Topband: Summer Stew Perry

[Kenneth Grimm]

If it were easy, the Summer Stew would lose its charm!  While working
Europe in the Winter is relatively easy for those on the East Coast, I
really had to struggle to pull out two DLs and a PA in this Stew.  I almost
missed my lone Caribbean contact due to heavy QRN.  What I did notice was
that most of the 160 regulars were there, with the big exception of KV4FZ.
One of my first Qs, in broad daylight, was with VE3MGY.  Don, WD8DSB, you
made it into my log as well.  So did K7RAT.  Still, it's ham against mother
nature and to enjoy the Summer Stew, you have to be a little bit of a
masochist...and I sure would miss it if it ever went away!  😷
73 and stay safe,
Ken - K4XL


On Mon, Jun 22, 2020 at 7:18 AM Don Kirk <wd8dsb at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi Rick and gang,
>
> The biggest problem with the band in the summer in the Midwest USA is high
> QRN level from lightning.  As an example during the Stew Perry contest this
> past weekend our noise floor during hours of darkness in Indiana was
> running 20 to 30 dB above our normal noise floor due to lightning which
> made it impossible to hear EU if you were just using simple RX antennas
> such as EWEs or Tuned Loops, etc.
>
> It's the high QRN level during the summer months in the Midwest US that
> causes most of us to disappear from 160 meter activity until the lightning
> subsides in Fall which is typically sometime in October.
>
> You (N6RK) as well as K7RAT had nice signals into Indiana during the Stew
> Perry contest, and it was great to get both of you into the log as I was
> only running 100 watts and using small pennant RX antennas.
>
> 73,
> Don (wd8dsb)
>
> On Sun, Jun 21, 2020 at 7:21 PM Richard (Rick) Karlquist <
> richard at karlquist.com> wrote:
>
> >
> >
> > On 6/21/2020 3:41 PM, List Mail wrote:
> > > I worked K7RAT (with some difficulty) and that was all.
> > >
> >
> > > Luke VK3HJ
> > >
> >
> >  From California, the band was basically only active
> > from sunset until about 0500Z, at which point K7RAT
> > was the last man standing, and it didn't seem like
> > he had much rate.  He was something like 40 dB over
> > S9 here!   After CQing for 10 minutes without
> > any calls, I went QRT.  Only ZL was in the dark by
> > then.  I was too tired to stay up until VK was in
> > darkness.
> >
> > For the brief time when there was some activity, the
> > propagation to the east coast was great.  A dozen or
> > two stations in the FM grid field were easily worked.  After
> > the contest, I got an email from an Ohio station
> > saying I was the only station he heard west of the
> > Mississippi.  So maybe I was in the spotlight.
> > Come to think of it, I didn't heard any east
> > coast stations CQ'ing.  They were all responding
> > to my CQ.
> >
> > K7RAT to some extent made up for KV4FZ not being
> > there :-(  He was often the last man standing in this
> > contest.
> >
> > Anyway, I think we have established that the band
> > works just fine at our Summer Solstice and we just
> > need more activity for this contest.  Before this
> > contest was started a few years ago, I had the
> > mistaken impression that the band was dead in the summer.
> >
> > Rick N6RK
> > _________________
> > Searchable Archives: http://www.contesting.com/_topband - Topband
> > Reflector
> >
> _________________
> Searchable Archives: http://www.contesting.com/_topband - Topband
> Reflector
>


-- 
Ken - K4XL
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