Hobbies! - Page 15

Jingo · 23-11-2009, 13:41

Sounds great that you've managed to turn around a bit of a poop situation with the foot, and come out with an interesting, and obviously successful, hobbie!

Writing is a natural talent that can be brushed and edited to acceptance, but the way your reviews/articles appear to naturally flow, inform and entertain is admirable.

It's great that you are choosing to take a freelance route with this - retaining the enjoyent of gaming without succumbing to the tedium of a 'forced piece of writing'... something your work will most likely benefit from also.

For me, my new 'hobby' is getting back to some running - I'll most likely create my own thread for this to benefit me in terms of motivation and personal advice

Or as Desmo suggested, a good place for people to shout at you!

Feek · 16-12-2009, 00:11

Our radio contesting has gone from strength to strength and the results of this years contest series is out.

Bear in mind that we only picked up on this partway through the year so we only operated for 7 out of the possible 12 events and a couple of our operators are incredibly inexperienced and don't seem to be improving much. I'm hoping they'll get better as time goes on. We have one guy who's only been using the radio for a couple of years but he's a very good contest operator. I don't want to blow my own trumpet too much but he's been listening to me and has picked up on the way I operate very quickly. I _am_ a good contester

The overall club championship is made up of all entries that a club puts in so we have no chance with this as the leading clubs have multiple stations working for them and we only have one. We came 22nd out of 51 entries and I think that's really good for our first attempt, especially as we didn't start until June.

The individual station section is much more interesting, this is calculated by taking the best scoring eight entries of the year, we entered just seven times so we were always going to be at a bit of a disadvantage.

We came 21st out of 289 entries.

Next year we will do better. I'm aiming for top ten in the individual station section and maybe the top fifteen of the club championship.

We're also increasing the number of contests we take part in next year, it'll be three a month on 50MHz, 144MHz and 432MHz.

Garp · 16-12-2009, 01:07

What's involved in Radio Contesting? I see from your earlier post it's about speaking to as many people as possible, but how much does that entail? Twiddle the dials to a random location, say a couple of words, wait for a response and job's a good'un?

Feek · 16-12-2009, 09:14

Not quite as simple as that, there are a number of details that need to be exchanged between the two stations.

There are a couple of ways to operate in a contest, we tend to find a frequency and sit and call and wait for replies, the other way is to tune up and down through the band and listen for people doing what we do and then call them, this is the search and pounce method. We'll tune off of our spot a couple of times during the contest and pick up more people.

The exchange consists of callsign, signal strength, serial number and location. The planet is divided into a number of unique squares - More details of the system we use is here and you can have a play here to see how they work.

A typical contest contact would be like this...

[The initial call]
CQ CQ CQ contest, CQ contest, G0PKT golf zero papa kilo tango, contest

[The reply]
Golf one hotel charlie tango

[First part of exchange]
golf one hotel charlie tango, thank you, you are five nine, zero two six, juliet oscar zero one mike tango, qsl?

[Response]
qsl, you are five seven, zero zero two, india oscar nine three charlie whiskey, roger?

[Close]
roger, thank you, seven three and qrz contest

So we've exchanged callsigns (G0PKT and G1HCT), signal reports, I gave 5-9 and he gave me 5-7. I gave him 026 serial number and he gave me 002, these increment for each contact and locators, ours is JO01MT and his was IO93CW. qsl? and qsl are part of the international q code in this context used as 'did you get that?' and 'yup' respectively. 73 is a ham term for best wishes and qrz is 'who is calling me' which gives anyone who is waiting the cue to leap in for the next contact.

These details are all logged, usually on computer now although up until fairly recently it was all done by pen and paper and then they are submitted to the contest adjudicator.

When it comes to checking the logs, if a single detail doesn't match up between the two stations then no points are given to either station for the contact so it's vital that all details are exchanged. When stations are weak with a signal report of something like 5-2 (technically the 5 means perfectly readable but even on a signal that is so weak it's practically unreadable it's very unusual to exchange anything other than a 5 although we do use 4 sometimes) it's not uncommon to have multiple exchanges to confirm details.

