2001 – Grenada J3 & St.Vincent J8

This is a copy of the original website

From Grenade 25.825 QSO’s have been made
From St.Vincent 24.323 QSO’s have been made

Total QSO’s: 50.148 thank you!

Welcome to the Caribbean Tour 2001 web-site.

 

This years team members have been Bouke PA0ZH, Ronald PA3EWP, Rob PA5ET and Dennis PA7FM.

Last update 6th December 2001

This web-site will keep you up-to-date about the complete tour. As last year we will have daily uploaded logs, digital pictures, a diary and of course lots of Real Audio recordings how we hear the pile-ups from our side. We invested in digital recording equipment to do this in a professional way.

We also hope to improve our low-band signals this year, we have purchased the Titanex V160E vertical for 40/80/160 meters which should do the job.

The Plan:

The Flight Schedule looks as follows:

2nd August Amsterdam – London
2nd August London – Barbados
2nd August Barbados – Carriacou (Grenada)

In the air from 3rd August – 15th August

11+12th August Worked All Europe DX Contest CW as J38PA

15th August Carriacou – Bequia (St. Vincent)

In the air from 15th August – 27th August

18+19th August SARTG WW RTTY Contest as J8PA
25+26th August SCC RTTY Championship RTTY as J8PA

27th August Bequia – Barbados
27th August Barbados – London
28th August London – Amsterdam

Some personal remarks :

Rob PA5ET :

This was my 7th Caribbean Tour and like other years I enjoyed every minute of it. This year we didn’t had any stacked beams but still made a remarkable number of 50.000 + QSO’s in only 3 weeks time. The strategy to use one call on 160 meter proofed to be the right strategy, no dupes anymore. I hope you enjoyed the digital pile-up recordings. The tour web-site has been updated daily with the latest information. We noticed the PacketClusters made overtime again. These things are mandatory these days. A spot on the cluster means a pileup. I must say our audience behaved correctly and I really enjoyed working everybody in the pile-ups. I like to thank Bouke PA0ZH for building the 2 single window Quads which performed outstanding, also the Titanex 160E vertical is a welcome addition to our antenna farm. We now have to focus more on reception and probably need to have a separate 80 vertical. We hope to see you next year from . . . and if you are interested to join, don’t hesitate to contact us!

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Dennis PA7FM:

Another great experience. Sri propagation wasn’t really good sometimes so the higher bands were sometimes not really ‘open’…but my lousy CW skills improved a lot because of this. Tnx for al the patience in the sometimes HUGE pileups QRN and mosquito’s were our biggest enemies, never knew there could be so much bites on one leg ( must have been over 100) ,not to forget the shortage of sleep that occurred more and more during the last 4 weeks. Looking forward to another one…next year from….

 

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Ronald PA3EWP:

Everybody thanks for the support of my 8th DX-pedition. I hope that you enjoyed the pileups like I did it. The last days it was not easy to be concentrated, sometimes I fell in sleep between the reception of the dots and the dashes. It was very hard to activated 2 stations 24 hours a day with 4 team-members. This time I was very active in CW but I still prefer the other mode (SSB). I am satisfied about the end result of 50.000 QSO’s. During the local QRM/QRN it was sometimes impossible to receive anybody. The simple antenna farm has performed excellent, except the receiving antenna on the TOP-band, this one needs to be improved. Thanks again and I hope to see you in the pileup from the next place. (Don’t forget to sign the guestbook)

 

 

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Bouke PA0ZH:

Hello callers…..it was big fun to be on the other side of the pile up. This was my first real dxpedition and I enjoyed it very much. Every has been said above, it was great. I like to thank my team members, they learned this newcomer very much, in other words, even if you have a license for 35 years, your career is NOT complete with one or more expeditions. The other reason of participation was also simple, former expeditions brought up my DXCC score to 333 countries, this was the way to do something back for all who needed J3 and J8 very badly. It was my pleasure to help them ….. Thank you all 73/88

Bob ( Bouke in Frisian) PA0ZH

 

Diary:

Tuesday 28th August 2001

• In the afternoon we arrived home again, we slept 95% of the journey . . . which says enough. The first pile of QSL cards are collected from the Post Office . . . there we go again . . . In the coming days we will publish more sound files, detailed statistics etc. Don’t forget to sign the guestbook !

