10 METER PROPAGATION BEACON

K5DZE/B CURRENT STATUS

10 NOV 2009

QRT WHILE I AM ON 20M PSK-31 RIGHT NOW

The K5DZE/B 10 Meter Beacon operates on 28.2415 MHz ~ 18-24 hours daily transmitting a CW signal at 16 WPM as an aid to check 28 MHz propagation into Northern Kentucky.  

RIG:  Here are the details concerning K5DZE/B:  

    XMTR:           HTX-100

    PWR:             3 watts 

    FREQ:           28.2415 MHz

    KEYER:        (ID-O-MATIC from N0XAS)  beacons every 4 seconds the following 16 wpm ID:  K5DZE K5DZE  EM78qs  KY KY    

   ANT:             S9V  31' vertical.  An MFJ-901B antenna tuner is used to match the S9V to an HTX-100.

    QSL:             Your beacon report is very much appreciated, and may be sent direct or by email to MY CALL at ARRL DOT NET. 

                         (If you would like a beacon QSL card for your collection, please let me know in your report and I will send one right out to you.)

     (Click thumbnail pictures to enlarge)

The HTX-100 based Beacon.

A muffin fan suspended on a heavy, stiff wire frame over the cooling fins at the back of the rig keeps the HTX-100 from even getting warm! 

The ID-O-Matic keyer is in the black project box to the left of the rig.  (The 35 amp supply on top shelf powers the main station rigs.) 

          The new S9V 31' vertical antenna and (16) 27' radials is the primary beacon antenna.      

THE WORLD OF 10 METER CW BEACONS - Probably not well known to a great many Amateur Operators, particularly to newer Hams, is the fact that unattended low-power Beacons are permitted by the FCC and many other countries on certain frequencies.  The primary purpose of these beacons is to provide signals from various locations to show when propagation will support DX communications.  This is particularly useful as we look forward to improved 10 meter conditions in the coming months.

To easily explain the need for this, have you ever tuned across 10 meters and heard nothing, only to change bands to look for signals elsewhere?  Sure you have...we all have.  Well if you think about it, what if everyone just listened without transmitting and then switched to 20 meters thinking the band was not open?  We could easily tune across the band and hearing no signals we would QSY when in fact the band was really open!  This where the low power 10 meter CW Beacons comes in. 

Running unattended in the 10 meter Beacon Band either part-time or 24/7 and signing a CW call sign with a grid locator QTH signal, these little beacons provide a marker signal that allows other operators to tune to these known freqs to see if the band is open and if so, to/from what area.  If you don't copy CW very well or maybe not at all, remember these signals are automatically sent and continually repeated.  Most speeds are moderate and you can hear them over and over till you get all the info correctly. (Very slow CW is usually not common since QSB (signal fade) can cause you to miss part of the signal over and over while a moderate to fast speed lets you copy all the signal as the QSB is on the upswing.) 

There is no standard agreed upon Beacon message format so you will hear a wide variety of information being sent by beacon operators.  It seems that the beacon callsign sent two or three times, followed by the grid locator and/or state of origin with a short break before repeating the string is somewhat common.  Since QSB is common on 10 meters, a long message or a one time callsign can make a beacon hard to copy without listening to several strings go by.  Many operators who listen for beacons have commented that they won't spend 5 minutes trying to copy a beacon callsign so the longer (or slower) format can defeat the purpose of the beacon.  Still, you can set up and use any format you like.

You may think that small low-powered rigs would not provide much of a signal to let us spot an open band, but it is a common knowledge to those familiar with 10 meters, that when the band is really open, you can work all over the world on very little power and only a modest antenna.  Most 10 meter Beacons run no more than 5 watts, with many running 1-2 watts and some even a fraction of a watt!  (You will be surprised at well you can copy these flea power rigs!)

Often you can go to www.QRZ.com  and plug in the call sign of a beacon (without the /B) to look up the station info and find he/she has a website you can visit.  Here you may see a picture of the beacon you just heard or perhaps get QSL info you need to confirm your reception.

With this brief background in mind, what follows below is a description of my 10 Meter Beacon along with more information on how this all works, what gear can be used, and how you can even participate either with a Beacon of your own or just better use the existing beacons on 10 meters.

If you hear my Beacon on 10 meters, please drop me a QSL (via snail mail or email).  I will look forward to hearing from you and will reply with a color QSL!

 QTH:  My beacon is located in Dry Ridge, Kentucky [EM78qs] ... about 34 miles south of Cincinnati, Ohio. 

