Welcome

Welcome to my ham radio site.  The picture at the top of the web page is an antenna’s eye view of the Catalina mountains from my Tucson, Arizona QTH (location for you non-hams).

Current rig is an Elecraft K3 feeding a fan inverted vee that works on 80 to 10 meters.

My QSL card has a photo of the San Xavier Mission near Tucson.  I am happy to exchange paper QSLs.  I request confirmation also through Logbook of the World.

I was first licensed in 1973 as a Novice through the club at Onteora High School in upstate New York.  I upgraded to Advanced Class in 1975, barely passing the 13 wpm “one minute solid copy” code test.   These were the days where tests higher than Novice class were administered by FCC examiners, so my father drove me up to Albany, NY on a school and work day so I could take the test.

I attended Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, NY, earning a BS degree in Electrical Engineering in 1980.  Ham radio and computers had a lot to do with my choice of major.

I upgraded to Extra Class in 1977.  The FCC had make 1×2 callsigns available to Extra Class licensees around that time which was a major incentive for my upgrade.  This was still the days of FCC examiners but I could easily take a bus from Troy to Albany for the test.  Due to my experience with the 13 wpm test, I ensured I would pass the 20 wpm code test by training to copy 30 wpm solid on paper and 35 wpm in my head.  It wasn’t long before I took the test that the code test was changed to a multiple choice test on the content.  I had no trouble passing that with my solid copy paper in front of me.

I moved to Tucson, Arizona in 1980  My ham radio activity has been very sporadic over the years due to demands of school, work and family.   My rig and antenna are nothing spectacular but are probably the best they have ever been and am trying to be more active in award-chasing and contest.  I hope for further improvements once we complete a planned move to Sonoita, Arizona where there will be more room (and hopefully time) for ham radio activity.

I’ve been working on “Worked all States” certificates as well as “DX Century Club” (worked 100 countries).   I have completed WAS on Digital, CW and Phone modes, 5BWAS, as well as Triple Play WAS.  I have more than 150 countries (out of 337 possible) worked for DXCC.

I’ve participated in some contests in my quest for states and countries.   I found that I needed a good means to bulk load QRZ.com data into logs from N1MM+ before I imported to my regular log.  Finding no solutions at the time, I wrote my own Windows software to do this.  If it might be of use to you, see my Software page.