160m FT8

For a change, I am trying 160m FT8 with the earth-electrode "antenna" in the ground. An FT8 CQ was spotted by no-one, but I was blown away by the high number of stations spotted on RX. There were so many! Best DX so far on 160m FT8 RX is UA4HBW (3300km) in Samara. In about 30 minutes 51 stations already spotted on 160m FT8 RX. Quite staggering.

Stations spotted on 160m
FT8 RX in first hour

UPDATE 1947z:  17 stations occupying just 2kHz of band! Best DX on 160m FT8 RX now R9GM (3499km) in Perm. 127 stations spotted already in the first hour on 160m FT8 RX.  A recent 2.5W FT8 CQ on 160m was spotted by 5 G stations with best being G0KTN (211km).

70cm activity contest tonight

Starting at 8pm UK clock time is the 70cm activity contest, held monthly. As I have no 70cm antennas up currently, I use the 2m big-wheel omni antenna 10W SSB. Despite this compromise set-up I often get over 100km despite being on for far less than 1 hour, because of my poor voice.

2m FT8

After a brief look in on our local 2m FM gateway, I have returned to 2m FT8 calling CQ just now with 2.5W to the big-wheel. 5 spots so far with the best report being by GD3YEO (384km) on the Isle of Man. On 2m FT8 RX no spots yet.

2m FT8 never fails to amaze me: if I worked the Isle of Man with QRP CW or SSB I would be flabbergasted. To do this regularly, irrespective of conditions with 2.5W and just the omni antenna is just mind-blowing.

UPDATE 1857z: A recent 2.5W FT8 CQ was spotted by a couple of stations.

Antipodial 2m DX

Not quite sure how he finds all this juicy news, but EI7GL's blog reports some remarkable 2m DX QSOs in Australia and New Zealand.

This is a good blog with lots of interesting stuff regularly.

See https://ei7gl.blogspot.com/2019/12/recent-3000km-opening-on-144-mhz.html

Kitchen narcissi - NOT amateur radio

I thought it was last week, but on reflection it must have been the week before, my wife bought a bowl of narcissi for the kitchen table. Most are now in flower.

It is great fun seeing them develop when we eat breakfast. The heads are smaller than we expected, but they still are glorious.

472kHz WSPR TX (10mW ERP) overnight

Although there were no stations in Norway spotting me, last night was quite a good session with 20 different stations spotting me on 472kHz WSPR despite me using the 10mW ERP from the earth-electrode "antenna" in the ground. At the moment, the 472kHz WSPR is still on, although I may switch to 2m FT8 later.

Stations spotting my 472kHz 

10mW ERP WSPR overnight

UK winters - NOT amateur radio

Although we had a few flutters of snow on this day a couple of years ago, most winters in England are just dull. The photo show our local baker and butcher on a typical winter day.

Sunspots - Tuesday December 10th 2019

Solar flux is 71 and the SSN 0. A=4 and K=1.

472kHz WSPR TX

For the first time in a while, I am back on 472kHz WSPR TX with 10mW ERP from the earth-electrode "antenna" in the ground. In the first few transmissions 7 stations spotted me in 2 countries, which is a promising start. No great DX as yet, but I'll leave it running overnight.

UPDATE 2125z: 12 unique spots so far.

UPDATE 2226z: 16 unique spots in 6 countries so far this evening.

AM QSO party - Jan 2020

Southgate News reports on an upcoming AM activity contest towards the end of January. On some bands there is plenty of space for AM. This concentrates on HF AM.  There is little doubt that SSB is a better DX mode and takes up less bandwidth, but there is still a place for AM.

See http://www.southgatearc.org/news/2019/december/january-2020-am-qso-party-in-europe.htm#.Xe6ju-iTLnE