630m QRP WSPR (Thursday)

My 10mW ERP from the earth-electrode "antenna" in the ground was turned on about 1830z. So far, at 1848z, 6 stations have spotted me.

UPDATE 2212z: 11 stations have spotted me this evening.

Australian beach - NOT amateur radio

This photo was posted on Facebook recently by a friend in Australia. It shows a beach in the south of Australia.

Baa Humbug! - NOT amateur radio

 

These were some of the Christmas displays in a big store in Cambridge.

Misty Cambridge - NOT amateur radio

When we went to Cambridge on the bus earlier, it was very misty. 

This soon cleared and it has been a lovely day. 

630m QRP WSPR overnight

16 stations managed to spot my 10mW ERP WSPR (measured) from my earth-electrode "antenna" in the ground. See table. The furthermost was DL0AO (865km).

8m QRP FT8 (Thursday)

My 2.5W 8m FT8 was turned on after lunch. So far (at 1442z) local spots by G4WSZ (12km), but no DX.

UPDATE 1500z:  First transatlantic 8m spot today by WW1L (4976km).

UPDATE 1534z:  4 spots of my 2.5W 8m FT8 with 3 "across the pond".

UPDATE 1613z:  6 spots of me, of which 5 are transatlantic. Crossing the Atlantic on 8m is almost daily at the moment despite my QRP.

10m 500uW WSPR success

For several days, my beacon, with the PA off, was operating without an antenna because of a coax fault. Today, I repeated the 500uW WSPR test (with the beacon PA off), but with the antenna! I was copied, quite well, in Italy. According to my TinySA spectrum analyser the power is 500uW. According to the report I could have been copied at 100uW or less with a low RX noise floor. My beacon is hard programmed to report 0.5W, even though it was producing 0.5mW for this test.

Even  though the beacon is hard coded
to report 0.5W, it was actually 0.5mW

Sunspots - Thursday November 30th 2023

Solar flux is 171 and the SSN 164 .  A=5 and K=1.

630m QRP WSPR (Wednesday)

My 10mW ERP WSPR was turned on at about 1715z.  So far, at 1746z, 4 stations have spotted me. On recent nights, I have not had spots from really distant Europeans. I wonder if this conditions?

UPDATE 2045z: So far this evening, 11 stations have spotted me. See table.

Much colder - not amateur radio

Today, we had our first real frost. We had one the day before, but not as cold. We are more used to mild weather these days, but today is bitter for us. It is about +2 degrees Celsius maximum, which is cold for here in the daytime. I can hear readers in Canada and Scandinavia saying," you think that is cold?".  It is sunny and bright, so I don't mind the cold.