[VHFcontesting] Saturday evening is a FUN time to hang out on 222 MHz

[David Olean]

OK, it isn't as much fun as firing off an M-60 machine gun, or base 
jumping from Mt Aconcagua, but it still can be a hoot. This last pass of 
the MOON on Saturday night into Sunday morning of the EME Contest will 
feature just about everyone who is capable of putting a signal to the 
Moon and back on 222 MHz.  OK, you say but I am not capable of sending a 
signal to the Moon and have it come back strong enough for anyone to 
hear it.   Think again! Last night, I tried a test with N1YCQ in FN41. 
N1YCQ has a single 15 element yagi and about 190 watts RF in the shack. 
Wheat tells me that he has about 2 dB of feedline loss. His beam is 
fairly low to the ground. We started at his Moon rise and went for about 
25 minutes and when the Moon was just below 5 degrees, I copied him for 
three transmit periods. It was quite exciting to see his direct signal 
at about -20 path and then see his Moon reflected signal at -25 dB about 
400 Hz higher and with a 2.6 second delay. The bad news was that he 
could not detect me, or we would have had a nice QSO via the Moon.

I plan to be active around 222.080 as the Moon rises in New England and 
then across the mid West.  I will be monitoring the HB9Q chat page for 
222MHz. (There are different chat pages for each band)  If you want to 
try a horizon attempt, just get onto that HB9Q 222 MHz chat page and let 
us know, and we will make noise in hopes that a contact can be made.  I 
will be active until about 0300 UT. Then the Moon is too high for me to 
aim. I can be back again at about 06:15 UT when it drops below 62 
degrees again.  I have to QRT when the Moon rises in Hawaii at about 
0330UT.

So please try and allocate some time around your Moon rise. If you do 
not have a Moon tracking program, WSJTX has aiming info for your 
location in  real time. You can get an idea from these numbers around 
the country.:

Maine  21:40 UT

Indiana  22:50 UT

Arkansas  23:35 UT

Idaho    00:30 UT

California   01:30 UT.


I hope to see you on 222 this evening. Of course Sweepstakes SSB is 
going on, but Sweepstakes is not quite as exciting as base jumping or 
squeezing off bursts from an M-60 or a 50 cal Browning.

73

Dave K1WHS