Topband: Last Night - S9SS (the "Alligator")

[charles Lewis]

The few of you who got into my log last night were blessed because I drank more iced tea than I should have at dinner.  I am normally in bed by around 2130 UTC on weeknights because I have to go to work early.
   
  I had been on 1829.5 around my sunset working TR8CA and a few Europeans. Afterward, I left the receiver gain turned up just a little throughout the evening to see if anything popped out of the noise while I was working at a computer in the shack.  Quite some time after I had gone to bed, that tea I drank at dinner decided it wanted to be let out.  When I got up, I noticed I could hear some distinctly copyable CW coming from the turned down receiver in the radio room. Once it got my full attention, I distinctly heard that the call signs were North American.  The stations were calling in a VQ9LA pileup.  For a brief time, those were some of the strongest signals I have ever heard here from NA.
   
  Though it was late, I decided to fire up the amplifier and try a CQ.  By the time I got the ancient Alpha warmed up and re tuned to a spot well above the VQ9 pileup, the NA signals I heard in the VQ9 pileup had greatly diminished in strength.  I decided to try a few CQ's anyway.  I was able to work a few NA stations before the signals all fell below the noise.  I needed many repeats on most calls because of QSB and heavy static crashes on top of the steady QRN. Perhaps the band lighted up again later, but I couldn't sit up too late waiting for it to do so on a work week night.
   
  This time the pennant was useless.  I was hearing much better on the transmit T.  Back at the time of the Stew Perry, the T was useless for receiving and the pennant earned its keep.  160 M is wierd!
   
  I think some of the QSO's last night were repeats, which I don't mind at all, but I hope a few more of you who have been trying for S9 for a long time finally punched through my continual noise.  If so, you would consider it one of your proudest achievements if you understood just how bad my receiving environment is.
   
  I noticed afterward that someone posted on the DX-Summit that I was on a bad frequency for Europeans.  I wasn't trying to be heard in Europe at that time of day.  I get better results with European contacts earlier in the evening.  Anyway, I have lost my list of bad frequencies for Europe that I copied once from this topband list.  Will someone please forward a copy to me?
   
    On the current thread concerning split operation - as is usually the case here on Top Band, I could not hear a pileup last night, but after a while I announced a small split when it appeared obvious that some stations were not hearing my response to them when their turn came to rise to the surface of my sea of noise.  
   
  Despite complaints about it by some, I have never seen the need to split on 160 M as long as the stations I call continue to respond promptly and roger the exchange with apparent ease.  The band is too small in my opinion for me to gobble up a lot of spectrum unnecessarily.  
   
  As for splits in contests, I will not work more than a small unannounced split of less than 1kHz in a CW contest on any busy band, much less 160 M.  However, anyone who does not call me just a bit off frequency during a contest pileup on the bands 80 to 10 meters is not using good sense.   If you are zero beat with everyone else, I am not going to copy you.  It seems a lot of folks have yet to figure that out!  On 160 M, however, in my case it usually doesn't make much difference if everyone is zero beat with everyone else since I usually hear only one signal at a time.
   
  A pointer - if you call me on 160 M and I am struggling to piece together your call sign in the noise, please wait until I get the full call right before you send a report.  I lost one station last night who was extremely difficult to copy in the noise.  I probably would have completed the contact had he not given me his call once or twice followed by repeated RSTs every time I sent a partial and "?".  He faded back into the noise before I could piece together the complete call sign.  Had he concentrated on getting the call sign across to me first, I'm sure he would be in my log now. Save the RST report until I get your call right.  I can usually copy RST's more easily in the noise than I can copy call signs.
   
  FYI, I have begun uploading my logs to the LoTW about once a month.  
   
  Happy Top Band DX'ing in 2006!

   
   
  73,
  Charles Lewis - S9SS

			
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