Campus

Shortwave World Championship: Ilmenau radio amateurs fight for title defense

The German Amateur Radio National Team "DA0HQ-Team Germany" of the DARC e.V., led by the radio amateurs of the local association "X34 - TU Ilmenau", once again competed for victory at the 36th IARU Shortwave World Championship on July 10 and 11, 2021. The German Amateur Radio Club (DARC) e.V. is the largest amateur radio association in Germany with 33,600 members and about 1,000 local chapters. The organizer of the World Cup is the International Amateur Radio Union (IARU), in which the amateur radio associations of the 160 member states are organized.

Amateurfunker Ortsverband X34 - TU Ilmenau
Radio room with two contest teams for the bands 40 and 10 meters.

The world championship takes place annually on the 2nd weekend of July from Saturday 14 o'clock to Sunday 14 o'clock CEST (12 o'clock - 12 o'clock UTC). This year, too, the German team competed in a special classification class in which spatially distributed so-called radio stations contested the competition together. At eight locations, among them besides Ilmenau also Kerpen, Giessen, Horschlitt/Eisenach, Wetzstein, Ulm and Jessen, about 50 radio amateurs were active to transmit the special callsign "DAØHQ" and the association identifier "DARC" all over the world. The signals sent out over shortwave bands of 10 to 160 meters went around the globe and reached even the most remote places.

Outstanding results of the German team

Last year, the DA0HQ radio amateurs made over 22,000 radio connections within the 24 hours of competition, securing the World Championship victory ahead of France. This year, they were able to maintain the number of radio connections at the previous year's level. The club chairman of the Ilmenau local association (X34) and competition leader of the German team DA0HQ, Björn Bieske: "This number is an excellent result. It was only possible due to the enormous commitment of our team, which started the competition highly motivated. I would like to take this opportunity to sincerely thank all the active participants for their fighting spirit and high level of commitment." The official result of the World Championship will be announced in about six months.

Intensive preparation

In the 2021 competition, the team from Germany has set itself the goal of once again prevailing against strong international competition and defending the title. Despite Corona-related restrictions, the preparation for the World Cup was correspondingly elaborate and intensive, including at the Ilmenau site. Björn Bieske: "We have worked out a contest strategy and optimized our radio technology, antennas and computer networks at all DA0HQ locations. In addition, receiving antennas (beverage) were purchased to be able to pick up even the quietest signals. Some repairs had to be carried out on the existing antennas, because the winter had also left its mark this year with a lot of wind, ice and snow."

No major weather-related interference fields

In addition to the skill of the players and ensuring the best possible technical conditions, however, there is another factor that is as important as it is almost impossible to calculate: the radio weather. Since the propagation of radio waves depends on solar activity, radio weather plays a significant role in the successful establishment of radio links. In addition, there are local conditions - major interference levels include electrical discharges in the atmosphere that occur during thunderstorms. "This year," reports Björn Bieske, "the weather was mixed, sometimes sunny, sometimes rainy, but fortunately no major electromagnetic interference fields."

Prominently visited info evening in the run-up to the world championship

To present the activities around the IARU Shortwave World Championship, but also to answer questions about amateur radio, contests, radio technology, antennas and propagation of electromagnetic waves, the local association X34 - TU Ilmenau had invited to an info evening on July 1. Among the guests were the President of the TU Ilmenau, Prof. Kai Uwe Sattler, the Vice President for International Relations and Transfer, Prof. Jens Müller, Ilmenau's Lord Mayor Dr. Daniel Schultheiß and the District Administrator of the Ilm District, Petra Enders. In a relaxed atmosphere, many technical matters were discussed, from the engineering education at the TU Ilmenau to the focus of the courses for obtaining an amateur radio license. The guests were impressed by the commitment of the Ilmenau radio amateurs and Vice President Prof. Jens Müller summarized:

The association lives from the enthusiastic cooperation and active support of all members. Over the years, this has led to technical innovations as well as to worldwide friendships. As the university management, we want to support the association in particular in recruiting young talent, just as it is, conversely, advertising for the TU Ilmenau: Not every engineering university has an amateur radio station that is a world champion!

Should the German team around the Ilmenau local station "X34 - TU Ilmenau" succeed in defending the world championship victory in 2021, this would be no less than the 15th world championship title to go to Ilmenau, Thuringia and Germany in the 35-year history of this competition.

Contact

Björn Bieske

Chairman of the DARC local association X34 -TU Ilmenau