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[HCDX] DESIGNING YOUR OWN PFC
Looked at older issues of WUN and found the follweing article .Please use
moonospaced lettrsto read the text and graphics
*** DESIGNING YOUR OWN PFC ***
This month we're going to do something which every ute ought to know: how to design
or customize a PFC (Prepared Form Card) that'll draw the sort of attention from station
personnel to get a QSL from them.
A Prepared Form Card is one way a ute can speed up and increase the chances that a
station to which he has submitted one will reply with a QSL (QSL, by the way, is an old
CW/Morse abbreviation for 'please verify' or 'please acknowledge'). When you send a
reception report to a station in letter form, it then must fill out its own separate reply
referring to the data in your letter. These replies, occasionally issued by stations in QSL
card form, can be sharp looking and in that way preferable to a ute's own PFC.
Certain stations, such as time-keeper WWV, attend regularly to QSL'ing reception
reports. But, needless to say, there are plenty more out there that have better things to
do than cross-check your data to their logs and then fill out cards or verification letters.
Also, the use of a PFC has become almost standard practice now since most ute
stations no longer issue QSL cards. It therefore should be one of your basic tools. Fig. 1
gives you an approximate idea of how your PFC should appear.
=====================================================
| (graphic) CALLSIGN |
| STATION |
| QTH |
|___________________________________________________|
| This will Verify Reception of: |
| (CALLSIGN, STATION, ID) |
|ON: (FREQ) KHZ (MODE) AT: (UTC TIME) DATE: (DATE)|
|===================================================|
| TRANSMITTER/POWER:_____________ |
| |
| TYPE ANTENNA____________________ |
| |
| LOCATION:_________________________ |
| VERIFYING OFFICIAL AND STAMP: |
| |
| |
| |
=====================================================
fig.1
The PFC simplifies a station's task. On it (the standard size is about 6" x 4") the ute
listener lists all the data relevant to the trans- mission (including date, time, frequency
and mode; you may leave spaces for the station to fill in their location and the type of
antenna and power used). This eliminates one step in the QSL process, which is the
task of filling out their own form with your information. For their convenience your PFC
has spaces beside the reception data for their ink stamp and the station manager's or
attendant's signature. All that's left for them to do is stamp and sign it.
It may not always look as good as an official QSL, but it has essen- tially the same
value. It certifies that you heard a given transmission at the time and on the frequency
listed on it (which is all that counts in contest). And there are those, too, who swear by
the appearance and quality of their PFC's. (WUN's own Rick Baker uses WordPerfect
with over 10 megs of graphics and a 600 dpi laser printer to customize each PFC he
sends.) If you're just starting out, you may also try having generic PFC blanks (with
spaces to be filled in) printed up commercially in a batch, say, of 500. In many cases,
your PFC and the facility and clarity of its design will make all the difference between a
report getting prompt attention or ending up on the bottom of a pile of papers (or even in
the wastebasket).
There might be those who are wondering just how much point there is to QSLing if it
consists of little more than collecting verification cards. It should be added, however, that
many stations which send back verifications often include with them various kinds of
freebies, such as decal-stickers, photographs of transmitters and antenna arrays, post
cards, etc. Enough loot of an offbeat sort eventually to start a small archive. So there is
this added bonus on top of QSL collecting's usual reward.
That's about all for this month. Next month we're going to look at specific stations to be
QSL'd by utes: easy ones, harder, and the most diffi- cult, and how they should be
approached. Until then, 73s and Happy Monitoring.-
NEW WEB PAGES on my site
-Pieria-TV.html : my TV channel in Katerini
-ths-trans.html Transmission sites in Thessaloniki
-TVRO.html: Important TVRO instrallations ( big file+pics)
-DE1103.html etc 1102 /PL200 /1103 comparative results
-Bolong.html a test o old Bolong radio
-Thesfm.htm Update on Fm on thessaloniki
-De808A.html , my new MP3 player
-mp3_comp2.htm new comparison of MP3/WMA codecs
------
Please do not send mesages above 400 kB
Zacharias Liangas , Thessaloniki Greece
greekdx @ otenet dot gr --- www.geocities.com/zliangas
Pesawat penerima: ICOM R75 , Lowe HF150 , Degen 1102,1103,108,
Tecsun PL200/550, Chibo c300/c979, Yupi 7000
Antenna: 16m hor, 2x16 m V invert, 1m australian loop
---[Start Commercial]---------------------
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Order yours from http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0823059367/hardcoredxcom/
---[End Commercial]-----------------------
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THE INFORMATION IN THIS ARTICLE IS FREE. It may be copied, distributed
and/or modified under the conditions set down in the Design Science License
published by Michael Stutz at http://dsl.org/copyleft/dsl.txt