[DX] anyone else NOT hearing VP8THU??

[Kelly Jones]

Hi John,

I'm not sure where you are located (call not in QRZ or Buck), but he's
what I have experienced in Colorado.  I only have 3 elements at 40' for
10-20 and Butternut HF6V for 30-80.

They seem to favor EU for much of the day.  I suspect just propagation or
a "clearer" shot at EU.  Sometime around 20:00Z +/- the East Coast start
to work them, usually on 17 and 20m.  After the East Coast has been
working them for a couple of hours, then W6 and W7s start to work them.
For whatever reason, the prop skips right over most of the Zero call area.

I start to hear them on 17 & 20 around 22:00-23:00Z.  Not very loud, but
can tell they are there.  Solid copy comes first on 20m around 01:00z.
About the same time, they start to have decent copy on 30m and a little
later on 40m.

I did manage a 15m SSB Q with them last night, but the "solid copy" window
was only about 15 minutes.  As fast as they peaked, they were gone.  20
and 30 seem to stay open for quite some time.  They were still decent copy
past 06:00z last night on 20, 30 and even 40.  I think that was even past
their sunrise a bit.

The biggest frustration for me was trying to break the EU "wall".  Spent
nearly 3 hours on 40 and never did "break" it on 30 even though they were
S7 for a good portion of the night.  Oh well, tonight is another shot.
:-)

Hope that gives you a little insight.

73
Kelly - KE9KD
http://www.dx-central.com



On Mon, 21 Jan 2002, John Geiger wrote:

> I was thrilled to hear that there was going to be an
> operation from South Sandwich Islands, since that is
> one that I still need.  There is only one problem-I
> can't hear them.  I tune to the spots that I see on
> the internet cluster-and NOTHING?  I don't think that
> my antenna is that bad.  It is a Cushcraft MA5B-not a
> monobander or anything, but it did work the Falkland
> Is. Dxpedition ok last year.  I also worked VP8SGK on
> South Georgia last year, and can hear LU1ZA on the
> SOuth Orkneys, just can't find when they are taking
> the list.
>
> SO what is going on with VP8THU?  THis should be a
> fairly easy path from the central US.  I realize that
> they are taking a more simplestic approach to this
> DXpedition-but I am afraid that that means that only
> big guns with stacked monobanders will work them.  Is
> there some aspect of the dxpedition that I don't know
> about?  Are they forced to run QRP, or dipoles, or is
> there a big mountain between them and the US?
>
> This is really getting frustrating.  When and where
> should I listen?
>
> 73s John KA0IFG
>
> __________________________________________________
> Do You Yahoo!?
> Send FREE video emails in Yahoo! Mail!
> http://promo.yahoo.com/videomail/
> _______________________________________________
> Dx mailing list
> Dx@mailman.qth.net
> http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/dx
>