Introduction

DXing is one of the major facets of Amateur Radio and comes from the old telegraph days where the term DX meant distance or distant. In amateur radio it has come to mean making contact with other countries or “Entities”. 

As in most things in life it was not long after amateur radio operations commenced when the competitive side of the hobby became apparent and operators started counting the number of continents they had contacted, this then grew to the number of countries and so on.

Defining a country or entity

In October 1935 Clinton B. DeSoto of the ARRL proposed the definition of “Each discrete geographical or political entity is considered to be a country”. This is still the case today with rules in place for determining the geographical limits. Most DX awards rely on the ARRL’s definitions and their list of approved DX entities.

The Current list of DX entities stands at 340 entries. List is available on the WIA website HERE

Who is the ARRL?

This is a good time to talk about the ARRL – The American Radio Relay League.  The ARRL is the national amateur radio representative body in the USA. They produce a lot of amateur radio literature and provide financial and administrative support to the IARU (Internation Amateur Radio Union). In Australia the WIA (Wireless Institute of Australia) is the national representative body and is a member of the IARU.

What are the awards?

The ARRL started the DXCC (DX Century Club) in 1945 and provided an award for operators who could demonstrate they have contacted 100 entities. They also provide for endorsements when additional entities are contacted – in exact multiples of 50 up to 300 entities then in multiples of 5.

The WIA runs a DX awards program as well and we encourage all members of the club to also join the WIA and take part in this program.

Confirming contacts

 The first thing that an operator needs to do is maintain a log of all their QSOs so they can confirm the date, time, frequency, mode and signal reports of each contact.

Early on paper logs were maintained in “log books” and operators would need to keep track of what countries they needed and which QSOs would enhance their standing on the DX ladder. Now days nearly everyone who is chasing DX uses a logging program most of which will keep track of DX totals and if QSOs have bee confirmed or not.

To demonstrate that an operator has made contact with an amateur in another country the QSO needed to be confirmed in some way. Initially QSL cards were used for this purpose and are still used a bit today but we now usually rely on electronic confirmations. This can be via a facility known as LOTW (Log Book Of The World) run by the ARRL, this is the only one accepted by the ARRL for their awards, or several other systems such as eQSL and clublog.

LOTW requires each party to a contact to upload their QSO details to the online system and if the two entries match then the QSO is confirmed (there is a small time difference allowed). Thus there is a double blind aspect that relies on both parties uploading matching information. eQSL uses a different system as one QSO partner can upload a QSO and the other is informed that this has occurred and can then choose to add that QSO to their log.

Applying for awards

The ARRL allows you to apply for awards through the LOTW site and does require payment for each award or update. The WIA award system is free to WIA members (not available to non-members). Below is an example of the WIA awards certificate.