W6IWI, Arvada CO, 2017 - 2021

This is an archive of W6IWI in Aravad CO. We moved there in February 2017 and moved to Tucson AZ in April 2021.

The call letters W6IWI were first used by Kauko Hallikainen in the 1930s (1933 license, 1937 ARRL membership). See the 1934, 1936, 1937, and 1938 Amateur Radio Callbook. The 1930s QSL card was similar to that shown above (I may still have one of the originals somewhere). By 1952, the call had been reassigned to Carson Donaldson in Inglewood CA. He held it through 1977. I acquired the call in 2016. Prior to that, I held the call WA6FDN, and prior to that, WN6FDN. The WA6FDN license was first granted in 1969, with WN6FDN in 1968. WA6FDN shows up in the Summer 1969 Callbook. NL7XM offers a great service. He has over 100 years of Radio Amateur Callbooks and will find the first appearance of your callsign in the Callbook. For a reasonable cost, he'll provide certified copies of these pages verifying that the callsign was held by the particular person on this date. This is what he sent me for WN6FDN and WA6FDN.

WN6FDN started with a Heathkit DX-60 transmitter and a National NC-300 receiver running CW on HF. WA6FDN used a Viking Ranger transmitter running AM, CW, and RTTY on HF. RTTY used a Teletype model 15 printer (also see a slow motion video of a model 15 in operationg), and a model 14 typing reperf and transmitter distributor. W6IWI now uses an SEA 245 with a Dentron Clipperton-L amplifier running CW and SSB into a Cushcraft A3S with 40 meter adapter. Previosly, a HyGain TH-3JRS 3 elemement tri-band (10, 15, 20) beam was used. Finally, an inverted V for other bands (other than 40, 20, 15, and 10). VHF and UHF FM are covered with a Baofeng UV-5R and a Wouxun KG-UV-6X. The Wouxun KG-UV-6X normally drives an outside vertical antenna at home. Mobile info is here.

HF Station Details

• Teletype Model 15KSR Printer
• Teletype Model 14 Typing Reperf with keyboard
• Teletype Model 14 Transmitter Disbributor
• Flesher TU-170
• Seacom SEA245 HF Transceiver - Seacom SEA 245. This runs 150W CW or SSB between 1.6 MHz and 30 MHz.
• A - 1 meter of RG-8/U 50 ohm coax
• Seacom SEA 1630. Microntroller-based remote antenna tuner. The microcontroller switches a set of binary weighted inductors and capacitors in and out of a pi network to match the antenna impedance to the impedance of the transmission line to the transceiver (50 ohms). Measures frequency at start of transmission. If frequency used before, tunes to it within 20 milliseconds. If this is a new frequency, it tunes within 5 seconds. The antenna tuner matches the Seacom SEA 1630 to the load, which is either the input of the Dentron Clipperton L (grounded grid amplifier with untuned input) or the selected antenna (Clipperton-L in bypass).
• B - 3 meters of RG-8/U 50 ohm coax.
• Daiwa 501H HF/VHF cross needle watt meter. This meter monitors the power into the Dentron Clipperton-L Amplifier. Note that this is after the Seacom SEA 1630 antenna tuner. If the amplifier is in bypass, this meter reads forward and reflected power to the selected antenna. If the amplifier is operating, this meter reads the forward and reflected power into the untuned grounded grid input of the amplifier.
• C - 1 meter RG-8/U 50 ohm coax
• Dentron Clipperton-L Amplifier - A 1 kW grounded grid linear amplifier using four 572B triodes.
• D - 1 meter RG-8/U 50 ohm coax
• Daiwa 501H HF/VHF cross needle watt meter. This meter measures the amplifier output power and the reflected power from the selected antenna.
• E - UHF Barrel
• MFJ-4712 - This remote antenna switch selects between inverted V and the Cushcraft A3-S
• G - 75 feet RG-8/U 50 ohm coax
• Cushcraft A3-S triband 3 element beam with 40 meter kit
• H - 5 meters RG-8/U coax
• DX Engineering DXE-BAL050H10AT. 50 ohms. 5 kW CW, 10 kW SSB. with lightning arresor on coax side
• I - Ladder Line, Balun to Antenna - About 15 meters of DX Engineering DXE-LL450-CTL 450 ohm ladder line connects the balun to the antenna.
• Inverted V - Used for all bands not covered by Cushcraft A3-S tri-band beam with 40 meter kit. An antenna tuner is under construction.

Maximum Usable Frequency (17.42 MHz at 16 Apr 2024 2300 GMT)

The graph shows the MUF and OWF for the past two days. Drag right to see previous values. Use the mouse scroll wheel to zoom in and out. Right click to get back to the original view.

W6IWI HF Activity

The table below shows recent contacts logged on qrz.com.

RBN Report

The table below is generated by a PHP script that pulls JSON data from the Reverse Beacon Network, parses it, calculates distance and bearing based on latitude and longitude, then shows data for the last 250 spots. Frequency changes greater than 1 kHz or time changes greater than 1 hour are shown in bold. The Rx links link to the QRZ page for the station. The SNR links link to a graph of signal to noise ratio versus time for that receiver and band (data limited to 250 spots total from RBN)

The background color is green if the distance is greater than 3,000 miles. The Relative Distance column has a * for every 200 miles.