V44KF

   screenshot of 10 meters around lunchtime Saturday 02 December 2023. Greetings Amateur Radio Operators, All, from V44KF, It has been a long time, though it seems like just yesterday we were here blogging about ham radio in V4 and the region. The hurricane season ended a couple days ago, but weather is still the prime talk and they are now adding earthquakes to the chatter. But all is well in V4 and getting better from my perspective. But some may disagree with me, because I sport an optimistic attitude. Regrettably many people are letting other peoples pessimistic attitude get the better of them. This is a hard topic for many so I will just leave it there.  While I am blogging this I am listening to a G1 station that I contacted few minutes ago. He said that he visited SKB some years ago on a cruise. It is indeed great to speak to someone who has visited our country and have many pleasant memories. This was a DX moment for him so he could not hang out and rag chew, but I guess we may

  Greetings Amateur Radio Operators All A couple weeks ago I was pleased to hear from an unofficial source that the RF interference, noise and frequency jamming, caused by the smart meters of the Electricity Company, SKELEC, had been shut down. This shutting down should have come well over five [5] years ago when the RF interference matter was raised by the Amateur Radio Society members who were directly and adversely affected. The interference matter was escalated to the NTRC, who is responsible for keeping the frequencies clean, and free from any RF interference under International member country agreements. But SKELEC refused to hear from the NTRC, and the RF interference continued to plague the Amateur Radio Operators. Fast forward to 2022, and the Government then in office lost the general elections of August 5th 2022. New Ministers were assigned to the Ministries responsible for Telecommunications and for Electricity, and within seven [7] months of being in office the RF interfer

  Happy New Year. Welcome. Wow!! Four days gone already, there is no time to lose. In this year, what we need to do, we need to do quickly. Gone are the days when it would be tomorrow, because tomorrow never comes, is a wise saying. Something always takes it place, so with the best intentions, it never gets done. Be smart, be wise DO IT NOW. "DOIT NOW" has been a "success motivation" strategy for some of us, it always work, and helps us to be ahead of every game, all the time. Not doing it now is what keeps many of us out of the game. In hind sight many of us, if we are honest with ourselves, will recognise that we are the ones responsible for "us" not being at the head of the class. We need to adopt a "DO IT NOW" mentality if we do not yet have it. For those of us who are already there, if we rest now, we shall be overtaken and fall behind. No overtaken by our brothers and sisters, but by the negative mentality that now exists in our world today

  Alure of the Seas at Port Zante, Basseterre, St Kitts. 2022-01-03 It is a nice warm, bright, not cloudy, and not windy day in the Federation of Saint Kitts and Nevis.  A wonderful day to begin taking our amateur radio on a journey to another level. Amateur radio in this Federation can only go upward, as all of us seek to make our amateur radio mark in 2022. We all need to seriously consider what is next, so that we can effectively and efficiently take our amateur radio to the next level. I suspect that all of us wish to take our amateur radio knowledge and education to that next level. I know for a fact, that some amateur radio operators used the pandemic "stay at home" and "lockdown" to update their radio knowledge online. There are problem situations in V4. There are almost 200 amateur radio operators by call sign, and many of them are not active, as in being on the air regularly. That is not a real problem. Our resident amateur radio population are either opera

The "new normal" continues to roll in for November and it may not be as bright as imagined. Every country has its version of 'new normal' for the citizenry, some are easy and some are hard, and it depends on whether you are old or whether you are young. No matter your status, everyone will be affected by the 'new normal' and its mentality. This is driven by the people in authority, some who do not understand but think they do, and others who understand but are totally excluded from the process. This is not unique to any place but just the way that globalism rolls in these times. Our world has changed irretrievably, we cannot go back, so it is forward ever, for all of us and our amateur radio, and that applies to every amateur radio operator and for every country on our planet. This is not the first time that we are adapting, so this should not be difficult unless we make it so. There are always people who resist change, including even some amateur radio operat

