
August 2025
Volume 30 Number 8
Next meeting: August 30th at Round Table Pizza in Martel (Jackson). Find out more.
In this issue: tubes as always, and… ancient PowerPoints? – new videos! – classifieds – DX – focus contests – State QSO parties! – funny stuff! – and more!
From the Prez
Hello Contesters and DX’ers!
We’re going to talk about CQP at our next meeting so I thought I’d suggest a few items for everyone to peruse.
There are five categories for a California club to enter in:
- Yosemite
- Joshua Tree
- Sequoia
- Redwood
- Channel Islands
The number of logs submitted determines what category a club is in.
- The Yosemite category is for those clubs submitting 31+ logs.
- The Joshua Tree Category is for those clubs submitting 21-30 logs.
- The Sequoia Category is for those clubs submitting 11-20 logs.
- The Redwood Category is for those clubs submitting 6-10 logs
- The Channel Islands Category is for those clubs submitting 1-5 logs.
In 2024, the Yosemite category had no entrants. Not one club submitted the required 31 or more logs.
The Joshua Tree Category is where the Southern California Contest Club and MLDXCC ended up, with SCCC submitting 30 logs and MLDXCC submitting 28 logs. SCCC beat us by a lot….775,754 points. In short, we were not even close.
The Redwood Empire DX Association was the only entrant in the Sequoia Category, with 12 logs and, obviously, won the category.
Pizza Lovers 259, with 8 logs submitted, won the Redwood Category beating the West Valley ARA, with 10 logs submitted. This was a fairly close competition.
Last, but not least was the very interesting Channel Islands Category. There were 42 clubs represented in this category. The winner, by around 150,000 points, was the Sierra Foothills ARC. The Orange County ARC came in second.
It is interesting to look at the clubs in MLDXCC territory who submitted logs:
- 5 logs – Sierra Foothills ARC
- 2 logs – Calaveras ARS
- 2 logs – River City ARCS
- 3 logs – Yuba-Sutter ARC
- 2 logs – El Dorado County ARC
- 1 log – Stockton-Delta ARC
- 1 log – Toulumne County Amateur Radio and Electronics Society
- 1 log – Fresno ARC
Recruiting from local clubs could be a possibility for us. Something else to dig into are the respectable scores from some of the members of clubs competing in the Channel Islands Category. Let’s take a look at the scores they contributed to their club total (with bonus points).
- Sierra Foothills ARC – KD6HOF – 152,768 (Expedition to Butte/Plumas)
- Sierra Foothills ARC – N6WYZ – 113,600 (Expedition to Alpine County – new contester)
- Sierra Foothills ARC – WU6X – 103,344 (Expedition to Siskiyou County)
- Calaveras ARS – KA9MDP – 125,124 (Expedition to Alpine County – new contester)
- Calaveras ARS – N6FRG – 61,484 (Expedition to Calaveras County)
- River City ARCS – N6PGQ – 105,468 (Placer County)
- Yuba-Sutter ARC – W6PNH – 66,750 (new contester, Sutter county)
- El Dorado County ARC – KN6UDK – 61,190 (new contester, Madera county)
If you total up all of the above scores, the total is 789,728 points.
You may recall that I mentioned above that SCCC beat us by 775,754 points. Note, however, that if every one of the stations listed above entered logs for MLDXCC, we would be in the Yosemite Category all by ourselves but at least we would have the pleasure of out-scoring SCCC.
So, my question to all of you: Do you know any of the stations mentioned above? These are stations that are ripe for recruiting.
See you on Saturday!
From the Veep
Did you get an opportunity to participate in the NAQP SSB contest? I was pleased to host Skip N6NFB at home during the contest. He ran the contest under his call @ 100 watts and managed to log quite a number of states on 15 meters. Hopefully some of those will turn out to ones he needs for 15 meter WAS.
My HF activity has been someone what limited lately as other jobs tend to take precedence. I’ve yet again allowed myself to be looped into another repeater project. While very time consuming, the results are rewarding.
My six meter quest continues. Band conditions have been on again, off again. I continue to look for Delaware and Rhode Island only to have them fade out. One day last week there were a number of openings, thanks to a sporadic “E” event. This was my first real exposure to that much of an opening. As the name implies, one minute they were there, then gone the next, very frustrating indeed.
I had previously mentioned to a couple of members that I had purchased a receive loop from W6LVP. I’m looking for it to be an asset during the winter season on 40, 80 & 160. I’m still looking for four (4) DX Q’s to confirm on 80 meters.
How’re your DX Marathon numbers looking? Remember even though you’ve worked a DXCC country before, they count as “brand new” again every year for the CQ DX Marathon. Also for those of you using FT8 / FT4, those contacts count in your Marathon totals as well.
I like to urge each one of you to become involved in MLDXCC by attending meetings, submitting your DX contacts to Club Log, participating in the CQ Marathon and by contributing your contest scores. Please list your log submission under the name “Mother Lode DX Contest Club“.
Also invite new people to club meetings. It doesn’t matter if they are new to the hobby, we all started somewhere. MLDXCC is an award winning DX & Contest Club and with your support we can continue to excel.
Thank you all & 73,
Steve / NC6R
Secretary’s Report
Minutes of the July 26th Meeting (Round Table Pizza, Jackson)
Breaking News!
(Imagine the sound of a chattering teletype…)

