I recently received a QSL card from Bible Voice Broadcasting re my reception of their station on 15300 kHz on 2nd March 2022.

The 2022 Oceania DX Contest has come and gone once again. It was held from 0600 UTC Saturday 1st October 2022 to 0600 UTC on Sunday 2nd October 2022.

OCDX promotes HF contacts to and from stations in the Oceania region  as well as contacts between stations inside Oceania

https://www.oceaniadxcontest.com/

For the first time in many many years I had an ‘all nighter’ and stayed up for the entire 24 hours of the contest. I ended up making a total of 1,009 QSOs with a claimed score of 1,367,456 points.

My operating equipment for the contest was the following:-

• Transceiver – Yaesu FTDX101MP
• Power – 100 watts
• Antennas – 40m rotatable dipole; 80m home brew dipole; 5 element tri band yagi.

The map below shows my contacts around the world.

• 10m – Green
• 15m – Blue
• 20m – Orange
• 40m – Red
• 80m – Blue

The band conditions on Saturday were excellent. I made a total of 856 QSOs from 0600 UTC Saturday to 0000 UTC Sunday. This was 84% of my contacts over the 24 hour period. A significant X-1 class solar flare from sunspot AR3100 caused a significant shortwave radio blackout over the Pacific Ocean. The picture below shows the blackout map over the Pacific Ocean and parts of North America.

The majority of my contacts were on the 20m band. I made a total of 613 QSOs on that band. This was about 60% of my QSOs.

• 10M – 118
• 15M – 57
• 20M – 613
• 40M – 175
• 80M – 46

During the contest I worked a total of 65 different DXCC entities:-

• Alaska
• Antarctica
• Asiatic Russia
• Australia
• Austria
• Balearic Islands
• Belgium
• Bosnia-Herzegovina
• Brazil
• Bulgaria
• Canada
• Croatia
• Czech Republic
• Denmark
• East Malaysia
• England
• Estonia
• European Russia
• Falkland Islands
• Federal Republic of Germany
• Finland
• France
• Greece
• Guam
• Hungary
• Iceland
• Indonesia
• Ireland
• Israel
• Italy
• Jamaica
• Japan
• Kaliningrad
• Kazakhstan
• Latvia
• Ithuania
• Luxembourg
• Netherlands
• New Zealand
• North Macedonia
• Northern Ireland
• Norway
• Philippines
• Poland
• Portugal
• Republic of Korea
• Republic of Kosovo
• Romania
• Samoa
• Sardinia
• Scotland
• Serbia
• Singapore
• Slovak Republic
• Slovenia
• Spain
• Sweden
• Switzerland
• Taiwan
• Thailand
• Ukraine
• United States of America
• Wales
• West Malaysia

Unfortunately I did not work any African stations, and only a handful of South American stations.

On Saturday afternoon, I made a significant number of contacts into Europe and the United Kingdom on the long path. My first contact was with Eddy MW0YVK in Wales who had a very big signal.

I also made some contacts in Europe on Sunday morning on the 40m band which I was very pleased with.

The map below shows my European/UK contacts (orange pins-20m, red pins – 40m).

I made a number of QSOs into North America (a total of 130).

• 116 – USA
• 14 – Canada

The majority of those contacts (a total of 79) were made on the 20m band, short path across the Pacific on Saturday evening. I made 34 contacts into North America on the 10m band. With the remaining 17 QSOs being made on the 40m band.

I cannot wait to get to my 40m yagi into the air!

The 10m and 15m bands were working okay into Japan, Indonesia, and South East Asia. Unfortunately there was not the big pile up of Japanese, with 64 JA stations worked on the 10m band and 15 JA stations on 15m.

I worked 210 Australian (VK) stations during the contest. That is about 21% of my total contacts. The majority of those contacts around VK were on the 40m band, followed by 20m.

• 10m – 1
• 15m – 5
• 20m – 75
• 80m – 43
• 40m – 86

It was very slow for the last few hours of the contest and I was stuck in the 900’s for quite some time. I really wanted to try to tip over the 1,000 QSO mark. My 1,000th QSO was with IZ0OTV in Italy, at 0546 UTC, with just 14 minutes remaining in the contest.

Some of the more interesting countries worked were Samoa on the 80m band (a new one for me), the Falkland Islands, and Iceland.

Thank you to everyone who called and thank you to the organisers. It was a fun event. I slept like a baby last night!

A few days ago I received an eQSL card from the English Service of China Radio International for my reception of China National Radio CNR2 on 22nd June 2022.

Today via email I received an eQSL from the the Voice of the Martyrs re my reception of their station on 13th November 2021.

I mailed a Reception Report to their station via postal mail last year, but had not had a reply, so I sent an email a few days ago and received the eQSL below.

