LA1KHA's PP3/MN1604 Challenge

My first outing for the Challenge today.

Stats:
Battery: #1
Activation: #1
Summit: G/SP-013
Band: 30m
Starting Voltage: 9.65V (no load)
Finish Voltage: 9.02V (room temp - measured in shack)
QSOs: 17
DXCCs: 6 (G, DK, I, LA, F, OE)
Cumulative QSOs: 17
Cumulative DXCC: 6

Battery type: Energizer Hi Tech (Alkaline)
http://shop.eurobatteries.com/pp3-energizer-high-tech-single-pack-p-2584.html

Rig: homebrew, designed specially for Challenge

Antenna: dipole

The rig worked really well. The narrow filtering and high efficiency PA are doing a good job.

Hope to be QRV again tomorrow.

73

Richard
G3CWI

Dr OM G3CWI Richard.
Fine start . compliments on your achievement on first activation.

I give you a tip from my father: reheat the battery in the sunlight or on a oven.
Well he is a economic man and it may also work on the new type battery.

Other tip is high speed Cw.

73 de LA1KHA Kjell

Sunday 21 November

Stats:
Battery: #1
Activation: #2
Summit: G/SP-017
Band: 30m
Finish Voltage: not measured
QSOs: 7
DXCCs: 5 (DK, F, HB9, HA, SM)
Cumulative QSOs: 24
Cumulative DXCC: 9 (G, DK, I, LA, F, OE, HB9, HA, SM)

Stats:
Battery: #1
Activation: #3
Summit: G/SP-010
Band: 30m
Finish Voltage: 8.7V (room temp)
QSOs: 11
DXCCs: 5 (DK, F, HB9, G, LA)
Cumulative QSOs: 35
Cumulative DXCC: 9 (G, DK, I, LA, F, OE, HB9, HA, SM)

Looks like I will be growing some nice potatoes Kjell.

Incidentally, what is your current record?

73

Richard
G3CWI

First Philips Extreme life PP3
Cumulative QSOs: 51
Cumulative DXCC: 11 (DL,EI,F,G,GW,HA,HB9,I,LA,OE,ON,S5)

Logg see sota or below.
Rig Rockmite on 10.120

Stats:10/11/2009
Battery: #1
Activation: #1
Summit: LA/TM-049
Band: 30m
Finish Voltage: not measured
QSOs: 8
DXCCs: 5 DL,F,G,ON,S5
Cumulative QSOs: 8
Cumulative DXCC: 5 (DL,F,G,ON,S5)

Stats:12/11/2009
Battery: #1
Activation: #2
Summit: LA/TM-049
Band: 30m
Finish Voltage: not measured
QSOs: 10
DXCCs: 8 DL, EI, F, G,HB9, LA, ON, and S5
Cumulative QSOs: 18
Cumulative DXCC: 8 (DL,EI,F,G,HB9,LA,ON,S5)

Stats:13/11/2009
Battery: #1
Activation: #3
Summit: LA/TM-049
Band: 30m
Finish Voltage: not measured
QSOs: 6
DXCCs: 5 DL, F, G, I and LA
Cumulative QSOs: 24
Cumulative DXCC: 9 (DL,EI,F,G,HB9,I,LA,ON,S5)

Stats:13/11/2009
Battery: #1
Activation: #4
Summit: LA/TM-049
Band: 30m
Finish Voltage: not measured
QSOs: 13
DXCCs: 10 DL, F, G, GW, HA, HB9,LA,OE, ON and S5
Cumulative QSOs: 37
Cumulative DXCC: 11 (DL,EI,F,G,GW,HA,HB9,I,LA,OE,ON,S5)

Stats:15/11/2009
Battery: #1
Activation: #5
Summit: LA/TM-049
Band: 30m
Finish Voltage: not measured
QSOs: 9
DXCCs: 10 DL, G,HA and ON
Cumulative QSOs: 46
Cumulative DXCC: 11 (DL,EI,F,G,GW,HA,HB9,I,LA,OE,ON,S5)

