Topband: Calling without hearing (was CQ 160 WW)

[by way of Bill Tippett <btippett@alum.mit.edu>]

From: "Stan Stockton" <stan at aqity.org>
Subject: Re: Topband: Calling without hearing (was CQ 160 WW)
Date: Tue, 31 Jan 2006 20:44:31 -0600

IF there is really a problem, it will probably take care of 
itself.  I made a mistake in never listening above about 1845 
thinking there probably was no activity up there.  Having it to do 
over, there would be a lot of S&P or perhaps CQ activity by me above 
1850.  As activity increases stations will move to a more clear 
frequency even if it is up as far as 1875 or higher. Think about when 
10M was wide open about 5 years ago.  I can remember running Europe 
as high as 28200 or higher.  When the band is not so alive, stations 
probably don't even listen higher than about 28075.  The problem on 
160M is not nearly as bad as 20M where it is further compounded by 
the fact that you sometimes cannot even hear the stations that are 
100-600 miles away..

Finding a frequency and calling CQ when you can obtain results or 
choosing to S&P when you believe you will produce better results in 
that mode is all a part of it.  As far as what W4ZV says, he is 
correct in that you have a right to call a DX station who is calling 
CQ regardless of whether there is a local calling CQ on the same 
frequency and N2IC is also correct in saying that you have the right 
to CQ provided you are not interfering with a DX station that has 
locals calling that DX station.

However, it would be nice if the contest rules strongly suggested a 
larger window (say 35 Khz.) be reserved for DX stations to call CQ 
from 0000-0600. This would encourage the USA/Canada stations who want 
to call CQ to go up the band during that time period..  They can work 
the weaker ones calling CQ as well as the 50 loud Europeans who would 
call CQ and run USA and Canada when the band is really open.  It 
would also be nice to recommend that same frequency QSOs not take 
place in the JA band between JA sunset and W6 sunrise, whatever times 
those are.  A lot more stations would have the opportunity to work JA 
if split operation were used. It is sometimes frustrating when you 
may only have 30 minutes near sunrise to work a few JA stations and 
there are 20 loud West Coast stations occupying 1810-1825 from 0800 
to after the sun is up everywhere in the USA.  The only hope with the 
current situation is to grab a frequency at a very early time in that 
window and call CQ until sunrise even if you may not hear a single JA 
but in hopes that you might work a couple of them at a sunrise peak.

Stan, K5GO