[Skimmertalk] IARU and Skimmer

[Pete Smith]

I'm looking for after-action reports.  I ran a single-band 20M Skimmer this 
weekend in the IARU - because my all-band SoftRock is temporarily hors de 
combat.  Discovered one thing for sure - you absolutely have to protect 
your Skimmer RX from your transmitted signal - not just to prevent damage, 
but because if the receiver is completely hammered, it takes a couple of 
seconds for the Skimmer decoders to recover.  If you're only running 3 
seconds or so between CQs, you're losing 2/3 of your listening time, you 
miss a lot, and the number of busted calls goes up rapidly.  Bandpass 
filters and other isolation measures seem to be essential.

On the other hand, I found Skimmer quite effective for filling my bandmap 
on 20 when I was operating other bands, even though my SO2R isolation isn't 
wonderful; evidently it can handle an ordinarily loud local signal without 
much diminution in accuracy.

73, Pete N4ZR