News #10 (January 31, 2023)
Our QSL manager Georg, DL4SVA, has processed all received direct OQRS requests and letters for P29RO by the end of January. He sent over 3700 letters and a few QSL packets to the foundations that supported us. This affects 5,000 paper QSLs that have already been sent, almost six weeks after receipt of the cards from the QSL shop (www.qsl-shop.com). The team members would like to thank Georg for the extremely fast and careful work.
New incoming direct inquiries will be answered immediately. All direct requesters will continue to receive an additional LoTW confirmation immediately too.
In February the answering of bureau QSLs via OQRS and via the DARC QSL bureau will start. In March, the entire log will be uploaded to LoTW.
The entire P29RO team is very grateful to all of our supporters. See you again on the air in autumn 2023 – next DXP is already in planning stage.
News #9 (December 17, 2022)
Our QSL manager Georg DL4SVA has received 10.000 QSL nice color cards P29RO from the QSL-Shop Berlin and is now starting direct mailing. Since he has received more than 3.000 direct QSL requests in the meantime, it will take him until February 2023 to reply. Georg still has a full-time job, so he has to do the QSL-job in his spare-time. Please understand his situation and be patient. As stated earlier, our supporters are served first.
In November, a first LoTW upload was made for all our supporters. This also includes confirmations for our friends in Ukraine.
In March and April next year Georg will start uploading LoTW for all other QSOs and will answer the QSL requests through the bureau.
Based on the experiences from the real F/H operation with FT8, where many radio amateurs do not master this procedure properly, we are considering using the MSHV program as a multi-channel fox in the future.
The team would like to thank all our supporters and those who worked us. We wish You and Your families a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
News #8 (November 22, 2022)
Our QSL-manager DL4SVA is still busy with the 'fine tuning' of our log. As explained earlier the most problems exist with the FT-8 QSOs and with a great number of dupes or multiple times logging.
Beside that he has got numerous e-mails regarding QSOs which did not appear in ClubLog. Georg is checking every request and he will decide finally.
After that, the ClubLog-datas will be changed with the corrected log-datas.
The QSOs of our sponsors and direct-requesters will be uploaded into the LoTW-system the next days.
We will have a similar procedure with the paper-QSLs mid-December. The QSL design P29RO is finished.
Thank You for understanding our course of action.
We will do our best - as usual.
News #7 (November 18, 2022)
Back home …....
The entire P29RO-team arrived safely back in Germany. Exhausted, but happy after an expedition which exceeded all our expectations. The positive feedbacks we received from all over the world motivated us to work hard until the day we had to dismantle the antennas.
We are deeply grateful for all support we received from our sponsors and individuals.
The hundreds of QSL-requests we received just a few days after finishing the expedition shows us, that Papua New Guinea was a good choice.
The design of our QSL-card is finished, they will be printed very soon. All inquiries will be answered from mid-December.
In these days we are working very hard on reviewing and correcting our log-file.
We have seen some problems with our FT8 logging, which will take some time to resolve. So, please be patient – we do our very best.
The early LoTW- upload for our sponsors will start as soon as the log-correction is completed.
News #6 (November 8, 2022)
Our DXpedition P29RO ends in a few hours. On local Wednesday morning, November 9th, we will start dismantling the antennas. QRT is expected at around 0400z.
We are happy to have reached the 90,000 QSO mark from 160m to 6m on all main modes with some stations still calling for the first QSO towards the end. 160m has been extremely difficult due to the local QRM situation. Nevertheless, we are happy to have roughly 550 QSOs on Top Band in the log.
This expedition involved a lot of logistics and didn't come cheap. The climate took a heavy toll and sleep was also neglected. At the end of the day, we are very happy with the result. We appreciate the many positive comments that reached us.
Our flights to Germany will leave on Thursday and we should arrive home after some 30 hours on Friday.
Please wait for the final online log. Our QSL manager will do his best to correct errors beforehand.
We hope to receive our nice color QSL in four weeks to start sending out QSLs and the LoTW upload for donors before Christmas.
On behalf of the entire team, I would like to thank everyone who supported us with a donation.
Rolf DL7VEE
News #5 (November 2, 2022)
After a week and almost halfway through our stay, it's time to sum up.
The choice and decision for this location was a very good one. Just off the coast of Port Moresby, the capital of Papua New Guinea, the island of Loloata is situated. It can be reached in a few minutes by ferry from the mainland. The luxurious Loloata Private Resort is a modern holiday complex for day-trippers and tourists. Electricity is available 24 hours a day and good internet is provided. The warm and humid climate is a challenge for central Europeans. Working in this heat takes a lot of energy!
