[Lowfer] WSPR Tests Saturday Night

[John Andrews]

Jay and I will continue the WSPR-JT tests tonight starting at 2300 UTC. 
Since this was originally conceived as a QRP mode, and all of the 
reports from last night were from the eastern U.S., we are going to 
reduce power and see what happens. XGR/3 will start with 20 watts 
output, and XGR/2 will start with 10 watts. We may drop further during 
the evening, depending on reports.

Jay and I did some daytime tests this afternoon, and he could copy my 30 
milliwatt signal, which is 40 dB below last night's 300 watts. 
Interestingly, we tried a WOLF signal at that power level, and it 
decoded at 192 seconds. It's a tough comparison, because of WOLF's 
ability to build up copy...if you're patient, you could drop the power 
further and wait longer for copy. But the 30 milliwatts over 70 miles 
groundwave speaks well for the potential of the WSPR approach. As 
intended, this is a great tool for propagation monitoring.

If you download and run the software as described yesterday, we will 
both be on the same frequencies we used last night (XGR/3 on 508.500, 
and XGR/2 offset by 50 Hz). Set receivers to 507 kHz USB, and use "WSPR 
Rx 0.507" on the command line. Your computer's clock should be within 1 
second of real time for best performance.

John Andrews, W1TAG / WE2XGR/3