This evening, the 26th April 2025, band conditions were fantastic. Across 15m, 17m and 20m, there was a wide opening from the United Kingdom to North and South America and Australia in particular. I managed to work all 6 continents this evening, and the distribution of FT8 contacts were scattered across the globe.
Map of Contacts, 26.04.2025, courtesy of Qscope.orgList of DXCCs, 26-04-2025 (evening) and 27-04-2025 (early hours of morning)
Thanks to the high sunspot number and SFI, the bands have been in great shape recently. In addition to widespread FT8 openings, many SSB contacts to North America were also possible. Did you manage to get any in the log?
Last weekend (19-20th April 2025) was the Spring edition of the “Support Your Parks Weekend” event. This is a quarterly event run by the Parks on the Air (POTA) team encouraging radio amateurs to “get on the air” from/to a park to support the program.
I was pleased to be able to make contact with Riso OM6RT in his activation of Rumanovský park. Luckily for me, this meant I was issued with the special award for the event, which you can view below.
I continue to support the Parks on the Air program, and I am pleased that such events exist to support the portable community within the hobby. Some of my best contacts have been while activating a local park/beach, and the proximity to the sea in my local area boosts signal propagation.
I was very pleased to open an airmail letter to find my DX Century Club (DXCC) award. One of the most prestigious and most sought-after awards in amateur radio, I was delighted to receive mine.
The award celebrates making QSOs to 100 different DX entities, and proof of contact (QSL) must be provided for each.
More on the scheme can be found HERE (link opens in new tab).
I have launched a new series of articles on my site, titled “Foundation Stories”. In the United Kingdom, there are three tiers of amateur radio licence; foundation (M3, M6, M7 prefix), Intermediate (2E0 and 2E1 prefix) and Full (M and G prefix).
This series focuses on the first of these, celebrating the entry level licence and opening the hobby to new people. Thanks to online examinations offered by the Radio Society of Great Britain (RSGB), more people than ever are taking up the hobby and getting involved.
In the first of these articles, I had a Q&A session with John M7DDL (now 2E0IYB) on his experience in amateur radio, particularly with getting his foundation licence and the online examination.
This weekend, the CQWW WPX (Prefix) award on SSB was held, one of the biggest events in the annual contesting calendar.
I took part as M7OJA from my home QTH with 25w, a 5 band cobweb and 10-40m end-fed. I entered the fixed, single-op, low-power, all-band category with youth overlay.
In total, I achieved 546 QSOs to 65 DXCCs.
Contests like this help to keep the bands alive, with no shortage of DX available this weekend.
As I was away from the shack today, I decided to leave my radio (Yaesu FT-991A) connected to my PC (running MMSSTV) to see if any SSTV images could be decoded.
I was very surprised when I returned to the shack to find over 100 images saved. Although some were blurry and distorted, the majority were clear and readable.
The following images were received 20/03/2025 between 11:00-17:00 on 20m SSTV (14.230MHz) with a cobweb antenna:
I had the pleasure of talking to Esad E77PY for a recorded conversation about the E7 POTA special event callsign for Parks on the Air (POTA) activations. You can watch the interview HERE.
A never-before-seen scale expedition is planned to Bouvet, the most remote island in the world. Planned for February 2026, the 3Y0K team of 18-24 operators are planning to operate on the island for around 3 weeks. The group has a budget of approximately $1.6 million dollars funded by various DXpedition groups and corporate sponsors.
The group plans to arrive on the island by helicopter (by the Norwegian Polar Institute) before sailing on an icebreaker for around a week. Two camps are planned to be setup, one focusing on North American contacts and the other on the rest of the world. SSB and CW will be prioritised, with some operation on digital modes such as FT8 and RTTY and via the QO-100 satellite.
The DXpedition will participate in various awards schemes, with the following references:
Parks on the Air (POTA) –BV-0001
Islands on the Air (IOTA) – AN-002
World Wide Flora Fauna (WWFF) – LAFF-0044
Summits on the Air (SOTA) – BV-001
QSL cards will be offered for any contacts during the expedition. Currently, a PayPal Online QSL Request (OQRS) and Logbook of the World (LOTW) confirmation will be $15, with bureau requests priced at $3. Direct cards will also be answered, with a suggested minimum contribution of $5 or more. For those unable to make a financial contribution, a free bureau QSL card option will become available after the expedition and when other requests are processed.
QSL requests will be available via Charles M0OXO at his website HERE (link opens in new tab).
Further information about the expedition is available at the 3Y0K dedicated website, accessible HERE.
A new guide is live on my website titled “Improving your QRZ Page”. The guide covers how to format your page, useful information to include in your biography, how to add images and set featured images and how to embed useful tools such as POTA Statistics and Clublog OQRS into your QRZ page.
You can view the guide HERE (link opens in new tab).
So far, I have received positive feedback from the guide, and I hope it will be useful for you.
The special callsign E7POTA from Bosnia-Herzegovina is now active on the HF bands for the Parks on the Air (POTA) program.
E7POTA and OE/E7POTA will be active across the HF bands on SSB and FT8/FT4. Keep an eye on the POTA cluster HERE (link opens in new tab) for information. The callsign is also active on Facebook and you can follow them HERE (link opens in new tab).
