Happy New Year 2024 to all the readers!

CQ World Wide DX Contest is one of the largest and most popular amateur radio contests in the world. It is held in the last weekend of October in SSB mode, and in the last weekend of November in CW mode. Both events are sponsored by CQ Magazine in the US. These CQ World Wide DX Contests 2023 in SSB and CW also serve as the first two out of fifteen qualifying events for WRTC 2026 which will take place in the UK.

Figure 1. The antenna system at LA7JO/HSØZGD contest station in Ban Ta Bong, Thailand

CQWW SSB 2023 took place on 28th – 29th October 2023.

This year, E2A operated in CQWW SSB under Multi-Single High-Power category. The operators consisted of Stig LA7JO/HSØZGD, Dietmar DL3DXX/HSØZFV, Dusko ZL3WW, Sam HSØZDY, Ray HS4RAY, Bun E25KAE, JC E2ØNKB, and Champ E21EIC. This year, we welcomed Dusko ZL3WW from New Zealand to the team for the first time. Dusko is an expert on towers and antennas and we have been very lucky to have him join us. He single-handedly installed the newly repaired rotator on the tallest tower which finally allowed us to finally rotate our OB804020 10el Triple Monobander at 60mH.

Figure 2. The E2A team enjoying the Welcome Dinner at the local restaurant in Phimai on 26th October 2023 prior to CQWW SSB 2023 contest.
(Top Left, L-R) Champ E21EIC, JC E2ØNKB, Ray HS4RAY, Stig LA7JO/HSØZGD, Dietmar DL3DXX/HSØZFV, and Dusko ZL3WW.

Our journey from Bangkok started on the morning of 26th October 2023 with three radios and various equipment required to compete. The contest station was located 400km to the North East of Bangkok at Ban Ta Bong village, Boat Subdistrict, Phimai District, in Nakorn Ratchasrima province, and hosted by Stig LA7JO/HSØZGD. The three of us consisted of Dusko ZL3WW, JC E2ØNKB and Champ E21EIC travelled in a car for 5 hours and arrived in Ban Ta Bong on Thursday afternoon. As soon as we arrived, many tasks awaited us and we got to work straight away fixing broken radio gears and installing all the transceivers, amplifiers and equipment for the contest. We decided on having 3 radio stations in total, one served as the Run machine, and the other two were dedicated to Multipliers and as potential backups. Before we arrived, Stig LA7JO/HSØZGD, Dietmar DL3DXX/HSØZFV, Ray HS4RAY, and Torn the village local repairman had already carried out some preparation and maintenance work to prepare us for the contest.

On the same evening, we got together for the annual “Welcome Dinner” so that both old and new members have the chance to introduce oneself to another, discuss the strategy and exchange information about what the propagation from Zone 26 are usually like and what can be expected in the upcoming contest. Many fun stories were shared during dinner about their experience with the previous CQWW contests.

Figure 3. During the heat of the CQWW SSB 2023 contest
(Top Left) Dusko ZL3WW (Top Right) Dietmar DL3DXX/HSØZFV (Bottom Left) Bun E25KAE (Bottom Right) Champ E21EIC

Friday 27th October was the last preparation day before the contest. Everything started to come together and we were ready for the contest to start on Saturday 28th October at 07.00am local time, or 00.00 UTC time. On the first day, we only had one main operator on the Run station which was Champ E21EIC, whilst Dietmar DL3DXX, Stig LA7JO, and Dusko ZL3WW were handling Mult1 and Mult2 stations. Due to family engagement, Bun E25KAE finally managed to join us on Sunday morning for the contest.

The contest went well and the propagation on both 10m and 15m bands were very good through the day and night. Bun E25KAE helped on the Run station on the second day until the end of the competition, and in the end E2A made 5,064 QSOs and 8.1 million raw score.

Figure 4. E2A score summary for CQWW SSB 2023 contest plus a little note written by Stig LA7JO/HSØZGD on 3830scores.com

CQWW CW 2023 took place on 25th – 26th November 2023.

For CQWW CW, E2A operated again under Multi-Single High-Power category and the operators consisted of Stig LA7JO/HSØZGD, Bob 5B4AGN, Marty N6VI, Dusko ZL3WW, Sam HSØZDY, Ray HS4RAY, Bun E25KAE, JC E2ØNKB, and Champ E21EIC. We took this opportunity to welcome Marty N6VI who is also on the board of YASME Foundation to Ban Ta Bong for the first time.