Stats:17/11/2009
Battery: #1
Activation: #6
Summit: LA/TM-049
Band: 30m
Finish Voltage: not measured
QSOs: 5
DXCCs: 10 DL,ON,I,LA and S5
Cumulative QSOs: 51
Cumulative DXCC: 11 (DL,EI,F,G,GW,HA,HB9,I,LA,OE,ON,S5)

Stats:
Battery: #1
Activation: #4
Summit: G/SP-013
Band: 30m
Finish Voltage: 8.6V (room temp)
QSOs: 9
DXCCs: 7 (DK, F, OE, OK, G, LA, SM)
Cumulative QSOs: 44
Cumulative DXCC: 10 (OK, G, DK, I, LA, F, OE, HB9, HA, SM)

Relaxed activation in the sunshine. Slow QSO rate but most enjoyable.

Thanks to all the callers for their support!

73

Richard
G3CWI

Stats:
Battery: #1
Activation: #5
Summit: G/SP-004
Band: 30m
Finish Voltage: 8.5V (room temp)
QSOs: 12
DXCCs: 8 (DK, F, OE, ON, G, HB9, HA, S5)
Cumulative QSOs: 56 (a new World Record?)
Cumulative DXCC: 12 (ON, S5, OK, G, DK, I, LA, F, OE, HB9, HA, SM)

Yet another relaxed activation in the sunshine. Still plenty of life in the battery.

Disappointing that no-one else seems to have taken up Kjell’s Challenge.

Thanks to all the callers for their support!

73

Richard
G3CWI

In reply to G3CWI:

I might not have taken the challenge but am finding the results fascinating.

Andy
MM0FMF

In reply to G3CWI:

Disappointing that no-one else seems to have taken up Kjell’s
Challenge.

I’m still trying to learn the code and to build a working Rock Mite… :wink:

…but it’s interesting to follow this. It would also be interesting to know something about the rigs folks are using. :slight_smile:

In reply to M6LEP:

Kjell uses a standard Rockmite (as far as I’m aware).

My rig is homemade and was designed specially for the Challenge.

RX: Two-crystal ladder filter at signal frequency, NE602 mixer. Low noise AF amplifier, active lowpass filter (700Hz cut off). All AF processing done with CMOS op-amps.

TX: Crystal osc, bi-polar buffer, bi-polar amp, FET class E PA (300mW). Internal Tick1 keyer.

Design optimised for operation at 8.5 Volts (roughly the mid-point of the discharge curve of an Alkaline 9V PP3).

Good luck with learning CW.

73

Richard
G3CWI

Today’s Stats:
Battery: #1
Activation: #6
Summit: G/SP-015
Band: 30m
Finish Voltage: 8.5V (room temp)
QSOs: 5
DXCCs: 3 (DK, LA, HB9)
Cumulative QSOs: 61
Cumulative DXCCs: 12 (ON, S5, OK, G, DK, I, LA, F, OE, HB9, HA, SM)

Cndx seemed poor. Battery still lively. Are 100 QSOs possible?

73

Richard
G3CWI

In reply to G3CWI:
Your homemade 9v rig are a hard competitor.Looking like you have and edge now.
73 de LA1KHA Kjell

Just back home. This was in my in-box:

Ric,

Heard U on 10116.4 this morning at 1110Z ± with ur 300 mW Tried to answer U but a 9A7W kept coming back to me. Oh well? Never knew if ya heard me or not but that 300 mW was an accomplishment in any case.