  It is not over yet, and even after the official close of hurricane seson, it is not done. Storms and hurricanes have wisited our location way out of season, in the past, and almost every day there is an historic return of something we have forgotten a long time ago. This seems all part of the 'new normal' we were being introduced to a year ago. Everything has to be treated as 'new' because it will never be business as usual ever again. This also means that our amateur radio has to be treated as 'new', because there are now 'protocols' to follow, but fortunately, no 'protocols' can be established for certain aspect of amateur radio, so many of us can still enjoy our ham radio as it was, and hopefully will forever be. Amateur radio participation is taking off with the introduction of the 'new normal' lifestyle, the ham radio scientists are still looking for the triggers which are making amateur radio so popular at this time during and aft

 We are moving on. A couple weeks out of lockdown and we are full speed ahead. Lockdown should not slow down or stop our ham radio, but everyone has a different recaction to the same stimulus. When our mobility is under threat we all experience adverse reactions. At V44KF, I got into the planning and building mode. I developed an interest in the EFHW, "end fed half wave" antenna. Many people seem to build it like an inverted "VEE" or a long wire of sorts, but I am interested in it as a vertical. Vertical antennas, installed correctly and properly, posses the lowest signal take off  angle. The half wave vertical has a lower take off angle than the quarter wave vertical. Check your vertical antenna handbook for take off angle data, or knock yourself out with a 'Google search' for "vertical antennas take off angles". 40-meters is my favorite band, 7.0 mhz  to 7.3 mhz, but that amateur radio band is not useable for amateur radio communications because

We are moving again. The first weekend out of lockdown. I have not seen my ham radio buddies, brothers or sisters for a while, but I suspect that all is well with them. Some ham radio operators do not experience any difficulty with lockdown as they use the VHF radios to talk to each other, and release any stress built up. I am not active on 2 meters at present, but I can hear the repeater actively keying, and even involved with dx contacts at times. As long as most ham radio operators can communicate, they are happy. It becomes a problem when anyone restricts or stops ham radio operators from talking on their radios. However, the exception to this is the present situation in V4, where the Government sides with the Electricity Company to break the law, allowing them to use equipment that generates illegal Radio Frequency interference in the HF radio spectrum. Some of these frequencies are legally allocated to the Amateur Radio Service, and because these frequencies are noisy and jammed

  The great outdoors where an amateur radio operator in our Federation of Saint Kitts and Nevis can experiment with any antenna design so long as it does not cause any interference with anyone else. However, there is no protection for the amateur radio operator from RF interference generated by certain business operations  in Saint Kitts, even though the law of the land declares that the interference is illegal, and the authority charged with upholding the law has requested the entity to cease generation of  the interference. This interference has  been going on since about 2017. It is all about talk, talk and more talk, and nothing is being done. Occasionally there seems to be some sort of activity which could give an impression that something good is happening, but then the noise seem to get worse. Personally, I have stopped stressing over this interference situation, but I am leaving this matter in the hands of the Master who I believe will fix this in due time. In between time it i

  "The rewards of life come to those who DO, not to those who merely read, talk or day dream. ACTION is The KEY" .  I don’t know where that quote originated, but it is on my wall, in my face as I sit at my computer. This  continuously galvanizes me to ACTION. Yesterday was for talk, and day dreaming, but today is for ACTION. I do not know who this is for, but I hope that it can help someone put that DX station in their logbook. If you can hear it, you can work it. True, but sometimes you have to try a wee bit harder to make it happen.  The antenna is the secret to pulling in real DX. My DX band is 40-meters with 80-meters a close second. Right now things are tight with the electricity company generating RF interference on these bands DX bands, from their smart meter equipment. By now most of the world should know about this RF interference, noise and frequency jamming problem that exist  in V4 land, as it sabotages ham radio DX activity.  The RF interference is illegal, but i

Welcome to another month end. Things are happening, and seem to be moving fast in certain ham radio areas. Let us keep the momentum, continue hardening the foundation, so that our energy fail not. Always remember that there are negative elements working overtime against us, but we on the right side of history, helping our brothers and sisters, all over the planet, in times of their greatest need. That is the serious nature of our commitment to amateur radio. In peace times, like now, we prepare for the Atlantic Hurricane Season, starting up in less than 100 days time. I suspect that V4 will be better off this season as I heard through the grapevines that many more ham radio operators have acquired an HF radio. Everyone already has a VHF radio or two, the 2-meter net is active, so we are good to go. But while we wait for the season to change let us enjoy today to the max. For some of us that is making contact with ham radio operators on the far side of our Earth. In my case the focus is

