With this page I intend to provide a record of particular interesting contacts and observations I made on higher frequencies from the area around Oslo. I also share some views based on my own experience on technical or operational developments, and would be happy to receive some feedback or discuss them if anybody should bother (you may reach me by e-mail to la0by "at" nrrl.net). The records are provided in chronological order, with the latest on top. Records on activities from other locations than home or hilltop in JO59 may be provided as separate files, but links to those will be in this document. Also pictures may be accessed through links, which allows me to keep this document in the simnplest possible and smallest format.
My objective for the Perseids to work some new squares was not fulfilled this year. I was chasing a few stations to the East but had no luck with that. I was operating from home in JO59FW first, and went to my hilltop in JO59IX for the predicted maximum. My first contact with EA2BFM over 2057 km was promising. Thereafter I was listening mostly East. Few hours later, just in time for the predicted MS shower maximum, a massive Aurora developed which made me and others focus on that rather than MS. There were many stations particularly from EW, SP and UA. Even with Aurora extending far South it was fun for us in the North. I went home again in the evening, when both Aurora and MS conditions went down. LA0BY in JO59FW wkd via MS on 144 MHz: 2024-08-11 06:30 06:38 HA6VV JN97VW +11 +10 1464 km 2024-08-11 07:26 07:41 YU7MS KN05FG +03 +08 1761 km 2024-08-11 07:43 07:52 YU7SMN KN05EG +06 +05 1759 km 2024-08-11 09:50 10:03 UA1ANA KN69BW +03 +08 1761 km 2024-08-11 12:10 12:52 EU1AEX KO33TT +12 +03 1240 km 2024-08-11 18:10 18:54 EU7SV KO43HH +07 -04 1326 km 2024-08-13 08:50 08:58 UA1ASA KO48GH +04 +02 1044 km 2024-08-13 09:24 09:28 GM4FVM IO85WU +07 +02 869 km 2024-08-13 10:05 10:15 PA3PCV JO20VV +07 +04 1047 km 2024-08-13 10:36 10:50 F5GHP IN96LE +10 +03 1706 km 2024-08-13 11:01 11:10 G4DML JO02OJ +08 +05 1013 km 2024-08-13 11:13 11:16 G0LBK JO03BD +08 +17 983 km 2024-08-13 11:25 11:46 GW4HDF IO81JO +09 +04 1256 km 2024-08-14 16:20 16:56 RA1AEP KO59DO +06 +10 1107 km LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via MS on 144 MHz: 2024-08-12 09:28 09:43 EA2BFM IN83SH +10 -02 2055 km 2024-08-12 10:25 10:30 OH5MNH KP41FC +15 +01 976 km 2024-08-12 10:29 10:36 RA1OK KP94VM +16 +13 1572 km 2024-08-12 10:49 10:53 UA3MBJ KO87QV +04 +00 1537 km 2024-08-12 11:03 11:24 UR5HVR KN69TA +00 +04 1900 km 2024-08-12 11:53 12:00 RU3BQ KO67NE +13 -02 1329 km 2024-08-12 12:13 12:25 RX3DPK KO96DI +15 +12 1654 km 2024-08-12 12:27 12:35 RK3AF KO75WO +12 +00 1558 km 2024-08-12 16:28 16:34 UA6IE KO85FG +15 +03 1608 km LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Aurora on 144 MHz: 2024-08-12 12:43 LY4AA KO14WW 53A 59A 60 964 km 2024-08-12 12:45 SO3Z JO82LJ 59A 57A 927 km 2024-08-12 12:47 EU6AAX KO35UD 53A 56A 70 1143 km 2024-08-12 12:50 EU1AI KO33SV 53A 58A 70 1219 km 2024-08-12 12:51 DH8BQA JO73CE 59A 59A 70 785 km 2024-08-12 12:53 EW2BZ KO34OD 53A 59A 70 1185 km 2024-08-12 12:55 DL6BF JO32QI 57A 57A 70 872 km 2024-08-12 12:57 DJ4TC JO63PN 59A 59A 70 731 km 2024-08-12 12:59 DK8MM JO53CL 56A 55A 70 723 km 2024-08-12 13:00 UA1WAN KO47HU 55A 59A 70 1052 km 2024-08-12 13:01 SM0PYH JO99DK 59A 59A 429 km 2024-08-12 13:03 ES4EQ KO39CE 56A 59A 70 875 km 2024-08-12 13:05 RG2A KO75UU 53A 59A 70 1535 km 2024-08-12 13:07 LA3EQ JO28XJ 57A 57A 323 km 2024-08-12 13:11 EW8CN KO42KP 57A 59A 80 1378 km 2024-08-12 13:14 EW6BS KO45JN 55A 59A 80 1175 km 2024-08-12 13:19 EW6DX KO45JL 55A 59A 80 1179 km 2024-08-12 13:24 DL1SUZ JO53UN 59A 57A 716 km 2024-08-12 13:27 SP8NR KO12NA 54A 55A 90 1171 km 2024-08-12 13:28 DK6SP JO61VE 56A 59A 89 996 km 2024-08-12 13:32 EW7T KO53DR 57A 59A 80 1371 km 2024-08-12 13:38 DK3BU JO33NO 59A 59A 741 km 2024-08-12 13:50 SM5EPO JP80MC 59A 59A 352 km 2024-08-12 14:09 DL4SZB JO63PO 53A 55A 80 726 km 2024-08-12 14:11 SP3QDM JO82EF 55A 55A 80 930 km 2024-08-12 14:16 EW3AA KO12TC 59A 59A 80 1184 km 2024-08-12 14:20 DL8KX JO53CL 57A 57A 80 723 km 2024-08-12 14:26 SP3TLJ JO82TM 57A 55A 80 932 km SSB 2024-08-12 14:33 RO3X KO73FU 55A 55A 80 1583 km 2024-08-12 14:48 LY2BKQ KO05OQ 55A 55A 80 782 km 2024-08-12 14:53 UA1WCF KO55IR 57A 55A 80 1268 km 2024-08-12 15:05 LY2SA KO14UG 57A 59A 80 1006 km 2024-08-12 15:14 SP2HMT JO94FQ 56A 59A 80 749 km 2024-08-12 15:33 OG0C KO09CX 57A 59A 60 528 km 2024-08-12 15:36 RT1L KO49WS 56A 59A 60 1066 km 2024-08-12 15:44 UA1AJY KO49TW 57A 57A 60 1049 km 2024-08-12 16:13 SP2GUB JO94RE 55A 55A 70 832 km 2024-08-12 16:56 SP5CCC KO02OH 56A 59A 70 1070 km 2024-08-12 16:58 LY2J KO14QL 53A 59A 70 975 km 2024-08-12 17:03 ES4RM KO49AL 52A 55A 70 970 km 2024-08-12 17:11 EU1AEX KO33TT 53A 55A 70 1230 km 2024-08-12 17:18 SP2QCW JO93NP 52A 55A 70 869 km 2024-08-12 17:20 RT1W KO47EI 54A 55A 70 1059 km 2024-08-12 17:22 SP2FRY JO83WR 58A 59A 70 819 km 2024-08-12 17:24 SP2CNW JO93AI 57A 59A 70 861 km 2024-08-12 17:26 DJ0PY JO32MF 55A 51A 50 891 km 2024-08-12 17:29 GM4YXI IO87WK 56A 57A 0 792 km As usual, my equipment was the IC-9700 with Gemini 500 W PA and 2 x 9-element yagi at 520 m asl, powered by generator. Everything was working fine and so I enjoyed what was coming along on the band. All MS contacts were made in MSK144 and all Aurora QSO in CW (except for SP3TLJ in SSB).
