DIARY AND PHOTOS 2013-09-05-- 2013-10-31

2013-09-05

Board meeting via Skype

Present during the meeting:

SM3GHE, SM3FJF, SM3ESX, SM3LIV, SM3CER, SM3EAE, SM3BQC, SM3GDT, SM3CVM

Following was discussed/reported during the meeting:

• Reports:

Previous meeting minutes

King Chulalongkorn Day

SK0YT Youth Camp

Working Days in the end of August

• Decisions:

Rent a sky-lift

• Coming activities:

SAC CW

Guest Visitors from Åmsele

Ham meeting in Utanede on October 5

Guest operators from Belgium

TX5K

CQ WW CW

• Next meeting:

Will be decided later

2013-09-20 -- 2013-09-22

Scandinavian Activity Contest, SAC,

on the CW from SI9AM

SI9AM worked as "Multi Operator Single Transmitter" in the Scandinavian Activity Contest, SAC CW.

SM3CER/Janne and SM3FJF/Jörgen met on Friday evening and started the preparations for the contest and on Saturday SM3EAE/Lars joined them.

During the weekend SM3BQC/Arne and SA3BPG/Markus visited SI9AM.

When the contest ended there were1,784 QSOs in the log and totaly 674,766 points.

2013-09-27 -- 2013-09-29

Guest visitors from Åmsele in Sweden

SA2YLM/Maria and SA2AWO/Mats from Åmsele rented SI9AM for two days.

They worked about 300 QSOs during the weekend and they did great marketing

for the Visitor´s Amateur Radio Station SI9AM on amateur radio bands.

2013-10-05

District 3 meeting in Utanede

The District 3 meeting was organized by SI9AM and took place at Holmstagården in Utanede. It was about 30 hams from Östersund, Örnsköldsvik, Sollefteå, Kramfors, Sundsvall and Gävle who this day in October had went to the meeting. They all wanted to hear and talk about District 3 questions, get information from SSA and of course listen to SMØJZT Tilman who held two very interesting presentations.

Coffee and sandwiches was served before the meeting, and all had the opportunity to say hallo to each other. SM3LDP Markku demonstrated some radio equipment he had for sale.

Welcome

SM3FJF Jörgen, vice president of SI9AM, welcomed everyone to Utanede and after that the District Leader for the third call area (DL3), SM3GDT Hans opened the meeting by thanking everyone who had come to the District 3 meeting.

The meeting

During the meeting, the were information from Swedish Amateur Radio Society (SSA) and everyone had the opportunity to ask questions. SM3WMU Tomas , member of the SSA Council, presented the ongoing discussions about the questions for the amateur radio certificate. SM3FJF Jorgen gave a short information about of SSA's Youth camp, SKØYT, for seven young people, held at Holmstagården in August.

At twelve o’clock is was a break for a lunch that consisted of "Flying Jacob". At all tables there were lively discussions and mostly about amateur radio.

After lunch the District 3 meeting continued with reports about the activities in the amateur radio clubs in the third call area.

The highlight

SMØJZT Tilman, SSAs section leader of ham radio technology, went by car from Stockholm to Utanede and later on back to Stockholm, a trip around one hundred Swedish miles, just to talk to us. Outstanding Tilman!

The first presentation was about QRSS - slow telegraphy for connections with very low power. After a coffee break Tilman continued with a presentation about WSPR - modern techniques and protocols for global propagation experiments and communication with VERY low power.

Tilman is a very good speaker and all probably started to think about if they themselves or their home club could do some of the projects Tilman had spoken about.

Thanks

A big thanks to everyone who visited SI9AM and District 3 meeting and a special thanks to you Tilman that inspired us all.

2013-10-11 -- 2013-10-13

Scandinavian Activity Contest, SAC,

on the SSB from SI9AM

SI9AM worked as "Multi Operator Single Transmitter" in the Scandinavian Activity Contest, SAC SSB.

SA3BYC/Johan and SA3AZK/Mikael met on Friday evening and started the preparations for the contest. When the contest ended there were 1,061 QSOs in the log and totaly 396,460 points. 

2013-10-23 -- 2013-10-31

Guest Operators for the sixth time

DD2CW/Jef, ON6UQ/Marcel

For the sixth year in a row ON6UQ/Marcel  and DD2CW/Jef choose SI9AM in Utanede to work the CQ World Wide DX SSB Contest in October 26 to 27!

For the second year in a row Amateur listener ONL741/Dirk and for the first time ON7TQ/Roger choose SI9AM . The group now is known as "The R- TEAM " in Belgium.

On October 23, they arrive to Stockholm / Skavsta airport and then then they went by car up to SI9AM.

In Njurunda they made a stop for coffee and a sandwich at the home of SM3LIV/Ulla and SM3FJF/Jörgen. SM3JOS/Rene, who had lived many years in Belgium had  also came to Njurunda to welcome his countrymen.

As soon as the guys came to SI9AM and Utanede they were QRV on the amateur radio bands.

In the CQ WW DX SSB Contest on October 26 to 27 attended "The R- TEAM "  they worked in the multi single class and they were QRV 43 of the 48 hours.

The result: 3040 QSOs, 113 Zones, 358 Country 's and Claimed score 2 071 659 points. A bit higher than the result 2012.

During the week “The R-Team” worked 5400 QSOs from SI9AM.

On the way back to Stockholm / Skavsta Airport they stopped in Njurunda by Jörgen and Ulla and booked SI9AM for the same period in 2014.

Welcome back again!

Read ON6UQs blog about the trip to Utanede in 2013.