Welcome to the new month. All Thanks and Praise to GOD for allowing us to see another month. Condolences to the family and friends of the Silent Keys, their contributions to ham radio locally and international will never be forgotten. We will keep building on our amateur radio to the best of our ability. We thank those amateur radio operators who daily work overtime for us, making amateur radio possible especially in the remote parts of the world. There are people still coming against amateur radio, and we must never, ever forget that. Regrettably, everybody in this world is not our friend. Enough said. So, how did ham radio turn out for you in January? Don't beat up yourself if you did not move it along, that  happens to all of us. Take a deep breath, refocus and plan that you will take your amateur radio another step this month. One step at a time. I met an amateur radio operator a couple days ago, and he was excited, because he had ordered an HF transceiver, which he expected to

Greetings ALL,  [a] Happy New Year.  We are all pleased that 2020 is now behind us. [b] Please excuse my treating this blog as a business document. I am of the view that we need to treat all that we do very seriously until the world is rid of this "pandemic". Ham radio is still our hobby, we still love doing what we do in our spare time, but I am just taking my ham radio more seriously than before. Everything around us are not like before. In our Caribbean there is an active volcano just miles down the street in Saint Vincent, J8 land. Things are not like before, and we need to be aware, and ready for any eventuality, anytime. We must know what we can do, what is expected of us, and how to do it effectively. I am getting the impression that we are just watching the movements. If that is true then that is bullshit, and every Caribbean ham radio organization should be on alert, even though nothing blows yet. Of course, this is my personal view,  and everyone is free to disagree

snap of sknaars operating table March 7, 2020 March 7th 2020 made five [5] months since the National Telecommunications Regulatory Commission of Saint Kitts and Nevis, the NTRC,   issued a cease and desist order to the utility company, telling them to stop transmitting illegal radio frequency signals on the international short wave radio frequencies used by other radio services inside and outside of the Federation of Saint Kitts and Nevis. As I scribe this I am not aware that the utility company has stopped transmitting the illegal radio frequency signals that cause RF interference, noise and frequency jamming to other radio services inside Saint Kitts and Nevis. Five months ago on October 7th 2019, the NTRC, issued the order to stop the utility company from making these illegal signal transmissions, but the utility company seems to have just brushed the NTRC aside, and continues to generate the illegal RF interference, noise and frequency jamming signals. I suspect t

Greetings and Happy New Year 2019 Today I have decided to combine all my ham radio blogs into one and post them here. Ham radio is alive but not doing well in St Kitts. This is my personal view after being a ham radio operator for over 50 years, since 1968. I have seen many things coming and going, but nothing has affected our ham radio like what we have in these technological times. We live in the times where the laws which are designed to protect us are challenged by unscrupulous and selfish people, who only want to collect something for themselves, at any cost. They seem willing to take matters all the way to the Supreme Court of the land, knowing full well that this is a case that they cannot win. This is the kind of people that wish to kill ham radio in our St Kitts. So we have to stand up, put on our gloves, and do what we must, to ensure that our ham radio continue to live in St Kitts, for the good of future generations.  The snapshot above was made a few minutes ago

Greetings from the ham radio station of V44KF. If you are not yet into the ham radio hobby, let me invite you to investigate this hobby on google, learn more about the hundreds of ham radio operators in every country of the world, and join this unique band of ham radio operators who share a common joy of contacting each other on various digital radio communication modes around the world. But contacting each other is just a drop in the bucket, because these same ham radio operators are ready, willing and able to help each other in times of emergency and disaster situations no matter what country they may be in. Truth be told, no matter what country you are in, there will ALWAYS come a time when we have an emergency and disaster situation. The good thing is that ham radio helps us to be prepared for this eventuality. You may be the only ham radio operator in your community, and your ham radio knowledge and training in emergency communication can help you saves the lives of all the peo