[VHFcontesting] 222 Activity Night N1BUG

[N1BUG]

Well that was nearly a bust! I don't know when I have seen conditions so 
poor and I made an error in strategy.

I had a brief chat with K1WHS at the start.

Tried a chat-coordinated sked with K1DS using Q65-60A. I saw nothing. 
Rick reported seeing a sync tone but no decodes. Discovered when it is 
hot in the shack my driver amp gets warmer than I feel is a good idea so 
I scrambled around really fast and found a 12V fan to sit on top of it 
and made a quick connection to a nearby power supply.

Tried chat-coordinated skeds with KA2LIM and WA2VNV. Not a peep.

Heard VE2XX talking to K1WHS but I was busy with a coordinated QSO 
attempt and didn't get a chance to work Stu.

Heard someone else (N1QG I think but not 100% sure) with Dave but I was 
busy with a sked.

Heard two stations chatting on 222.119.4, didn't give calls before they 
both faded out.

Called CQ on CW for a while and worked WZ1V.

So I had just two QSOs, K1WHS and WZ1V. Conditions seemed really 
horrible. One lesson learned for next time is no chat coordinated 
attempts in the first hour or so. That time should be left free for 
working the easy ones that I can hear around the band without assistance.

There was some EME activity and since I had not had any prior 
opportunity to see if I could hear signals off the moon on 222 I went 
down to listen in on that. The only station transmitting was K1WHS. I 
was decoding him direct of course, but for 45 minutes or so I was also 
seeing his sync tone clearly via the EME path. At times I could also see 
all of his tones via the EME path, but I never got an EME decode. This 
was curious because I know Dave's EME signal was strong enough for solid 
decodes, probably around -20 to -18 or so. Does WSJT-X refuse to decode 
the same call sign twice on two different frequencies within the 
passband on JT65? I am encouraged that I could see Dave's EME signal so 
well despite a bit of power line noise, but it doesn't appear there is 
much interest in Q65 among the 222 EME crowd.

I will be on ON4KST chat and Ping Jockey trying to find folks to run 
meteors this morning until 1300z. I have modified my schedule to free up 
all of Thursday the 12th and Friday the 13th (oops, do I want to run 
radios that day considering how my luck has been lately? HI HI) for 
meteor scatter. Unfortunately I don't think there are many within range 
on 222 that I haven't already worked. I hope some come out of the 
woodwork as I have been having a lot of fun with the meteors over the 
past week.

73,
Paul N1BUG
FN55mf