Topband: topband report from 4V1JB

[Jan Erik Holm]

I called you for 45 minutes or so, also a lot of
other EU stations called, you did have a decent
signal but problems receiving.
Wow 20 over 9 noise floor, if I had known I never
would have called you, waist of power and time.

73 Jim SM2EKM
-------------------------------------------------
On 2014-12-06 09:36, Jim Brown wrote:
> I can help with RX noise issues.
>
> 73, Jim K9YC
>
> On Fri,12/5/2014 2:01 PM, DALE LONG wrote:
>> Our plans for a 160m operation and CQWWCW entry were delayed due to
>> supply issues and construction woes. THINGS ARE NOT EASY IN HAITI !!!
>> We are very fortunate that we had any place to operate.  We had only
>> very low dipoles on the higher bands at the hotel/guesthouse.
>>
>> Thanks to the great kindness of Jean-Robert HH2JR (who is also famous
>> for his efforts in the Haitian earthquake) we were offered the
>> opportunity to use his nice station for the contest, and operate with
>> the club callsign of 4V1FR.  The last two days we worked on erecting
>> the 160m antenna.
>>
>> We need to be thankful for three things, the kindness of HH2JR, the
>> efforts to put up the antenna (including tower climbing and
>> roof-climbing by an un-named old guy) and the excellent filtering
>> ability of the Elecraft K3.  We did not have time or space for a
>> listening antenna, although with more time I would have tried.
>>
>> In the end we worked 180 stations on topband and had 3100 QSOs in the
>> contest, which is not bad for a contest operation with only two ops.
>> We aso had three lengthy power outages during which we got good
>> exercise trying to start the generator. You probably already know that
>> we were there on the top of every hour.  We made a big effort on 160m
>> because of the need.
>>
>> The antenna was an inverted Vee with one side folded back to the tower
>> about 15 feet from the ground.  The wire almost reached back to the
>> tower.  The other side went over a couple roofs and tied off in a
>> neighboring property.  It was an accomplishment to get this antenna
>> erected and our host HH2JR was delighted to have a 160m antenna.
>>
>> The bad news is that we worked no EU stations, not a single one.  We
>> had 20 over 9 noise constantly...We did not have static crashes, just
>> constant noise.  One leg of the antenna was very close to a WIFI
>> antenna.  Not sure if that was the only culprit.
>>
>> I would like to know how we were being heard in EU...I have no
>> reports.  Our antenna described above and we used an Acom 1011
>> amplifier with about 750w output.  Our best contact was with CN2AA.
>> All other contacts were in the Caribbean area and North America.
>>
>> My goal in the future is to organize a dxpedition for topband
>> operation only.  We are looking for interested operators who love
>> 160m.  We know that contest weekends are not the best for DXing.  We
>> need a dedicated team of topband guys, not one guy without an RX
>> antenna.  But again, we need to thank HH2JR.  Without his kind offer
>> there would have been zero contacts on 160m last weekend.
>>
>> Thanks for all who called and wish that more of you could have been in
>> the log.  Please let me know if you would be interested in doing a
>> 160m dxpedtion from Haiti. And please let me know how was our signal
>> in EU compared to other stations.
>>
>> Thanks & 73
>>
>> Dale - N3BNA
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