VE7GL VC7G VC7GL CK7GL  CG7GL XM7GL
(Click above links for E-QSL Data)

Radio Amateurs of Canada

University of BC Amateur Radio Society

Richmond Amateur Radio Club

mail me at ve7gl@rac.ca

 

Welcome to one of Canada's many amateur radio stations.  We operate one or more two-way short-wave radio stations for fun as a hobby, in radio contests or for emergency communications purposes.

For the contests we operate on various weekends with the goal of contacting as many other radio stations around the world as possible. It is not unusual for us to contact three to four thousand stations, and well over a hundred countries, during a fourty-eight hour contest weekend.  Contacts are made via voice, Morse code or one of the various digital modes depending on the contest type.

Antennas:

  1. Stacked TH7-DX yagis at 26M and 13M with a TIC-Ring rotator for the lower array. Phasing done with Array Solutions WX0B Stack Matches. 

  2. 4el HF Quad at 20M on a crank up tower with separate feeders for each band and each station.

  3. 4-el 20M 5-el 15M 5-el 10M tri-bander at 20M

  4. Two 2el 40M rotary Yagis at 25M and 20M on separate towers. 

  5. Elevated ½ wave 80M ground plane verticals in a switchable yagi array and an 80M dipole at 80'.

  6. Elevated 160M Inverted L with elevated radials. 

CONTEST OPERATORS

Nedo VA7OO doing a single operator 20M radio contest.

(clockwise from left)
Regular ops: VA7AO Nedo (ex YU4NW) VA7OO Rade (ex YU4RW) VA7VZZ Zoran VE7GL Dale

Formerly VE7BWK and VE3BWK /4U (United Nations in Syria) /4X (Israel) /OD (Lebanon) 5B4MN (Cyprus). /ZS (South Africa) /G5 (Great Britain) /KL7 (Alaska) /VY1 (Yukon).  Here are some pictures of the VE3BWK/4U station at a UN military base on the Golan Heights in Syria. And pictures of the 5B4MN radio stations on the island of Cyprus.



Gary VA7RR
Has popped over on occasion to guest operate.

We use WriteLog for contesting and Logic for regular logging and QSL tracking on networked Windows 7 computers. 

Transceivers: All ICOM 756 Pro series



And we use Array Solutions band-pass and low-pass filters used to reduce inter station interference.

Here are some more pictures of the station.



Dale - VE7GL sitting on his perch working on one of the 40M antennas.

Here are some more pictures of the Station Pictures.

Radio contests are sponsored by various amateur radio groups or magazines around the world and there are certificates or trophies to be won.  Some examples are below.

See Contesting.com for most of what you'll ever need to know about radio contesting plus dozens of cool pictures.

A very important function of this station is emergency  communications.  Should there be a disaster the station can quickly switch over to emergency power and has antennas and equipment suitable for operating extended periods of time on all required modes and frequencies.

As you can see from the pictures, there are many  people who make up this contest station. Some are radio operators. Others help with the designing and building the many antennas systems. Others help setup the equipment and computers, keep the generators up and running or do the cooking.  It's a team effort and everyone contributes in some way.

That's Zoran VA7VZZ Putting up one of the two 40M mono-bander yagis.



By Dale Jackaman – VE7GL – 2013