Sunspots - Wednesday August 3rd 2022

Solar flux is 93 and the SSN 25. A=9 and K=3. 

Oil giant's profits - NOT amateur radio

The war in Ukraine has caused an undeniable rise in the costs of fuel and household gas. Only today one of the giants in the industry announced huge profits. 

Now I know some times things can be much harder, but most companies were not expecting these huge profits. This is at a time when millions of ordinary people are struggling to eat and keep warm.

My view is simple: this is obscene.

I am not a vocal politician, but this is asking for trouble. In many countries I think this could lead to revolt or even revolution.

See https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-62382624 .

10m WSPR QRP TX (Tuesday)

It is now 1320z. There still seems to be plenty of Es about with 13 stations spotting my 500mW 10m WSPR today.

UPDATE 1522z: 18 unique stations have spotted my 500mW 10m WSPR today.

UPDATE 1748z:   23 spots of me today on 10m QRP WSPR.

8m experiment (Tuesday)

It is now 1314z and I have been on 8m FT8 QRP TX for about an hour. 2 spots  of me so far today.

UPDATE 1345z: 4 stations have spotted my 8m QRP FT8 today. Off whilst things cool.

UPDATE 1529z:  Back on QRP 8m FT8 TX again. In the last 24 hours I have received 8m SWL reports from 2 other countries as well.

Wicken near Cambridge - NOT amateur radio

The photo shows the village of Wicken not far from Cambridge, UK.  

This morning we walked to the National Trust cafe at Wicken Fen from Burwell Lode and back, stopping for a break at the cafe.

Enjoying the Australian winter - NOT amateur radio

One of our sons with his children in Queensland, Australia visiting his inlaws. 

5m recording from the 1940s?

In the late 1940s a recording of the very last night in the UK on 5m was made by Jack Hum G5UM, who lived in London, I think, at the time. I wonder if copies of this historic recording still exist?

Updated solar data

As we are early in the month, my favourite site for solar data gets updated with the latest figures.

At the moment, the peak of solar cycle 25 is expected in November 2023 with a peak of 141. I cannot recall what way of averaging was used. If this peak date is the case, HF conditions could be good for several years to  come. 

I recall spotting South Americans at the very minimum on 10m FT8. This is why FT8 could be so useful. I like FT8 as it allows easy monitoring of even short openings.

Anyway, I hope you enjoy good conditions! When conditions are good, SSB, FM and AM QSOs can be had with low power on 10m.

Fewer 10m F2 openings?

When I am on 8m, I use WSPR on 10m as this does not tie up the PC and the 10m antenna is available. 

Now this may be as a result of more people now using FT8 rather than WSPR, but I am getting fewer F2 10m WSPR spots than during the last solar cycle. Sunspot numbers have been quite high and I would have expected to get a few reports from further afield on 10m. Most stations are European. Maybe it is just that E layer reflections block the way up to the F layer?

Is it just me?

Time sync

In the shack I have an Asus laptop that is several years old, so I would expect the battery to be losing capacity, In the past I used an online time server to sync to internet time when using WSJT-X. I have found this a waste of time. 

Every morning, I resync the PC clock using the facility in Windows 10. I find that this is perfectly fine. Occasionally, I resync the clock "just in case", but get the feeling this is overkill.

So, I do not think anything special is needed.