We were able to install our antennas on the hiking trail on the mountain ridge. With water around the island and a free takeoff into almost all directions with no disturbances from the hotel complexes down on the shore, this is one of the best possible QTHs for worldwide radio operation. However, this comes with a downside: we needed roughly 60 m of coaxial cable for each antenna. On the high bands, we only use a robust two-element wire beam from LZ Antennas. A pentaplexer from LBS allows us to operate simultaneously three bands from 20 to 10 m, each with 500 watts HF. Loops are used for 30 and 6 m. For the other bands 160, 80, 60 and 40 m, we use verticals with an elevated radial.
We are very happy with the propagation and the good RX situation from 40 m upwards. After 7 days we already have over 55,000 QSOs in the log. The pile-ups are still tremendous. We have strived for equal operations on all modes and bands. The FT8 stations are also manned. All operators work in rolling shifts. 4.5 hours at the station and 9 hours free for eating, sleeping, checking emails and making repairs.
We have major hearing problems on 160, 80 and 60 m. On these bands, the noise level is always at S9 plus! Possibly an atmospheric problem near the equator at sunspot maximum and not man-made noise. That means stations calling us have to be louder than the noise floor. 80m CW is very hard to read. Under these circumstances, all OPs agreed that CW operation makes no sense on 160m.
A note on FT8 Fox & Hound. We use WSJT-X, not MHSV. This means, the confirmation must be on our transmission frequency. Additionally, those who call us below 1,000 Hz can’t be worked. There are still a lot of stations from all parts of the world who cannot work correct F&H. So fare in last days we may use normal FT8 mode.
Due to the hot climate, we have to finish the antenna dismantling a day earlier. We are therefore only QRV until November 9th around 4 UTC.
News #4 (October 29, 2022)
We've been QRV on all bands since two days. 160 and 80 m are quite atmospherically affected. We have not yet received any signal on 6 m but are monitoring 50313 kHz.
It is big fun working through these strong pile-ups under good conditions. We want to get each of you in the log! All team members are well and busy. And we are happy for so many positive comments! Thank you!
Please don't bombard us on our contact address with log discussions, inquiries and useless hints. These emails will be ignored. Please clarify log differences with our QSL manager after the DXP. Mistakes will corrected of course. If the QSO is not in the online log, work us again.
The contact address should be used only for really serious hints.
P29RO will participate in WWDX SSB contest. These QSOs will be posted online after the contest.
Please be patient - Updates to our homepage in DL require one to two days.
News #3 (October 26, 2022)
All team members and equipment arrived safely in PNG. No problems with Covid 19 but we had to wear a mask at all times. Everyone was tired from the lack of sleep over the past two days, but started installing the first antennas and radio room. The weather is extremely hot and muggy and is a challenge for everybody. At 50 degrees in the sun with no shade, we need three times as long as usual to set up the planned antennas. The way from the hut to the antennas is one kilometer long plus a few meters of altitude! Loloata Resort General Manager Mr. Uday helps us a lot in our radio expedition. Loloata Private Resort is a beautiful self contained resort and the staff is very friendly. The electricity from the hotel's generator is stable 24 hours a day. We have the option of installing our antennas alongside the island's hilltop trail. This will require more coax than expected, but we should be able to manage it for all antennas. Due to the great heat, we can only do antenna work in the morning and in the last hours of the day. On Tuesday we were able to raise the 5-band LZ wire beam for 20 to 10 m, the 40 m vertical and the 30 m loop. The next bands will follow. Today we will finalize the 160-m-Vertical.
Please refrain from comments and emails like: Why aren't you on 6m today? Please be patient. We do our best. On our homepage https://p29ro.mydx.de you will find news and information.
News #2 (October 22, 2022)
All members are well and ready for departure from BER airport on Sunday. After a long trip we should arrive in Port Moresby at local Tuesday morning (October 25). Hopefully we are not too tired to install first antennas on Tuesday and start the operation still the same day.
News #1 (August 25, 2022)
As our plans for Papua New Guinea in 2021 had to be postponed due to Covid 19, we are now hoping for a good DXpedition in autumn 2022. The team is planning activities from 160 m to 6 m in CW, SSB, RTTY and FT8 24/7 with four well equipped stations. Period is October 25th to November 10th, 2022.
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