[Dxbase] Rotor Direction for VE3 in W4 Land Problem

[Eric - VE3GSI]

Thanks Guys,

I guess what threw me off was with my contesting software the CALL/W4 will
give the general direction I need for the rotor. Perhaps because of the
newer small rigs and more people working portable or mobile, maybe Jack and
his band of coders could consider adding direction look up on a slash suffix
in some future release.

Thanks all again for checking,
Eric - VE3GSI.


-----Original Message-----
From: Joseph Glockner

Peter and Eric,

Just for a test-run, I plugged-in the coordinates of roughly the middle of
W4-land (as a group) .. and then called for the direction, etc  ... this is
do-able -- but, I am not too sure how good that would be - depending upon
where you are calling from - in relation to Florida... Florida comes out
107.7 degs from N. Texas .. whereas, the middle of W4 land itself as a group
of states - comes out to be 81.6 degs from N. Texas...


I guess it would be up to the user, which method would be the best to call
for ....

73 Joe wa6axe


Peter Dougherty (W2IRT) wrote:

> At 16:48 03/16/06, Eric - VE3GSI wrote:
> 
>> I don't think this is a finger problem at my end, but just to be sure
>> here
>> is the problem.
>>
>> If I enter W4ABC in the entry window and tab, click the rotor it gets
>> turned
>> to 193 degrees, which is about where I would expect it to go from my QTH.
>> Today during a sked with VE3ABC/W4 the rotor goes to 255 degrees. For the
>> heck of it I tried W4/VE3ABC, same thing 255 deg.
>>
>> Did Florida move or is there a potential problem here? If not why 
>> does
>> DXB
>> map a /W4 as USA and W4 as Florida?
> 
> 
> Looks as if a specific call is mapped correctly, but a mobile or
> portable call is mapped to the center of the country. If I plug in W4ABC 
> is gives me 210 degrees (to St. Petersburg FL, where W4ABC actually 
> lives). Anything else points to 268.5 degrees, or essentially 
> dead-center of the country from here in NNJ.
> 
> What would make more sense, though, would be to point into the middle 
> of
> the geographic area that is #4 if you put in /W4 (or a US call /4 
> without the W). After all, in your example, VE3ABC/W4 could be in St 
> Pete, Atlanta (considerably further west) or on the Atlantic coast of VA 
> (about 160 degrees from you).