CenturyLink DSL repair

 

I started to notice a problem with our internet connection dropping and slower connect speeds. This seemed to be happening mostly early morning and clearing up later in the day. This started several weeks ago. It finally was bothersome enough I did a test with the CenturyLink App on My iPhone and it did show an issue. I did an online chat with the repair people and they also verified a problem and set a time for an onsite visit.

 Close to the scheduled time of course the problem cleared up but the technician did see the problem we were experiencing from earlier. After some onsite checks He decided to add a filter/splitter to the incoming line. I looked it up on the internet and its a NID-01VTj. A simple device but effective so far. We have three analog phones with DSL filters at the phone jack but this will help the DSL modem to not "see" the phones and associated wiring. This fix has actually improved our connect speed and we are no longer experiencing retrains. 

  I wonder if the extra wiring to feed the three phones around the house acted like antennas and were picking up some interference--we see. Very happy to have a solid internet connection and again I've had another good CenturyLink repair experience!

 73--Tim

QSL cards and several new DXCC's

 

I received a couple QSL cards from the Zero Bureau recently and noticed its time to send more money for supplies. I also have a stack of outgoing cards to send to the ARRL outgoing bureau. I don' receive as many as I used to which is fine--many Hams are using electronic QSL cards for exchange like LOTW and EQSL.

 I also notice I have a new DXCC in my LOTW -HD8R- Galapagos Island which I had a contact with during the CQ WW SSB contest in 2021 that was just recently verified. I also have two contacts with V55Y from Namibia but He doesn't seem to be a LOTW user yet-maybe someday. I now have 129 confirmed DXCC's. I haven't actively been chasing Dx , just adding a few thru contesting.

73--Tim

 

ARRL RTTY RU 2024

 This contest started Saturday January 6th at 18:00 UTC and finished at 23:59 January 7th. I was hoping to have most of my contest time on Saturday, but I had antenna/tuner issues several hours after the start. The weather was wet and humid outside and eventually turned cold enough to freeze towards sunset and I suspect it affected my vertical antenna. I decided to wait until Sunday morning to investigate, which I did and cleaned the doorknob capacitors and connections on the antenna. It helped some but I still backed the power down to less than 50w just to be safe.

 I was able both days to make contacts on 40m through 10m and at the end of the contest was surprised to see 20m had the most contacts. The conditions were good for domestic QSO's but the DX was not as available. I still managed almost 200 contacts for a score 0f 11,136 so I was pleased with the results. I was suffering with a chest cold so this was the perfect contest for me--point and click and no voice needed!!

73---Tim

Christmas vacation cruise 2023

 

We decided to spend Christmas on a short Caribbean cruise this year instead of a white Christmas in the north country. The weather up north actually didn't cooperate for the usual snowy holiday and instead was a rainy, foggy, no snow Christmas but we enjoyed warm weather and palm trees with nice Caribbean breezes. 

  A plane ride to Tampa Florida, an overnight stay, then a short Uber ride and we were embarking on a Royal Caribbean cruise ship on a five-night holiday. We did have a few days at sea but enjoyed all aspects of the ship with stops at Coco Cay and Nassau, Bahama before cruising back to Florida. Travel days can be rather long and the return trip was no exception, but it was a memorable vacation. 

  Happy New Year---Tim

ARRL 10m contest 2023

 This contest started Friday night and continued thru Sunday although because of a solar flare Friday night was a non-event. There were many signals before the contest started but by time I checked later Friday the band was silent, so I switched off radio and went upstairs. Saturday was much better after sunrise with the band slowly filling up from 28300 to well past 28700 with both domestic and DX. I did notice a huge amount of splatter from adjacent frequencies but in tuning around could not always find the offending station. I wondered if some interference was atmospheric. Another interesting aspect was the lack of direction to complete a QSO- seemed many times the Yagi did better for receiving stations on edge or even off the back. Saturday was my best day with about two thirds of the total QSO's for the contest. Sunday tuning around I had a lot of gray spots on my band map and had to work a little to find new contacts. Sunday also was more normal with directional reception, but signal strength was up and down with one station commenting on how loud I was and the next commenting on needing to pull me out of the noise.

 It was a very fun contest with good conditions overall although instead of a strictly S & P operation I should have tried for a run or two. Oh well -158 contacts for 16,748 points was not bad. I haven't checked for any rare DX but I think it was mostly the usual suspects---I recognized many call signs!!!

73---Tim