The season started on May 29 with a patchy opening to the East, but in the following month was nothing more in JO59. On June 28 there was a good opening of more than one hour, mainly to YO. Late in the season on Aug. 6 there was another opportunity for ES while I was on holiday. LA0BY in JO59FW wkd via Es on 144 MHz: 2024-05-29 09:38 09:40 R3PA KO93JV +13 -08 1829 km 2024-05-29 09:58 09:59 UA1WCF KO55IR -12 -11 1281 km 2024-05-29 11:41 11:43 RU3BQ KO67NE +16 +09 1342 km 2024-05-29 14:25 14:26 UT4LA KN89CW +14 -08 1965 km 2024-05-29 14:27 14:29 US8AR KO60RR -09 -18 1764 km 2024-05-29 14:36 14:36 RK6MC KN97KF -09 -14 2318 km 2024-06-28 17:35 17:39 YO9CEB KN24SP +16 -09 1975 km 2024-06-28 17:40 17:43 YO2BBT KN05UK -11 -02 1776 km 2024-06-28 18:05 18:07 YO3CCB KN34CL -05 +09 2015 km 2024-06-28 18:11 18:13 YO4FYQ KN44FD +00 +03 2129 km 2024-06-28 18:19 18:20 YO3FWL KN24XL -09 -01 2006 km 2024-06-28 18:21 18:23 YO4GJH KN35XG +18 -04 2001 km 2024-06-28 18:22 18:24 UW8SM KN28IV +21 +01 1529 km 2024-06-28 18:25 18:27 LZ2HV KN23SF -17 -14 2119 km 2024-06-28 18:26 18:28 YO3AK KN25 -15 +06 1871 km 2024-06-28 18:29 18:31 YO8ST KN36KQ +01 +14 1822 km 2024-06-28 18:31 18:33 UR5SSB KN28 -04 -14 1577 km 2024-06-28 18:32 18:34 YO5AVN KN17WW +08 -13 1591 km 2024-06-28 18:45 18:47 LZ2LG KN13VK -15 -14 2043 km All QSO were made in FT8 on 144.174 MHz. During the openings I checked and called in SSB on 144.300 MHz but no stations were heard.
Hepburn gave us some hope on good conditions for the IARU R1 145 MHz Contest but those did not quite show up for me. I was QRV on Sunday morning and worked the usual suspects plus a few more. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd on 144 MHz via Tropo (>800 km): 2023-09-03 5:13 DF0YY JO62GD 559 559 878 km CW 2023-09-03 5:34 GM4ZUK/P IO86RW 579 579 840 km CW 2023-09-03 6:09 OK4C JO60LJ 59 59 1075 km SSB 2023-09-03 6:15 OL1R JO70LR 59 59 1063 km SSB 2023-09-03 6:43 DK6AS JO52JJ 559 599 843 km CW 2023-09-03 6:51 DL1SUZ JO53UN 579 599 716 km CW 2023-09-03 7:20 PC5T JO23KE 529 599 835 km CW 2023-09-03 8:02 DF0TEC JO73CE 55 59 785 km SSB 2023-09-03 8:59 DK3WG JO72GI 559 599 880 km CW 2023-09-03 9:04 DK2ZF/P JO43WJ 559 559 734 km CW 2023-09-03 9:18 DM5D JO61OC 529 599 999 km CW 2023-09-03 9:37 DL0HTW JO60QU 529 599 1028 km CW 2023-09-03 9:47 SN7L JO70UR 59 599 1075 km SSB 2023-09-03 9:55 DK0NA/P JO50JP 59 59 1038 km SSB Two days later I was QRV from hilltop for the NAC, and propagation was above normal but only to Denmark and Southern Sweden. So not much DX was noted in the log, but rather many contacts. