Sky last night - NOT amateur radio

Last night we did a walk in the village. It had been a hot day. This was the sky.

Sunspots - Sunday July 15th 2018

Solar flux is 73 today and the SSN still 0.  A=5 and K=1.

10m WSPR TX (500mW)

Today just IK0DMQ (1484km) spotting me. In the last day, 8 different stations spotted my 10m WSPR TX.

UPDATE 1714z: 9 different stations have spotted my 500mW WSPR beacon today with the best again being by EA8BFK (2880km).

Genuine 6m from the USA

Around teatime last night a couple of USA stations in Florida USA were spotted on 6m FT8 RX.  Best DX was WX4G (7171km). This station was widely spotted in the USA and Europe, so I am pretty sure this is genuine.

Yet again, G stations are spotting and calling Japanese stations on 6m FT8 this morning, although none have been spotted here.

So far this season, 5 continents spotted on 6m FT8 RX, even with my V2000 omni vertical and CB coax feed. Others with better systems will have done much better, but it shows just a basic set-up works!

UPDATE 0914z: Just EU Es and Gs spotted here today so far on 6m FT8.

UPDATE 1006z: So far today on 6m FT8 RX, 31 different stations in 11 countries.

UPDATE 2013z: A good Es day on 6m FT8. These are the stations spotted on the band in the last half day.

UPDATE 2042z: A brief 6m FT8 QSO with an EA7 was spotted widely in southern Europe at up to +4dB S/N. Classic Es. And I was still using 2.5W to my vertical omni V2000. Although I was going to go QRT, I decided to stay on RX.

Patio flowers - NOT amateur radio

Our grass is very brown. We never water the grass, but it usually recovers fine after our rain (frequent).

The flowers usually get watered every other day and look fine this year. Our cosmos has only just flowered and we expected this to be out weeks ago.

Sunspots - Saturday July 14th 2018

Solar flux is 73 and the sunspot number still zero. A=6 and K=1.

10m WSPR TX (500mW)

Although I have been on 10m WSPR TX, no spots so far today.

UPDATE 1300z: A couple of German stations spotted me on 10m WSPR about an hour ago.

6m FT8

JAs were being called by UK stations earlier on 6m FT8. Sadly, I spotted none. I called CQ with 2.5W and got 6 spots and a QSO with G3TXF (334km) in north Devon on 6m FT8. There is some Es about on the band from southern Europe, but it is not exactly "humming".

UPDATE 1302z:  22 different stations in 9 countries so far today on 6m FT8 RX.

UPDATE 1652z:  Pirate? I am very suspicious of a station spotted on 6m FT8 RX that is supposed to be in Guinea (3X9KFM). The only spots of him are very strong reports from the UK. If real, I would have expected spots more widely. These days, sadly, pirates are all to common. I hope I am proved wrong.

UPDATE 1656z:  Es widely applicable on 6m FT8 RX today. Best DX (excluding the 3X9) is 4X4DK (3580km).

Irish low VHF allocations

Amateurs in Eire have been given generous allocations at low VHF and a bandplan has now been created. This aligns with allocations made in other countries for beacons. It would be great if small allocations at 40MHz could be made across Region 1. Even a small allocation would allow Es research. Will it happen? Yes, if more people press their national bodies. These allocations could be quite small and take-up is likely to be small as no commercial gear is available.

See https://www.irts.ie/cgi/st.cgi?downloads .

International Lighthouse Weekend

In August (18th-19th_, there will be activations from several lighthouses around the world.

See  https://illw.net/ for more details.