[VHFcontesting] 222 MHz Activity Night

[David Olean]

Hello 222 addicts,

The rather fair weather in northern New England is still holding on. I 
am hoping for an exciting Tuesday evening. Tuesday IS 222 Activity 
Night! One look at the Hepburn map is a bit discouraging, but there is a 
slight chance for some tropo from TN down towards Louisiana much later 
in the evening.  The West Coast has good tropo but only along the coast. 
The Northeast looks devoid of anything.  That is not going to slow me 
down. I will be running an EME sked before the starting time, which 
seems to be about 0000 UT or 7 PM EST. and runs for a few hours to about 
0200 UT, but can go later if activity is high or the band is great. We 
can always wish! The plan is to make SSB, CW, FT8, or MSK144 contacts. 
Whatever floats your boat! I do a bit of rag chewing with some chasing 
DX thrown in.

If you have not caught an activity night yet, the idea is just to get on 
the air and make noise.  There is activity in the northeast and some 
lesser action in the midwest and southeast.  I get nice reports from 
southern California along with the Pacific Northwest and there are 
hotbeds of activity in those spots as well.   You can set up skeds using 
chat rooms. Most guys around me tend to use the ON4KST 144/432 Region 2 
Chatroom. I will monitor that along with  the HB9Q logger that has a 222 
MHz page. If there is no activity in your area, a check on the chat 
pages could allow you to set up a sked over a long path. I have worked 
SSB meteor skeds while running 100 watts in the good old days, so 100 
watts with FSK441 or MSK144 modes can actually be quite productive. Keep 
your mileage under 1000 miles for best results.

I will be on EME from 22:00-00:00 UT and could get back on EME when 
things slow down terrestrially at about 0200 UT.  The Moon will be just 
about due South of me then and visible over most of the country. I will 
monitor the HB9Q logger/chat page for 222 MHz on Tuesday.  As winter 
approaches, I am realizing that my evenings on 222 will end with our 
first big snowstorm, so I want to definitely make the most of the next 
several weeks!

73

Dave K1WHS