QSL:   I QSL for all cards received...no SASE required.  I also appreciate and reply to email beacon reports.  I will be glad to send a snail mail QSL for all  email reports received if the sender requests a QSL.  My mailing address is on QRZ.com and email is also noted below.  Like most Hams, beacon ops (including me!) really like to know if their beacon is getting out and to where, so please drop us an email or a QSL when you copy one.  If you hear my beacon or another beacon for the first time after weeks or months of general scanning of the beacon band, it might be this is an indication that conditions are improving, so let us know.  Incidentally, if you need a custom QSL card for reporting your reception of a beacon, or you need a beacon QSL to confirm reception reports of your beacon, please see my page titled MAKE A QSL CARD.  It will let you make a custom QSL in small quantities using your computer printer.  

For  use MY CALL at ARRL dot NET

BEACON FREQS:  The 10 meter “Beacon Band” (common terminology) is actually a range of frequencies running from 28.200 to 28.300 MHz, although you can hear some non-US Amateur Radio beacons down perhaps to 28.175 MHz or lower.  The purpose of all these beacons is to help operators world wide determine if the band is open and if so, to where.  Beacons often identify their location by a grid designator such as EM78 with a few giving an even more specific location such as EM78qs.  Some give their power output, antenna, and/or other info as well.  This is sent in CW at speeds mostly between 10 and 20 WPM. 

Since deep QSB is often a factor in copying a beacon, a faster, shorter message is usually easier to copy than a slower, longer message. My beacon operates at 16 wpm for this reason.  The message is very short and easy to pick up again if you miss any of it. 

By FCC Regulation, amateur beacons from 28 MHz up can be 'unattended'.  (Other HF bands are OK for beacons, but must have a control operator present when they are on the air.)  I monitor my beacon daily.

NOTE: A world wide system of automated beacons is supported under the NCDXF Beacon Project.  For more information on these beacons, go to there web site at:    http://www.ncdxf.org/beacons.html .

While 6 meters is often called “the magic band”, I have found 10 meters to also be very “magical” in its own right.   When 10 meters 'really opens' you can talk all over the world with very little power and fairly simple antennas.  Copying a CW  beacon running 1/2  watt or less is not uncommon.  The key to good communication on 10 meters is to know when the band is open.  Many amateurs tune across 10 meters, but hear nothing so they assume the frequency won't support communication and they leave to find more activity on another band.  However, if no one transmits and we all are just listening, then the band sounds ‘dead’ when it may in fact be 'open'. 

This is where the 10m Beacon comes in.  The beacons operated by many Amateurs can help everyone know when these openings take place and in which directions the band will support your QSOs.   So if you copy a beacon pretty well from a specific area, fire up your 10 meter rig and get on the air to see if you can make a contact into that area.  You might be pleasantly surprised!

A great deal of the time at this period of the solar cycle, the band does indeed appear mostly 'dead', but openings do occur and often and these can provide good QSOs and a lot of fun if you can catch the opening.  The QRP beacons are particularly fun to catch.  A good time to listen is around sunrise and sunset.  This is known as The Gray Line period, but the band can open at any time. 

To see where the Gray Line is right now, go to:  http://bavard.fourmilab.ch/cgi-bin/uncgi/Earth/action?opt=-p

If you are interested in setting up a beacon, first of all do your homework.  Visit as many beacon web sites as you can.  Start with WJ5O's site (listed below).   Simple courtesy dictates that you don't want to QRM someone else, plus what good is a beacon parked on top of another beacon?   Drop a note of coordination to the IARU Region 2 HF Beacon Coordinator, Bill WJ5O,  and tell him you would like to set up a beacon and you are requesting a 'coordinated' frequency.  WJ5O doesn't  "grant" beacon freqs, but he helps everyone avoid beacon traffic jams and QRM.  Again, see  his  site for more info. http://userpages.troycable.net/~wj5o

      Click for full size

BEACON RIGS:  Rigs used for continuous beacon work can be a simple homebrew 10 meter transmitter, a modified CB rig, or one of the various 10 meter only CW/SSB/AM rigs available at Hamfests or eBay.  Amateurs seem to be divided about 50-50 between modified CB rigs and 10 meter Amateur transceivers.  I personally like the Radio Shack HTX-100 10m SSB/CW rigs.  These nice little transceivers make good beacons and good 10 meter mobile rigs.  I purchased a very nice one in good condition in July 2009 for $60 on QTH.com Ham Swap.  It replaced an ailing HTX-100 in the car.  However, the absolute best rig is... whatever works for you!

There are a number of devices on the market that will key your 10 meter rig automatically to make it "Beacon".  The one I use is the ID-O-MATIC by N0XAS of Ham Gadgets.com.  You can read all the details about this neat little keying device at:  http://www.hamgadgets.com/product_info.php?products_id=64 .  The little PCB and parts sell for ~ $20 and it is very easy to assemble in about 30 minutes.  You can program it with Windows terminal emulation program such as Win XP Hyperterminal, etc.  Should you need help, Dale, N0XAS, is available by email to answer your questions.  When you are finished, just add power and plug it into your rig's key jack and you should be up and running.  There are also a number of other options such as the "Freakin Beacon" used by a number of Hams.

