Making HF contacts...

12/14/13 • 2 min

What use is an F-call? I recently talked about making contact with a station on HF. Getting a feel for the other station is very important because it will make you understand when the other person is listening and when they're not. It will let you know to what kind of station they're responding to, and when they do respond, how they respond. I recently made a contact with T33A. I used 5 Watts on a rotatable dipole, 15m. I listened to the station for a good 10 minutes before I made my first call. They gave me lots of information about the contact long before I opened my mouth. It was one of the last days they were operating and it was bedlam on the frequency, lots of stations wanting to make this contact. The station told me that they were listening 10 up, so I configured my radio to deal with that. Then I worked out what the rhythm of the operator was, got a feel for how they replied and when I was ready, I called my callsign. I was floored that they came back with "the VK6 QRP station" on my first call. It took two goes to get my callsign across, but the contact was made there and then. Making such a contact is as much about the ability of the remote station to pick you out, as it is about improving your chances of success. It's about picking your moment, getting it just right, so that when you call, it all happens in the blink of an eye. Picking your moment is also about understanding that some people just don't want to talk to you. Two people who are talking to each other might do that every day and are really not interested in talking to you. Picking the group or the 'net where to call-in is crucial to your success on HF. Look at the 7130 DX net. It runs on Monday, Wednesday and Friday at 9:30 UTC. It's aim is to facilitate making DX contacts between amateurs. When you tune to 7.130, get out a piece of paper and write down all the stations you hear, write down what signal strength they are and what the operators name is. The net hosts will call for new stations for the 'net on a regular basis. They'll acknowledge you and continue seeking other stations. Once they have a bunch, they'll ask which stations want to make a call. Hold off for a couple of rounds and listen. Stations will announce their callsign and the host will take a list. Each station is called in turn and invited to make a QSO or two with another station. If it's busy, they might do one QSO per station. Once they're done, the next station gets a chance and so on. It's a fantastic way to meet other DX-stations and make your first overseas call. Making contacts on HF is hard work, fun and amazingly rewarding. Have a go! I'm Onno VK6FLAB

Previous Episode

Making HF contacts...

What use is an F-call? Recently I talked about making contacts on HF. Picking the band, the time of day, the right location on the band and looking for a nice loud station are part of the equation, but there are other considerations to be had. If you consider a station transmitting with 1.5 kilowatt on a 5 element Yagi and you're at home with your radio, you tune around and you find this station to be the loudest on the band, you're likely to try to talk to them. Sometimes this even works. However, many times, in fact, most of the time, this is pretty hard to do for a number of reasons. The first reason that this is hard is because their strength is a combination of lots of power and lots of antenna gain. If you transmit back, the only thing going for you is their antenna gain, but their power will likely distort your perception of how well they'll hear you. If you find a station that tells someone else that they're running high power, then make sure that their signal to you is banging the S-meter against the wall, that is 10 or 20 db over 9, before you spend hours trying to get their attention. I should point out that there are plenty of amazing operators who will pick out your tiny signal among the hash and call you back but there are many more who to put it kindly are deaf as a post, who expect HF to sound like a 2m FM repeater and set up their kit to make it so. You're unlikely to ever succeed in making contact with the latter, but you'll be thrilled when you deal with the former. Another aspect making it hard to talk to such a loud station is that everyone else also hears it very loud and will also call in. This will completely drown your signal at their end, so you're unlikely to cut through. There are some amateurs who swear by changing their microphone response to "cut through", or to fiddle with other aspects of their transmission, but I've got to say that this lacks finesse and that's what really is required. Imagine that you're at the other end. Your aim is to make as many contacts as possible with weird and wonderful stations. Living in Australia makes your callsign pretty sought after, so use that to your advantage. When you're on a roll, you don't want to break the rhythm, so, listen for a few overs to see what is going on. Does the station always end their QSO in the same way, or is it different each time? Write down the information that you pick up from the station, where they are, who the operator is, lots of little details will make the contact go smoothly. Make sure that you have their callsign correct, check it again before you call. Also, write down the frequency on which the station is operating. If they spend a little while talking to each station, you can go hunting for another station and come back to check their progress. When you do call, try to speak in the rhythm of the other station. If they're fast, speak fast. If they're slow, speak slow. Figure out when they're likely to key their mike and when they'll release it. Find breaks in the pauses and use those to put your callsign out. Only call once per over, many stations will ignore you if you don't. Make sure that you just say your callsign, not theirs, not while you're getting their attention. There is more on this topic to share, but listen to the other station and get a feel for the person at the other end. I'm Onno VK6FLAB

Next Episode

Making HF contacts...

What use is an F-call? Making contacts on HF is a challenge. Over the past few weeks I've talked about some of the things you can do to make your HF life simpler. At no time have I advocated sitting on a frequency calling CQ. You could do that if you liked, but there are times and places to be more successful in that endeavour also. If you feel the need to call CQ, then pick a frequency that'll be visited by others. Make sure you're not at the end of the band where no-one goes, rather pick a spot next to another big fish. Leave a gap and set up shop next door. Think of it as fishing with bait. The big station is the bait, you're the little minnow on the side, easy to pick off if you're heard, ignored if not. The nice thing about being next to a big station is that people are slowing down to hear it and in doing so might also hear you, which of course is the aim of the game. If I look back at the contacts I've made so far, calling CQ is the least effective way of making a contact. It's not a waste of time, but there are better ways. Searching and Pouncing, that is finding and getting a station, one at a time, is much more effective. Use the tools at your disposal. Rotate your antenna if you have a rotator, tune slowly, and look around. Stations are often in a QSO with another station, so you might not hear both sides of the discussion. You might tune past when the station you cannot hear is talking, so you'll never know that there is a big loud station on the same frequency. Sometimes you hear a loud station, but it's a station responding to a CQ request. If that's the case, set up shop next door and call them as soon as their QSO is finished, you'll pick up weird and wonderful stations along the way. If you hear a station that is just too far away, have a go anyway. You don't know what their conditions are like, for all you know they have a very quiet QTH and can hear the proverbial mosquito fart. There are many failures in HF communications, making the successes all the sweeter. Have a crack! I'm Onno VK6FLAB