[600MRG] W8BYA Summary - Jan 25, 2021 - 630m

[Gedas]

I wanted to share some observations & reports of my first night back on 
630m. I was not QRV last year and the year before that was my 1st year 
on the band so I do not have a lot of experience.

I started sending WSPR signals out around my local sunset last night and 
ceased around 5:45 AM this morning. This was the 1st time using the new, 
short inv-L ant vs. my previous 600' Inv-V antenna with feedpoint at 
85'. This Inv-L has it's feedpoint 5' above ground using a vertical 
radiator of 60' and a single horizontal capacity hat approx 185' long. 
There is a ~300 uH inductor at the base of the vertical.

The antenna is fed against a pair of opposing 165' elevated radials made 
of aluminum fence wire. The antenna being within several feet of a 85' 
tower and many antennas presented a very unexpected and high feedpoint 
impedance of ~76 ohms ! This required me to design and build up a 
low-pass L-matching network to bring the SWR down to 1:1. The matching 
network is mounted directly below the loading coil also 5' off the ground.

No surprise here but the Inv-L is not a good antenna as far as low noise 
pick-up so I will be experimenting with some better alternatives. Noise 
levels on my Flex 5000 averaged S9 to S9+10 dB all night.

For transmitting being mostly vertically polarized was a huge advantage 
over the mostly horizontally polarized signal I was using several years 
ago when I tried 630m for the first time with the Inv-V.

After looking over the reports I was really surprised to see many 1000+ 
km reception reports from stations still transmitting this morning. For 
example my last reception of Arliss (W7XU) occurred at 11:40 AM ! Hard 
to believe getting decodes at almost noon time from that far away. 
Arliss must have one heck of an awesome transmit setup.

Looking for even further distances I found my last decode of K0KE in 
DM79 at 1660 km occurring at 9:18 AM local ! The sun was well, well up 
by then. Pretty cool. And there were MANY receptions of W7XU and K0KE.

Highlights for me were being heard by K9FD receiving me at -21 at 3:30 
AM (7003 km), as well as being heard several times by GM4OAS at 5716 km. 
I was able to receive G0MRF (6183 km) a half dozen times but he was not 
able to hear me. I was also thrilled at seeing that N6LF at ~3000 km 
heard me at a -9 dB.

As far as being heard & hearing within NA the summary looks like this:

*W8BYA*
_Hearing:_ AA8HS, AE2EA, G0MRF, K0KE, K2BLA, K3RWR, K4BYN, K8HTL, K9MRI, 
KE7A, KN8DMK, N3HSK, NV4X, VE9GJ, W0IOO, W3TS, W4BCX, W4KZK, W7XU, WA3U, 
WA9CGZ, WB0TEM, WB3AVN, WD8DAS.


_Heard by_: AA1A, AA5AM, AA8HS, AE2EA, AK0SK, GM4OAS, K0KE, K1HTV-4, 
K1RA-BB, K1RA-PI, K2ZN, K3CLT, K3KQV, K3MF, K3RWR, K3SIW/2, K4BYN, 
K4RCG, K5KHK, K5VR, K8YBU, K9AN, K9ANF, K9FD, K9IMM, K9MRI, K9XT, KA1LM, 
KA1R, KD2OM, KD3UY, KD9OWT, KE7A, KF4HCW, KF8QL, KF9KV, KI7KG, KI8FW, 
KJ6MKI, KK6PR, KM5SW, KR7O, N0LBY, N2HQI, N3HSK, N6GN/K, N6IO/K, N6LF, 
N7JYS, N8IT, N8UR, N9RU, NO3M, NV4X, NY4Q, VA3ROM, VA7JX, VA7MM, VE2UG, 
VE3EAR, VE3HOA, VE3MNA, VE6ARS, VE6JY, VE9GJ, W0AY, W0ETH, W0IOO, W0PXM, 
W1EQX, W1NJC, W1XP, W1XP/1, W3ENR, W3PM, W3TS, W4BCX, W4KEL, W4KZK, 
W5EST, W6UV, W7XU, W9RAN, W9XA, WA2TP, WA2ZKD, WA3TTS, WA3U, WA3U/W, 
WA9CGZ, WA9EIC, WA9NWW, WA9WTK, WB0TEM, WB3AVN, WB5PDQ, WB6YAZ, WB9WON, 
WD4ELG, WS3W, WV5L, WY7BUD


All in all it was a very fun night. The SWR on the antenna varied from a 
1:1 to 1.8:1 and this is due to the ceramic padding capacitors I am 
using in my matching network. As long as I kept my TPO to about 20-25W 
the SWR remained low. I need to replace those caps. At this point I will 
concentrate on making QSO's. I am available via CW or digital if anyone 
needs Indiana or my grid on 630m. TU all, 73.

Not sure if my coverage map will make it as an attachment but I added it 
in as a JPG.

Gedas, W8BYA EN70JT

Gallery at http://w8bya.com
Light travels faster than sound....
This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.


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