The 10 meter band has had somewhat poor propagation for the last couple of years, but it will be soon improving.  The positive side is that right now there is are still a lot of 10 meter gear on the market at good prices since many folks don't want gear they can' t immediately use.  When the new solar cycle starts up and 10 meters begins to get really good, so too will equipment prices surely climb!  Now is a good time to assemble your 10 meter station.  In particular, there are a several 10 meter rigs that make excellent mobile rigs.  These install and take up no more room in your vehicle than a 2 meter rig,  but these rigs let you catch band openings to work DX from the car as well as letting you check your own beacon anytime you are out and about.  Used equipment such as a Radio Shack HTX-100 or the RCI-2950 are easy rigs to find and either of these rigs make an excellent beacon and/or 10 meter HF mobile rig at a reasonable price. Watch eBay and the other Amateurs Classified On-Line ads for such gear and shop carefully to get a good rig for your beacon and your car.  One tip... be cautious of eBay  estate sales with "sold as is...no return" clauses.  It is easy to get stuck with a dead rig.  Look for a Ham seller who says "good rig...works well...guaranteed not DOA."

For continuous use as a beacon, the advice from many of those who have been doing this for a long time is to crank the power down to 4 or 5 watts and consider using a muffin fan to help the rig and power supply stay cool and last a long time.  Some rigs have run 24/7 for YEARS without failing!  Talk about getting your money's worth!  I would add to this that you should tune the antenna for optimum performance on the beacon  frequency you select.  Since your beacon is locked on one frequency, you can really tune the antenna for exactly where you want to park.

A vertically polarized antenna is probably the best approach to give you an Omni-directional coverage.  However, beacons can also be a neat way to check out some different antenna set ups since you can run the test antenna for 30 days or more non-stop to see how it works out!

KEEP A BEACON LOG:  It’s a good idea to keep a log of what beacons you hear.  You may decide later to see how many beacons you have copied or someone may ask if anyone has copied such and such a beacon and a simple log sheet makes it easy to go back and check to see who, what, when and where.  To do this, you might use a computer to keep a log, or use it to make up a log sheet designed for just what you need and just as you want to log it.  I like spaces for the Beacon Frequency to be noted first, followed by the Call Sign, Signal Report, Time/Date, Rcvr/Ant, Notes/Condx and sometimes a check box for QSL Sent Y/N.   This is a bit different from a regular Ham Log, but it will help you find out if you have heard that station before by  quickly referencing the frequency first and then looking at the call sign the call sign.  Set your log format up however you want it to read...what is important is to have the information, not just a particular order.  

Here are a couple of Beacon log formats that I use.  These scanned copies are not suitable to reprint, but these will give you an idea of what you can make for your station using WORD.  Both Logs are made on standard 8.5" x 11' paper.  Make your own version and 3 hole punch it for a 3 ring binder to make a nice Beacon Log Book.  The first version  has a 'side panel' for making notes or copying beacon info and is printed in a 'landscape' orientation.  The advantage with this format is that your 'notes' are filed with your log sheet.  The second version is just a full page log sheet example.

Log Sheet with side panel             Log Sheet -Full       

There is also an excellent HF Beacon Reflector used by Beacon Operators to send reports and comments to the Beacon community on a 'right now' basis.  You can check it out at:  http://10mbeacons.com/ . 

The WJ5O web site has a very helpful list of active beacons that will help you know who you are hearing and where they are located.  Bill keeps this list very current which  makes is very useful.  I print a copy and keep it by the rig for fast reference.  Check it out at:  www.qsl.net/wj5o/bcn.htm 

10 METERS: 

11 - OCT 2009 - Much better day on the beacon sub-band today.    Numerous stations copied here and by several beacon ops monitoring the band.  Beacons copied in Northern Kentucky coming in from Canada (NWT), Texas, and Florida.

17 SEP 2009 - Spaceweather.com  reported on 16 SEP that two solar satellites had observed a new, large sunspot forming on the backside of the Sun.  This sunspot is making its way around to Earth side where it will be visible on 20 SEP.  Hopefully, this is thought to maybe be the first of the Cycle 24 sunspots to kick off the upswing we have been looking for the past several months.  

1 SEP '09 - 10 m has slipped from the fairly active Summer E's to long periods of quiet with no signals whatsoever.   As we wait for the band to return, the best time to find activity is as the sun rises and sets... this is the well known Gray line propagation period.  (You can see a moving map of this at http://10mbeacons.com/map.html?opt=-p .   As we near wintertime and into 2010, hopefully this will improve.  Meanwhile, 10m beacons are there 24/7 to show us all when and if conditions open.

29 May 2009: An international panel of experts led by NOAA and sponsored by NASA has released a new prediction for the next solar cycle saying that Solar Cycle 24 will peak in May 2013 with a below-average number of sunspots.