Monday 27th August 2001

• We just reached the 50.000 QSO milestone. We like to thank everybody for supporting us during the tour. We think we have succeeded in meeting our goal and hope we made you happy with 2 new countries on different bands. We hope you will sign the guestbook and express how you enjoyed this years tour. At 10.00Z the last QSO has been made on 40 meter.

Sunday 26th August 2001

• Today we started the last day of the Caribbean Tour 2001. The high bands have been wide open to the USA and Europe, we might reach the 25.000 QSO’s. Tomorrow at 11.00Z we will stop the transmission from J8. We have already taken down the Titanex vertical and all digital mode equipment. The 2 Quads and the 40 Meter vertical will stay in service until the end.

Saturday 25th August 2001

• During our dinner time a pirate was active on 40m SSB. We only use this call on 160 meter and in the digital modes. Approx. 35 PSK31 QSO’s were logged in the morning on 20 meters. The shifts are getting more difficult as we’re so tired we may fall asleep during the pile-up….so if we don’t answer suddenly..don’t worry, we’re having sweet dreams. This morning the SCC RTTY contest started..our last RTTY operations from J8. Coming up night we do the last lowband operations, as the antenna must be down and on the plane sundayafternoon. We need to send some things on earlier flights to be sure we can get it all to Barbados for our return flight to Amsterdam on Monday.

Friday 24th August 2001

• 160 meter was very noisy during the greyline. It was this time more difficult than before to copy the stations.

Thursday 23rd August 2001

• During the greyline we went QSY from 80 meters to 160 meters. The SWR on 160 meter was very bad on the verticale. After a short trouble shooting we noticed that the tuning box was the problem the relay didn’t switch. There was not much time left to examen the problem so we went back to 80 meters. The QRM level on 80 meters was still very high, but the receiving antenna did a good job and about 100 stations are logged, there was a lot of QSB on the signals. We decided to activate also RTTY outside the contests otherwise a lot of the RTTY freaks don’t have the change to work us. We also made the first PSK31 QSO’s. We will use the J8PA for both digital modes to avoid dupes like we did on 160 meters.

Wednesday 22nd August 2001

• Sorry folks, we know you are there on 40, 80 and 160 meters, but the QRN of last night did his job … 20 db over S9, we could pickup a few but decided to go back to the higher bands where the QRN was a bit less. Even in the morning there was a high noise level so the number of logged JA’s were not impressing. Dennis decided to clean up the swimming pool because more than 1K mosquito’s couldn’t really swim…. With over 15k qso’s now where on schedule for our goal of 25000 from J8.

Tuesday 21st August 2001

• Finally the opening on 160 we where waiting for, about 70 QSO’s are logged. Shame on all the EU’s who did not listen but just kept on calling. That behavior cost us a lot of top band qso’s. The opening to JA this morning was disappointing however in CW the high bands have been workable reading signals on noise level. In the afternoon the bands improved a littlebit. Lets hope we can make a good run again on 80 & 160 tonight, no thunderstorms so far.

Monday 20th August 2001

• During the night we have logged about 35 stations on 160 meter. About 10 from Europe, not much but at least a start in compare to previous nights. We noticed that stations are working to fast in CW to make them readable over here. Remember we have 59 QRN. After our grey-line we had a good run to Japan on the high bands. Europeans don’t understand we are also workable in Europe during the Japanese runs and keep on calling. We sometimes have to make priorities to meet our goal, one of them is working Japan.

Sunday 19th August 2001

• Again this morning we didn’t work any Europeans on Topband. 10 & 12 meter has been wide open to North America. So far we haven’t had any thunderstorms so that looks promising. We passed the 10.00 QSO marker.