Not all signals are nice and strong. We get a lot of noise when our aerials are pointing directly over a nearby pub and that causes us big problems when we beam that way and there is a phenomenon called qsb which is effectively signal fading due to conditions. This can be quite bad, someone can call who is a good 5-9 signal but ten seconds later they've dropped to a 4-1 signal and then they may come back out of the noise.

You can see a map of all the contacts we made during the contest at the beginning of December here

Scoring is worked out as one point per kilometre all added together then multiplied by the number of squares spoken to, that's the larger main squares such as JO01 or IO93 as mentioned above in the example contact. We generally manage 18-20 squares per contest.

So that's it. I've just realised how much I typed so if anyone got further than the fist few lines then I applaud you

Garp · 16-12-2009, 18:19

Quote:

Originally Posted by Feek

So that's it. I've just realised how much I typed so if anyone got further than the fist few lines then I applaud you

Read through it all

. No small challenge you've got there! Fascinating to read, though it's not really a hobby I'd pick up. Mind you, I imagine it'd be boring here fairly restricted to just the islands if I didn't fork out the cash for some serious radio hardware

Pheebs · 17-02-2010, 20:37

I'm goooooing to BLllaaaaaaaaaaaackpooooooool tomorrow for the Magic Convention!

I AM *THE* EXCITED!

Going on my tod but know a fair few peoples heading up... going to be fantastic! Lectures and shows and competitions and and and more magic and music, all gladly swished back with a deck of cards and a glass of vino!

Meganess.

Mega mega meganess!

Been waiting for this for over 5months now

Darrin · 18-02-2010, 10:04

I guess you could say my Jeep is my hobby right now. Especially with as much time and effort I put into it.

Well, today was no different. The call volume dropped to nothing and I was bored.

This is what my Jeep looked like this morning:

After a little masking, a light go over with the abrasive wheel on the drill and 2/3 of a giant can of Rustoleum gloss black and you have this result:

Further plans are to take the black that I have on the bonnet area and continue that up over the roof and down to the pinstripe. Then after all that is done I will hit the purple part (actually it's Dark Cherry) with every form of paint restorative compound known to the automotive industry to get it shiny again.

All in all, a lot of masking, painting and buffing shall ensue in the next few days as I get time.

Feek · 06-03-2010, 13:19

That looks a lot better like that, Darrin.

We have another big contest this weekend - It's actually a 24 hour bash but we're putting an entry in the section that means we only work six hours of it.

So last weekend we did some aerial work. Bear in mind that this is 30 feet up on a roof that's on top of the Martello Tower which I posted here.

Health and Safety would have a fit! After a while we realised we couldn't get the aerial we wanted on top of that pole so we used an angle grinder to trim about five foot off of it. Tony was really careful because as he said - If the grinder had locked he'd have been thrown backwards off the tower!

As a result though we have replacement cable to the aerial and a rather good masthead pre-amplifier fitted.

IainB · 09-03-2010, 20:10

After selling off all my kites to fund re-furnishing the house, 5 months down the road....Ive just bought another

Its left me short for this month, but it was offered at a too good to miss price...so I had to say yes!! (Then Virgin Media screwed up my bill and took double the amount....ooh the fun)
Its a Peter Lynn Venom II and is a nice ickle 16m baby

will be getting a bit of landboarding in and then move back into kitesurfing when the water warms up a bit

Feek · 30-05-2010, 23:07

Kites are interesting - You say that's a 16 metre kite, that's bloody huge.

I like the idea of getting a big kite and using wire as the string and attaching that wire to the back of a radio! A full wave vertical aerial at 1.8MHz (160m) should work quite well.

Anyway, my new toy. I sold my wireless and replaced it with this.

Yaesu FT-847. HF through 70cms all in one box. Nice.