If they are correct, Solar Cycle 24 will have a projected peak of 90 sunspots making it the lowest of any cycle since 1928 when Solar Cycle 16 peaked at 78.

Right now, the solar cycle is still bottomed out and this is the deepest low of the past century.  According to the forecast, the sun should remain generally calm for at least another year, which is not particularly good news for 10m aficionados.

(Basic info courtesy of NOAA/NASA) 

As one who started out listening to shortwave as a youngster in 1955, I can remember when 10 meters was nothing but hiss and absolutely no stations were heard.  Most upper HF ranges were also very quiet as it was at the bottom of the Solar Cycle.  By 1958 (the International Geophysical Year ), 10 meters had become active as a powerful band that really began to open daily for worldwide DX.  By 1959-60, I was regularly working DX on 10 meter AM from my mobile rig.

All this means that now is the time to get your 10-10 number and to get your 10 meter gear tuned up and ready to go.  Used 10 meter equipment is surely at better prices now than it will be when the band opens and the demand increases.  When conditions begin to improve in the coming months, it will both interesting and fun to listen for 10 Meter Beacons across the country and from around the world.  

LEARN MORE:  Interested in getting even more info about 10 Meter Beacons?  I suggest you use your favorite browser and look for “Ten Meter Beacons” or “10 Meter Beacon Station List” or similar subjects on the Internet.  There is a world of info and some neat Beacon sites out there and most of them have links to help you find even more beacon sites.  Here are just a couple of other links to look over ...

http://userpages.troycable.net/~wj5o

http://www.monitoringtimes.com/MT-10meters.pdf

http://www.qsl.net/kl7fdq

http://www.ncdxf.org/beacon/beaconSchedule.html

FCC REGS CONCERNING BEACON OPERATIONS:

§97.203 Beacon station.

(a) Any amateur station licensed to a holder of a Technician, Technician Plus, General, Advanced or Amateur Extra Class operator license may be a beacon. A holder of a Technician, Technician Plus, General, Advanced or Amateur Extra Class operator license may be the control operator of a beacon, subject to the privileges of the class of operator license held.

(b) A beacon must not concurrently transmit on more than 1 channel in the same amateur service frequency band, from the same station location.

(c) The transmitter power of a beacon must not exceed 100 W.

(d) A beacon may be automatically controlled while it is transmitting on the 28.20-28.30 MHz, 50.06-50.08 MHz, 144.275-144.300 MHz, 222.05-222.06 MHz, or 432.300-432.400 MHz segments, or on the 33 cm and shorter wavelength bands.

(e) Before establishing an automatically controlled beacon in the National Radio Quiet Zone or before changing the transmitting frequency, transmitter power, antenna height or directivity, the station licensee must give written notification thereof to the Interference Office, National Radio Astronomy Observatory, P.O. Box 2, Green Bank, WV 24944.

    (1)  The  notification must include the geographical coordinates of the antenna, antenna ground elevation above mean sea level (AMSL), antenna center of radiation above ground level (AGL), antenna directivity, proposed frequency, type of emission, and transmitter power.

    (2)  If an objection to the proposed operation is received by the FCC from the National Radio Astronomy Observatory at Green Bank, Pocahontas County, WV, for itself or on behalf of the Naval Research Laboratory at Sugar Grove, Pendleton County, WV, within 20 days from the date of notification, the FCC will consider all aspects of the problem and take whatever action is deemed appropriate.

(f) A beacon must cease transmissions upon notification by an EIC (Engineer-In-Charge) that the station is operating improperly or causing undue interference to other operations. The beacon may not resume transmitting without prior approval of the EIC.

(g) A beacon may transmit one-way communications.

 You will find that it’s not hard to set up a beacon station and in doing so you may provide some real assistance to your fellow Amateurs, so why not join in and make this a fun project?   Meanwhile, tune around and see what beacons you can hear! 

QRZ? - WHO IS ON 10 METERS NOW?  To see what beacon stations are currently being heard on 10 Meters, I recommend a visit to the KI4KQQ 10 Meter Spotter Page that can be found at http://10mbeacons.com/ .  Here, operators post what beacon is being heard from where and by whom.  It may help you see what areas are coming through and what condition the band is in from various locations.  This helpful page is maintained by KI4KQQ who also provides a list of beacon ops who offer web pages like the one you are reading now.  You can access this list of web pages by also going to KI4KQQ's Spotter Page as noted above.

Lastly, some Beacon Ops call "CQ" or listen around 28.327 USB at the top of every hour  when the band is open and beacons are coming through.  Some of us also listen at the bottom of the hour as well.  Please give a listen or give a call.  I hope you will join us on 10m as conditions permit!   Good luck and good DX!

 10-10 # 72596