[SADXA] DX report.

[Alan Komenski]

Thanks for the update, Frank.  We will all be spending more time on the bands over the next few weeks, so let's hope DX is good!

Alan - AC2K

-----Original Message-----
From: sadxa-bounces at mailman.qth.net [mailto:sadxa-bounces at mailman.qth.net] On Behalf Of Frank N7FG
Sent: Saturday, March 21, 2020 1:49 PM
To: SADXA <sadxa at mailman.qth.net>
Subject: Re: [SADXA] DX report.

 Following up on Wes' suggestion, here are my DXploits for the month.


After missing a few days while out of town, I picked up the VP8PJ South Orkney expedition and netted 8 slots for this ATNO.  They were FT8 on 80, 40, 30, 20, and 17, CW on 30 and 20, and RTTY on 20.  I also got a good lesson on propagation.  My years as a casual DX-er with a modest station left me with a mindset (mental block?) that little-pistol DX is done during good solar activity periods and on the higher-frequency HF bands.  For several afternoons I tracked the VP8 FT8 spots on 17 and 15m and watched them move from EU to the East Coast and Midwest, waiting for my shot.  The West Coast calls were always more sparse and at best I only heard/saw the VP8 weakly in short bursts before they faded out.  One evening I thought I'd at least listen on 40, hoping to capture a whisper with my mighty 80m end-fed half wave which runs all of 18 to 12 feet off the ground.  There they were, solid and with a good SNR.  After a few calls they were in the log.  Some nights later, near midnight, I repeated the process on 80m.  I did eventually work them on 17m, logging them just 20 minutes before they pulled the plug for good.


Flush with success, a week later I logged 40m FT8 Q's with ATNOs 9J2LA, Zambia, and TO7DL, Reunion Is. (like on the other side of the world).  The next evening I tuned up on 60m for the first time and worked 4 (new, of course) band-slots in NA and HI.  Who needs sunspots?


Frank, N7FG 


    On Tuesday, March 17, 2020, 03:09:43 PM MST, Wes <wes_n7ws at triconet.org> wrote:  
 
 Since there will be no monthly meeting, hence no round table brag session, I thought I would start off with one here and maybe others will be disposed to chime in.

Although I'm not a contester, looking for a challenge I thought to participate in the ARRL International SSB DX contest with the idea of trying to work a 20-meter DXCC (unassisted) during the contest.  Unfortunately, although I worked everything I heard, I never heard 100 countries on 20 and came up far short of the goal; working only 81.

But I did dabble on the other bands and worked 8 on 160, 11 on 80, 10 on 40, 22 on 15 and even 4 on 10-meters.  All together I worked 136 countries, on SSB at the bottom of the sunspot cycle. So a phone DXCC in a weekend.  There were even a few semi-rare prefixes; 4O, 4X, E7 (40-meters), ER, JT, HB0 and V8.

Wes  N7WS

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