I asked Dan KB6NU for the possibility of publishing his article, which you can currently see at www.eham.net. He gladly agreed. His grandparents, in fact the whole family, come from Slovakia, so he himself feels affection for our nation. But let's go to his article:
If I were seriously interested in DXing, I'd probably buy a big amp and a ten-element yagi that would sit on a 15-foot mast. But I'm not that kind of person… I'm more of an occasional dx-man. In my kingdom (Shack) currently you can find Icom IC-735 and outside I have a 20m vertical unipolar antenna into which goes something in the range of 50 to 100W. If the conditions are good, I also like to look for dx, and if not, I am happy to work with US stations. I am aware that there are many casual dx-men on the bandwagon. These include mainly people who don't have the money to build a real DX-station, don't have the time to monitor the conditions, but above all love to make connections with operators outside their own country, if they can of course. I have some tips for such people:
You will read in the article
Band selection
Use the correct band. Generally speaking, you should use the largest frequency band that is open. If the 10m band is open, go there. You will do much more there than if you were at 20m or 17m in those moments. Listen! This is perhaps the most important, if you can't hear the dx station you can't do it. I personally have worked with many dx stations just by looking at the band and listening carefully, especially to each one CQ challenges. In many cases, I was the only one who answered their call.
Listen even if the band seems very quiet. Sometimes this means that the promotion for dx stations is excellent, but not enough for a short hop, so you can't hear your neighbors... I remember one evening I was scanning the bands and after a while, when I was about to wrap it up, I heard a Spanish operator calling CQ with a 599 signal! Of course I responded to his CQ and my report with him was 579. We had a good time QSO on the "dead" band.
Also, listen very carefully for any weak signals. It's not uncommon for me to work with a few DX stations whose signal was almost unreadable, but for some reason they read me nicely and we exchanged solid reports.
Quality headphones
Get quality headphones that will help you with weak stations... I personally bought a pair of quality headphones, without which I would not have been able to make several interesting connections. Be patient. If the DX does not hear you after the first call, stay on the frequency and try again. Many times, dx-stations are interested in working with as many people as possible, which means they get rid of them one by one. Unless they are extremely rare, or the band is not very active, they will soon get rid of the strongest ones and then it will be your turn. But if you give up too soon, you'll never get your chance.
CW telegraph skills
Improve your CW skill. After all, everyone knows that it is easier to work with DX using CW than a phone. There are several reasons for this. First, weak CW signals are more readable than weak SSB signal. This is all the more important if you use max 100W of power, not to mention if you only go as QRP. You will hear many dx-stations working 20 wpm and above. A lot of them are polite and will slow down when they hear someone calling out a challenge at 12 or 15wpm, but it's still better if you can make contact with them at the same speed they're calling CQ.
Contesty
Zúčastňujte sa contestov. V contestoch máte najväčšiu šancu pracovať s novými DXCC. Počas contestu nielenže budete počuť veľa DX-staníc, ale budete môcť s nimi aj nadviazať cenné spojenie.
Nemusíte sa zúčastniť celého contestu, a rovnako nemusíte poslať svoj denník pre skórovanie. Zistite si aké informácie požadujú na výmenu pri spojení, a to buď počúvaním rôznych kontestov alebo vyhľadávaním v rôznych časopisoch, alebo internete. Pokiaľ ich máte, nič Vám nebráni sadnúť si a pohrúžiť sa do kontestovania…
Ďalšou výhodou zúčastňovania sa contestov je to, že vám pomôže zlepšiť Vašu rýchlosť v telegrafii. Moja teória je taká, že počas contestu sa viac sústredíte, čo pomáha lámať mentálnu bariéru ktorú si vybudujeme počas tréningu na vyššiu rýchlosť. Vzhľadom na to, že som Vám dal tieto tipy si môžete myslieť, že mám DXCC s pár stovkami krajín v mojom denníku a veľkým boxom s QSL tickets. Unfortunately, this is not true. I returned to the band in August 2002, since then I have made calls to about 60 countries, and those QSL cards are not many either. However, after all that, if I knew the exact numbers and got a higher percentage of QSL tickets for my connections, I probably wouldn't be a casual dx-man anymore, or would I?
By Dan Romanchik KB6NU, translated by Oliver Bross M3SDO.
Website: http://www.blurty.com/~kb6nu