Dayton Hamvention 2023 Recap

Dayton Hamvention May 19, 20, 21, 2023 takes place at the Greene County Fairgrounds and Expo Center in Xenia, Ohio

You can visit their website for more info!

DAYTON HAMVENTION 1923"Innovation!"This is an exciting theme because we are confident it encompasses in just one word the world of Amateur Radio today. There are so many exciting “Innovations!” world wide in Amateur Radio we want to capture the spirit and we expect to see many of these throughout the coming year and presented at HV23. Will you be involved in an Innovation!

Hamvention 71th Reunion 1952 - 2023

The 2023 Hamvention attendance was 33,861.
This is more than 2,000 greater than last year and even surpassed the previous pre-pandemic attendance record at the Greene County Fairgrounds and Expo Center of 32,472.
General Manager Jim Storms AB8YK said, “Things went very smoothly due to the dedication and hard work of close to 700 volunteers.”

For the 2nd time, starting in 2022, the contesters will be staying at Hope Hotel and Conference Center at Wright-Patterson Airforce Base, Ohio which is closer to Xenia, where the Hamvention is being held. There are 265 guest rooms that went on sale at 9:00 AM on June 8th and sold out within a few hours. Contest University will be held here all day Thursday, May 18, 2023 and hosted by Tim Duffy K3LR. This is where the Top Band Banquet will be held on Friday May 19, 2022 and Contest Banquet will be held on Saturday May 20, 2022. Visit contestuniversity.com or contact Tim for more info.

Buses starting at 7:00 AM leave from the Hope Hotel every 30 minutes to the Hamvention in Zenia. The buses also leave the Hamvention every 30 minutes back to the Hope Hotel.

The weather in Xenia, Ohio on the Hamvention weekend was:
Thursday May 18: Sunny 70 deg. F
Friday May 19: Sunny 80 deg. F
Saturday May 20: Sunny, 66 deg. F
Sunday May 21: Sunny 75 deg. F

2023 Hamvention Award Winners

Michael Kalter W8CI co-chairman and Frank J. Beafore WS8B co-chairman of the Hamvention Awards Committee are delighted to present this year’s amateur radio award selections.

Our winners are:

Technical Achievement Award: Dr. James Breakall WA3FET

Dr. James Breakall’s work has been instrumental in amateur radio antenna technology development for decades. He has teamed with many experts in the field to develop state of the art advancements with a wide range of applications, including the Numerical Electromagnetic Code (NEC). As a professor of electrical engineering at Penn State University from 1989 to 2022, Dr. Breakall (WA3FET) developed cutting edge antenna technology and mentored his students in amateur radio, resulting in 700 new licensees. Now a retired Professor Emeritus, he serves as a consultant to the Army, Air Force and Navy on many antennas related projects.

Nittany Scientific, a company initiated with his students, developed some of the first optimization methods applied to NEC in a package called NECOPT, a design he called Optimized Wideband Antenna (OWA) Yagi. The optimization had the goals of minimum peak SWR in a band, maximizing the lowest gain in a band, and maximizing the minimum front-to-back ratio in the band. These OWA Yagi designs have been used in numerous contest and DX stations around the world. Because he wanted this technology to be readily available worldwide, he has never pursued patent licensing. He also was the first to use helicopter measurements and Geometrical Theory of Diffraction (GTD) techniques for antennas in terrain at HF that led to software such as TA and HFTA.

In 2010, Dr. Breakall in conjunction with Joe Taylor (K1JT), Angel Vazquez (WP3R) and Pedro Piza, Jr. (NP4A) collaborated to use the Arecibo 1000 ft. dish to do moonbounce (EME). He worked on many antenna designs at Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico and at the HAARP facility in Alaska. Dr. Breakall has been a frequent forum presenter at Hamvention sharing his expertise on antenna design and enthusiasm for amateur radio.

As an avid amateur radio contester, Dr. Breakall has built contest stations in Pennsylvania and Puerto Rico and participated in over 100 contests, winning a fair amount of them. Dr. Breakall has authored numerous peer-reviewed scientific articles and books.

Amateur of the Year: Carsten Dauer DM9EE

Carsten Dauer (DM9EE) has been active in European amateur radio through WRTC and YOTA for 30 years. Recently, he has spearheaded DM9EE-Helping Hands, a movement to provide amateur radio equipment to war torn Ukraine by collecting donations and delivering them personally to communities in Ukraine. Approximately 5000 kg of radios, power banks, solar packs, and first aid have been shipped to Ukraine along with the donation of countless hours of planning, packing, documentation, and accessing permits have gone into this endeavor. On the return trip from Ukraine Carsten transports war refugees to havens in Germany, including his own hotel.

Supporting amateur radio friends and inspiring youth involvement is Carsten’s passion. On his website https://dm9ee.de/dm9ee-ukraine-help/, he states, “Ham radio gave me a lot and I try to give back to our great hobby. The world is very small when you have a radio license. You talk to the world, and eventually you also visit people in other countries… and you always learn more about culture, when you know people there. Ham radio is great to learn languages, even if it is only a few friendly phrases.”

Club of the Year Award: The Delaware Valley Radio Association (DVRA)

The Delaware Valley Radio Association (DVRA), an ARRL affiliated club formed in 1930, serves the Trenton, New Jersey metropolitan area. The club has tripled in size over the last six years due to the wide range of amateur radio activities and events they offer. An all-purpose club, the DVRA’s activities include public service events, operator training/mentoring, Scouting events, informational monthly meetings, POTA events, and the operation of a world class club station.

