Last update: 12/21/2006 11:50 UTC
- The shack -
J20SA Information Page First Trip (November - December 2006)
Eric, ON7SAT was in Djibouti, from November 20th till December 16th, 2006.
J20SA News Date Eric installed his antenna about 1.5 meter above the hotel's roof and will be qrv in the next days, once he cleared interferences concerns with his neighbor the Radio & TV company. He has a lot of work to do and have limited "air" time.
November 21st, 2006 First test have been made at 17:00 UTC, but unfortunately the 20m band was closed and the 40m was to noisy in Djibouti November 21st, 2006 First contacts have been established this morning with Belgian (ON4TX, ON4ZD) and French (F5MRP) stations -- Info provided by ON4ZD. November 22nd, 2006 The antenna isn't doing well at the current location, signals aren't that great and Eric is hardly heard in Europe. In the next days he will look for bamboos to elevate the antenna above the roof. No activity is expected for tomorrow Friday 24th, since Eric will be in the backcountry.
November 23rd, 2006 No news today, but as the "new" week starts tomorrow, Eric will get back to work. November 24th, 2006 Eric was qrv at noon during his lunch break (local time) and made some nice qso. His logging program shows some issues with special calls, he will therefore go back to a paper log. As a result it won't be published on this page. He will try to elevate the antenna tomorrow.
November 25th, 2006 The antenna is now more than 6 meters above the roof and signals in Europe are stronger than before . -- Info provided by ON4ZD November 26th, 2006 Nice signals have been received in Europe today. Eric really enjoyed being called by so many stations. The electronic log issues have been solved, but as the PC is shared among his colleagues for qrl activities, and due to the lack of an Internet connection, the log will definitively not be published before Eric's return in Belgium. November 27th, 2006 Eric is currently (10:45 UTC) qrv on 14.180MHz. In the last days he made 1 qso on 40m but the band really is too noisy. In the next days he will try to operate on 15m.
Eric might extend his stay in Djibouti until December 23rd and be back home for Christmas, more on that later...
In the mean time he tries to be qrv:
§ Saturday to Wednesday: 10:00 - 13:40 UTC (+/- lunch time) § Thursday: 10:30 - ..... UTC (weekend) § Friday: All day (unless other activities with his colleagues) As short hint: Eric only answers operators who announce their full callsign. Yes the one that contains prefix, number and suffix.☺
November 28th, 2006 Eric won't be active this afternoon. His qrl under 34°C is pretty exhausting, which forces him to rest a bit. (La siesta) Yesterday he worked ON4BW on 40m. Jean-Michel runs a 4el beam which helps a lot through the qrm.
November 29th, 2006 Good news, Eric managed to send us his log today. - Logbook - He caught a cold due to the temperature difference, 35°C outside and 20°C inside with the air-conditioning, but will try to operate later on this afternoon.
Another good news: Eric will back in Belgium around Christmas, but will go back to Djibouti around January 4th, 2007. In the mean time, he tries to extend his license.
November 30th, 2006 Nothing specific to report, Eric enjoyed qso'ing on 20m this afternoon. Tomorrow he will be back to work. December 1st, 2006 Two nice pictures showing Eric in action and his antenna on the hotel's roof. Eric was active at lunchtime (local time). During a phone call we had this afternoon, he said how pleased he was to work so many stations. He also said he has almost no qrm on 20m, so he can listen to small signals and will continue working by regions to give everybody a chance. He will send an updated log in 2-3 days. The only Internet access is a 33kb/s modem and the phone bill is exploding (no sponsor), so please be patient.
December 2nd, 2006 So far no news for today, we haven't heard Eric yet. Tomorrow I will be on a business trip too, so updates will be delayed until at least 23:00UTC. Sorry for the inconvenience.
December 3rd, 2006 Nothing specific to report. Eric's signal wasn't that great in Belgium today due to huge qrn. He is still waiting on a confirmation for his flight to Belgium, more on that later...
December 4th, 2006 Hi folks, the latest logbook version is now on-line (09:00 UTC today). To ease the research, we only kept the first qso each station has made with Eric, so don't be surprise if you worked him several times. December 5th, 2006 Signals were very weak on 20m this morning, so Eric went on 15m and worked Europe, Australia and Indonesia. As he will have to work on the week-end (Thursday & Friday), his activities will be limited to the lunch break, just like the other days of the week.
December 6th, 2006 Eric was qrv during lunch break today, further there is nothing specific to report. December 7th, 2006 Yesterday evening (local time) Eric was quite busy on 40m. We didn't hear him this morning, but signal on 20m were very strong in Europe around 16:00 UTC, he even worked some US stations. Once again he experienced difficulties to connect to the Internet and was therefore unable to send an updated logbook version.
Thanks to Léon ON4ZD, today we could add a search engine for J20SA's logbook. We hope this will be more efficient.December 8th, 2006 Eric will probably not be qrv today. In an email he sent yesterday evening, he says he is trying to get the log over a 33k connection which is quite a challenge... He also said he will try to operate on 17m in the next days, at least if the propagation condx are good enough. We just had a chat with Eric on the Internet. He wasn't feeling good today, so he didn't go to work and didn't operate either. He is recovering fast and hope to be fit by tomorrow.
His return date to Belgium hasn't be confirmed yet, more on that later...
He already received about 20 qsl cards by mail and ask you guys to be patient, he'll answer these upon his return home.
We managed to get an updated logbook version, which is now on-line.
Be aware that some qso's, that need a manual correction upon Eric's return, were not imported. If you think you are logged incorrectly, send me an email with all qso details (date, UTC, call, exchanged reports, band...) at the address hereunder, we'll check it.
December 9th, 2006 Qso's were on 17m this morning with the usual pile-up. Eric is feeling better and went back to work in the afternoon. I will be on a business trip to the UK until Tuesday evening, with no or limited access to my email and to this web page. I'll will therefore be unable to provide you with any update before Tuesday 23:00 UTC. Sorry for the inconvenience.
December 10th, 2006 Operations were on 17 and 20 meters . Eric feels sorry his schedule doesn't give him opportunities to work more than European stations. December 11th, 2006 Operations were on 15 and 20 meters. December 12th, 2006 Eric's departure date is confirmed for December 17th. The good news is he is due to Djibouti on January 4th, 2007 for about 3 weeks (exact date to be confirmed) and his license is extended for another 2 months.
December 13th, 2006 Qso's were on 15 and 20 meters today, but the propagation isn't to great. Eric is exhausted, working by 33°C in the shade when there isn't any, forces him to re-hydrate and rest a lot. In the next day he might rebalance his schedule and probably reduce ham activities during the lunch break.
December 14th, 2006 Eric plans to dismantle his antenna on Sunday, which means operations will end on Saturday December 16th. If you haven' contact him, stay tuned to this web page for further details regarding his January trip. December 15th, 2006 A lot of qsb this morning on 20 meters, but signals were ok in Europe. As you might have read before it is Eric's last day of operation. Tonight he will have dinner with his colleagues and start packing his rig.
Thanks to you all for reading our news and also a special thank to all contributors. We'll keep you posted for the January trip.
- Patrick ON4KNP -
December 16th, 2006 Eric is home now, having some rest and already thinking possible improvements for his January trip ! In the mean time we updated the logbook.
December 19th, 2006
Questions, comments or suggestions are welcome at : on4knp@skynet.be answers will be provided via this page.