Conditions were obviously poor during the CQWW CW contest. Plus, the
static level was up (at least in Nebraska). The best time to RECEIVE
stations outside of the American continents on 160 appeared to be
during the first hour of sunlight on either side of sunrise/sunset.
It was in pre-sunset light that I had my best copy of 5V7A. The JA's
peaked in readability after sunrise. EA8ZS (winner?) had a consistently
good signal that was never more readable than during sunlight.
EA3JE and OZ5W both had 559 signals almost an hour before sunset but
didn't come back to any of their many callers (including myself)
during the time that I heard them.
Pre-sunset and post-sunrise are the two times when reciprocal
conditions between transmit and receive does NOT appear to exist.
I ASSUME that this is due to the reduced noise level on receive for
the person in the sunlight. Both stations may be receiving equal
signal levels, but the static level APPEARS to decrease more with the
limited sunlight than the RF signal does. So, the more sunlight
that exists the less likely its been for the DX station that I'm
copying to hear me.
Perhaps these circumstances (along with a possible higher noise
level) is why XZ1N is having a hard time copying the many west
coast stations which are copying him...
73, Bill K0HA
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