Topband: Summer Update & a Surprise

[Peter Sundberg]

If we CW operators would all stay on a very tight frequency passband 
and call CQ every 15 seconds I bet there would be a lot of 
interesting things happening to us also. Especially if we do it 24/7 
or at least every hour that we are not asleep.

However, PC-automation has it's advantages, some are at work while 
working DX and others are gardening. Some even sit by the radio/PC 
and watch things happen :-)

Bottom line is, we need to activate our transmitters more and not 
just listen for others. A perfect example is Bill KH7XS who opens up 
almost any seemingly "dead" band to Europe, at any time, just by 
calling CQ for a while.

CW is not only great fun as you say Dave, CW is King!

73
Peter SM2CEW


At 16:39 2019-07-31, daraymond at iowatelecom.net wrote:
>Interesting observations Jeff.  I will remain on 160 CW as I have in 
>years past.  I enjoy the visceral satisfaction that comes with 
>pulling out the weak signals and having direct, unencumbered 
>interaction with the station to which I'm communicating. . .or 
>trying. . .hi.  CW is still great fun.
>
>73. . . Dave, W0FLS
>
>-----Original Message----- From: k1zm--- via Topband
>Sent: Wednesday, July 31, 2019 7:20 AM
>To: topband at contesting.com
>Subject: Topband: Summer Update & a Surprise
>
>Hi Gang
>
>
>It is mid summer here and E season on 6M has been fun to play with 
>while 160m is pretty S L O W as it usually is.
>On these pages there has been alot of chatter regarding FT8 - (which 
>basically took over 6M DX'ing starting in July 2917 - all DX is now 
>on 50.313 FT8 - which is why I had to adopt this mode in order to 
>continue DX'ing on 6m).  It was either do that or give up operating 
>on 6M during E season.
>I do hope that CW continues to thrive on Topband - but this past 
>season there was TONS of DX on FT8 and in my opinion LESS DX on CW 
>than in prior years.   It is quite possible to work in JA on 160m 
>from here on FT8 with 100w out - which would have been quite rare 
>indeed on CW as I recall (I do not think I ever worked JA with 100w 
>from here - but who knows?)
>Today as I write this - I am listening to 28.074Mhz on a totally 
>DEAD 10m band.  If I tune the entire CW portion and the whole SSB 
>portion, there is NOTHING - repeat NOTHING there - no signals 
>whatsoever to be found.
>Yet on 28.074Mhz - I just worked a whole page of Europeans on FT8 - 
>to my almost total INCREDULITY!!
>I am not sure how I feel about all of this - but one thing is SURE - 
>the DX world has changed - and there is no looking back.
>I love CW on Topband and used to love CW on 6m - but that no longer 
>xists  -so I do hope the 6m migration to FT8 does not repeat itself on Topband!
>To all a good summer and CU on CW again starting in September.
>73 JEFF   VY2ZM
>
>
>.
>
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