Saturday 18th August 2001

• At 00.00Z we started the SARTG RTTY Contest (first part). The second station tried to be active on 80 & 160 but couldn’t work any Europe due to local QRN which made reception impossible. The Titanex is working fine, we received some nice reports from North America. Also the reception antenna seems to work much better than on J3, the QRN prohibited us of working more stations, the coming night will hopefully be better. In general we noticed it’s more difficult to work Europe on all bands, that’s a fact of live. We do our best to get as much Europeans in the log as possible. Due to a limited Internet access we can only upload all files ones a day.

Friday 17th August 2001

• Tropical storm Chantal passed by with a lot of lightning, wind and rain. Some areas had no electricity for a while. We decided to postpone the operation so no equipment could get damaged. At 07.00 this morning we continued the J8 operation. We received some complaints from Europeans that they couldn’t through the pileups that easy as on J3, this is because the USA and JA are much stronger than on J3. We will call more to specific call areas which may be sounds strange if we are 59 are your QTH. Please listen carefully what area we are calling for. This afternoon we have setup the Titanex vertical and it looks that it will perform outstanding again. Tonight we will participate in the SARTG RTTY contest with one station signing J8PA. The other station will be on 80 & 160 coming night.

Thursday 16th August 2001

• This morning we started the J8 operations. We have setup the 2 Quads and the 40 Meter vertical. The signals from the US and JA are big! This morning we notices a tropical storm “Chantal” is heading St.Vincent. It might develop to a bigger storm or even a hurricane. We will postpone the setup of the Titanex vertical and might take down the Quads if it gets to worse.

Wednesday 15th August 2001

• We had a good trip to Bequea, late in the morning we arrived without any problems with customs. First we had a good lunch (something different than dry bread or chicken) did some shopping and had a swim in our pool. After that we started to setup the 2 Quads and the vertical. After evening dinner we started the J8 operations.

Tuesday 14th August 2001

• The last day operating from J3 has started. Just in time we reached the 25.000 QSO marker. Yesterday we decided to do something strange, we announced to be active on 160 meter SSB during the European grey line. Dennis worked 10 stations in total, CW is difficult imagine SSB. Again we had lots of local QRM. When the QRM disappears we could run short pile ups until the next noise wave, we are happy to leave this QRM behind. Since we published our e-mail address we received several requests for missing band/mode contacts. We are not making skeds! If you haven’t worked us by now you will never work us. The plan for today looks as follows: 20.00Z – Take down the station, 23.00Z – Finalize all J3 statistics and publish them on the net. Tomorrow morning early we will fly directly to Bequia and expect to setup the 2 Quad antenna’s and the 40 meter vertical before sunset. The Titanex has to wait until the next morning. You can expect the first signals somewhere tomorrow 23Z and than the story starts all over again, we are new on all bands so you can start hunting us again on all modes and bands. We finalized the J3 operation with 25.825 QSO’s in the log and look back to a successful week.

Monday 13th August 2001

• During the European gray line we have focused on 80 and 40 meter SSB, it wasn’t easy with the local QRM but several made the log, probably one of the last changes from J3. This morning we had a tour around the island. In general you could say Cariacou isn’t very developed. It was very quiet in the villages due to Carnival on the main island Grenada. We saw some more quest houses and came to the conclusion that the place we rented is far away the best for HAM radio activities. The only thing we are missing is a big steak . . . we are getting enough of the chicken and rice hi, hopefully that will be different on Bequia, at least we will have our own car so we can freely tour around. Tomorrow at 20.00Z we will take down the station and will start packing so tonight is the last change for 80 and 160 meter. The Titanex will be taken down first thing in the morning.

Sunday 12th August 2001

• During the WAE Contest we spent some time on 80 meters and worked about 50 big guns. It’s nice to compare the signals, most of them are the same strength but operating practice determines if they make it or not. The other station has been working mainly SSB on the WARC bands. In addition to this contest we continue working the WARC bands, run by the bad skilled CW operators, especial me PA0ZH….. , may be in time I will also start liking CW, you never know. It was nice to work a 5N breaking through the European pile up and work 5A1A from the other side of the pile up. Tonight we will try again to work some Europeans in phone at 3799 +/- QRM…..the time ? …..around the morning grey line in Europe. As you can see in the statistics we already reached our goal of 25.000 QSO’s, so tomorrow morning we take a common break and have a sight seeing tour around this tiny island and will be back beginning of our afternoon.

