I started listening yesterday (Saturday Evening) at sundown monitoring
1826.5 with waterfall local display via a small 3 ft loop. Operators at
VP8STI would come and go checking propagation every 20-30 minutes. Based
upon my experience with the remote I knew I could QSO if the band was
not too crowded.
At about 0430 UTC I made a post on the low band reflector that I was
beginning to hear the station. About 0450 UTC the VP8 was strong enough
to call. After a couple repeats due to QSB he was in the log at 05:05
UTC and slowly faded to nothing by about 05:20 UTC. According to the
waterfall display there were probably only a dozen of us that were
hearing him. I heard him come back to KG7H but he apparently had a fade.
Whoever the operator was took his time to insure a good QSO, that is why
I exchanged contest reports twice during contact with a little QSB. His
signal strength was S1 and I had intermittent static crashed of S3.
Essentially I was in or near the seat listening and watching for about
4.5 hours. I consider my self very lucky to get a contact as NX7M, Josh
N7DD, Larry and N5IA, Milt reported not hearing a peep all within about
350 miles of me.
When I worked them earlier in the week on 80m their signal strength was
no different, just less band noise. (single vertical 100W)
Beam heading was SE at 155 degrees, power from trusty TS480 ~ 100W. I
have no additional RX antennas at the remote site except for a local
spotting RX loop. Receive signals are from TX antenna which in this case
is a 3 EL end-fire beam width of ~110 degrees.
Good luck you guys ! It's a tough one to crack. I'll be listening.
Bob
http://w7rh.net
W7RH DM35OS
Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm
not sure about the former. Albert Einstein
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