Topband: VE6WZ QSO

[VE6WZ_Steve]

Very FB ears Andy.  That EF Beverage array is working well.
You were also very weak, but just enough of a short QSB peak for the QSO.
I was RX via the direct polar path on the Beverage array and 9 C in diversity.

As others have said, the condx this season have been very poor for the trans-polar path to EU.
For example, I did a log extract for my 160m QSOs for the 4 months starting in August for the last three years:

In 2020 at this point I had logged 766 EU QSOs with 240 unique calls.
In 2021 (last year) I had logged 341 EU QSOs with 117 uniques.
And this season for the same 4 month period I have only managed 14 EU QSOs, with 10 uniques!
Those strong and sometimes stable openings like we had in 2020 and 2021 are very rare during this solar uptick.

The band can still open up over the pole, but it can be fleeting, usually weak and even more un-predictable than when the geo-mag is cooler.
The Asia and VK-ZL path has remained open most mornings, sometimes with strong signals.

Here is a list of the EU from my log this winter:

DF2UU-	1
DL8LAS-	1
F4HEC-	1
F5IN-	2
G3XHZ-	1
OH1XX-	1
OK1CF-	2
OM2XW-	2
OZ4MM-	1
SM5EDX-2

73, de steve ve6wz

> On Dec 8, 2022, at 11:40 PM, Andree DL8LAS via Topband <topband at contesting.com> wrote:
> 
> Hey gentlemen, 
> I had my first contact with VE6WZ Steve this season.We made the QSO via the pole.Receiving antenna was my 2x585ft end-fire beverage array. No other stations from NA worked this morning,  so I am very happy with this DX QSO.
> https://youtu.be/_r75XbZP5Ak
> www.dl8las.com
> _________________
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