The DVRA center of activity is club station W2ZQ, which operates a regular schedule. The station was renovated six years ago and currently houses two complete HF stations, a VHF repeater, an APRS digipeater and a WinLink VHF-RMS node. The recent addition of 1296 MHz EME capability has been optimized with the assistance of member Joe Taylor (K1JT). Station activities include an open house, hands-on seminars, contesting, and special event activations. Most importantly, the exchange of ideas that occurs within the walls of the building is priceless.

The DVRA’s focus on training and its diversification of projects attract new and prospective hams and engage radio amateurs at all levels and with widely varying interests.

The Southwest Ohio DX Association presents the DXpedition of the Year Award.

Our goal is to recognize excellence in DXpedition planning and execution from Most Wanted entities. DXpeditions that were completed from March 2022 through February 2023 are eligible for this year’s award. The Southwest Ohio DX Association is proud to announce that the 2023 DXpedition of the Year award goes to TN8K, Republic of the Congo. We congratulate the team on a well-organized and executed DXpedition in a very challenging environment.

Announcing: 2023 Inductees to the CQ Amateur Radio, Contesting and DX Halls of Fame.

The CQ Amateur Radio Hall of Fame honors those individuals, whether licensed hams or not, who have made significant contributions to amateur radio; and those amateurs who have made significant contributions either to amateur radio, to their professional careers or to some other aspect of life on our planet. This year, we are inducting six new members, bringing to 339 the total number of members inducted since the hall's establishment in 2001.

The 2023 CQ Amateur Radio Hall of Fame inductees are:

Andrew "Andy" Andros, W0LTE (SK), and brother Theodore "Ted" Andros, W0URN (SK), founders of Hy-Gain Corp. Their first antenna, the TH-3 triband trap beam, got the company off to a solid start. The company went on to become a major antenna manufacturer for the amateur, CB, military and diplomatic markets; later sold to Telex and then to MFJ Enterprises, which continues to produce Hy-Gain antennas, rotors and accessories.

John G. "Jack" Curtis, K6KU (SK) – Revolutionized CW keying by developing circuitry for an iambic memory keyer and putting it on a chip. The chips were later integrated into many commercial transceivers featuring built-in electronic keyers.

Gerald "Jerry" Lawson, WA6LVN (SK) – Pioneer of home video games, helping to develop the first cartridge-based video game controller, which allowed users to switch between multiple games. Also one of the few African-American engineers working in the computer industry as the first video games were developed.

The 2023 Inductees to the CQ Contesting Hall of Fame are:

Kirk Pickering, K4RO – Founding member, past president and past vice president of the Tennessee Contest Group; webmaster of TCG website; has hosted many new contesters at multi-ops from his home station; 3-time US winner in ARRL Sweepstakes CW/QRP category and regular top-ten finisher in multiple contests; past editor and columnist ("Contesting 101") for National Contest Journal.

Ken Claerbout, K4ZW – Accomplished contester both domestically and as DX, operating from over a dozen countries around the world. A driving force in the ongoing training and mentoring of students at ET3AA, the radio club at the Addis Ababa University School of Electrical and Computer Engineering. On a recent visit, he helped students install one of the few HF skimmers in Africa to feed the Reverse Beacon Network. He has served in multiple positions for the YASME Foundation and is past president of the Potomac Valley Radio Club. In that role, he began a series of contesting-related webinars that has morphed into today's Contest University.

Bernhard "Ben" Buettner, DL6RAI (SK) – Avid contester and contest administrator who has operated from 49 different DX entities. Co-founder and past president of the Bavarian Contest Club (BCC), Ben helped develop and maintain the club's DX cluster, the first in Germany. He is also a past director of the Worked All Europe DX Contest (WAEDC). In that role, he spearheaded the conversion from paper to electronic logging and the introduction of electronic log checking. Ben is also a former member of the CQWW Contest Committee, served as IT manager for WRTC-2018 in Germany, and has been a beta tester for Win-Test contest logging software.

The 2023 CQ DX Hall of Fame inductees are:

Arecio "Al" Hernandez, K3VN – Al has been deeply involved in DX expeditions to many rare and difficult to reach destinations. He has traveled to more than 100 countries, operated from at least 20 of them and has participated in close to a dozen award-winning expeditions. Al is a prolific public speaker and author. His first DX expedition article was published in CQ magazine in 1976. He is an expert in electromagnetic interference and compatibility and holds seven patents in the field.

Adrian Ciuperca, KO8SCA – Adrian has been on 30 DXpeditions in just over seven years, including the recent 3Y0J expedition to Bouvet Island. He actively promotes amateur radio to young people in places that he visits (assuming it's a location with people!) and is frequently the voice or face of various trips to the amateur community, appearing on interview shows and writing about the adventures for CQ and other publications. Adrian is also the tech support person for 4U1UN, the amateur station at United Nations headquarters in New York City and can frequently be found operating there when he isn't traveling to some remote part of the world.

Contest University, created by Tim Duffy K3LR, took place on Thursday May 18 at the Hope Hotel.

A YouTube video is now available for the entire Contest University!

2023 Silent Key List read by K1AR at the Contest Dinner:

K3ZO, N7TR, K2QMF, K6TA, LA5KO, V31MD/NM2D, ZL1AIH, K6GT, K7NV, W7DR, B. Walsh (son of N2AA), AA5B, WX7P, K6EBB, W1YL, K0JPL, VE7FO, K2HK, W7OM, K0GND, K4JRB, AF3P, WA6O, W2OX/V47KP, 8P6CC, K7DX/DJ0QN, K6EVR, AC4CA, N2VV, AC8G, K5NA, WB6BFG, GW3YDX, HA1AD, K8JQ, DL6RAI.

CQ Hall of Fame, DX Hall of Fame, Contest Hall of Fame info courtesy of CQ Communications, Inc

| HamGallery Homepage |