Sunspots and 10m - Mon Oct 26th 2015

Sunspot number has fallen to 63 today but K=1 so conditions are not very disturbed. 10m propagation is again forecast to be "poor", although yesterday there were lots of USA stations on 10m WSPR and conditions in the CQWW SSB contest seemed fine on 10m. As I've said many times,when the 10m forecast is supposed to be "poor" I have got some of my best DX on the 10m band!

QRT on 10m and 6m WSPR

So I closed down my WSPR stations on 10m and 6m at about 2045z. The chance of hearing any more F2 DX on 10m is nearly zero and on 6m WSPR I have copied, and been copied, by not a single station all day. Both 10m and 6m WSPR should be active again after breakfast tomorrow.

10m and 6m WSPR - Oct 25th 2015 - update

So far today, I have received 16 unique reports on 10m of my little 500mW WSPR beacon. Of these, 9 were from the USA.

Unique 10m WSPR spots today (but more below)

So far, 6m WSPR has been very quiet with not a single spot given or received all day.

It is still possible other stations may spot me on either band. I continue to look for others 80% of the time on 6m.

UPDATE 1752z:  K5XL (7660km),  WJ9H (6361km) as well as KD4RLD (6402km) spotting me on 10m WSPR, so now 19 unique station spots with 12 different USA stations. Much better than yesterday by a long way.

UPDATE 1935z:   The last 10m USA spot appears to have been at 1800z.

CQWW SSB contest

10m is filled with contest stations from across the Atlantic. After a quick contest exchange with a Canadian station (worked with 5W SSB), I have gone back to 10m WSPR instead. With my poor voice, an HF contest was just too much hard work! In the past I have filled pages in the logbook in CQWW SSB, but I know I can work these stations if I persevere, even with 5W, so I decided to give it a miss.

Currently I am on 10m and 6m WSPR.

Title change

You may have noticed the very slight title change.  Although the vast majority of posts will continue to be amateur radio related, a few are on other things. These other posts are proving quite popular so I shall continue to add other stuff from time-to-time. When not amateur radio related I hope to continue the trend of saying, "NOT amateur radio" so people can choose to ignore these posts if they want.

A reminder the URL of this blog is http://g3xbm-qrp.blogspot.co.uk/.

Plenty of USA spots today on 10m WSPR

W4DEX (6390km) was spotting me as early as 1240z. There have been plenty of USA spots on 10m today. At the moment, things look better than yesterday, even though the sunspot number is a bit down and conditions were expected to be more disturbed. In 2 minds whether or not to bother with CQWW SSB contest. I don't feel brilliant and may stick with WSPR to save my voice.

UPDATE 1436z:  6m WSPR remains stubbornly quiet with no spots given or received on that band again today.

10m Es or backscatter?

I4ZTO (1185km) is spotting me on 10m WSPR. This is too close for F2 (I think) so I wonder if this is out of season Es or F2 backscatter?

The UK and China - NOT amateur radio

The wooing of China by the UK bothers me. This last week we have bent over backwards to "love" China. I guess this is a move to get inward investment, more exports and help with our nuclear power plants. At the same time China is carrying out a sabotage job on UK manufacturing (partly of our own making) and soon we will have no industry left at all, with all our manufacturing in China or its neighbours.

No, I have the feeling this is not in our best interests at all.

See http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-34626936 .

Early 10m F2

UB9OCQ (4859km) in MO95ek square is the best DX spot of my 500mW 10m WSPR beacon so far today.  There have been plenty of WSPR spots from the far eastern edge of Europe too on 10m this morning.

So far today, 6m WSPR has remained very quiet.

Sunspots and 10m - Sun Oct 25th 2015

Sunspot number has dropped back a bit to 74. K=3 so conditions are a little more disturbed. 10m propagation is expected to remain "poor". With CQWW SSB contest in full swing expect plenty of 10m SSB activity this weekend. I am currently on 10m and 6m WSPR but may come try CQWW later, although these days I prefer WSPR - I never enter HF contests but may try them to work a new country, although I only use QRP.