More information on the Voice of the Martyrs can be found on my previous post at…….

Voice of the Martyrs, SOUTH KOREA – 9930 kHz

Or on their website at……

Home

I have been chasing/hunting quite a bit of DX SOTA/WWFF of late. Last Sunday (18th September 2022) was another great day. Below are the SOTA/WWFF activators that I logged.

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YU1FKJ/p – Deliblatska pescara YUFF-0031

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EA8BJ/p – EAFF-0740

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DL8ECA/p – Gülper See NSG DLFF-0511

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EC2AG/p – SOTA EA2/ BI-063

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EA8W/p – Parque Natural Los Volcanes EAFF-0069

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EA8BM/p – Área de Reserva de la Biosfera La Palma EAFF-0079

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MI/EI3ISB – SOTA GI/ CA-001

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EA8CNR Jose – EAFF-0739

“I inform you that the QSO is spectacular for me, because I was with an MFJ 1620t mobile antenna…….Thanks again for the Fantastic contact on the 14 Mhz band.”

Yesterday I applied for my latest VKFF award certificate. It is the VKFF Hunter Honour Roll 1,700 issued for having worked 1,700 different VKFF references.

Thanks to all of the VKFF activators and thanks to Adam VK2YK the VK5 VKFF State Rep for the certificate.

On Thursday 15th and Friday 16th September 2022, I operated with the special event call of VK90ABC to celebrate the 90 year anniversary of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC).

I made a total of 502 QSOs on 10, 15, 20, 40, & 80m SSB. This included 53 different DXCC entities.

The vast majority of my contacts were on the 20m band with 359 QSOs. This was followed by 61 QSOs on 40m, 38 QSOs on 15m, 37 QSOs on 10m, and just 7 QSOs on the 80m band. I tried 80m briefly on both nights, but the band was so noisy with static crashes. As a result there were few callers.

The maps below show my contacts around the world. The different pins show the bands.

• Green – 10m
• Blue – 15m
• Orange – 20m
• Red – 40m
• Blue – 80m

I worked the following DXCC entities:-

1. Andorra
2. Australia
3. Austria
4. Belgium
5. Bulgaria
6. Canada
7. China
8. Corsica
9. Costa Rica
10. Croatia
11. Cyprus
12. Czech Republic
13. Denmark
14. East Malaysia
15. England
16. European Russia
17. Federal Republic of Germany
18. Finland
19. France
20. Hawaii
21. Hungary
22. Indonesia
23. Ireland
24. Isle of Man
25. Italy
26. Japan
27. Latvia
28. Malta
29. Mexico
30. Mozambique
31. Netherlands
32. New Zealand
33. Northern Ireland
34. Norway
35. Philippines
36. Poland
37. Portugal
38. Puerto Rico
39. Republic of Korea
40. Romania
41. Scotland
42. Slovak Republic
43. Slovenia
44. South Africa
45. Southg Cook Islands
46. Spain
47. Sri Lanka
48. Sweden
49. Switzerland
50. Trinidad & Tobago
51. Ukraine
52. United States of America
53. Wales

Conditions into Europe and the United Kingdom on the long path on the 20m band were the best I had heard in a number of years.

The map below shows my European/UK QSOs.

I also worked 37 of the 50 US States. These contacts were made on the 10m, 20m, and 40m bands. Short path propagation on 20m into the USA during the evening was very good.

There was a very nice opening to Japan on 15m on Thursday afternoon.

The highlight for me was working a number of South African stations on 40m.

Thank you to everyone who called. It was another fun 2 days. Thanks also go to the organisers of VK90ABC who allowed me to use the call ocne again.

Last Wednesday (14th September 2022) I attended the monthly Strathalbyn Amateur Radio Group meeting at the home of Tony VK5MRT at Strathalbyn.

I spent an enjoyable couple of hours there and delivered a short presentation on the upcoming trip to Troubridge Island.

PerthTech is on the weekend 22-23 October 2022.

Marija VK5MAZ and myself will be attending to deliver a presentation on Saturday on WWFF and operating portable.

On Sunday, I will be one of a handful of ‘team leaders’ who will be taking amateurs out into the field to activate VKFF parks around Perth. For some this will be their very first park activation.

I would encourage other VKFF activators to head out that day to hopefully make contact with the VK6 activators.

I had a great day out yesterday (Saturday 3rd September 2022) at the Amateur Radio Experimenters Group (AREG) Car Boot Sale.

Adam VK2YK and myself manned a small table promoting WWFF/VKKF. We had a lot of interest in the program.

I also checked a number of QSL cards for ARRL DXCC as an official ARRL card checker. I also checked ID for persons wanting to register with Logbook of the World.

Caught up with a lot of hams I had not seen in a while.

Congrats to AREG for organising such a great event.