2010 Year in Review

Well another year is about to close on me and it has been a rough year for things other than amateur radio which limited my on the air time (family illnesses mostly). I am thankful that the year is almost behind me.

There are some good things though. Jamboree on the Air (october 16, 2010) with the scouts somewhat forced me to learn CW - although we did not do much CW transmission during the Jamboree itself. I did get a chance to use my new (then) Palm Mini paddle which attaches to the radio via magnets - a real clever design.

Since Oct 16, I managed to learn enough CW to make 56 QSOs in CW - 3 of which were QRP.

We started a CW training net on Saturday mornings on 80m with Dave Watson (W4DJW), Stephen Belknap (KJ4RXY), Tony (N4BDR), and Phil (KG4FQG) as regulars.

Dave (W4KA) gave me a tip on a great logging program from N3FJP - ACLogger.

I also purchased my first quality paddle from Begali with great correspondence from Bruna (the owner's daughter).

I also put in a 500 Hz CW filter to complement the DSP narrow filters into the FT897D.

PSK has taken a back seat and I have not been on HF phone since the spring and summer other than occasionally checking into the Carolina SSB Net on 3915.

I managed to get 48 of 50 states with QSL Cards in hand - just need Alaska and South Dakota

Memberships in FISTS, SKCC and NAQCC have been helpful in being able to log the CW QSOs so far.

I am looking forward to NAQCC Sprint days in 2011 and I am contemplating operating mostly QRP in 2011 especially as we get into the peak of the solar cycle.

I attended my first BRARS Club meeting and have been able to meet most of the club members at the Friday night "Eat and Greet" at the Golden Coral in Cherrydale.

I joined Greenville ARES and attended most of the meetings since joining and the Thursday night training nets on the 146.820 repeater.

As for projects - built an OHR Dummy load and a cantenna type dummy load. I built reverse polarity and overvoltage protection for the Yaesus and put a lightning arrestor onto the feedline.

Thanks to the readers for reading this blog and hope to see you on the air in 2011. Have a Merry Christmas.