Saamrus Magaliesberg 'Piet-my-Vrou' 

Saamrus between mountains. Not good for radio!

Berry, our dog Chaiya and I spent a wonderful weekend at Saamrus, a guest farm nestled in the beautiful Magaliesberg area and only about an hour from our apartment in Fourways. The main attraction here being the fact that it is dog friendly, a huge plus for us, especially Chaiya. The road access was terrible to say the least. We kept touching down in our very low Toyota Corolla. I wished that I had a higher clearance vehicle for this trip. Our bags plus my radio gear, minus the moxon were man-carried the last 100m up a steep 4 wheel drive only road. The cottage, called  Piet my Vrou after a popular local bird, was beautiful. Very peaceful among nice shady trees. Extremely clean, neat and nearly new.
On friday evening I was able to erect an EFHW about 5 meters off an extremely steep slope behind the cottage. Upon orienting myself using my BB compass I was disappointed to see that mountains to the north behind the cottage and the Magaliesberg would completely block the path to Europe.
During the evening nothing heard and a lot of noise on all bands except a few stations on 40m in the noise. I tried connecting the EFHW tuner to the fence via a short lead but no real difference.
The next morning I was up early and was surprised to note that 40meters sounded better. I deployed a 40m dipole up about 10m and facing N-S. This involved a lot of scrambling around in dense bush, getting tangled on small aloe bushes and generally falling and stumbling over the steep rocky ground. Not fun and dangerous. But it sure was good practice for field operations! Since this was a new antenna I had to take it up and down to trim it to resonance. I noted about 1s unit improvement between the EFHW and the dipole for near in stations with a definite noticeable improvement in the dipole for Region 1 and 5 stations in the Cape and Natal. At around 8am I was able to QSO with om John in Witbank ZS6JBJ. John gave me a 579 report improving to 599. He was unable to hear any difference between the two antennas. I then had a nice chat with Andy ZS6ADY in Benoni and Pierre ZS6A also in Benoni. They both gave me a 599 report and Pierre noted a slightly better signal on the dipole. The results interested me and I assumed that the EFHW is a good antenna for NVIS work and is adequate for local contacts within Region 6 Gauteng, NW and Mapumulanga areas. I also assume that I was getting some benefit from the extreme slope behind the EFHW for propagation towards the south.
After a stiff and enjoyable 3 hour walk I was back on the air for the AWA net at 2 pm running 2 watts. The following stations checked into the net ZS0AWA/ZS6ADY, ZS5DM, ZS5CQD, ZS6AJY, ZS6JBJ. All stations in region 6 had no problem copying my 2watts. However the region 5 stations were having some difficulty. They were also experiencing heavy QRN at the time in Natal.
Later in the afternoon I erected a 15m dipole facing N-S. I was amazed at the difference between this antenna and my long wire (20meters). I could hear no stations on the long wire. On the dipole the band came alive although the signals were weak from Europe. No doubt due to the mountains blocking the low angle signals. It was very frustrating hearing all the G land stations on the air and participating in the BERA contest but they were barely above the noise. My log for BERA (Commonwealth contest) stations worked was as follows (UTC).
15:14 7Q7BP 599 599 177 15m 001 Malawi
15:20 5X1XA 599 599 214 15m 002 Uganda
16:27 5H3EE 599 599 285 15m 003 Tanzania
16:52 9X0NH 599 599 244 20m 004 Rwanda
04:05 5H3EE 599 599 585 20m 005 Tanzania
04:28 9J2BO 599 599 360 40m 006 Zambia
I am certain that given a better QTH that I would have been able to contact the UK and also the many Canada and Indian stations calling. Clearly I had  continental communications into East Africa.
My 15meter and 20meter dipoles also performed well. These were all antennas built in a hurry for this trip.
I could also hear that 10m was well opened and I kicked myself for not having a 10m dipole with me. I did contemplate shortening the 15m dipole but I ran out of time. Propagation appeared to be good with the SFI above 110. However the A index was high and thus the noise level was too high for good QRP conditions.
On Sunday morning I was on 20m by 6am local and worked 5H3EE before the band closed. I then deployed my 40m dipole and was surprised to hear the path to North America wide open. I believe I was copying via long path since there was flutter and echo on the signals. I am sure that I could have worked some of the big guns if I had been on top of the mountain. Once the band went short I called CQ for an hour between 7am and 8am local with no response. I guess Sunday morning is not the time for 40m CW in SA?
During our walk on Saturday we walked to the topmost point on the farm mountain. From there we could clearly see the Magaliesberg to the north and the Witwatersberg to the south. We scouted the area and found a good spot where I could deploy a field station in the future. However no tall skyhooks are up there. Still I reckon a low dipole would work given the clear take off in every direction. I need to look at a topo map of the area to see what the altitude difference is between the Magaliesberg and where we were at Saamrus.

Lessons and observations from this trip:

1. Get a topo map of the area
2. Re build the 20m and 15m antennas to strengthen the connection to the feeder hub
3. Build a 10m dipole
4. Buy more thin 'lacing cord' from Builders Hardware and build a new and better antenna launcher. This cord is nice and slippery and extremely light weight.
5. Remember the back pack!

Berry and I will definitely return to Saamrus. Recommended for all dog lovers who have social dogs. The end of another enjoyable adventure!