Jim WA6TFZ

Today’s Stats:

Battery: #1
Activation: #7
Summit: G/WB-010
Band: 30m
Finish Voltage: not measured
QSOs: 14
DXCCs: 9 (DK, LA, HB9, S51, F, OK, HA, 9A, SM) + reception report from W6
Cumulative QSOs: 75
Cumulative DXCCs: 13 (ON, S5, OK, G, DK, I, LA, F, OE, HB9, HA, SM, 9A)

Battery: #1
Activation: #8
Summit: G/WB-005
Band: 30m
Finish Voltage: 8.4V (room temp)
QSOs: 9
DXCCs: 6 (DK, I, HB9, LA, S51, EV)
Cumulative QSOs: 84
Cumulative DXCCs: 14 (ON, S5, OK, G, DK, I, LA, F, OE, HB9, HA, SM, 9A, EV)

Two enjoyable activations.

73

Richard
G3CWI

In reply to G3CWI:

Battery: #1
Activation: #9
Summit: G/SP-004
Band: 30m
Finish Voltage at room temp: 8.5V - (it’s increased, how odd)
QSOs: 4
DXCCs: 3 (DK, HB9, SM)
Cumulative QSOs: 88
Cumulative DXCCs: 14 (ON, S5, OK, G, DK, I, LA, F, OE, HB9, HA, SM, 9A, EV)

Battery still going; seems to have recovered after last activations. More to come!

73

Richard
G3CWI

In reply to G3CWI:

At this stage, I think I would be disappointed if it didn’t last 100 QSOs! 20 DXCCs might be asking a bit too much - unless you manage to find GW, GM, EI, PA, UR and SP before it runs out.

You must also be making some critical decisions about when to “give up” rather than continue calling without reply, in order to optimise battery life. Are you using an algorithm-based strategy for this, or just calling it a day when you get fed up?

Tom M1EYP

In reply to M1EYP:

I have a strict rule that I only ever call CQ for 5 minutes. If no contacts result I go QRT. That means that over the 9 activations I have spent at least 45 minutes calling CQ (5 minutes at the end of each activation). I will actually have spent a good deal more time calling CQ over all the activations as many CQs resulted in QSOs before the five minutes was up.

The interesting thing (from an engineering perspective) is that the radio is far from optimised in several key areas and, were there to be a serious challenger I could dramatically improve the performance.

73

Richard
G3CWI

In reply to G3CWI:

Activations using single PP3/MN1604 battery:

Battery: #1
Activation: #10
Summit: G/SP-015
Band: 30m
Finish Voltage at room temp: 8.5V - when will it fall off the plateau?
QSOs: 15
DXCCs: 7 (OE, G, HA, F, DK, HB9, SM)
Cumulative QSOs: 103
Cumulative DXCCs: 14 (ON, S5, OK, G, DK, I, LA, F, OE, HB9, HA, SM, 9A, EV)

Battery still going. It really can’t last much longer - can it?

73

Richard
G3CWI

More to the point, is anyone else’s PP3 still going? I suspect you’ve won this one Richard. No word from Kjell for a while…

Tom M1EYP

In reply to G3CWI:
Congratulations Richard! Over 100 QSOs on a PP3 battery! This has to be a world record.

72/73! Mads, la1tpa

In reply to LA1TPA:

The journey continues:

Activations using single PP3/MN1604 battery:

Battery: #1
Activation: #11
Summit: G/SP-013
Band: 30m
Finish Voltage at room temp: 8.4V
QSOs: 12
DXCCs: 7 (G, HA, F, DK, HB9, SM, I)
Cumulative QSOs: 115
Cumulative DXCCs: 14 (ON, S5, OK, G, DK, I, LA, F, OE, HB9, HA, SM, 9A, EV)

The battery remains in good condition. I always keep it warm in my pocket before and during every activation.

I am now thinking of a new design of radio which will have every stage optimised for a balance of performance and low current. The acquistion of a vector network analyser for the G3CWI shack will probably make this easier (but will no doubt create its own set of inponderables and scary scenarios).

I have ordered a special low-drop out regulator for the present radio which will help prolong the life of the battery even more.

73

Richard
G3CWI