10 Meters Springs to Life

As in the previous post 10 Meters this weekend has been to say the least fantastic,here in Minnesota 10 meters is normally pretty quiet but this weekend it was hard at times to find a clear frequency to call CQ. Stations were booming in from all over, Europe,South America, Mexico,Japan,Greenland, Cayman Is, Puerto Rico ,Cuba,Canary Is, North Africa,with stations from the East Coast USA, West Coast USA & Canada all heard from this location on Sunday alone.Pile ups were the order of the day and many were heard here. Not having the power or the antenna to break them I mainly listened to the traffic.But I did manage a few QSO's with my 5 watts. I had YT1HA, S52NR,IZ5EBL & IZ5HPQ all on SSB.Not staggering DX I know but it keeps me happy just working a few here and there.
        I got a surprise via E-QSL yesterday too,I received my first SWL report for my USA Call from a n SWL   ( DL-1213867  Peter from Eulenbis in Germany ) I really appreciated that and immediately confirmed it for him.

        Well as I said the weekend was totally enjoyable DX wise and I hope this bodes well for this winter,and the DX continues.

         Till next time 73's gd DX
         Derek KD-0-PNP

Hi All,
Been a good week here for us 10 meter operators,the band has been open nearly every day,offering good propagation into Europe in the early morning and running into the evening with good South American  propagation.Even some Japan & Australia have been heard at this location,that's pretty amazing considering the antenna here is only a 10 meter wire loop strung up on our balcony.

All the stations above were worked from here using only 5 watts and the 10 meter loop.Good to see 10 meters open again and we hope it continues during the Winter months.When the band is open you can find me around 28.420 on SSB  if you hear me feel free to call I'd appreciate the contact.

Magnum 257 RF Limited

  Hi All

I Just recently took possession of a Magnum 257  (non High Power) by Rf Limited and having read a lot of reviews about this transceiver I was eager to try it for myself. The radio was not new only new to me but well looked after second hand.It's one of the older versions brought out in 1999 and therefore only has the reset pads and 2 conversion points as opposed to the new versions that have a reset button and 4 conversion points. This small difference does not however take away from the performance of this little radio.

       Out of the box the radio covers 10 meters only from 28.000 to 29.699 AM/FM/SSB a little let down that it didn't have CW facility but that's a minor issue. To expand the radio's coverage is a breeze open the rig find the reset board move the jumper from one position to another ans with power off (off course) short out the reset pads momentarily. Put the covers on and power up the Radio,as usual it powers up on 29.300 (the Japansese FM calling channel) why I don't know as over here it's 29.600 mhz. Press function button and hold,then press call button for approx 3 seconds and wallah you now cover from 25.165 to 29.699 .

      I use it as a base unit hooked up to my 10 meter loop antenna on my balcony (3rd floor apartment) and it works pretty well indeed.This model (or mine anyway) is conservatively tuned to deliver approx 28 watts SSB / FM & 15 watts on AM this suits me just fine as I'm a keen QRP operator anyway.The receiver is pretty hot but a tad noisy radio really benefits from an external speaker something a little more widebanded frequency response wise than the built in speaker.On the CB part of things it can suffer a little from strong signal overload (backing off the RF gain here helps a little) but on the 10 Meter side this is not as noticeable.

       Ease of use (well I found my way around it) in about 3 mins flat without reading the manual,so yes it's pretty user friendly.I found it hearing weak signals pretty well and it picked up 10 meter beacons better than my FT301d did. I worked a few PY stations on it yesterday and it performed flawlessy .

      In my humble opinion it's better than the HTX 10 from Radio Shack (I've used both) so if you can pick one up for under $150 grab one they really are a nice little rig to have around.

Derek   KD-0-PNP