Tag: N1MM
ARRL DX CW
This weekend I entered the ARRL DX CW contest. It started out as a challenge to score 100 Q’s. But actually it went quite well and I just closed N1MM with 350 Q’s in the log. It was a nice picture to see all the American and Canadian amateurs all lined op in my band monitor. The propagation was quite good so I got a habit of CTRL+[down], call the station, do the exchange, CTRL+[down], next. It seems like the higher bands (20 – 15 – 10) are favorite, I never scored the most Q’s on 10 meter before! A good thing I left my Antron 99A on the roof. It turn out to be an excellent antenna for 10 and 15 meters. Only with a very few stations that didn’t copy me, I switch to the ZS6BKW on these bands. And that’s no guarantee I will work them.
Great adventure and my CW-skills are a little better now!
N1MM CW serial interface
After a few months of radio inactivity I picked up a little idea I read a while ago on the N1MM wiki. Of course I could buy a Winkeyer, but since I’m just a CW-novice with not many miles on the paddle, I want a cheap and simple solution first. I could always buy a Winkeyer in the future. Besides, I really dislike all kind of separate little boxes in my shack. I’m more of a Zen-fan.
When I read the N1MM wiki, the described serial interface for CW was simple enough to put into a DB9-connector. Just solder two parts and off you go. I bought the parts (and the DB9-connector) on a local ham marked for a few euro’s and put things together. Result? It works like a charm! Now N1MM is able to send CW directly from my PC to the rig. Next step is getting my CW-skills up to speed to run my first CW-contest.