When I was fourteen I lived in a little village near the town of
Königstein about forty kilometers south-east of
Dresden. There was a radio amateur who organised together
with a teacher courses for young girls and boys to teach them morse
code and some things about the radio. On a rock above the town is a old
fortress (360 meters above the sea level). The community gave them
rooms in that fortress and the state organisation GST sponsored
old military radio equipment for the foundation of a radio
club. The call sign of the club station was DM4QL.
In 1961 I began to learn the morse code and all about the amateur radio
in the evenings. I constructed a receiver 0V1 and listened as a SWL
(short wave listener) to the European radio amateurs. Soon after I
assembled a receiver SH6 to listen to the amateurs world-wide. In 1965
I passed a class 2 examination and got my first call sign
DM4YQL to work at the club station. (Every licensed member of
a club station got a different first letter for the suffix of
the club call).
One year later I went to the university of Dresden to study high
frequencies. At the university there were three club stations. I got
the call sign DM3BVL as a member of one of them. Then I upgraded
after a new examination and became the leader of
the club station DM3VL. Some members of the club station designed and
assembled one of the first single sideband transmitters (phase method)
in the GDR at that time. Other members spent there free time
constructing antennas. Every year we taught a new group of
young girls and boys the morse code. So we won new members for the club
station.
In 1970 I passed the examination at the university and became an
engineer of electrical engineering and worked for the company ROBOTRON.
That year I got a private call sign DM2ENL, designed and assembled a
single sideband transceiver (all of tubes) for the 80m band and hanged
up a dipole antenna. Since then I have been on the air from my flat.
Six years later I finished a five band transceiver based on
semiconductors with a 150 W tube power amplifier and built dipoles and
a cubical quad above the roof of the block of flats.
On 31/12/1979 ended the time of the DM prefix and the GDR got Y2 to Y9
as prefixes. So I worked as Y25NL between 1980 and the reunification of
the two German republics in 1990.
After the reunification all radio amateurs from the GDR got new call
signs with the prefixes DC to DL. I got DL6DSL.
In 1991 first one I bought a transceiver: FT 900 made by
YEASU.
It is a lightweight 100W device and easy to carry when traveling.
In 1998 the government decided the issue of the DM prefix for new
licenses and gave the opportunity to the former owners to get back
their old DM calls. Since October 1998 I have been working as DM3VL
again.
In January 2000 I spent one week on Madeira. After the hiking tours I
worked as CT3/DM3VL on 20m band in PSK31.
In 2001 I moved to a new flat without possibility of construction of
antennas. Since then I have a radio
shack outside Dresden in the village
where I was born. I built verticals for 30/40m, a cubical
quad for 10/15/20m on the top of a
10m tower and a dipole for 17m along the boom
of the cubical quad.
In 2008 I made an Inverted L for 80m.
In April/May 2009 I spent 3 weeks in Kyrgyzstan. Ivan, EX2A helped to
get a license and gave the opportunity to work from his shack as
EX/DM3VL.
In 2009 I improved the Inverted L for use on 80m and 160m.
In 2019 I added two wires to my 80/160m-Inverted-L as Coupled-Resonators for 30m and 40m.
Currently I am in the air by Yaesu FT-DX-5000MP and homemade PA.
In December 2019 I bought Up-Converter 430/2400MHz and 2400MHz-PA 8W
made by DG0VE. Then I made a Helical-Antenna with 16 turns, connected
my FT-818 to the Up-Converter and tested first QSO via satellite QO-100. RX was Web-SDR. In
February 2020 I completed my rig by 90cm-SAT-dish, LNB and SDR-RX.
Since then I am QRV on QO-100.
I hope to hear you soon.
Please send your QSL-card via bureau or direct!
vy 73 de DM3VL
Peter