Topband: Poor 160m DX Propagation

[Guy Olinger K2AV]

Just looking around the band tonight, and what I'm hearing is pretty
representative of what's been going on.

1) The general propagation is down about what one would historically expect
at this point in the sunspot cycle. We're gonna put up with that for
several years.

2) The propagation seems about right for April, it will get worse because
it's moving toward summer.

3) QRN is getting worse and worse and worse. I can remember in 1958, 59,
deep into 80m NTS traffic nets and having to put up with QRN for 2, 3
months in summer, and now and then having to QSY to 40m for a path
diminished by low power, low antenna, poor antenna, etc. The other 9 months
were QRN free, or QRN spread out so much, not bad enough to bother.

Today, 02Z on 24 April, QRN is coming from a string of thunderstorms,
having a look at Blitzortung.org, that stretch all the way from the Texas
Panhandle to Manitoba.

In late March, there was a string of thunderstorms off the east coast out
about 100-200 miles all the way from Georgia to New Brunswick. It ran all
night without any pause, never cooling off and was still there long after
the sun was up, finally gone the next day after another night.

If you are in Europe using CW and you do not have an EXCELLENT transmit
antenna, running power, I won't hear a peep from you, for sure not until
the QRN dies down, and still likely not, because 1) and 2) above are about
normal for sunspots and seasons. FT8, with the gain in demodulation, and
its organizational advantages, may still make it.

The size and persistence of the QRN storms are steadily increasing, on a
ramp since the 60's, and with the increase absolutely NOT slowing down. We
have this undiminished problem with global average atmospheric energy
increase (also known as climate change and global warming). The size of
storm circulation patterns around low pressure systems has become large
enough to most commonly cover half of the continental US. The increase in
atmospheric energy due to heat retention supplies the energy to push
the circulation out that far.

When I was in college, those patterns would commonly be four, five or six
discrete circulations. Now we are perilously close to creating a
hemispheric low pressure circulation that goes West to East in Mexico and
East to west over the Arctic Ocean. Think that one will have QRN in the
springtime?

Let's not be beating up on folks that are having a hard time hearing on 160
about now. Far worse problems afoot.

I still listen and hear "openings" scattered around among the
disadvantages, kind of like clear patches in a mostly cloudy sky. But I
have neither time nor stamina any more to listen in the wee hours to see IF
someone MIGHT be sending CQ on CW. At least (and primarily) FT8 is all in
one place and can drive a computer which can sound an alarm and get my
attention. I'm not saying I love FT8 more than my faithful love CW. Not at
all. But noting what and how FT8.....

Why outside of contests do we do our CW calling all over the place? Then I
have to go tune in from the P3 display, maybe turn on my K3's APF to copy,
and the CQ call disappears before I figure out who it was.

Why not do non-contest CQ's all on exactly 1825.000, 1825.333 1825.667,
1826.000, 1826.333. Region 1 at the hour:00 plus multiples of 3 minutes,
Region 2 at the hour:01 plus multiples of 3 minutes. Region 3 at the
hour:02 plus multiples of 3 minutes. No transmitting on the calling
frequencies outside of your region's one minute slot. Never, Ever.

Then I can listen on CW using SSB mode to **all 5** calling frequencies at
once, using my 2.7 kHz SSB filter, which will allow me to hear peeps, even
if too weak for copy. Then I look at my watch to see if that is EU or the
Americas, and switch from SSB to CW and the narrow filter, and tune to
where the peep is coming from.

Contact made, then any exchange other than one of either true RST (5n9) or
dB above noise (B15) , or true dB microvolts (nnM for plus dB, Mnn for
minus dB), S units (Sn or S9/nn for dB over S9).

Always go down or up in multiples of 3 kHz for locations, names, rigs,
antennas, ragchew, etc.. The QSY instruction or request is U3, U6, D3, D6,
etc sent 3 times rapidly. Folks will get used to listening on the QSY spots
to know that U3 U6 K3 or D6 from your calling frequency is busy.
Or better.....

Set my P3 to 1826.000, with span set to 15 kHz. Then I can see what is
busy. OK to call stations after prior extended QSO on U/D frequency only.

And if your selectivity won't stand another station up/down 333 Hz, you
need to get a modern receiver or a filter and it's good practice for the CW
contests which WILL force you to deal with 300-400 Hz spacing.

And if a DX station has established a run on a down QSY, when you see a
50D9 on the spot you know that's 1825.000 down 9 kHz, he's outside the +/-
3,6 frequencies, he's on 1816 and pileups should stay between up .5 and up
1.5. 56U12 means he's up on 1837.667 and his pileup is up .5 to up 1.5.

Otherwise, if we don't do something like this, we're just griping into the
wind, or more correctly, griping into the increasing QRN storms. FT8
popularity has given us some really good clues. And the QRN will be getting
worse, for a long, long time.

And we can do this without the regulatory agencies, work out kinks, debate
needed refinements, yada, yada.

And then maybe, just maybe someone can write some software for the CW
signals that will give some demodulation edge and support this or whatever
scheme.

Sorry (but not too sorry) for the rant.

73 & Stay Safe (D*mn I wish this thing would be over.)
Guy K2AV