AWARDS
| The 5 Band DXCC is perhaps one of the most coveted Awards for the Ham Radio enthusiast.
It represents many hours in the "Shack" searching the bands for those rare
countries. 100 different countries on each of the HF bands (80, 40, 20, 15, 10mtr
bands)
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| For me, this award represents the very pinacle of achievement. I can't count the number of early mornings (very early!) I spent combing the 80 mtr band for Europeans and the very elusive South Africans. I was fortunate in striking the sun spot cycles at a most favourable time, it would certainly be a much different story today especially on 10mtrs!! Thanks CQ for such a challenging award. | |
| I really do owe a debt of gratitude to the very helpful guys in the States for this award. I mean Vermont on 75mtrs is a real challenge!! Thanks to ARRL for this great award program. I met many of those who helped out for the 5BWAS while doing the 5BWAZ and 5BDXCC. If you really want to see co-operation in practice, meet up with the guys trying for 5 band awards.!! | |
| A couple of buddies persuaded ne to go for this very interesting award sponsored by the Mexico DX Club. Not an easy one at all !! The pre-requsites for this overall 5 band award are the following 5 band continental awards. I am very proud to be "Number 1" for this rather difficult award. | |
| 5 Band anything into Africa from New Zealand is a real challenge. Our best shots on just about any band happen to be directly over the South Pole. The difficulties on 80 mtrs have to be heard to be believed. Phased verticals on 80 mtrs proved to be the wining formula in the end. | |
| 5 Band Asia is a real breeze from New Zealand and can be done on any reasonable contest weekend. The biggest problem is really trying to work through the thousands of JA operators to find the hard-to-get Asians under all the QRM. | |
| 5 Band Europe from New Zealand can be a challenge at the top end of the HF spectrum. Fortunately I struck a good sun spot cycle for 10 mtrs and was able to get my quota for Europeans reasonably easily. A 6-ele beam on 10 helps as well !! | |
| 5 Band Americas sounds as though it should be quite easy. However, after the States the others can be remarkably elusive. Many times I worked stations who had equipment for 10, 15, 20 mtrs but none for 40 and 80 mtrs. So to get all the countries required with the same operator on all five bands did present some challenges. | |
| From New Zealand the 5 band Ocenaia is a breeze. We have heaps of countries to choose from in close proximity however because of the closeness 10mtrs can be a real challenge. Some of the paths used to work some of the northern pacific islands were unreal !! | |
| This is New Zealand's most prestigious award perhaps. The rules are siple but to get the required contacts and contact types is a real battle for sure. Check NZART for more details. |
