Last Saturday, I got on in the afternoon, which I rarely do, and since it was the middle of the afternoon, I thought I’d try to load up my homebrew Cobra antenna on 17m. I had tuned it up on 17m before, and while I failed to make any contacts at that time, it seemed to work just fine.
This time, however, while the antenna tuned up OK, I seemed to be getting into electronics all over the house. I could hear my signal coming through the speakers in my office, which is just above the shack, and my wife said she could hear me on the TV. In spite of the noise, I managed a quick QSO with a PY station.
Transmitting on the other bands seems to be noise free, so I’m not sure what’s going on on 17m. Any thoughts?
Short DX, long contact
Later that evening, I answered a CQ from Ulrich, AC8PL. As it turns out, he lives only 1.4 miles from me, according to QRZ.Com. We had a nice long chat, though.
Two RI contacts in one day
Because it’s a small state, lots of hams need Rhode Island for Worked All States. I’ve never had trouble working the Ocean State, which is the smallest state in the Union.
On Sunday, I worked two RI stations, including W1ZY at 1700Z on 40 m and WA1SKQ on 30 m at 1930Z . It was my first contact with W1ZY, but my fifth with WA1SKQ. I wonder what the odds are of two CW contacts with RI stations in the same day?
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