4W1A Team will be active from Timor Leste, IOTA OC - 148, 10 - 22 April 2023.
Team - DL6FBL, E77DX, SP5XVY.
Recent DX Spots 4W1A
4W1A Log search They will operate on 40 - 10m, CW, SSB, RTTY.
QSL via DJ4MX, LOTW.
4W1A Timor Leste News 23 April 2023 News Part 2
The team is on the way back home on three different flights from Singapore. Our QSL Manager Sven DJ4MX wants to point out that using OQRS through Club Log will automatically bring a LotW confirmation as well.
Looking back, everything went as expected, although some things took a little longer in the beginning. Nothing went broken, and everything we needed was there (based on a 250 lines long Excel sheet) following the PPPPPP principle ("Proper preparation prevents piss-poor performance"). The Excel sheet for the upcoming November activity will be somewhat longer, as we'll probably send a sea freight container in August.
73 de DL6FBL for the 4W1A team
(DL6FBL, E77DX, SP5XVY)
4W1A Timor Leste News 23 April 2023
We shut down operation around 03:00z, which is local noon here. In a short while we'll begin to take down our antennas and clean up the outside space, which will not take long. Then we'll go out for some final negotiations in our prospected second location. After dark we'll pack our suitcases with the stuff that goes back home, while some other stuff will be securely stored away onsite to wait for us coming back in November 2023. When all is done, we'll have a nice fish dinner and finish up the rest of cans/bottles around. Flight back home starts tomorrow in the early local morning, with a stopover in Singapore.
Thanks for over 43.000 QSOs with 13.500 unique callsigns: 21.640 x CW, 19.760 x SSB and 1.870 x RTTY. We hope you've enjoyed our operation as much as we did. If you didn't make it in the log, watch out for us coming back in November.
OQRS service goes through Club Log, and - if you want - please consider a donation for the next activity.
73 de DL6FBL for the team
4W1A Timor Leste News 20 April 2023
Internet connectivity over LTE doesn't get better. There is only one cell for the whole area, and the number of users in the network has dramatically increased over the past three years. Especially in the local evening hours we experience a packet loss of >50%, which is the cause for frequent upload errors in the Club Log Live Stream. We noted that once a QSO upload is busted for a callsign, subsequent QSOs with the same callsign are somehow ignored, too. This creates extra confusion, because the same guys try over and over again, although they are perfectly fine in our (local) log. The only way to get over it are full log uploads every few hours, which will make all the missing contacts show up in Club Log.
Still struggling to increase the number of North American and South American stations in the log. Signals are very low compared to all the Europeans booming in. We started to listen explicitly for North America and South America for a couple of minutes every now and then when the bands let also come Europe in. It's better in the hours when there is no propagation to Europe. Some guys are complaining that we were "always beaming to Europe". Please read our website again. We only have Vertical Dipoles. There is nothing to beam with... ;-)
Yesterday we had several meetings with the License Agency, the Customs Office, customs brokers, transport companies and the local airline to pre-arrange more things for the upcoming larger activity in November 2023.
Today we'll have a very special moment here: around local noon we'll have a full solar eclipse, and there is a big party going on here in the Beach Resort. Since DX propagation is down during the daylight hours anyway, we'll join the party and have some fun and relax.
We have also made up our schedule for dismantling the station. We'll stop operating on Saturday, 22-April-2023 around 06:00z.
73 de DL6FBL for the 4W1A team
4W1A Timor Leste News 17 April 2023
Internet connectivity at 4W1A is unstable at times. It appears that some contacts are lost in the permanent Live Log upload stream to Club Log. This can be fixed/synchronized by a later full upload of the ADIF file. If you wondered about missing contacts on Club Log, please check back again, and if necessary, send us a message through the Contact Form on our website.
Last night a thunderstorm and heavy rain came by, and we shut down operation for a while. Sorry for the abrupt disappearance. Same can happen, when public electricity or the on-site generator is lost, and doesn't come back for a while. After 5 days, our small team has made 23.600 QSOs, from 8.400 unique stations. We're still struggling to get more North and South America in the log. When the medium bands (20m, 17m, 15m) are open to America, there is also propagation to Europe. As we don't have directional antennas, and European signals are always stronger here, it is extra stressful to pull out the weaker signals from America. Please bear with us, when we try to work only America for a couple of minutes every now and then. However on the lower bands (40m, 30m) and the higher bands (12m, 10m) it seems to get easier now as the loud Asian stations have already made it in the log.
Please note that we concentrated on operating so far. Now, after the weekend, we'll take more care about preparations for the larger 4W Timor-Leste DXpedition coming up in November 2023. It means that we'll be operating less hours per day as in the past days. If you don't make it in our log now in April, stay tuned for November.
