I started my radio hobbies in Finland. I first started shortwave listening when I was 12 in December, 1980 and got my amateur radio novice licence in May, 1983 when I was 14. I upgraded to general class year later in 1984 (general class is the highest class in Finland with all the privilegies). My call was OH6EE (quick call for CW).

I moved to U.S.A. in 1996 and finally took the US exams in February 2004 (all elements in one session) and received my extra class license.

When I'm not working on ham bands nor working, I'll most likely mess with linux/Internet servers, BCL (see http://www.hard-core-dx.com ) or spend time with my wife and 6 year old son.

My current station:

Tranceivers: Icom IC-7000 and Icom IC-718. Both w/ 100W out. Also have INRAD 250 Hz CW filter installed in IC-718.

Receiver: Icom IC-R8500

Tuner: LDG Z-100. RFI prevention: MFJ 915.

Noise elimination: JPS/Timewave ANC-4.

HF Digital: RigExpert SD interface. Software: MixW 2, Digipan (PSK31), PSK Deluxe (PSK31/PSK63), MMTTY (RTTY), IZ8BLY Stream (MFSK), MMSSTV, etc.

Grounding: 12ft copper rod, about 10ft into the ground (tnx WA6KGD http://www.qrz.com/callsign/WA6KGD for the help). The shack is connected to the ground through MFJ-931 artificial ground.

Keyer: Idiompress CMOS-4. Paddle: Kent TP-1

Antennas: Inverted-V's for 40, 30, 20, 17 and 15m. All are about 30-40ft high @ apex. G5RV has been taken down. I like Inverted-V's because they have nice features:

1) lowering the sides will lower the impendance to closer to 50 ohm 2) lowering the sides will make the pattern more omnidirectional 3) only one higher support structure needed (big plus for me)

Antenna switching: Ameritron RCS-10 remote antenna switch. 50ft of RG-213 down to the shack.

Software: Ham Radio Deluxe for rig control, N1MM Logger for contests. I have now both CAT and keying working. Still need to work on antenna switching from the software.

HT: Yeasu VX-7R (6m/2m/1.25m/70cm).

I am also operating from Stanford Amateur Radio Club station in Palo Alto every now and then. The county in that case is Santa Clara, CA. Well, how can you tell if I'm there? Usually if my signal is booming and strong, most likely I'm operating from the club station.

My areas of interest in the ham radio:

1) QSLing (paper or LoTW). Working on next levels of DXCC (see http://www.w6rk.com/dxcc.html ) and USA-CA CW (~ 2300 worked, about 1900 confirmed ).

2) DXing

3) county hunting (CW only)

4) FISTS

5) VE

6) Using Internet for Ham radio

7) contesting -- this is getting more serious now. they warned me about it and I didn't believe.

8) Digital modes (PSK31/PSK63/MFSK/RTTY so far but would like to try Hell, Throb, etc)

Memberships:

1) ARRL http://www.arrl.org/

2) Finnish DX Association, http://www.sdxl.org/

4) FISTS #10908 since 5/5/04 , CC#1622 since 6/21/04, silver #430 since 1/18/2005.

5) MARAC ( http://www.marac.org ), R-3153 since 10/6/2004.

6) NCDXC ( http://www.ncdxc.org ), since 10/14/2004.

7) 070 Club #393, since 1/19/2005.

8) NCCC ( http://www.nccc.cc ), since 4/18/2005.

9) Stanford Amateur Radio Club (W6YX), since December 2005.

10) Feld Hell Club #31 (since 3/8/06)

Accreditations:

1) ARRL Volunteer Examiner, http://www.arrl.org/arrlvec/

Awards:

1) WAC, CW endorsement

2) WAS, CW endorsement

3) WAS in the 90th

4) Route 66 On the Air

5) FISTS Century Award #1622

6) FISTS Silver Award #430

7) Contest awards: Salmon Run 2004, NEQP 2004

8) DXCC mixed #40134 & DXCC CW #20022

My online log can be found through http://www.w6rk.com/. Interesting piece of stats: out of my 5980 QSOs ad W6RK between 4/24/05 and 7/21/05: SSB: 2.8%, CW: 85.7%, RTTY: 8.8%, PSK31: 2.7%.

Realtime spots for the county hunters and contesters: http://ch.w6rk.com/

My current project: ham shack backyard. Please see www.w6rk.com.