2013-10-25

Unique lecture about TX5K on SI9AM

The last six years DD2CW/Jef and ON6UQ/Marcel has rented SI9AM and worked CQ WW SSB Contest from SI9AM. This year ONL741/Dirk and ON7TQ/Roger took the opportunity to to with them. For ONL741/Dirk it was the second time but for ON7TQ/Roger it was the first time to rent SI9AM.

During the spring, we asked Jef, who was one of the operators on the DX peditionen TX5K to Clipperton Island in February/March this year, if he wanted to give a lecture about TX5K. " Of course. Best for us is on Holmstagården the day before the CQ WW Contest, he replied".

Arrival to SI9AM

Already on Wednesday evening October 23 the guys arrived to Utanede and began to work from SI9AM.

Friday evening October 25

On Friday evening at 19:00 local time, it was 18 radio amateurs from Örnsköldsvik, Kramfors, Östersund and Sundsvall who had travelled to Holmstagården to listen to DD2CW/Jef. All the hams had travelled a long way to hear the lecture. Some of the hams had travelled 120 Swedish kilometers one way to Utanede. It became 240 Swedish kilometers the same evening, so there were big interest hear about the preparations for the DX-pedition, the travelling to Clipperton , building up the camp, all the amateur radio contacts and then how to dismount the camp och the trip home and of course to see a lot of pictures.

Silent key

Our president SM3CVM Lars Aronsson died after a long illness on October 22. This evening was therefore initiated with a minute of silence for SM3CVM Lars.

TX5K

The DXpeditionen to Clipperton Island consisted of 24 radio amateurs and five scientists / journalists. It was a huge preparation work . The DX team had a chartered boat , Shogun, who took half the team and all the material from San Diego to Cabo San Lucas where the rest of the team boarded the ship continued the trip to Clipperton Island.

The landing on Clipperton was not easy. Shogun had to anchor a bit off and everything has to be transported to the island in a small boat. It took a lot of time to move all the people and the equipment  to the island and it was not quite risk free. There was a huge amount of materials needed for the stay on the island.

On the island all helped with unpacking all the equipment that was clearly packed in different boxes, to put up all masts and to build up the camp. It was a tuff work and sometimes the temperature was up to 55 degrees.

All food was cooked on the boat Shogun and transported once a day to the island. But in case of stormy weather, when to boad could not land on the island, they must have extra food at the camp.

The radio operating from the island could be followed from their website where all the logged QSOs could be followed in real time.  For those who worked TX5K there no speculation if they was in the log or not.

The DX peditionen was shut down a little early because of an approaching storm. It was a hard work in the heat to take down all the masts, dismantle the camp, pack everything into boxes and clean up. But through an efficient teamwork Shogun and the expedition could leave the island before the storm came.

The trip started on February 18 and ended on March 18. The radio team logged 113,601 contacts, and the science team made several discoveries. No damage was done to the island or wildlife; the campsite was left cleaner than before the expedition.

How did they manage in the CQ WW SSB contest ?

In the CQ WW Contest on SSB the guys worked 3,040 QSOs and got about two million points, which is an all-time high on SI9AM.

They have already booked in for next CQ WW SSB on SI9AM.

Thanks

A very big thank to you Jef, it very fascinating to take part of your experience of DX peditionen and see all the pictures. There were many questions which you answered and some of us who listened had wished that could have joined to DX-pedition to Clipperton Island.

We hope you will participate in more DX peditions and let us heare about them.

Facts about Clipperton Island (from Wikipedia)

Clipperton Island is an uninhabited 9 km2 (3.5 sq mi) coral atoll in the eastern Pacific Ocean, south-west of Mexico, west of Costa Rica and 2420 km north-west of Galapagos Islands, Ecuador. It is an overseas possession of France under direct authority of the Minister of Overseas France.

It is low-lying and largely barren, save for scattered grasses and a few clumps of coconut palms. A small volcanic outcrop rising to 29 m (95 ft) on its south-east side is referred to as "Clipperton Rock".

Clipperton is about 945 km (587 mi; 510 nmi) south-east of Socorro Island in the Revillagigedo Archipelago, the nearest land. Its ring-shaped atoll completely encloses a stagnant freshwater lagoon, and is 12 km (7.5 mi) in circumference. 

It has a tropical oceanic climate, with average temperatures of 20–32 °C (68–90 °F). The rainy season occurs from May to October, when it is subject to tropical storms and hurricanes.

The island has long been an attractive destination for amateur radio groups, due to its remoteness, difficulty of landing, permit requirements, romantic history, and interesting environment. While some radio operation was done ancillary to other expeditions, major DXpeditions include FO0XB (1978), FO0XX (1985), FO0CI (1992), FO0AAA (2000), and TX5C (2008).

2013-10-31

Board meeting via Skype

Present during the meeting:

SM3VRG, SA3BEN, SA3BKF, SM3EQF, SM3GHQ, SM3ESX, SM3FJF, SM3LIV, SM3CER, SM3BQC, SM3EAE, SM3GDT, SM3SZW, SM3YKF

The meeting started and we honored SM3CVM/Lars with a minute of silence.

During the meeting was following discussed/reported.

• Reports:

Information about what has happened during the recent months.

• Decisions:

Temporary QSL manager SM3TIR/Sven

Printing new Awards

Printing new Guest Certificates

SM3CVM  Memorial Fund - For SI9AM's development and survival

Buying a new headset

• Proposal:

The Nominating Committee starts its work immediately.

• Next meeting:

Will be decided later