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd on 144 MHz via Tropo (>800 km): 2023-09-05 17:23 ES2MC KO29GG 529 559 780 km CW 2023-09-05 18:14 SP2FRY JO83WR 559 559 819 km CW 2023-09-05 19:08 OG3Z KP11WK 59 54 733 km FT8 2023-09-05 19:14 OH2BYJ KP10QO 54 56 700 km FT8 2023-09-05 19:25 PA0O JO33HG 53 53 786 km FT8 2023-09-05 20:43 DG5BRE JO62VM 559 519 851 km CW 2023-09-05 20:48 GM4YXI IO87WK 559 559 792 km CW Hepburn gave more hope for the following days, but it was only towards the weekend the trop became really good for us in the Oslo area. I monitored FT8 from home and worked a few contacts. Saturday morning, after having worked YO for the first time on 2m Tropo, I decided to go to my hilltop site. LA0BY in JO59FW wkd on 144 MHz via Tropo (>800 km): 2023-09-04 18:20 DF7KF JO30FK +03 -07 1086 km FT8 2023-09-06 19:57 SP2FRY JO83WR -07 -07 824 km FT8 2023-09-06 20:05 SP5NOF KO02ME -14 -24 1081 km FT8 2023-09-07 05:51 DL2ALF JO50IW -06 -15 1001 km FT8 2023-09-07 05:53 DG5CST JO60DS +05 -13 1026 km FT8 2023-09-07 06:34 DK1FG JN59OP -17 -19 1145 km FT8 2023-09-07 06:35 DG0JMB JO60LV -08 -09 1018 km FT8 2023-09-07 06:40 DL7ZN JO62OJ -12 -11 856 km FT8 2023-09-07 06:41 DL7UKM JO62UO -14 -04 839 km FT8 2023-09-07 12:55 DL5ZA JO51HK -16 -15 945 km FT8 2023-09-07 14:10 DK0A JN48CO -11 -15 1268 km FT8 2023-09-07 16:41 OK1ADT JO80AC -16 -19 1149 km FT8 2023-09-07 18:56 DC1NNN JO60BE -16 -09 1089 km FT8 2023-09-07 19:01 DK7CM/p JO40HE -20 -22 1090 km FT8 2023-09-08 09:37 DF0RSA JO61PH -4 -02 975 km FT8 2023-09-08 09:39 DG0JMB JO60LV -17 -21 1018 km FT8 2023-09-08 09:42 SO3Z JO82LJ -09 -04 929 km FT8 2023-09-08 21:07 SP9CLQ KO00AA -20 -24 1258 km FT8 2023-09-08 21:14 SP6CVB JO80VE -20 -21 1179 km FT8 2023-09-08 21:19 DH2UAK JO71FU -11 -23 932 km FT8 2023-09-09 06:26 SP9HE JO90HE -15 -14 1200 km FT8 2023-09-09 06:37 YO5BAK KN07WE -14 -09 1601 km FT8 2023-09-09 06:39 SP5XMU KO02LG -09 -09 1070 km FT8 I set up single yagi antennas for 2 m and 70 cm but found that propagation was best on 2 m. Even at 520 m asl I was still sitting in the fog. Occasional glimpses of sun showed I was near the upper edge of the layer. The temperature was around 16 deg C, almost the same as in the lowlands. Signals from HA0HO came through for a long time but not much further DX could be worked. On 70 cm there were few signals, with OE5VRL being the best DX. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd on 144 MHz via Tropo (>800 km): 2023-09-09 08:06 PA3PCV JO20VV 1056 km FT8 2023-09-09 08:12 HA0HO KN07SU 1519 km FT8 2023-09-09 08:14 OM4CW JN88UN 1347 km FT8 2023-09-09 08:19 SP9VRY KN09JW 1286 km FT8 2023-09-09 08:21 SP7VTQ KO00HU 1189 km FT8 2023-09-09 08:23 SP7NHS JO91RU 1053 km FT8 2023-09-09 08:56 OK1TEH JO70FD 1119 km CW 2023-09-09 09:02 DM2CNE JO73DB 800 km FT8 2023-09-09 09:10 SP9EMF JN99PU 1250 km FT8 2023-09-09 09:12 DL3BCV JO52 830 km FT8 2023-09-09 09:22 DK2EA JO50UF 1086 km FT8 2023-09-09 09:47 DL6KA JO30BS 1063 km FT8 2023-09-09 09:50 DG0JMB JO60LV 1020 km FT8 2023-09-09 10:09 OK2BRD JN99FN 1258 km FT8 2023-09-09 10:13 OK2ZAW JO80CF 1138 km FT8 2023-09-09 