Saturday 11th August 2001

• We had a good run again on Topband, less noise than other days. Also we started the WAE contest and are working Europeans without any problems thanks to the little amp. Dennis is preceding working CW and is improving his skills dramatically. He doesn’t admit it yet, but he will like it soon hi. More to follow . . .

Friday 10th August 2001

• The propagation is improving, more and more JA’s are in the log. Also 10 meters is much better open than in the beginning of the week. Tonight one station will participate as J38PA in the WAE contest.

Thursday 9th August 2001

• After the European gray line we worked lots of Europeans and JA’s using the beverage for reception. I must sound strange on the other side, but without using these receiving techniques we can’t operate from 18.00 – 10.00 local time! This automatically means we only receive the big boomers. It looks like that we have to live with this interference. The interference stopped earlier than other days, at 06 o’clock local time we could operate all bands again. Lots of JA’s are worked on 30,20 and 17 meters. This afternoon Ronald has made the first PSK contacts. Rob also started to make some phone contacts.

Wednesday 8th August 2001

• Propagation on 160 meter have been disappointing, we didn’t work a single station using the new beverage antenna . . . today we will modify it again. Rob worked about 120 stations on 80 meters and Ronald had a very nice opening to Japan on 17 meter, see the Real Audio page. Dennis starts to like CW ! he worked several stations on 40 meters. During the afternoon we had a nice opening op 12 and 10 meter.

Tuesday 7th August 2001

• We still can’t locate the interference we are facing. It starts at 17.30 local time and lasts till later in the morning. Imagine you have 59 +30DB noise, everybody who calls you has to repeat his call 3 times, that’s no fun for you and for us. When changing shifts at 02.00 local time the new crew decided to go to bed again because of this. As soon the interference is gone we will be active again. At 09.30 local time most of the QRM was gone and the pileups where back to normal. The balance between phone and cw becomes better according the statistics. Dennis became a multi-mode operator, he made some cw contacts, this will encourage Rob to work at least one phone contact.

Monday 6th August 2001

• The new beverage didn’t perform as expected despite of that we worked again about 20 new ones on topband using the vertical as receiving antenna. Most of the night we had 59 + noise on all bands making live very hard to hear weak stations. The source still hasn’t been found. In the morning we modified the beverage, changed the direction and position. In the afternoon we tried to fill the statistical gabs, 30,12 and 10 meter CW was needed so we skipped 17.

Sunday 5th August 2001

• The new (short) beverages worked well last night on 160 and 80 meters. The signals were not so strong but there was less QRM. On 160 meters 20 stations were added to the log. On 80 meters Bouke worked nearly 100 stations in phone. The high bands haven’t been good this morning, very low signals didn’t give us the pileups we are waiting for.

Saturday 4th August 2001

• During the European greyline Rob worked 80 and 160 meters. On 160 we worked only 20 stations because the receiving antenna’s is not performing like we expected on 160 meter. On daytime we will do some work to improve this. On 80 meter we logged approx. 40 stations. During our greyline there was a little thunderstorm, Ronald worked on 40 meters 35 JA/VK/ZL in the middle of the QRN. During daytime all bands seems to perform well, even 10 meters.

Friday 3rd August 2001

• We were already awake very early in the morning, around 05.00 local time and started planning the antenna setup around the villa. It took nearly all day assembling the antenna’s and the radio’s. Also some transport damage had to be repaired,they will never learn how to take care of your luggage on airports we think. The RX antenna’s do perform well and exists of 2 single window Quad’s for 30 – 6m, a Titanex verticale for 160/80 and 40, a 40 meter verticale and the RX-antenne. Just for dinner we started to make our first QSO’s from NA-147. The reports were good so it seems all works fine so far.