Figure 5. The atmosphere before the start of CQWW CW 2023
(Top Left) Sam HSØZDY working on the amplifier (Top Right and Bottom Left) Bob 5B4AGN fine tuning the Elecraft K3 and working on some common mode RF chokes (Bottom Right) Dusko ZL3WW becoming the team’s MacGyver

For this contest, under Bob 5B4AGN leadership and Marty N6VI as the helper, we made further improvements to the contest station by installing more Common Mode RF Choke for all the coaxial cables to prevent RF interference. Dusko ZL3WW also took on the responsibility of installing 10m 5el Monobander at 60mH as well as the 4O3A Azimuth Magnetic sensor on the tower. All this was completed before the contest start on Saturday morning.

Figure 6. (Top Left) Equipment being hoisted up and down the 60mH tower to help Dusko ZL3WW complete his task (Bottom Left) Champ E21EIC setting up the radio stations for the contest (Top Right, Bottom Right) common mode RF chokes made and installed by Bob 5B4AGN

The CQWW CW 2023 contest began on Saturday 25th November morning at 07.00am local time or 00.00 UTC. We had 4 operators on the run station including Bob 5B4AGN, Marty N6VI, Bun E25KAE and Champ E21EIC. On the Multi1 and Multi2 stations, we had Stig LA7JO/HSØZGD, Dusko ZL3WW, and Sam HSØZDY. Throughout the 48hour of the competition, we took turn to operate the radios while others engage in further on-the-spot repairing tasks such as fixing the 40m delta loop, fine tuning the 4O3A Magnetic sensor, figuring out why the cluster spots suddenly failed to show any data, why the computer stopped responding to the wired-keyboard, why the amplifier started smelling of smoke, and why the air conditioner was suddenly leaking water directly onto the amplifier. What fun would there be if not for little mishaps here and there.

Figure 7. Pictures from the heat of the CQWW CW 2023 competition
(Top Left) Champ E21EIC (Top Right) Stig LA7JO/HSØZGD (Bottom Left) Dusko ZL3WW (Bottom Right) Bob 5B4AGN

Unlike CQWW SSB, the propagation during CW contest was not good at all with solar flares reported. Our 20m band was practically silent. Despite that we persevered on until the end of the contest and made 4,020 QSOs with 7.2 million raw scores.

Figure 8. Pictures from CQWW CW and SSB 2023 competition
(Top Left) Stig LA7JO/HSØZGD at the Multi station (Top Right) Bun E25KAE (Bottom Left) Bob 5B4AGN. (Bottom Right) A final team photo from the CQWW SSB 2023 competition (L-R) Bun E25KAE, Stig LA7JO/HSØZGD, JC E2ØNKB, Dietmar DL3DXX/HSØZFV, Dusko ZL3WW, and Champ E21EIC

The final raw scores from CQWW SSB 2023 and CQWW CW 2023 should make E2A the New Thailand Record holders in both modes. At the end of it all, we must not forget that amateur radio is about making long lasting friendship across all borders, and we definitely achieved that at Ban Ta Bong.

Figure 9. E2A score summary for CQWW CW 2023 contest plus a little note written by Stig LA7JO/HSØZGD on 3830scores.com

For Thailand, there is still a growing trend of more HS stations joining in the CQ WW Contests. For CQ WW SSB 2023, 18 other HS stations participated in the event including E20MWE, E20PFE, E20XMG, E21LLR, E24SMC, E25OKO, E27EK, E29TGW, E2K, E2YOTA, HS0YNM, HS0ZOK, HS0ZPS, HS3NBR, HS4MLV, HS5NMF, HS8LVC, and HS8NKB. For CQ WW CW 2023, 24 other HS stations took part in the competition including E20HHK/QRP, E20MWE, E20XMG, E21LLR, E23NEZ, E24ZST, E25JRP, E29TGW, E2X, HS0ZLN, HS0ZME, HS0ZNV, HS0ZOK, HS0ZPQ, HS3NBR, HS4MLV, HS4OFE, HS5AES, HS5NMF, HS5TXB, HS8HEX, HS8JWH, HS8KAY, and HS8NKB.

It is very exciting to see that CW is slowly gaining more momentum in Thailand especially with the set up of “Bangkok CW Group” on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/BKCWG) which have helped quite a few novices overcome the initial adrenaline rush of getting on the air for the first time. Many have become more proficient at ragchewing with other HAM operators on the HF bands using both straight keys and paddles. A big credit to Supoj E25JRP and his team for organising countless number of Zoom sessions, weekly Giving Back program on 40m band, and the Bangkok CW Challenge which just ended in October 2023.