Topband: Best condx to JA of season

[David Raymond]

Greetings Topbanders. . .

After what has been a pretty mundane season on topband, today brought the best Asian opening of the season from here in Iowa.  The morning started out with a quick qso with HR9/WQ7R.  Then tuning around a bit I heard JA8ISU CQing with a big signal (peaking 5-10/S9).  After working Kaz and realizing the band was in good shape, I started CQing at 1158z.  I logged my last Q at 1318z, near my SR.  After all was said and done, HL5IVL, UA0NL, RT0Q, and RW0LD had called in plus 17 JA stations.  At least 8 or 10 of the JA stations were first time calls.  I possibly could have worked more stations but took the time to dig out the really weak ones (and there were some darn w-e-a-k ones), sometimes taking several minutes just to get the correct call sign.  In spite of the fact that the band was quiet, the 8 circle array proved its worth consistently beating the TX array on receive by a modest margin.  Anyway, while it wasn't like openings of a year or two ago (30 or 40 JAs in one setting) it was, nevertheless, encouraging and great fun.  Sometimes, you just have to be QRV. . .part of the mystery of topband.

73 to all. . .Dave
W0FLS