[TowerTalk] April Fool's Articles (I bet this become a whole new thread)

[Chuck Dietz]

David Clemons wrote:
> 
> Hi,
> 
>         When I was a teenager, I remember reading an April Fool's article
> in either CQ or QST which said that some heretofore unknown German scientist
> had discovered that QRP operation worked better than QRO.  (His papers were
> subsequently lost in WWII but recently were rediscovered.)  The theory
> behind this astounding discovery was that QRO signals heated up the
> ionesphere so much that most of their energy was lost.
> 
>         I believed this for several years, even occasionally detuned my HT-40
> to "boost" my signal!  When I finally asked my Dad about it, he said he
> remembered the article but that it was an April Fool's joke. 

Wait a minute, I remember this one...I'm sure it was true, I have
believed it for years.  They found that if you went down to about 1 watt
ERP or less, the ionosphere had an "amplification effect" which would
make your signal "louder."

In the '60s I tested this by running transatlantis 80 meter ssb QSOs
with one watt ERP from my station DL4FQ in Germany.  You mean to tell me
it was not true and I was not really talking to those VE stations on
80??

Whoa!  It boggles my mind!  I'll go back and erase my log book....

73

Chuck, KE5FI

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