23-11-2009, 13:41	#141
Jingo Smother me in chocolate and eat flapjacks with it! Join Date: Sep 2008 Location: North Somerset Posts: 1,854	Sounds great that you've managed to turn around a bit of a poop situation with the foot, and come out with an interesting, and obviously successful, hobbie! Writing is a natural talent that can be brushed and edited to acceptance, but the way your reviews/articles appear to naturally flow, inform and entertain is admirable. It's great that you are choosing to take a freelance route with this - retaining the enjoyent of gaming without succumbing to the tedium of a 'forced piece of writing'... something your work will most likely benefit from also. For me, my new 'hobby' is getting back to some running - I'll most likely create my own thread for this to benefit me in terms of motivation and personal advice Or as Desmo suggested, a good place for people to shout at you! __________________

16-12-2009, 00:11	#142
Feek ex SAS Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: JO01ou Posts: 10,062	Our radio contesting has gone from strength to strength and the results of this years contest series is out. Bear in mind that we only picked up on this partway through the year so we only operated for 7 out of the possible 12 events and a couple of our operators are incredibly inexperienced and don't seem to be improving much. I'm hoping they'll get better as time goes on. We have one guy who's only been using the radio for a couple of years but he's a very good contest operator. I don't want to blow my own trumpet too much but he's been listening to me and has picked up on the way I operate very quickly. I _am_ a good contester The overall club championship is made up of all entries that a club puts in so we have no chance with this as the leading clubs have multiple stations working for them and we only have one. We came 22nd out of 51 entries and I think that's really good for our first attempt, especially as we didn't start until June. The individual station section is much more interesting, this is calculated by taking the best scoring eight entries of the year, we entered just seven times so we were always going to be at a bit of a disadvantage. We came 21st out of 289 entries. Next year we will do better. I'm aiming for top ten in the individual station section and maybe the top fifteen of the club championship. We're also increasing the number of contests we take part in next year, it'll be three a month on 50MHz, 144MHz and 432MHz. __________________

16-12-2009, 01:07	#143
Garp Preparing more tumbleweed Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: Hawaii Posts: 6,038	What's involved in Radio Contesting? I see from your earlier post it's about speaking to as many people as possible, but how much does that entail? Twiddle the dials to a random location, say a couple of words, wait for a response and job's a good'un? __________________ Mal: Define "interesting"? Wash: "Oh, God, oh, God, we're all gonna die"? Last edited by Garp; 16-12-2009 at 01:11.

16-12-2009, 09:14	#144
Feek ex SAS Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: JO01ou Posts: 10,062	Not quite as simple as that, there are a number of details that need to be exchanged between the two stations. There are a couple of ways to operate in a contest, we tend to find a frequency and sit and call and wait for replies, the other way is to tune up and down through the band and listen for people doing what we do and then call them, this is the search and pounce method. We'll tune off of our spot a couple of times during the contest and pick up more people. The exchange consists of callsign, signal strength, serial number and location. The planet is divided into a number of unique squares - More details of the system we use is here and you can have a play here to see how they work. A typical contest contact would be like this... [The initial call] CQ CQ CQ contest, CQ contest, G0PKT golf zero papa kilo tango, contest [The reply] Golf one hotel charlie tango [First part of exchange] golf one hotel charlie tango, thank you, you are five nine, zero two six, juliet oscar zero one mike tango, qsl? [Response] qsl, you are five seven, zero zero two, india oscar nine three charlie whiskey, roger? [Close] roger, thank you, seven three and qrz contest So we've exchanged callsigns (G0PKT and G1HCT), signal reports, I gave 5-9 and he gave me 5-7. I gave him 026 serial number and he gave me 002, these increment for each contact and locators, ours is JO01MT and his was IO93CW. qsl? and qsl are part of the international q code in this context used as 'did you get that?' and 'yup' respectively. 73 is a ham term for best wishes and qrz is 'who is calling me' which gives anyone who is waiting the cue to leap in for the next contact. These details are all logged, usually on computer now although up until fairly recently it was all done by pen and paper and then they are submitted to the contest adjudicator. When it comes to checking the logs, if a single detail doesn't match up between the two stations then no points are given to either station for the contact so it's vital that all details are exchanged. When stations are weak with a signal report of something like 5-2 (technically the 5 means perfectly readable but even on a signal that is so weak it's practically unreadable it's very unusual to exchange anything other than a 5 although we do use 4 sometimes) it's not uncommon to have multiple exchanges to confirm details. Not all signals are nice and strong. We get a lot of noise when our aerials are pointing directly over a nearby pub and that causes us big problems when we beam that way and there is a phenomenon called qsb which is effectively signal fading due to conditions. This can be quite bad, someone can call who is a good 5-9 signal but ten seconds later they've dropped to a 4-1 signal and then they may come back out of the noise. You can see a map of all the contacts we made during the contest at the beginning of December here Scoring is worked out as one point per kilometre all added together then multiplied by the number of squares spoken to, that's the larger main squares such as JO01 or IO93 as mentioned above in the example contact. We generally manage 18-20 squares per contest. So that's it. I've just realised how much I typed so if anyone got further than the fist few lines then I applaud you __________________