10:15 DL3JIN JO60LX 1011 km FT8 2023-09-09 10:17 SQ9ANS JO90LJ 1185 km FT8 2023-09-09 10:20 DK5WO JO30BS 1063 km FT8 2023-09-09 10:22 DK2BJ JO30BS 1063 km FT8 2023-09-09 10:33 SP2CHY JO94GO 760 km FT8 2023-09-09 10:47 DK0A JN48CO 1275 km FT8 2023-09-09 10:53 SP5NOF KO02ME 1075 km FT8 2023-09-09 10:58 OK1HMP JO70EB 1127 km FT8 2023-09-09 11:04 OK1DUG JO60WP 1057 km FT8 2023-09-09 11:08 SP5LOT KO02OD 1085 km FT8 2023-09-09 11:10 SP4K KO03HS 914 km FT8 LA0BY in JO59IX wkd on 432 MHz via Tropo (>700 km): 2023-09-09 08:30 SP2JYR JO92GP 946 km FT8 2023-09-09 09:37 OE5VRL JN78DK 1304 km FT8 2023-09-09 09:39 SP1NEN JO73FU 718 km FT8 Back home I realized in the evening that conditions would not go down as suspected, but I could not spend much time on the radio. On Sunday morning I monitored 2m again and heard HA1YA quite well for a long time. When I was calling hime, I was called by E73O from KN95DA who set with 1739 km a new Tropo-DX record for my home QTH. Amazing this was possible with a single 9-ele-yagi at 100 m asl at very modest take-off! LA0BY in JO59FW wkd on 144 MHz via Tropo (>800 km): 2023-09-10 06:31 E73O JN95DA -19 -10 1739 km FT8 2023-09-10 07:21 SP7VVB JO91VQ -12 -11 1085 km FT8 2023-09-10 07:33 SP9EMF JN99PU -05 -04 1253 km FT8 2023-09-10 08:21 OK1DMP JN79IX -10 -03 1139 km FT8 Hoping for more tropo later in the autumn...
The maximum of the shower was predicted to occur around 08:00 UTC on Aug. 13. So I went to my hilltop location in JO59IX well ahead of that time, and was monitoring the 2 m band mainly eastwards. I was happy to work UA3NCN in LO28SJ during that day, for a new square. The other day I managed to work another new square with EU1DE/2 in KO43GR, even from home. LA0BY in JO59FW/IX wkd via MS on 144 MHz: 2023-08-12 10:53 11:18 T77GO JN63FW +04 +03 1784 km MSK * 2023-08-12 22:50 23:14 UR5HVR KN69TA +06 +04 1900 km MSK 2023-08-13 03:57 04:09 RA3LBW KO54WJ +07 +05 1410 km MSK 2023-08-13 04:10 04:35 R5WW KO81AU +12 +03 1802 km MSK 2023-08-13 04:40 04:55 UT2UB KO50UC +00 +03 1718 km MSK 2023-08-13 05:16 05:23 RK3AF KO75WO +07 +03 1558 km MSK 2023-08-13 05:28 05:51 UA3AVY KO95BI +02 +05 1695 km MSK 2023-08-13 07:39 07:42 RV3AQ KO85QR +13 +05 1634 km MSK 2023-08-13 07:46 07:59 OE1ILW/p JN77XX +02 +03 1377 km MSK 2023-08-13 08:09 08:20 RU3BQ KO67NE +08 +07 1329 km MSK 2023-08-13 09:40 10:12 RA4NCX LO49JM +09 +00 2104 km MSK 2023-08-13 10:12 10:30 UA3NCN LO28SJ +02 +04 1969 km MSK 2023-08-13 10:50 11:21 RK1AA KO58TV +09 +00 1184 km MSK 2023-08-13 11:30 11:39 F4EZJ JN05DK 28 26 1758 km SSB 2023-08-13 11:43 12:00 F6DRO JN03TJ 36 36 1943 km SSB 2023-08-14 08:42 09:10 IK3XJP JN55UC +06 +02 1651 km MSK * 2023-08-14 09:21 09:26 DL9DBF JO40AV +04 -01 1017 km MSK * 2023-08-14 11:19 11:29 EU1DE/2 KO43GR +02 +15 1292 km MSK * QSO marked with asterisk (*) were made from home in JO59FW.
