Welcome to the web page for WU7F, located in Centerville, UT.
I suspect that the reason you are visiting this site is because we have had a QSO on the air. If so, thank you very much! If by chance you are not already a 'Ham Radio Operator' – then I invite you to learn more about it and join us on the air. It's a lot of fun. You can learn more about it at www.arrl.org or thousands of other websites dedicate to helping newcomers get started. The rest of my content on this page is intended primarily for other ham radio operators.
I've got my ticket in 1978 while in high school. Ham radio has since opened opportunities for me in various careers – including sailing as a Electronics/Radio Officer on large container ships in the Pacific (Merchant Marines) for a brief period. Although I never strayed far from ham radio, my activity dropped considerably for about 15 years. I became active again in 2001.
Current Activity
The rig I use most of the time is a small Elecraft K2 running QRP (or sometimes QRPp). I didn't build any of the add-on modules available for this radio, so it is CW only, which has become my favorite mode of operation. I also own a Kenwood TS-570D(g), but rarely use it. Here is a photo of the current setup:
I have an old straight key given to me by my friend, KV7V, and the paddles belong to my son, Mike - KD7UUB. Those paddles are a prototype that Jerry, K8RA, sent to Mike when he was 12 years old (as a birthday gift!) Mike lets me use them – but I need to get my own, as Mike is heading off to college. In the meantime, I've really enjoyed that key. The paddles plug into a K1EL Winkeyer USB kit that I recently built. This is a great keyer that I usually use stand-alone. It can be connected to a computer so you can do keyboard CW, and let your logging program automate part of the exchange for you. It accepts the ASCII code and commands via the USB port and generates the CW on its own – so it doesn't rely on the timing idiosyncrasies of multi-threaded operating systems that have proven problematic over the years. I've used it connected to the computer for some contests – and I can see how handy it is when you are trying to log/dupe/copy and send at the same time. The main reason I got it is that I wanted something that I could use between rigs that would have the same 'feel' for me. The Kenwood has a terrible time with its own built-in keyer once you go above 16 wpm. The K2 has a great internal keyer. This keyer let's me have a consistent good experience, regardless of what rig I am using (including operating on a friend's rig, too!) Both the output from the keyer and the straight-key go into a little interface I made that connects directly to the radio's key input.
I use a LDG Z-11Pro for an antenna tuner. It works great!
My antenna is a G5RV. It's a slopper/sagger – it used to be almost horizontal, but when the utility company came through and cut branches from trees – they happened to remove the branch that one end of my antenna's support line was connected to. Rather than coming down all the way, the support line got caught in another tree. It's much lower. I tell people that it is up about 20 feet... but that's only at the one end. The other end is about 15 feet, and there is sag in the middle. I definitely need to fix things this spring!
CW and QRP
I learned CW to pass some licenses
when I first got involved with Ham Radio. As soon as I upgraded to
General, I figured that I wouldn't use CW much anymore, because I
really wanted to 'talk' to people on SSB. I was also an early
adopter of Packet radio in the early 80's. The funny thing was that
while on HF, I often found myself hanging around the Novice portion
of the band. I should mention that my first radio was an old
Heathkit DX 40 (considered very old even at that time) with only four
frequencies I could transmit on. As a 'General', and with my new
Kenwood TS-120s that I had at the time, it seemed odd that I would
return to those parts of the band that I had previously been
relegated to. I guess there was some nostalgia – but I also
found that CW was enjoyable. That's not the way I would have
described it before my license upgrade that allowed me to do
something other than CW! I think I was just rebelling a bit because
I was 'forced' to learn the code. I'm sure glad I did, or I would
have been missing out on what has become my favorite part of ham
radio!
Let's move ahead a couple of decades...
I was doing some work for a company that required that I work out of a condo near Denver, CO. This was around 2002. I had my new TS-570 with me and with extra time on my hands in the evenings, I thought it would be great to operate from this location. It turns out that I had to run a 'stealth' antenna that looped through the apartment and out to the balcony. When I would try to transmit, the alarm system in the condo would go off! I had to turn my power down below 10 Watts so the RFI wouldn't trip the alarm in my apartment. The prospect of running such low power with such a poor antenna setup was not appealing, but some research on the Internet revealed that others have been successful with QRP and simple wire antenna's (K3WWP's site was particularly inspirational to me). What really “sold” me was the fact that I was making contacts – including a contact on 12 meters with China! I had never worked China previously (at 100w), yet I just did it with 5 watts!
I love to go camping and take a radio with me. It is so nice to not have to worry about draining the Jeep battery while making contacts all night. The K2 draws very little current (less than 200 mA with backlight off) on receive. Compare that with the 2A draw of the Kenwood TS-570 – and you can understand why the K2 was such a nice upgrade for me. It also has a much better receiver. That makes a big difference in the enjoyability factor!
I should also mention that I am very grateful to the operators I have had the pleasure to contact over the years – especially when I'm running QRP. I know I don't always have a booming signal – but its the ham on the other side who is listening carefully to pull me out. I often get RST reports of 579 or 599... but I know there are plenty of 429's as well. Regardless of power levels being run, I am very happy to have a CW QSO.
Maritime Mobile
After the tech bubble burst and I found myself unemployed from the computer industry in my town, I decided to become a Merchant Marine and sail as a “Radio Officer”. I only did this for a couple of years, but I thought I'd mention it here, since I run into a lot of guys on the air that are ex-Navy or have some commercial radio experience. By the time I went to sea, CW was no longer used to communicate with shore stations for commercial traffic. It has been replaced with GMDSS – a system that utilizes a combination of satellite, mf, hf, and vhf using digital modes or using at least using a digital mode as an alert and preamble to a voice message. You still need to have a commercial 2nd class radiotelegraph license to get the required certification to sail (even though they don't use CW). Even though the shipping companies don't use CW, it didn't stop me from making CW contacts! In some of the areas near Asia, I heard quite a bit of CW traffic on the commercial bands – mostly from fishing vessels. I kept a sked with another Radio Officer (who also happens to be my “Elmer” from high school!). We would make ship-to-ship contacts on commercial bands, or make contacts on the ham bands if one of us was not at sea at the time. In fact, I still stay in touch with him while he is at sea, since he continues with that line of work.
On one of the ships I sailed on, I could not find a code key. I made one out of a couple of steak knives from the galley. I just connected a alligator clip to each blade, and taped the wooden handles together. Pressing down on one knife blade made contact with the other. I'm not sure, but it seemed to really “cut” through the QRM a little better! ;-)
Here is a shot of my son, Mike - KD7UUB, operating CW from a "Field Day" site in the Uinta Mountain range, elevation is about 10K feet.
