[SEDXC] 3B7C

James Streible k4dli at earthlink.net
Tue Oct 2 19:51:21 EDT 2007


Here is a copy of an e-mail by K3NA on the Topband Reflector for anyone who doesn't get it.

After reading this i feel very--very-fortunate to have gotten a contact on160 with them.

Jim  K4DLI


Hello everyone --

   My 160m experiences at 3B7C were fun but also often frustrating.

   Highlights were the long/skew path QSOs with stations in zone 3 
around 1400z.  I was the operator every afternoon (our time) for 
1330-1430z, but we only had three days in which anything certain could 
be heard from zone 3.  The first day yielded some individual characters 
but nothing like a callsign.  Another day yielded a couple of QSOs and 
some fractional calls... and the following day some more QSOs were 
completed and several other calls copied (and called without response).  
Unfortunately conditions shifted as the geomagnetic field became active 
and I never heard anything else from zone 3 during the remaining 
afternoons.  However, it sure was exciting to work those few stations on 
an extreme path.  I'm sorry we didn't get more in the log, but at least 
we tried consistently.

   Most nights were long and difficult.  Thunderstorm static levels 
varied from "not too bad" to much worse.  One evening I had the 8pm to 
midnight shift, and thought static was "not too bad" and was grinding in 
the JAs and Europeans into the log.  At 2000z I turned the radio over to 
my relief, who was an HF operator giving top band a try.  The next 
morning at breakfast he told me conditions were horrible!

   Unfortunately, none of us who worked top band shifts saw the ducted 
openings into North America that we experienced on many nights from 3B9C 
three years ago.  Other than the handful of stations with excellent 
antenna systems, most signals were weak, about equal to others calling, 
and down in the background QRN.  "Background QRN" means the propagated 
static from thunderstorms far away.  "Foreground QRN" means static 
crashes from the rain storms around our atoll -- short but very heavy 
with high winds (40 knots or more on occasion).  So a good night on top 
band was letting the CQ machine run, listening to the buzz of stations 
calling who were too buried in the background QRN to copy... and waiting 
for a propagation bubble to lift one station up for long enough to make 
a QSO.  Often a station would be strong enough to get his call copied 
(or most of the call), but would not last long enough to make a second 
transmission.  QSO rates were 20-30 an hour... but I remember one hour 
of the North American opening when I worked just four stations.

   I had to laugh when some of these weak signals would ask for "SSB" or 
even "RTTY".  There was no chance these guys would be heard on either 
mode... and we were reluctant to leave the pile of weak stations to run SSB.

   It was obvious to us that many stations had trouble copying us as 
well; we found quite a few stations calling us a second (or third) time 
10 minutes or so after their initial QSO... probably uncertain that we 
had completed and logged the first attempt. This made us reluctant to 
increase our CW speed -- but faster calls were more likely to result in 
completed QSOs than slow ones.

   In this respect, one topband contributor suggested that the 3B7C 
operator should have transmitted the other station's callsign multiple 
times; e.g., W1ABC W1ABC W1ABC 55N 55N W1ABC BK.  We found quickly that 
this just did not work at all under the conditions.  By the time we made 
such a long transmission, propagation would have shifted and W1ABC would 
again be inaudible.  The most successful approach was to reply 
immediately at a fairly high speed for topband (e.g., 27 WPM) with a 
very short transmission; e.g., "W1AB? 5NN W1AB?" or, if we had the whole 
call, just "K1XYZ 5NN" -- and, with luck, propagation would hold long 
enough to hear a report and send our TU message.  Many times we never 
got the report... or, judging from the duplicate contacts, the other 
station never heard the TU.

   In many respects it did not matter that some people were calling us 
non-stop; we couldn't hear these stations.  It was about the only time 
when I wasn't annoyed at non-stop callers - hi!

   When we announced a listening frequency (e.g., 1831), that is where 
we were listening.  I rarely tuned as much as a kHz either side of my 
announced frequency, as anyone calling that far away was generally 
uncopiable or would not be discovered soon enough to capture the full 
callsign.  The stations who got through were calling very close to the 
announced frequency when propagation gave their signal a boost, so that 
I could start to copy them right away.

   As a North American, I watch sunset approach North America very 
carefully!  At Rodrigues Island 3B9C, I limited my QSOs to North America 
when darkness started to reach the continent.  But conditions this month 
at St Brandon were completely different.  After the first few days (when 
all the loud stations were worked), European signals were just as weak 
as North American signals.  There was no point in calling CQ NA when I 
could not copy either a NA or an EU station.  And when my rate is 1 QSO 
every 2 minutes (about 10 CQ attempts), it doesn't matter if the ONE 
station I can copy in that interval is a European or a North American.  
The European who got the propagation lift did not prevent any North 
American station from being worked -- the European was the ONLY station 
I could copy during those 15 seconds it took to make the QSO.  Once he 
was in the log, I was back to listening to the buzz down in the noise, 
waiting for the ionosphere to bubble up another call from somewhere.  If 
you listen to the recordings, you won't find many instances where we had 
TWO stations calling and copyable simultaneously.

   Again, all these comments are about operating under the conditions we 
experienced during the 2000-0230z period after the first few days of 
operations.  Under different conditions (such as those strong signal, 
spotlight, ducted openings of three years ago), a different operating 
technique would be appropriate.

73,

   -- Eric K3NA
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