[VHFcontesting] Is FT8 Really the Problem with VHF Contests?

[Paul N1BUG FN55mf]

Decreasing activity has hurt some of us greatly.

It is painfully obvious that there are not as many stations active as 
their used to be. Or at the very least, fewer well equipped / high power 
stations, which is a big problem for those of us in outlying areas. I 
did very well this time only due to spectacular conditions.

As evidenced by the lack of any QSOs in my own grid and only one 2 meter 
QSO in an adjacent grid, most others in this area have given up 
completely. There are assorted reasons but in part it is due to having 
so few stations we can hear and work, especially or those up this way 
who had modest stations. It's no fun listening to white noise all weekend!

FT8 can dig a few dB below CW levels but it does not appear to make up 
for the lack of high power stations.

Of course for me the situation is compounded by low activity in this 
area, as there is less incentive for people to point this way.

Paul N1BUG



On 9/12/22 08:32, k3sk at buckwalter.co wrote:
> 
> I blame most of the weekend on very bad propagation and mostly general lack
> of participation.
> 
> This was both, the worst propagation in 30 years I ever remember during a
> VHF contest. And, it was also my first ever contest using a digital mode
> (FT8). I worked as many SSB contacts as I could find, with frequent moves to
> that portion of the band. I only heard 4 or 5 CW calls and all but one was
> stations I already had logged.
> 
> During the later hours almost all FT8 I copied were dupes, calls I worked on
> SSB or FT8 earlier. This was no different than other VHF contests, where
> only the diehards and power-house multi-op stations just keep hammering
> away. I did the same thing. I kept visiting the SSB calling frequencies and
> called over and over with no response.. Then I'd go to FT8 and do the same
> thing, getting the same results.
> 
> Regardless of the mode, it was tough digging out a contact. An example that
> proves this point is 222 MHz. Of the contest bands it's not a normally
> active band but it's one I have and enjoy. I run a full KW and 4 10 element
> LFAs on 222 MHz. In the past on this band I've worked 20 to 50 QSOs,
> sometimes more. Over this entire weekend I worked 9 contacts! 5 of them were
> on SSB and 4 were on FT8. There's nothing wrong with the equipment as half
> the QSOs were 400+ mile contacts, Q5 copy and some of those were SSB. On FT8
> I kept hearing the same 3 stations over and over again all weekend.
> 
> There just wasn't anyone there to work, regardless of mode.
> 
> de K3SK
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> VHFcontesting mailing list
> VHFcontesting at contesting.com
> http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/vhfcontesting