Topband: 49 contest stations caught on tape this AM

[Tod Olson]

Barry:

I found your tape fascinating. I am very envious of the low noise level
that was recorded - -  beverages must make a difference. :)

Although I heard, from my Idaho QTH, some of the same signals you
recorded, the signal levels were considerably different. KG7H, WA7LT, W6YI
were noticeably louder for me. Even AB5M was louder. NI6T seems to be
missing from your tape although they were active and loud every time I was
operating.

The big signals on your tape seem to be from stations that are less than
700 miles from you. The DX stations simply did not exist - at least for me
while I was listening. [I was sleeping at 4:00 AM MST <1100 UTC>]

I managed to hear and work a couple of FL stations, one ME station, and
one VA station. Only the ME station was comfortably above the noise level.
This year most of the East Coast stations simply did not seem to be on the
air. [I am sure that they were on the air but I just could not hear them].
While it seemed I could fairly easily work stations within 700 miles of my
QTH, there simply aren't enough of them. Most of the stations I was able
to work by calling CQ had signals that required a great deal of
concentration. All in all I found this to be one of the more challenging
years for this contest. It simply seemed as though the propagation was
insufficient to overcome the listening challenges of my station on 160m.
In other years this has not been the case. In fact, it was not the case
for the ARRL 160 and the CQWW CW 160 earlier in this contest season.

The conditions served to make one appreciate good propagation. And your
tape, during what I deem to be a poor propagation period, shows how a
really good station can overcome some of the poor propagation effects.


Thanks again for making it available.

73, Tod, K0TO




On 2/26/12 6:49 AM, "Barry N1EU" <barry.n1eu at gmail.com> wrote:

>I had the tape running this morning around 1100Z as I scanned the band and
>I caught 49 stations, and I posted the sound clip to
>
>http://n1eu.com/mp3/cq160ssb26Feb12_1100Z.mp3
>
>That's what it sounded like in Albany NY on my Orion and Beverage antenna.
>Unfortunately the stereo diversity was lost in the recording (my bad).
>Below is the list of stations in order:
>
>W0AIH
>N4HB
>WW8OH
>ND8DX
>K4WW
>N2EOC
>WA7LT
>W8CO
>NT8Z
>AB5MM
>C6ANM
>W0MR
>KK1KW
>NF8J
>WD5COV
>N2CW
>WB9Z
>VE3MIS
>N3RR
>K2GE
>W8GP
>W6YI
>KG7H
>N9UY
>W2ID
>K3STX
>W2MF
>W8XXX
>W5PR
>AK5DX
>W3TS
>AB2DE
>ZF2AM
>WA4ZXV
>N3HBX
>K1AR
>W3KL
>W1XX
>K1LZ
>K8PO
>CO2GG
>VE3DC
>WJ2D
>K9NW
>N4BCC
>W0MR
>KA1IOR
>AB5MM
>N2EOC
>
>
>73,
>Barry N1EU
>_______________________________________________
>UR RST IS ... ... ..9 QSB QSB - hw? BK