17-02-2010, 20:37	#146
Pheebs Deep Throat Join Date: Jul 2006 Posts: 6,512	I'm goooooing to BLllaaaaaaaaaaaackpooooooool tomorrow for the Magic Convention! I AM THE EXCITED! Going on my tod but know a fair few peoples heading up... going to be fantastic! Lectures and shows and competitions and and and more magic and music, all gladly swished back with a deck of cards and a glass of vino! Meganess. Mega mega meganess! Been waiting for this for over 5months now __________________ http://www.spiffingdesigns.co.uk

18-02-2010, 10:04	#147
Darrin Dirteh Kitteh Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Hiding out in Mormon Country Posts: 1,629	I guess you could say my Jeep is my hobby right now. Especially with as much time and effort I put into it. Well, today was no different. The call volume dropped to nothing and I was bored. This is what my Jeep looked like this morning: After a little masking, a light go over with the abrasive wheel on the drill and 2/3 of a giant can of Rustoleum gloss black and you have this result: Further plans are to take the black that I have on the bonnet area and continue that up over the roof and down to the pinstripe. Then after all that is done I will hit the purple part (actually it's Dark Cherry) with every form of paint restorative compound known to the automotive industry to get it shiny again. All in all, a lot of masking, painting and buffing shall ensue in the next few days as I get time. __________________ A bullet may have your name on it, but shrapnel is addressed "to whom it may concern".

06-03-2010, 13:19	#148
Feek ex SAS Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: JO01ou Posts: 10,062	That looks a lot better like that, Darrin. We have another big contest this weekend - It's actually a 24 hour bash but we're putting an entry in the section that means we only work six hours of it. So last weekend we did some aerial work. Bear in mind that this is 30 feet up on a roof that's on top of the Martello Tower which I posted here. Health and Safety would have a fit! After a while we realised we couldn't get the aerial we wanted on top of that pole so we used an angle grinder to trim about five foot off of it. Tony was really careful because as he said - If the grinder had locked he'd have been thrown backwards off the tower! As a result though we have replacement cable to the aerial and a rather good masthead pre-amplifier fitted. __________________

09-03-2010, 20:10	#149
IainB Long Island Iced Tea Join Date: May 2009 Location: South Beds Baby Posts: 143	After selling off all my kites to fund re-furnishing the house, 5 months down the road....Ive just bought another Its left me short for this month, but it was offered at a too good to miss price...so I had to say yes!! (Then Virgin Media screwed up my bill and took double the amount....ooh the fun) Its a Peter Lynn Venom II and is a nice ickle 16m baby will be getting a bit of landboarding in and then move back into kitesurfing when the water warms up a bit __________________ www.imc-racing.co.uk and www.djiainb.co.uk

30-05-2010, 23:07	#150
Feek ex SAS Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: JO01ou Posts: 10,062	Kites are interesting - You say that's a 16 metre kite, that's bloody huge. I like the idea of getting a big kite and using wire as the string and attaching that wire to the back of a radio! A full wave vertical aerial at 1.8MHz (160m) should work quite well. Anyway, my new toy. I sold my wireless and replaced it with this. Yaesu FT-847. HF through 70cms all in one box. Nice. __________________ Last edited by Feek; 30-05-2010 at 23:12.