Working first on 2 m from home location at low altitude and not perfect horizon. But I probably could not have worked much more from hilltop I guess, where I went for 70 cm NAC in the evening. No activity was noted in SSB or CW, but signals were usually not very strong. LA0BY in JO59FW wkd via Tropo on 144 MHz: 2023-02-14 07:01 OK1DQT JN79IX -07 -20 1139 km FT8 2023-02-14 07:32 DG0JMB JO60LV +04 -09 1018 km FT8 2023-02-14 07:34 DL5ZA JO51HK -15 -13 945 km FT8 2023-02-14 07:38 DL1DVL JO61UA -16 -10 1012 km FT8 2023-02-14 07:41 OK1DMP JN79IX -18 -16 1139 km FT8 2023-02-14 07:52 OK5TK JO70MB -07 +01 1136 km FT8 2023-02-14 07:54 DG5CST JO60DS -18 -22 1026 km FT8 2023-02-14 08:00 DF9YF JO42GE -11 -15 870 km FT8 2023-02-14 08:45 DM5TI JN68FF -05 -14 1308 km FT8 2023-02-14 08:48 DK2EA JO50UF -04 -11 1082 km FT8 2023-02-14 08:50 OK1PGS JN69RS -17 -18 1146 km FT8 2023-02-14 08:54 HA7JDU JN87VQ -05 -09 1443 km FT8 2023-02-14 09:01 9A1CRJ JN95HN -12 -20 1687 km FT8 2023-02-14 09:06 DG0RB JO60LN -10 -08 1054 km FT8 2023-02-14 09:18 DF1NP JN58OV -18 -16 1229 km FT8 2023-02-14 09:22 DL4DWA JO61QH -11 -07 976 km FT8 2023-02-14 11:33 HA3FQG JN86XV -12 -05 1531 km FT8 2023-02-14 11:44 9A3QB JN95HN -10 -09 1687 km FT8 2023-02-14 11:48 DH8BQA JO73CE -04 +05 785 km FT8 2023-02-14 11:53 DJ9MG JO52TC -06 -08 874 km FT8 2023-02-14 11:55 DK4VF JO43US -11 +00 687 km FT8 2023-02-14 12:00 OK1CT JN69OQ -15 -13 1153 km FT8 2023-02-14 12:02 SP6OWA JO71QA -10 -01 1038 km FT8 2023-02-14 12:09 HA1YA JN87GF -14 -07 1468 km FT8 2023-02-14 12:12 OK1KRI JN79GS -14 -10 1160 km FT8 2023-02-14 12:52 DL7UDA JO62TK +05 -05 856 km FT8 2023-02-14 12:54 OE3DSB JN78FA -16 -11 1350 km FT8 RIG: IC-9700, PA 300 W, 9-ele-yagi at 100 m asl Conditions prevailed in the evening, with a little up and down. It seems I hade a super duct to OK and further. I made a few DX contacts before the contest started, but decided not to waste time with FT8 during the NAC, It is a pity that not more stations tried SSB/CW as signals were certainly strong enough. Special thanks to Joze S51ZO for calling me again in NAC (he was audible with me the whole evening). LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 432 MHz (>800 km): 2023-02-14 17:23 SP6IWQ JO80HK -14 +17 1124 km FT8 2023-02-14 17:26 OK2WO JN89HE -16 -01 1258 km FT8 2023-02-14 17:29 OE3DSB JN78FA -11 -09 1352 km FT8 2023-02-14 17:32 9A1CMS JN86DM -14 -17 1541 km FT8 2023-02-14 17:46 9A5M JN95GO -16 -19 1680 km FT8 2023-02-14 17:53 S51ZO JN86DR -08 -07 1518 km FT8 2023-02-14 17:58 OM3WC JN88TI -11 -16 1367 km FT8 2023-02-14 18:00 OM3LQ JN88MK -13 -18 1346 km FT8 2023-02-14 18:20 SP2IPK JO93LR 559 559 856 km CW 2023-02-14 18:22 SP2FRY JO83WR 579 589 819 km CW 2023-02-14 18:28 OK1SC JO70OB 599 599 1139 km CW 2023-02-14 18:33 OK1TEH JO70FD 579 