[Lowfer] SJ, SIW overnight
listread at lwca.org
listread at lwca.org
Thu Nov 17 10:36:13 EST 2016
> SIW was strong, but so was a
> steady carrier only about 10 MHz away
Hmm. That was supposed to be lower-case "m" for millihertz. (Autocorrected?)
At any rate, that carrier was back on 185,299.3 last night, but of course
SIW was down on 185,185 so no harm done. I watched SIW for a little over
an hour beginning at midnight, with great visibility on both Argo and
WSPR-X's own waterfall. Decoded SNRr was mainly in the -31 to -32
vicinity.
This was despite elevated noise levels last night. The night before,
median noise levels were under S2 with intermittent peaks to S9. This
time, the median was a little above S6, with frequent peaks to S9. It
wasn't big crashes, and it didn't appear to have much 60 Hz
characteristics either...just a general hash. No sign of SJ last night.
I then tuned up to look for EAR, thinking I'd take a short nap then return
to the watering hole if I managed a few captures. Well, next thing I know
it's 7 AM and the sun is about to rise...but I have a nice string of
captures of EAR all night, peaking in intensity about an hour before
sunrise, then abruptly dropping to nothing in mid-R about half an hour
before daybreak.
After sunrise, I finally tuned back to the watering hole and saw SIW
again. By then, noise was down below S2, but signal strength had fallen
off too. SNRr values are currently showing around -37 or -38.
Now, I hadn't planned to be out there all night; not even long enough to
need the generator, really, so I went down there in the SUV instead. That
meant I had no tools, and even the cellphone turned up missing. So when I
got in the vehicle to come home and discovered that the battery died
during the night, it kind of delayed my return to make this report! Didn't
even have the means to dismount the deep cycle battery and carry it to the
car. A length of bare ground wire, a roll of zip cord with super-hard
insulation, and part of a hacksaw blade I found buried in some junk
finally enabled me to improvise a really lame jumper cable...but it
worked.
Think I'll change my handle to MacGyver.
John
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