Biography

Thank you for looking at my page. I am Mike, (Don't much care for Michael). I was born in London in 1943, grew up in England and moved to the United States in 1981. I lived and worked in Dallas, Texas until 2008, when I then retired and moved to Mississippi, where I now reside. In Texas I was employed for 25 years as an Operations Manager dealing with storm water and flood control, which involved dredging, heavy earth moving equipment, large pumps, and management of lakes and creeks.
I was not licensed in the UK and did not become a ham until 1989, when I was then issued the call KB5KYO. In the early 90's I activated a number of US islands for the IOTA collectors, including an all time new one, Grand Isle, Louisiana, (NA-168).
I am a DX'er and casual contester. I operate mostly CW and RTTY, I do not care for SSB and rag chewing. I am on the ARRL DXCC Honor roll with 343 countries confirmed. I QSL via LOTW and will return a card if requested. I do not send cards for all contacts since as a contester there are so many repeat contacts.
I am a member of the Cray Valley Radio Society in London and the Great Southern DX Association on the coast of the Gulf of Mexico in Mississippi.
I look forward to meeting many of you on the air, 73, Mike, WM5DX.

Equipment

I have two totally separate stations in my shack. Each station has its own power supply and computer. If I have a problem with one station during a contest I can immediately switch to the other station. I also have three towers with yagi antennas. One tower is a 55ft. crank up with a Mosley Pro 67 beam for 10 through 40 meters and the other is a 45ft. crank up with a Force 12 XR19 beam for 10 through 20 meters. I have an 80 meter slope from the 55ft tower. The third tower is a 40ft. crank up with a 5 element 6 meter and a 12 element 2 meter beam. I can switch from one HF tower to the other on either of the two stations. I can run 6 meters from either station and 2 meters SSB, CW, FM and AM at 100 watts from the Icom 746
My #1 station is an Elecraft K3, with KAT 500 amplifier and KAT 500 tuner and my #2 station is an Icom 746 with an LDG AT-1000 auto tuner and an Ameritron AL-80B amplifier. Each station has its own Navigator interface for digital modes, and its own computer. The computers are networked so that if one fails during a contest I can continue on the other without loss of data.
Typically, I keep one HF beam pointed NE and the other pointed NW so that I can switch directions instantly with the auto tuners, which saves time and wear on the rotors.
I use DX4WIN for general logging and Writelog for contesting. I have been very satisfied with all of my equipment and software, it has proved to be reliable and effective.