I have been playing around with FT8 on 160M and am a bit puzzled. I have
made plenty of contacts, but with many stations, it seems to require an
inordinate amount of power to get their attention, or they do not
respond at all. I also have noted that I can hear in a 2.8 kHz passband,
signals that register from -12 to -17 dB. About the weakest that I see
is a bit more than -20 dB. Does this mean that FT8 is only a few dB
better than CW? I have my time set accurately and I try to place my TX
signal away from whomever I am calling on a clear spot on my waterfall.
Some stations are easy to work, and I have worked across the country
(FN43 to a CM grid) running just 1 watt. It just seems that there are
many stations that are not hearing much, but are making plenty of
noise. Am I wrong?
I am working on cleaning up my 160 setup and have 8 beverages running
and they are all pretty quiet now that I installed plenty of ferrite
chokes around on the RG-6 feed lines. I am looking forward to next fall
and winter.
73
Dave K1WHS
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