[OKDXA] FT5ZM

[Robert Redmon]

Fortunately, 20 meters is the one band I have Amsterdam Is on, so I was 
able to ignore the circus there. Did call for an hour or so on 30 
meters, but gave up when they got weak (currently at the noise level 
here). Worked them on 17 after about an hour of trying. I understand 
your frustration with the very wide band of frequencies they are 
listening on. On 17 they were listening from 18080 to 18100; however, 
thanks to the panadapter and sub receiver, I was able to discover the 
operation was REALLY only listening from 18085 or so to 18095. He 
occasionally would drop slightly lower or slightly higher. Watching for 
the signal of the station he was working, I finally caught on to his 
pattern. He seemed to move a couple hundred hz either higher or lower 
than the station last worked and generally stayed in a 5 khz zone for 
very long stretches before moving or down a bit and then staying there 
for a while. I heard 2 stations work him on my frequency after I worked 
him. I was moving to the first clear space either above or below the 
station he last worked. His signals were S3-S7 here most of the 
afternoon, and the beam heading was the same skewed path you described 
on 20. I was hearing them best at about 45 degrees on both 17 and 20 
meters. Strange path. He seems to be building again on 30 now...so maybe 
I will get another shot a bit later. Sure hope he spends some time on 
the lower bands.

Good luck outsmarting the frenzied crowd, Kim.

Bob


On 1/26/2014 2:45 PM, Kim Elmore wrote:
> What a frustrating morning! I can hear FT5ZM pretty well here, much 
> better that I would have guessed. In fact, they're stronger now on 20 
> than they were earlier though the path is very skewed -- they peak for 
> me around 30 deg or so and their signal seems to come from just about 
> everywhere. My biggest frustration is that I can't find the stations 
> they're working. The pile-up exceeds 20 kHz in width and is so chaotic 
> that I can never find the station being worked, so I don't know where 
> they're listening.
>
> I'll happily take any sage advice anyone has to offer!
>
> 73,
>
> Kim N5OP
>
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-- 
Robert Redmon K5SM
AMA 58073