Thursday 2nd August 2001

• The Team left Holland at 07.15 local time heading for London, Barbados, Grenada. There was a little problem with our luggage on Barbados. Not all the equipment fitted in the airplane, so the flight company arranged an extra flight for us with the antenna’s. We had an unexpected stopover at Union island, waited half an hour for our antenna’s and after that we went with a larger plane to Carriacou. After this long trip we arrived at our rental villa around 18.30 local time. It was already dark so we couldn’t do anything on the antenna setup. Our host had prepared a very nice dinner,and after that we took a couple of beers and went to bed.

Sunday 29th July 2001

• We had our last meeting before the Caribbean Tour starts. All equipment is packed and checked and ready for transport. We had some wild guesses about the number of QSO’s, some think 50.000 should be possible, lets see and hope for good propagation. As of the coming days Ron PA1ZX will start publishing the daily propagation forecast. See the Propagation section for more details.

Friday 27th July 2001

• In contradiction to the announcement of June 20th the call J3PA will be J38PA, the Government of Grenada changed the license, the 8 in the call is for visitors and must be used.

Sunday 22nd July 2001

• Ronald and Rob have tested all computers, Internet connection and tested all software for CT, WF1B and Logger (PSK31). Less than 2 weeks to go guys, can’t wait to leave.

Saturday 21st July 2001

• Ulli PA5AT created a special receiving antenna which will be used on 40/80/160 meters. This antenna is several tested at PI4COM and has been revised several times to make it work better. It only needs a 8 meter tower (fibre-stick) and a filter for each band. Also an pre-amp is part of this design. The receiving antenna has an opening angle of about 100 degrees and is peak for as well high angle signals (short skip) as low angles (DX). In combination with the Titanex vertical it acts as a 2 elem vertical in phase. Lets see how this is going to work.

Friday 29th June 2001

• We met the Titanex makers on the Ham Vention in Friedrichshafen, South Germany and collected the V160E. Coming weekend we will setup the antenna and test it out and build some experience how to set up the 24 meter vertical. We will publish some pictures on the Photo Gallery.

Wednesday 20th June 2001

• The J8 licenses are now received and a contest call J3PA has now been confirmed.

Tuesday 24th April 2001

• Today we received confirmation for the Contest call J8PA.

Sunday 22nd April 2001

• The first time met each other at PA0ZH’s QTH. We inspected the new 2 Quads and they really look good.

Monday 9th April 2001

• Press Release

LLDXT 2001 CARIBBEAN TOUR:

The Low Land DX-pedition Team (LLDXT) is pleased to announce the 6th Caribbean Tour. This year’s tour will bring them to the “Island of Carriacou” (Grenada – IOTA NA-147) from August 2-15th and the Island of Bequia (St. Vincent – IOTA NA-025) from August 16-27th.

The team members will be Bouke/PA0ZH, Ronald/PA3EWP, Rob/PA5ET and Dennis/
PA7FM. The callsigns will be J3/homecall and J8/homecall. They will use two FT1000MPs with amplifiers and will be active around the clock on 160-10 meters on the modes CW, SSB, RTTY and PSK31. Titanex has sponsored a V160E vertical to give them a good low-band signal. As is in past years, they will have a Tour Web site which will be updated daily with the latest information, on-line logs, tour diary, digital photo’s and digital pileup recordings. The Guestbook can already be signed. The LLDXT home page can be found at: http://www.qsl.net/lldxt/

All QSLs will be managed again by PA5ET, Rob Snieder, Van Leeuwenstraat 137,
2273 VS Voorburg, The Netherlands.

Tuesday 27th March 2001

• The flight reservation have been made, the Villa’s are booked. The tour will take place from 2nd August until the 27th August. For Grenada it is not sure if we have to collect the license on the main island of Grenada, we are still negotiating with the Telecom people. When everything is confirmed the Caribbean Tour 2001 will be officially announced.

Friday 2nd March 2001

• The Caribbean Tour 2001 will go this year to Grenada & St.Vincent.

Pictures:

Pictures are available on an external link

 The Team:

This Years Team Member are: