Topband: Early JA's at PY2FUS

[Ronald Sekkel]

It seems to me everyone has a good story about working the first JA on 160m.

Japan is the antipode from the part of Brazil where I live, and the path
JA/PY2 is not as bad as from most parts of US, but it's still very hard -
it's a 18.000km QSO anyway. Our black hole here is Australia.

I have been infected with the TopBand bug back in 1974, by Rolf, PY1RO,
at that time PY1DVG. I was 17. I used a home made transverter
and a 4x811 amplifier modified to work on 160m - about 400W. The antenna
was a sloping dipole supported by a tree next to my parents house.

Rolf was the first PY to work a JA on 160m, and I was the second one just
a few days after him. My first QSO was with Yasuo, JA3ONB on Jan 3rd, 1975,
and then JA2GQO and Aki, JA5DQH. In 1976 we moved to a new QTH where I had
no room for 160 antennas and I only came back in 1999, when I bought a
small weekend ranch 80km north from Sao Paulo city.

I was luck enough to work W1BB, DL1FF, W6BYB/VE1, W2BP, W2DEO, W3JSX, WB4SJG,
GD4BEG, KV4FZ and several others during my first 160m operation from 
1974/1976. At that
time we had to call in the DX window (which was on 1825-1830 I guess)
and listen around 1805-1810.

Rolf is retired now, and he's only active on 6m at this time. We meet 
ocasionally,
and I'll probably visit him next month. Last year he gave me a full collection
of the old W1BB Dx Bulletins. I'm planning to scan them and make available
at the internet.

25 years after my first QSO with JA3ONB we did QSO again, and we already have a
schedule for the summer of 2025, when the first QSO will complete 50 years !

73's

Ron
PY2FUS



Ronald J. Sekkel - PY2FUS
py2fus at integral.com.br
Grid locator: GG66pt