Topband: LU5OM shortened dipole (inverted vee) doing a nice job

[Don Kirk]

Manuel (LU5OM) had been using an Inverted-L on 160 meters, and he recently
switched to a shortened dipole installed as an Inverted Vee.  Each of the
last 3 mornings Manuel has been using his inverted vee and I have heard
Manuel (LU5OM) all 3 days, and this Sunday morning I heard him for 1.25
hours running with a very constant signal that was able to overcome static
crashes from lightning strikes.  I made some recordings for Manuel and
created a brief youtube video of him calling CQ on Sunday and here is the
youtube video URL for those interested.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P56Rq-vCEEU&feature=youtu.be

If Manuel were not transmitting (not calling CQ) you would think the band
was dead, but in reality there has been pretty good propagation for long
periods of time between Indianapolis Indiana and Argentina the past 3 days
that I have listened.

Also in the video I tried to briefly demonstrate for Manuel that the
reduced RF gain trick provides very little (if any) improvement in my
receiver performance on 160 meters when using my very old Kenwood TS-180s
(contrary to what most others report with their receivers).  Maybe I'm not
doing something right, but I've never been able to find noticeable
improvements (to any great extent) in my receiver performance by backing
down my receivers RF gain control.

Just FYI, and 73,
Don (wd8dsb)