Last updated: 2007-08-27

Notice: © 2001 to 2007, Chris R. Burger. This document may be reproduced as required for personal use, and may be freely referenced from other Web sites. However, publication elsewhere requires express prior written permission from the author.

Chris R. Burger ZS6EZ
Box 4485
Pretoria
0001 South Africa

Southern Africa is no low band operating haven. There is no concentration of amateurs to work this side of Europe, and the closest Europeans are 7000 km away. In addition, lightning activity is unusually high, especially in the northeastern part of the country. Finally, we're out of synch with the Upper Half. When we have reasonably quiet conditions in winter, amateurs in the northern hemisphere keep their radios firmly turned off, and it is difficult to find anyone to work. If you really want to work DX, you have to endure the massive static of mid and late summer. You strain to hear signals, even the loud ones, and only sunrise presents a temporary respite.

It is no wonder, then, that low band DXing is not commonplace in South Africa. Only three individuals hold DXCC on 1,8 MHz, and less than a dozen 5 Band DXCC certificates have been earned. Most moderately serious DXers have completed the first four bands, but 3,5 MHz remains a challenge.

For more than three decades, from the late Sixties to the mid-Nineties, here was one shining exception. Bert Lausecker ZS5LB was one of the early users of 1,8 MHz, and some of his correspondence in the Sixties with low band pioneers like W1BB have been published in the low band literature. Bert grew up in Austria, where he was drafted into the German Wehrmacht at the outbreak of WW II. Bert was involved in training communications personnel, as he already had the necessary Morse and radio skills at the age of 18. He ended the war in a POW camp in France. He sat there until more than a year after the war's end, before being allowed to return to his wife and young daughter in Austria.

On his return, Bert was instrumental in founding the Ortsgruppe Steyr, in his home town. In 1996, he received a diploma to recognise his efforts as founder, something that pleased him greatly.

The family moved to South Africa not long after the war, and Bert set up an electronics repair shop in northern Natal. He retired in Durban in the late Eighties, and has recently moved into a retirement home in that city.

Bert's amateur career went through several phases. Although he joined the SARL as ZS5-052 in 1954, he was confined to listening until 1967. During this period, Bert was a keen shortwave listener, mainly on 1,8 MHz. His listener reports were met with great excitement, as many of the low band pioneers were surprised to hear that their signals were making it into the Dark Continent. When he was finally licenced, he continued to emphasise the low bands. As he recently said in a telephone conversation: "Eighty is no challenge; it's so easy!". Given that most amateurs shun Eighty because of the challenges of high noise, weak signals and big antennas, his statement speaks of a very determined individual, who's obviously spent too much time on 160!

Bert has had great DXing success over the years. He was the first South African to earn most major low band and five band awards, including 5BDXCC, 5BWAZ, 5BWAS and 160-DXCC. He is also the only amateur to have earned the All Africa Award on 1,8 MHz. Here is a chronological record of his achievements:

WAZ-SSB     SSB Worked all Zones                 1969-09-05    #710
DXCC Mixed  Mixed DX Century Club                1969-10-06 #10 782
DXCC Phone  Phone DX Century Club                1969-10-06   #4711
WAS         Worked all States                    1969-11-05 #20 287
WAC-80      3,5 MHz Worked all Continents       *1970-01-27
A1 Op       A1 Operator's Club                   1971-02-17
5BDXCC      5 band DX Century Club              *1972-03-13    #153
AAA-80      3,5 MHz All Africa Award            *1978-05-30         First on 80
WAZ         Worked all Zones                     1978-10-22   #4387
5BWAS       5 band Worked all States            *1978-12-07    #483
5BWAZ       5 band Worked all Zones             *1983-09-08     #67
DXCC-160    1,8 MHz DX Century Club             *1987-02-06    #199
WAZ-160     1,8 MHz Worked all Zones (36 zones) *1987-03-01     #21
AAA-160     1,8 MHz All Africa Award            *1995-05-29   #1445 First on 160
WAS-160     1,8 MHz Worked all Zones            *1997-03-20    #641

As you can see, in some cases he was in the first handful of stations to get the award. The "*"s indicate that he was the first South African to earn that particular award.

Bert's modus operandi, as explained to me, was to have a receiver by his bedside. He would listen every morning around 04:00 local time, and if there was any sign of propagation, he would get up and turn on the big radio. This strategy certainly yielded results, as I noticed in the Eighties and Nineties that he would always show up when we had good sunrise conditions, almost without exception.

His strategy makes it very clear that an indispensable ingredient in the life of a low band DXer is a very understanding wife! Gristl is certainly that. The two of them still have a grown-up daughter in Durban.

Fortunately, where Bert led, others have followed. In particular, fellow Durbanites Bill Smith ZS5BK and Franz Taschl ZS5MY became very active on the low bands in the early Eighties. They were among the first South Africans to earn the Five Band awards, and their presence on the bands got several other South Africans into the low band DXing game. Bill has subsequently died, and Franz has relocated to Swaziland and Mpumalanga. With Bert in the retirement home with very limited antennas, the three stalwarts are all now inactive, but the momentum they helped create continues on 1,8 MHz. ZS5K was very active for some years before relocating to New Zealand as ZL3IX. ZS6UT is still very active, and attributes his interest in 1,8 MHz to an article that Bert had written in RadioZS, titled How to work 100 countries on 160. ZS4TX and ZS6EZ show up occasionally, especially in contests. Even the likes of ZS6AVP, ZS6PJS and ZS6WB have deserted their customary domain of 50 MHz occasionally to work some DX on 160.

Perhaps a good measure of the growth of low band operating in last decade is the growth of the scores in the southern Africa Band Country Survey. When the first Survey was published in 1994, only Bert had over 100 countries on 1,8 MHz, and the sixth station on the list had less than a dozen. As of May 2001, the same list shows four stations over 100, and the entry level is 56. There is certainly still room for improvement, but we've already come a long way!

Bert turns 87 in December 2007. He now has antenna restrictions that confine him to a small loop antenna, and is active from 10 to 25 MHz with a barefoot radio. In the meantime, his scores remain on the Survey list, and set a very respectable target indeed for today's operators. Even as radios improve and activity increases, I expect that Bert's scores will remain on the lists for a very long time indeed.

The picture shows Bert and Gristl during August 2007, when ZS6EU and ZS6EZ visited them for a 5BDXCC reunion party. Both Bert and Gristl are still in reasonable health in their late Eighties.

Back to ZS6EZ's Home Page.