Hi and welcome to my site. I’m Cees Alberts; a radio amateur from the Netherlands.

Me in a contest

My Blog – See also here

My 1st mod; FT-817nd Wideband

by Cees (PA1CA) | February 29, 2012 | HAM Blog, Popular | 69 Comments

After buying my new QRP transceiver, the Yaesu FT-817nd, I found out that not all the bands on it are available for transmitting, some are only available for receiving. I thought that it would be possible to use some software (widebander.exe) to open all the bands for...

FT-950 Wideband mod

by Cees (PA1CA) | May 1, 2012 | HAM Blog, Popular | 10 Comments

After buying my new (secondhand) Yaesu FT-950 base transceiver I knew I again wanted to do the wideband mod. This is the same mod I did for the Yaesu FT-817 some time ago; I wrote about it in another blog entry. Because the FT-950 is much larger than the FT-817 I...

Using the FT-817nd with a “dirty amp” (RM KL300P)

by Cees (PA1CA) | April 23, 2014 | HAM Blog, Popular, portable operations, Technology | 8 Comments

Lately I’m trying to improve my portable HAM Radio setup because I want to do some activations for Castles On The Air (COTA) and WorldWide Flora & Fauna (WFF). The idea for the activations is that you take all the HAM radio gear you need to make your contacts and...

It finally arrived! My SARK100 from China

by Cees (PA1CA) | April 19, 2015 | HAM Blog, Popular, portable operations, Technology | 13 Comments

After waiting for a pretty long time, my new gadget from China finally arrived! It’s a SARK100 antenna analyzer. I wrote about buying one, in February I think, so already some time ago! Most radio amateurs know that antenna analyzers are pretty expensive; starting...

Contest results on Google Maps

by Cees (PA1CA) | April 3, 2013 | Contesting, HAM Blog | 0 Comments

Previous weekend I entered another radio amateur contest. This time I wanted to use a nice new feature of my logging software. This is the option where it can make a google map from all the contacts I made! For those of you interested; the contest was the “CQ WP WPX...

My talk with the King of Spain

by Cees (PA1CA) | June 30, 2014 | Contesting, HAM Blog, Rules | 0 Comments

In my previous post I spoke about the conversation I had on Sunday with the King of Spain. Some people asked me what we talked about and if we had a nice conversation. Because this was a radio amateur contest the talk we had was very short but friendly. To give you an...

It’s all about antennas!

by Cees (PA1CA) | February 23, 2015 | Contesting, HAM Blog, operating practice, Technology | 2 Comments

A week or 2 ago I competed in the PACC contest. This is a radio amateur contest where operators from all over the world need to contact Dutch operators to collect points. A contest is always a good way to check your antennas, your radio and other equipment because you...

My first RTTY experience

by Cees (PA1CA) | November 11, 2012 | Contesting, HAM Blog, Technology | 0 Comments

I have a lot of first experiences lately. After my first contest, getting my first tube linear I tried another new thing. I had my first RTTY (Radio Tele TYpe) experience, also known as Telex! I also decided to jump into the deep end and enter the German Worked All...

See who I talked to!

by Cees (PA1CA) | October 27, 2013 | Contesting, HAM Blog | 0 Comments

One of the biggest HAM radio contests of the year was this weekend; the CQ World Wide DX Contest 2013. This is a voice contest (we talk to each other) and the goal is to make as many talks to as many far away places as possible. It lasts 48 hours; the whole weekend....

Using a CW filter in digital mode

by Cees (PA1CA) | September 11, 2013 | Contesting, HAM Blog | 0 Comments

I discovered another use for the new CW filter I put in my FT-817; I found out it also works in digital modes! During my stay in Montreal, working as VA2/PA1CA, I decided to work an hour or so in the 2013 Russian RTTY contest. Because I was using my Yaesu FT-817 I was...

My contest on youtube

by Cees (PA1CA) | April 4, 2013 | Contesting, HAM Blog | 0 Comments

I put some of my videos of the CQ WPX contest on youtube! They show me making some quick contest contacts on my FT-950

My 1st Contest; CQ World Wide DX!

by Cees (PA1CA) | October 26, 2012 | Contesting, HAM Blog | 0 Comments

After buying the linear and optimizing my coax cables (I replaced all the RG58 with Aircell 7) I decided it is time for my first contest! Every Radio Amateur knows that around this time of the year there is the CQ World Wide DX Contest! This is one of the most popular...

I’m an EPC member!

by Cees (PA1CA) | December 25, 2012 | Contesting, Digital, HAM Blog | 0 Comments

After I got more into the digital modes I started investigating this a bit more and found out that there is a real digital modes club! It’s a club for people that do PSK digital modes and will give you certificates for achievements, like doing and / or winning...

Another Contest, Czech Style

by Cees (PA1CA) | December 15, 2012 | Contesting, HAM Blog, Technology | 2 Comments

I did another RTTY contest, this time it was organized from the radio amateur organization in the Czech Republic. For me it was a way to try out my mobile 40m band antenna which I bought and put up a few weeks ago. In this picture the left antenne is the 40m band...

Mircules DX Cluster now also for Android

by Cees (PA1CA) | February 14, 2015 | app store, DXCluster, HAM Blog, ham radio apps, radio amateur apps | 0 Comments

A few years ago I made a DX Cluster app for iOS (iPhone and iPad) called Mircules DX Cluster. I'm a freelance software developer and found it interesting to make some software for mobile devices for my amateur radio hobby. A DX Cluster app seemed like a nice choice....

Giving away FREE HAM Radio software for Mac OSx!

by Cees (PA1CA) | November 1, 2014 | DXCluster, HAM Blog, ham radio apps, radio amateur apps, Technology | 0 Comments

Some time ago I decided to make an application for showing DX Cluster information on Mac OSx. People that know me a bit better, know that I already made a few apps that I'm selling in the iOS app store, one of which shows the DX Cluster on the iPhone and the iPad. So...

Mircules HAM QuickLog update for SOTA and IOTA

by Cees (PA1CA) | January 14, 2015 | app store, apple app store, HAM Blog, ham radio apps, HAMQuickLog, iOS, portable operations, radio amateur apps | 0 Comments

Previous week a new version of Mircules HAM QuickLog came out. As most people will know, QuickLog is a logging app for Radio Amateurs voor the iPad. I wrote about this earlier in another post. The 2 most important additions to the app are "import from URL" and...