On Valentine’s day 2021, the call sign OE1XTU made its debut on 60 meters: RIG: FTDX-5000MP, TxP: 40W, ANT: Fan-Dipole 40m/80m/160m, MODE: FT8. Our Fan-Dipole is crudely matched on 60m, but first QSOs proved to be feasible.
Congrats to Emir, E7DX
We warmly congratulate Emir, E7DX, for his magnificent score in the IARU HF World Championship 2020: more than 3.7 million points. We are proud to count him as one of our most active and supportive members of the Radio-Amateur-Club of the TU Wien.
left to right: Peter OE1OPW, Emir E7DX, Helmut OE1TKW 
Activation of the Microwave Bands
On Sunday, Dec. 20, 2020, Bernhard OE1BES, Gerald OE1GAQ and Chris OE1VMC met at the terrace of Schloss Wilhelminenberg (Locator: JN88DF), approx. 360m above sea level to activate the microwave bands. This is the final ÖVSV microwave activity in 2020 and last chance to add some point to the score. We worked several strong stations on the UHF/SHF bands. (70cm, 23cm, 13cm, 9cm, and 6cm) using portable rigs and various antenna types. Fotos below show location, weather, operators and equipment.
Peter OE1OPW Contesting on 20m QRP
On Sunday, Nov. 29, 2020, Peter, OE1OPW, connected his two QRP transceivers (QCX and SW-3B) with approx. 5W to the 5-element beam at OE1XRW. With the setup shown below, Peter participated in CQWW CW 2020 in the 20m QRP Single-Operator class. In 6 hours, he was able to work 123 stations including 20 in the USA, four stations in CQ Zone 3, Indonesia, Thailand, Tunisia, Cape Verde Islands, and many more highlights.
It is simply fascinating to communicate with stations in the USA with just 5 Watt Tx power. So the OE1XRW Yagi works fine and the propagation conditions were really great.
OE1XTU Remote Operation in CQ WW CW 2020
The historic chimney was repaired and renovated during November 9-20, 2020 and we needed to disconnect the wire dipoles for two weeks. Stefan OE1ABU and Chris OE1VMC reconnected the wire dipoles and installed a new OE1XTU WebCam on the roof on Wednesday, November 25, 2020.
The peaking numbers of Covid-19 cases prevented us from contesting in CQ WW CW 2020 as a multi-operator single-transmitter station, but thanks to remote access via the internet, we could work a couple of stations as a single-operator „assisted“ single-band station on 160m. Transmission of predefined messages in CW is controlled by the N1MM+ Logger and our OE1XTU KiwiSDR provides a waterfall diagram overview over the activities on the band and demodulated audio.
With 70cm, 23cm and 13cm through the November mist
Gerald OE1GAQ and Chris OE1VMC out in the cold with portable gear on UHF and SHF. QTH Schloss Wilhelminenberg, height 360m above sea level, locator JN88DF. Foto on the right shows some of the experimental antennas: 12-elem. Yagi and a „Cantenna“ for 13cm, as well as a ground plane antenna for 23cm.
OE1XTU in CQ WW SSB 2020
In this year’s edition of the famous CQ world-wide SSB DX contest, the situation is bit special. Note the spray flask of disinfectant on the right hand side of the radio table. The Covid-19 pandemic is on the rise again and we need to enforce strict hygiene and social distancing in the shack.
Our CQ WW SSB contest team has seven operators in 2020: Tom OE3PTC, Gerald OE1GAQ, Horia OE1BQH, Dieter OE8KDK, Manfred OE4MQW, Arpad OE1SZW, and Chris OE1VMC. The Gantt chart below shows our time plan.
In preparation for the context, we implemented a couple of improvements to our shack, cabling, and surge protection. Additionally to our FTDX-5K transceiver, we have also connected a 66 MS/s direct sampling software-defined radio receiver (KiwiSDR) to our modest antenna farm with an RF sensing coax switch (MFJ-1708B-SDRS).
Microwave activity on Oct. 18, 2020
Testing El Cuatro with a logarithmic periodic antenna („LogPer“) at the roof of the institute of telecommunications. Trying to work Bernhard, OE1BES, at Prediktstuhl on 23cm and 13cm. Alas, this didn’t succeed as direct QSO, only via the OE1XKU relay (located at Wienerberg) on 13cm.
CATsync for KiwiSDR
The foto below shows a screenshot of the waterfall spectrum of the KiwiSDR running at our QTH. It is connected to our modest antenna farm using an RF sensing coax switch with additional PTT control by the FT-5K radio. CATsync enables a bidirectional coupling of the KiwiSDR’s frequency of interest with the dial frequencies of VFO A and VFO B of the FT-5K. Now you can tune the FT-5K by clicking on the waterfall spectrum. Vice versa, manually turning the frequency dial of the FT-5K shifts the QRG of the KiwiSDR.
Visit at Viktor’s QTH
Viktor, OE1VKW invited the members of the Radio-Amateur-Klub of the TU Wien on Sep 30, 2020 to his QTH. The photos below give some impression of his VHF/UHF/SHF antenna farm and the lively discussions at this event. During the evening flyby of the International Space Station (ISS), we recorded the transmitted SSTV images on the 2m band. We also welcome our new members Herbert with call signs OE1EXH and KN6FUW and Markus OE1MHF.