599 1119 km CW 2023-02-14 18:39 DL7YS JO62NM 579 579 843 km CW 2023-02-14 18:40 OK1KZE JN79FX 599 599 1137 km CW 2023-02-14 18:43 OE1GDA/P JN77TX 59 59 1372 km SSB 2023-02-14 18:51 OK1TEH JO70FD 55 59 1119 km SSB 2023-02-14 18:55 OK1FPR JO80CE 55 55 1143 km SSB 2023-02-14 18:57 DL3JPN JO60IS 56 55 1032 km SSB 2023-02-14 19:01 PA7MM JO23SE 51 55 818 km SSB 2023-02-14 19:06 PA2V JO22IM 529 529 908 km CW 2023-02-14 19:14 DH3NAN JO50NC 519 519 1098 km CW 2023-02-14 19:21 OK1ZHS JO70EC 559 579 1122 km CW 2023-02-14 19:23 DG0VV JO62RM 59 55 846 km SSB 2023-02-14 19:29 OK1FQK JN79NU 57 59 1160 km SSB 2023-02-14 19:36 DJ3AK JO52GJ 529 559 843 km CW 2023-02-14 19:41 S51ZO JN86DR 529 559 1518 km CW 2023-02-14 19:54 OK2IGG JN79QJ 59 59 1214 km SSB 2023-02-14 20:33 DG5BRE JO62VM 529 519 851 km CW 2023-02-14 20:59 G4ODA IO92WS 59 58 1040 km SSB 2023-02-14 21:11 G4NBS JO02AF 559 559 1084 km CW 2023-02-14 21:28 OK1FEN/P JO70NA 559 519 1142 km CW 2023-02-14 21:36 OK1DSZ JN79AT 559 559 1150 km CW 2023-02-14 21:41 DL0BFA JO62PL 59 59 849 km SSB 2023-02-14 21:47 DK5OZ JO62PL 56 58 849 km SSB 2023-02-14 21:53 SP6IWQ JO80HK 599 599 1124 km CW 2023-02-14 21:59 SP9SOO JN99OV 52 51 1243 km SSB RIG: IC-9700, PA 120 W, 2 x 13-ele-yagi at 500 m asl I was very happy to have caught such a good opening. Working more than 1600 km from home on 2 m and from hilltop on 70 cm is certainly very unusual.
The season was not very good here in JO59. The usual openings at the end of May were completely absent. But we had two very interesting openings, one to UA4 on June 7 during the 2m NAC, and the other to EA on June 11. During the latter I was able to work several stations over rather good distances in FT8, despite having a poor take-off in direction EA. My PC even recorded EA4I in IM68 before I discovered the opening. Most of the contacts I made would not have possible in SSB, so FT8 was clearly an enabler. LA0BY in JO59FW/IX wkd via Es on 144 MHz: 2022-06-07 18:48 UA4CIK LO31AJ -05 -10 2375 km 2022-06-09 14:54 I0JX JN61GW -12 -16 2007 km 2022-06-09 15:09 I0JX JN61GW +02 -10 2007 km 2022-06-09 15:17 IW0FFK JN61GW +00 -06 2007 km 2022-06-09 16:17 IK8YOQ JN70GR +13 +11 2154 km 2022-06-09 16:19 IK8BIZ JN70ET +04 +01 2144 km 2022-06-09 18:12 YU7MS KN05FG +05 -02 1761 km 2022-06-09 18:15 YU7ON KN04AX -02 -06 1781 km 2022-06-09 18:34 YU7KB KN04AX +06 -11 1781 km 2022-06-11 15:34 EA1VIL IN70HX -08 -03 2373 km 2022-06-11 15:37 EA1IW IN83AH -15 -06 2089 km 2022-06-11 15:41 EA1UQ IN83FL +07 +04 2059 km 2022-06-11 15:44 EA1U IN83GJ +03 -05 2065 km 2022-06-11 15:45 EA1DR IN83CL -09 -14 2067 km 2022-06-11 15:46 EA1BHB IN82EI +10 -12 2178 km 2022-06-11 15:48 EA1P IN70PP +22 +02 2387 km 2022-06-11 15:52 EA1HRR IN83JJ -15 +02 2057 km All QSO except UA4CIK were made from home QTH in JO59FW.