The Southern California DX Club has published their last monthly newsletter.
It’s time to brush up on your code skills for the fall DX and contest season! Two great resources to help are CW Academy and Learn CW Online.
Don’t wait until the last minute to get your RTTY going for the CQ Worldwide next month, visit Don AA5AU’s excellent RTTY Contesting site for help (or ask on the MLDXCC email list.)
A new four-part interview of noted (and perhaps notorious) DXer and DXpeditioner Don Miller W9WNV was posted recently on the NCDXF chat. Here’s the link to it in case you missed it.
Articles
Norm N6JV’s Tube of the Month for August
Steve NC6R found an old thumb drive with International DX Convention (IDXC) presentations on it. Enjoy!
Newly Posted Videos!
Subscribe to our YouTube channel! (I’m very lonely there… – ed)
Corrected link (and callsign) for the May 2025 presentation on 6m DXing
DX…
Steve NC6R presented a list of interesting upcoming DX at the last meeting, but I’m going to make you read the minutes to see it!
Upcoming Contests
Mark your calendar with our MLDXCC Focus Contests! Up next is the California QSO Party. on October 4-5, 2025.
Other contests of note this month, via contestcalendar.com:
- September 6-7: All Asian DX Contest, Phone
- September 13-14: Worked All Europe DX Contest, SSB
- September 13-15: ARRL September VHF Contest
- September 14: North American Sprint, CW
- September 21: North American Sprint, RTTY
- September 27-28: CQ Worldwide DX Contest, RTTY
- October 4-5: California QSO Party (MLDXCC Focus Contest)
New! State QSO Parties (via statesqoparty.com):
- August 30: Kansas, Colorado
- September 7: Tennessee
- September 20: Texas, Iowa, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Washington State Salmon Run
Classifieds
For Sale: New, never used, EHU for BigIR / $250 or best offer – Thank you, Steve / NC6R k6sca@volcano.net

For Sale: Palstar HF-AUTO, $1,000, picked up. Shipping is extra. Like new, little use. Replaced by an Amplifier with Tuner.
https://www.dxengineering.com/parts/pas-hf-auto
Model number shown in picture of the back panel.
Includes 12 Volt power supply cable and FTDI serial to USB cable to connect to computer running
W1TR automatic tune software. See links for W1TR software.
https://k5fr.com/binary/Palstar%20HF%20Auto%20Setup.pdf
http://www.glagowski.org/radio/Software.htm
Dave, w6de 530-409-7877


For sale: Bob W1RH has a WaveNode WN2 Digital Watt Meter, with four HF sensors. This unit sells new for $385, with a single sensor. I have been using is in an SO2R configuration with a sensor on the input and output of each amplifier.

That way, I can always see my input and output power. Rick, W6SR, who uses my station remotely more than I do, has depended on the software display to know how much power he’s running.

There are several options for the look of the computer display. And there are several other features such as rotator control and antenna switching but I have just used the wattmeter function.
I’m selling this because I have purchased the Flex PGXL amplifier, which has built in and remotable watt meters. It can be yours for $200.
Bob also has for sale an Array Solutions 6-PAK 6 port SO2R antenna switch – $250
Contact Bob W1RH w1rh@yahoo.com.

Humor!
Steve NC6R has a quote of the month:
“You see, wire telegraph is a kind of a very, very long cat. You pull his tail in New York and his head is meowing in Los Angeles. Do you understand this? And radio operates exactly the same way: you send signals here, they receive them there. The only difference is that there is no cat.” – Albert Einstein, explaining radio
And a bit of prescience from 1906, stumbled into by your editor:

Send more funny stuff for the next issue! – Ed.
ClubLog DXCC Standings
As of 25 August 2025. You can see complete MLDXCC standings on ClubLog here.
Overall
1 | NK7I | 232 |
2 | W1SRD | 231 |
3 | W6DE | 209 |
4 | K6OK | 190 |
5 | K6YK | 188 |
CW
1 | K6YK | 168 |
2 | NO5Z | 130 |
3 | K6OK | 119 |
4 | NA6O | 107 |
5 | N6WM | 106 |
Phone
1 | K6YK | 118 |
2 | W1SRD | 116 |
3 | NO5Z | 115 |
4 | N6WM | 111 |
5 | K6TQ | 101 |
Data
1 | NK7I | 223 |
2 | W1SRD | 206 |
3 | W6DE | 184 |
4 | K7QDX | 183 |
5 | K6OK | 159 |
Resources
Check out the Resources menu up there at the top of every web page for useful DX and contest info.
Prepared for the MLDXCC by Editor and Webwookie Jeff WK6I. Please do send me any corrections, omissions, or material for future issues of The Nugget. It is much appreciated!
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