73 de DL6FBL for the 4W1A team
4W1A Timor Leste News 14 April 2023 Part 2
So far everything is getting better and better. We are now in charge of electricity and can operate without any major problems.
Today, first tropical storm went over us. It was short with heavy rain, but no big issues or any damage. Except we were very surprised and scared by that rain and wind noise!
Internet connection is very slow sometimes, but logstream works ok. Close to 10000 QSOs now in the log.
We are checking everyday 6m but at the moment nothing seen on scope. As soon we see some FT8 signals we will QSY to CW or SSB. Don’t hesitate to send us a message if you see there is a opening close to Grid PI21QK.
At the moment we’re still operating together and sleeping at same time. We have some plans to change that.
There is also still some preparation work for the big November DXpedition. So we simply can’t be every hour on the radio.
Yesterday we noticed DQRM on our frequencies, especially on 20m and 30m. We are aware about that and we have patience. This is a case only with good opening to EU so far..
Please try to be fair and don’t call if you don’t hear at least part of your call. We still have situation that people just keep calling calling. This just slows down operating.
We notice also some remote callers. At the moment we are still thinking about what we are going to do about those fake QSOs.
4W1A Team.
4W1A Timor Leste News 14 April 2023
News #5 - 14 April 2023
After two days of operating (we'd better say "two nights of operating") there are over 8.800 QSOs in the log. You can always see the current statistics here: https://clublog.org/charts/?c=4W1A#r. We have touched all bands from 40-10m, but haven't spent equal time for SSB/CW there yet. Also the coverage on continents is not yet equal. Working Europe is easy on all bands, and also Asia, of course, but North and South America is still under-represented. We are aware of that and try to focus on those regions in the coming days. As we are only using omni-directional antennas here, it's not a matter of (our) antenna direction, but rather a matter of selecting the right bands for the Americas, which may offer the best propagation. You may also want to check out K6TU's propagation tool on our website to find the best times for each band. We'll use the same charts to identify and select the bands on our side.
4W1A Timor Leste News 13 April 2023 Part 2
Last morning were had very big issues with voltage on public network.
Voltage was collapsing. And we were in range between 130-285v. Operating with amps was not possible any more.
Finaly we discovered that is a impact of factory close by. Their working hors are 7-17 local time. Now we are forced to run generator at least during that time. We will have one, but there are still things we need to check and organize our self with fuel and other things around.
We were raported as well on one possible problem with audio on K3. We are about to try to see what we can do regarding that.
We hope to be back on air ASAP.
We need to do it in this way otherwise this will affect the operation till end of our stay here.
4W1A.
4W1A Timor Leste News 13 April 2023
First hours of operation went fine. We started on 10/SSB, 12/CW and 20/RTTY, moving to some lower bands later. More than 3.300 QSOs in the log. We had some upload issues in the beginning, which caused quite some dupes, however it should be working stable now. Club Log is providing some really exciting statistics.
Daylight hours down here are not very productive. That’s the time we use for sleeping, relaxing and doing other things. In the late afternoon propagation will pick up again.
4W1A.
4W1A Timor Leste News 12 April 2023
4W1A Team start activity from Timor Leste today.
They will try to have 3 signal on 3 Bands on the same time.
4W1A.
4W1A Timor Leste News 11 April 2023 Part 2
We just decided we will wait till sometimes tmrw to start operating The problem is we saw our license today dated with 12.04. But they didn’t wanted to handle it out till tmrw. We just decided we will not start till we dont have it in our hands.
4W1A Team.
4W1A Timor Leste News 11 April 2023
4W1A will start activity midnight today.
30, 12, 10m antennas up already.
4W1A Timor Leste News 31 March 2023
News #1 - 31 March 2023
4W - Timor-Leste
DL6FBL Ben, E77DX Braco and SP5XVY Robert will be active from Timor-Leste, Monday, 10-Apr-2023 through Saturday, 22-Apr-2023. The callsign is still unknown.
Ben writes: "This activity is meant as a Scouting Trip for a larger activity by Lagunaria DX group in November 2023. Now in April we'll have two or three radios/amps and wire antennas only, but we'll use the same beachfront location planned for November. We'll try to be on the air as much as possible, but we'll also need time for on-site negotiations etc. Now in April: CW, SSB and classic RTTY on 40m-10m only. We'll reserve all other bands and modes for the November activity. However we’ll keep an eye on 6m. When local Internet access is working well, we'll use Club Log‘s Live Stream logging as well as their OQRS services."
QRZ COM and Facebook page will be published after our callsign has been issued.
Timor Leste. Author - Elisabeth Vicente.
Timor Leste. Author - Fernando Perreira.
Timor Leste. Author - Manuhuia Barcham.