Berry and Chaiya taking a break

A picture of fitness and good looks :)

Berry and Chaiya with a beautiful stone fence post. (Note the  lichen).

A view of the 40m dipole and the cottage Piet-my-Vrou

Piet-my-Vrou from the steep hill where the EFHW was deployed

Far too many wires and too few QSOs!

ARLR Inter. DX Contest CW

Date Feb 16-17 March 2013. From 0000UTC Saturday - 2359 Sunday.

I participated in this interesting contest. The contest aim is to contact as many W/VE stations as possible. It is aimed at encouraging an understanding of DX propagation on the part of W/VE operators. 

I set up my field station at the Krugersdorp game reserve day picnic area. This is an excellent spot for radio. and there was no local noise on the band. There are many sky hooks in the form of very large eucalyptus trees and a lot of wide open spaces. The day entrance fee is R30 (I think per person?). The gate is open from 7am - 6pm local during summer, however I was told that you can depart the area anytime up to 10pm. I am not sure that the security is adequate after dark, but I did notice a number of security guards around the gate area. There are many braai areas and plenty of shade. The ground slopes up slightly towards the west which probably reduces the signals in that direction? The ground is soft and with few rocks, making it easy to hammer in pegs for guying masts etc. On the slight down side there are 4 lapa's there. On saturday there was a big and noisy party going on in one of the lapa's. On sunday there was more loud music coming from a group of picnickers. The area is also near the main road and thus there is a constant sound of traffic in the distance. All in all, I feel this is an excellent site. There is easily enough room to set up multiple antennas for experimental and comparative purposes.

I ran my Elecraft K2 at 5 watts QRP and operated on 15m and 10m of which I succeeded only in making  QSO's on 10m.  My key is a mini Palm which is designed for field operations. I used the internal battery in my K2 for the entire operation. My Antenna system was an inverted V center fed doublet on 15m. The apex was up in a tree about 10 meters and the wire length was about 40 meters long. This was center fed with a 300 ohm ladder line which did not quite reach the operating position. So I lengthened it with a piece of 450 ohm ladder line. This was tuned by an ancient ZW1 balanced tuner. On 10 meters I used a prototype moxon beam which I had fashioned out of some pieces of 20 mm pvc pipe, 0.5mm bare wire and a piece of plywood which I used as the hub. I attached a 1.5 meter piece of doweling to the top of my new ZS6TJS mast with two hose clips. The moxon can then be rotated using the armstrong method (see pics). See my separate write up for more details of this. 

On Saturday I was QRV at 12:30UTC. Setup time was about  50 minutes due to my unfamiliarity with the new mast set up procedure. I operated until 15:45UTC when it started to get dark and I had to leave the site. A total of 3.25 hours. I found that the 15m band was opened and that there was a huge amount of QRM from Europe. There was no way that the W/VE stations were going to hear my QRP signal. I moved to 10m which had much less QRM than 15m. On 10m I was able to get the attention of the big gun stations. I really appreciated their patience in pulling my signal out of the noise. Most of the stations asked for a repeat. I think this was due to a combination of weak signal and my difficult call sign. I noted that they generally copied ZS6R.. but had trouble figuring out the S and H hi hi. I did find that by QRS'ing down to about 19wpm that I scored a better non-repeat rate. I felt that many of the stations had multiple 10m antennas pointing in different directions since I did not notice any of them rotating their beams in my direction. Well put it this way, I did not notice their signal levels increase. These operators are very patient. I feel bad for them many times when they have to spend precious minutes digging out my weak QRP signal. But never once did an operator abandon the attempt and there was satisfaction expressed in the form of vy fb once they had copied and I sent QSL! I also noticed that a small tweek of my antenna to beam more accurately in their direction often resulted in them copying me. Next time I will take better azimuth bearing information to the field. The following stations were in my log for Saturday. K3OO (PA), K1LZ (MA), K3LR (PA), NY4A (NC), K1RX (NH), W3EP (CT), KE9I (IN), N4OX (FL), VE9AA (NB), K5RX (TX), N8AA (OH) gave me an honest 579, WB9Z (IL), W2FU (NY). When I went QRT the band was still opened and the signals were coming up as the sun set.

On Sunday I was QRV from the same site at 14:00UTC. This time I was a bit further up the slope and I only set up the moxon for 10m. I did not check out any of the other bands. I felt that the signals were stronger. However I noted that I had already worked many of the stronger signals. This time I stayed later and was QRT by 16:30UTC having operated for 2.5hours. I really noticed the signal strengths coming up as it got darker. There was much more QRM from Europe. Not sure if this was because they had exhausted 15m or if the band condx were better? The following stations were in my log for Sunday. K1ZZ (CT), N1UR (VT), K1WHS (ME), K8GL (MI), K4RO (TN), VE3JM (ON), VE3UTJ (ON), K3AJ (MD). 

In total I worked 21 stations over a period of 5.75 hours on 10 meters. The moxon performed excellently. However I wonder if a vertical might be more suitable for field DX purposes on the 10m band? It certainly would be easier to set up. The moxon has excellent F/B ratio but not much forward gain. However the problem for QRP is not so much eliminating QRM (since it is easy to copy the big guns) but more an issue of forward gain (IMHO). In a low noise field environment a vertical may perform better. It would be interesting to do some comparisons.