of our stay I was allowed to observe how the lady cooked her eggs and the photo shows my first attempt with the method.

TF4M 10388 DxO
The Perfect Egg!

The egg alone was worth the trip to England.

TF4M 10397
Alexey, VE2XAA with two perfect eggs!
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 Alexey, VE2XAA visited my station and operated the IARU HF contest with the call TF4X.

He made 1876 QSOs for a total score of 770,400 points in the contest.

Alexey became interested in visiting my station after we worked on 160 meters when he was QRV from Zone 2 in last years CQ World Wide Contest.

Propagation was poor due to Aurora and as a result most of the contacts were made on 20m.  

Despite 24 hour daylight, Alexey made 14 QSOs on 160 Meters during the contest.

Before the contest Alexey operated my station as TF/VE2XAA and made another 2,300 QSOs for a total of more than 4,000 QSOs during his stay.

Here are Alexey´s comments on his operation :

First of all I would like to thanks Thor TF4M for a great opportunity to see and use his
Super Station with unique Antenna Farm on the surface of 1500 hectares!
Before the contest I decided to participate in phone category but during first 6 minutes
of the contest was no phone QSO at all! So the mode was switched for CW and run
started on 20 m band – the only opened band at the moment. Time to time I did check
15m and 10m but it was no whisper on the bands. Finally I did a few QSO on 15m with
big troubles but 10 m was close during the contest completely. 20m was surprising: I did
expect that run on 20m will stop after a few hours as usually for my home location; that
will be already no new stations on the band and I can start hunting for multipliers; but
pile-up had no stop! The flat rate of 120-140 QSO was continued after 5, 6, 7…hours
of the run! The stations with High Power, Low Power and QRP had almost the same
signal level! The Otradalur Antenna Farm did a work perfectly and stack-match box
let me separate EU-USA-JA directions just with push on one button! Amazing! In 10
hours I had already more than 1200 QSO only on 20m and did expect to have a good
run on other bands to make same number of QSO for other 14 hours. But after 12 hours
of run somebody on the sky decided to switch off the light, put night Aurora cover on
Iceland and told: OK guys, now you can relax and go to sleep, it will be no propagation
for you for next few hours! It becomes nightmare: all bands closed, only big-guns were
on the bands, QSO rate drops for 10-20 per hour… Nice moment was on 160m: “Arctic
King” antenna was doing the work very well: on each 1 kHz distance I heard HQ or other
powerful stations with S7…S9, but they did not hear my 1 kW signal! Probably they
had other receiving directions except Arctic. With big difficulties spending 2-3 minutes
for each contact I was able to make a dozen QSO on 160m despite 24 hour day-light at
Island! Thor TF4M did not very good antenna, but exceptionally perfect!
Thanks to every one for the contacts and hope to see you in the other contests.
73! de Alexey VE2XAA

TF4M 10323
 
TF4M 10326
 
TF4M 10345
 
TF4M 10352
 
TF4M 10354
 
TF4M 10411
 
TF4M 10413
 
TF4M 10637
The local hot pool.
TF4M 10688
Birta – Magyar Vizsla with VE2XAA
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TF4M was honoured to have  Peter, VE3SUN and his wife Jane visit the station and tour the antenna farm during their short visit to Iceland.

Peter is the webmaster of the NCDXF International Beacon Project.

TF4M 10091
Peter, VE3SUN @ TF4M
TF4M 10092
XYL Jane and Peter, VE3SUN @ TF4M
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From the NSO Website:

According to scientists at the National Solar Observatory (NSO) and the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL).

Studies indicate that the next 11-year solar sunspot cycle, Cycle 25, will be greatly reduced or may not happen at all.

“This is highly unusual and unexpected,” Dr. Frank Hill, associate director of the NSO’s Solar Synoptic Network, said of the results. “But the fact that three completely different views of the Sun point in the same direction is a powerful indicator that the sunspot cycle may be going into hibernation.” 

read more..

From N4AA´s QRZ DX newsletter:   

SOLSTICE SOLAR FLARE: The first day of northern summer began with a solar flare. Magnetic fields above sunspot complex 1236 erupted during the early hours of June 21st, hurling a coronal mass ejection (CME) almost directly toward Earth. The incoming CME does not appear to be particularly potent; nevertheless, the cloud could trigger polar geomagnetic storms when it reaches Earth on or about
June 23rd. Check <http://spaceweather.com> for movies and updates.

I have been hoping for another Maunder Minimum with excellent Low Band propagation.

Increased solar activity does not equal improved radio conditions in the Arctic – any disturbance in the earth´s magnetic field causes long lasting radio blackouts in the Arctic.   This means weeks and months of no propagation at all.

I will be very happy if I never see another sunspot.

 A powerful Harris RF110-A  is a recent addition to the firepower at TF4M.

The amplifier fits very neatly into a small 19″ rack which I had available and was modified for 160 Meters by TF3BM who also built the single phase 230V/4400W continous duty power supply.

Due to the noise of the cooling system, the amplifier will be installed remotely in the adjacent equipment room once I have tested it thoroughly.

The amplifier accepts 100mW input for 1000W output and is fed from the exciter through a 30dB attenuator.

It uses two 4CX1500B tubes and is simply loafing at full power.   Two 8122 tubes take the 100mW and amplify this to 10W for the output tubes.  The pair of 8122 tubes are capable of a kilowatt by themselves but are only running at 10W!

The manual may be found here.

Some nice photos of the amplifier may be found here.

TF4M 10087
Harris RF110-A
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Yesterday was the first day of summer weather in my location and also a day off from the work of  planting our forest.

I took my new boat the Spermur II out for it’s maiden voyage. 

This boat is made of fiber-glass with a double hull and had been sitting for several years without being used.  It is powered by a 4HP motor.

Finnbjörn of Litlaeyri performed crew duties and took the photos.

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Otradalur farm in the background. 
P1000306
Open Sea ahead
P1000307
The Arctic King seen from the sea
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The Arctic King
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Otradalur
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Spermur II at full speed
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Spermur II at full speed
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My Perseus SDR receiver  is now open to public use.

To connect use the following settings:

IP :   88.149.5.173

Port 8014
 

The antenna is a 20m high broadband vertical.


 

Unauthenticated connections are limited to 30 minutes and can reconnect after a delay of 5 minutes.

A map of Perseus servers may be seen here.

The software may downloaded from here.

Instructions for setting up the software and router ports may be found here

Thank you for identifying when connecting to the server.  

Anonymous clients may find themselves disconnected without warning.

Comments on the reception are welcome.

The Arctic Queen and the LDF7 cable salvaged from Reykjavik has arrived in her new home – rescued from a fate worse than death.

 TFM3006
 
 TFM3007
 
 TFM3008
500 metres of LDF7-50A Heliax
 
 TFM3010
  The Arctic Queen extends 8.5 metres from the back of the trailer.
 TFM3011
 
 TFM3013
  The roll contains 745 metres of control cable
 TFM3014

The length of the trailer is 12 metres, the Arctic Queen extends out of the trailer 1 meter in the front and 8.5 metres from the back.

I am grateful to the Icelandic Road Authority for granting a special permit for this road transport.

Unloading will begin immediately.

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