An award scheme for the special callsign is also available, awarding diplomas for making QSOs with the station. Details of the award scheme is available on their website HERE.
I am pleased to have received the Bronze Award so far, and I will continue to work the callsign in their POTA activations.
I had the pleasure of interviewing Esad E77PY, one of the activators and leaders of the E7POTA callsign. You can view the interview HERE (link opens in new tab).
Despite a minor solar storm causing disruption and poor propagation on HF, I enjoyed operating today. I achieved 200 QSOs on Sunday, including 60 Youngsters on the Air (YOTA) contacts, 11 Parks on the Air (POTA) contacts and a new DXCC (Cocos Keeling Island) on 20m SSB.
On Sunday 10th March 2025, the first round of the Youngsters on the Air (YOTA) contest took place. The aim of the contest is to provide an opportunity for young people (under age 25) to be the focus of a contest. For 12 hours, amateurs all over the world made contact with each other, with bonus points available for QSOs with under 25s.
I chose to take part in the “6 hour” category of the contest, and as I am 21, I am classed as a “YOTA” station. In between other things, I put a few CQs out on 20m and 40m and finished the contest with 60 in the log. The oldest operator I spoke to was 82, and the youngest was only 7 years old operating with a youth club in Hungary!
Log submissions are to be in Cabrillo format and can be submitted HERE (link opens in new tab).
A few statistics from my log is below:
Map of my YOTA contacts (M7OJA) – Courtesy of Adventureradio.YOTA Contest Submission – M7OJADXCC list for my YOTA QSOs – Courtesy of QScope
I am currently in the process of writing an article on how to improve your QRZ.com page. I will cover the basic format and imaging of your page, ensuring all of your details are correct in the “detail” section, uploading an image and setting a main image (which is displayed automatically when DX stations search for you in their logging software), signing up to external services which can provide information and logging, updating your QSL information on QRZ.com and embedding external services into your QRZ.com page (such as HamAlert Cluster Spots for your station, POTA statistics, etc.).
Keep an eye on the website for more information. When the article is published, it will appear under the “Getting Started” tab on the navigation menu. I will also notify via Instagram and my free newsletter.
Last night, the 24th Feb 2025, I took part in the RSGB FT4 contest for the first time. I was using a 20.5m 49:1 end-fed. As the contest began, my strategy was to start on 20m for any DX contacts before moving on to 40m for as many European DXCCs as possible.
Within about 5 minutes of the contest starting, I realised I wasn’t going to get far on the 10w I was using to enter into the “10w Restricted” category, so I increased my power to the maximum 25w as permitted by my licence. This meant I was able to achieve more points and countries, but this was a disadvantage as I had to enter in the 100w category.
My first contacts as the contest began were to the USA, Morocco and the Canary Islands before moving on to 40m. Unfortunately, I do not have access to 80m at my home QTH, meaning I was unable to collect DXCCs from this band.
On 40m, I was slowly but surely beginning to collect DXCCs, until my computer crashed and I had to restart before JTDX would work again. This set me back around 10 minutes.
Owing to a couple of last minute DXCCs, I finished with 40 QSOs and 25 DXCCs in the log, which was nowhere near the highest score, but still fun to participate and nice to gain a couple of new countries on FT4.
Overall Log Statistics – Courtesy of Qscope.DXCCs Worked – Courtesy of Qscope.QSO Map – Courtesy of Qscope.
You can read more about the RSGB FT4 contest HERE (link opens in new tab).
The bands have been remarkably open over the past week or two. In the past few days, there have been many DX opportunities on 10m, 20m and 40m particularly. Please see the snapshot of today’s activities.
Working Conditions
Between 5W-25W into an end-fed antenna (49:1, 20.5m wire) positioned over the roof. Transceiver is a Yaesu FT-991a.
Statistics
Thank you to qscope.org for the statistics.Thank you to qscope.org for the statistics.Thank you to qscope.org for the statistics.
During February, the International Space Station (ISS) has been performing a test called Fram2Ham in preparation for the first human space flight in polar orbit. The test reduced the power of the space station’s transmitter from 25w to 5w, and transmitted a series of images via Slow Scan Television (SSTV).
I have enjoyed the test, and received these images from space.
(Blog posted retrospectively from my old website, NE Ham Radio).
VHF can work in wonderful ways! I was sitting listening to my radio when I heard a station (signal 5,9) calling CQ. I asked them to repeat the callsign, and I heard “ES8TJM”. They were calling CQ on 145.500FM, and I worked them (receiving a 5 and 9 signal in return).
The usual range of VHF is “just beyond line of sight”. If you can make a 30 mile contact line of sight, you can expect somewhere in the range of 40 miles radio range. This contact occurred due to an atmospheric condition called “Sporadic-E”. You just have to be in the right place and the right time to benefit from VHF propagation, and I was very lucky to have such a clear contact so far away! I have never worked Estonia on HF either, so a totally new country in the log for me.
I firstly thought that this might be a “troll” station, but the station I spoke to happily confirmed the contact via email. Definitely worth me sending a QSL card!
Moral of the story – keep calling CQ! You never know who might respond…
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