My activity was again limited to few hours on Sunday morning, but I was happy to be able to go at all. Having a little baby boy at home has influenced my priorities and duties quite a bit. When I started at 04:00 UTC the condx were flat at best. The duct between GM and OK seemed to block my path to the South. After a few hours the fence got broken, and signals from SP and OK came through. Around noon I managed to work some of the usual suspects, breaking the 1000 km barrier a few times. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 144 MHz: 2021-09-05 4:49 DL1SUZ JO53UN 529 559 716 km 2021-09-05 5:46 GM4ZUK/P IO86RW 559 579 840 km 2021-09-05 6:02 DF0UM JO73CE 559 599 785 km 2021-09-05 6:14 SN1I JO84CE 539 559 724 km 2021-09-05 6:17 SQ6POM JO71VQ 55 59 974 km 2021-09-05 6:52 SN7L JO70UR 529 599 1075 km 2021-09-05 7:51 DK2ZF/P JO43WJ 529 559 734 km 2021-09-05 8:39 OL7C JO60JJ 59 59 1074 km 2021-09-05 8:58 UA2FZ KO04FK 529 559 850 km 2021-09-05 9:29 DM3D JO62JK 529 599 848 km 2021-09-05 9:33 PA0O JO33HG 559 559 786 km 2021-09-05 9:43 PC5T JO23KE 559 449 835 km 2021-09-05 9:53 OK4C JO60LJ 59 59 1075 km 2021-09-05 9:56 DF0MU JO32PC 55 59 901 km 2021-09-05 10:13 DL2LAK JO43WG 55 59 748 km 2021-09-05 10:20 DK2LB JO53LQ 55 59 700 km 2021-09-05 10:31 DL0HTW JO60QU 559 599 1028 km 2021-09-05 10:36 DL0GTH JO50JP 559 599 1038 km RIG: IC-9700, PA 300 W, 2 x 9-ele-yagi at 520 m asl Even though these contacts where not spectacular, it was a good opportunity to test my IC-9700 in a low local noise environment (about zero activity from LA in these contests). And it is always nice to hand out a few northern points to the contest stations in central Europe.
A good inversion build up over the North Sea and lasted for several days. I followed the events from home, but had no good horizon to F and G who reported working many LA stations on the 1st. When I was able to get to my hilltop site the other day, the conditions were about to fade away. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 144 MHz: 2021-09-02 18:30 DK5YA JN49NX -08 -21 1116 km 2021-09-02 18:32 DK0A JN48CO +00 -24 1275 km 2021-09-02 19:02 GM4YXI IO87WK -13 -16 792 km 2021-09-02 19:25 DL4SZB JO63BO +04 -02 714 km RIG: IC-9700, PA 300 W, 9-ele-yagi at 520 m asl I was too far inland that evening to get into the duct. At least I was able to work two DL guys in FT8 over an unusual distance. Will do better next hime, hopefully. But I am not looking forward to experience activity being in FT8 exclusively. Interference at the hilltop site would for sure be very frustrating. My current take on this is that the propagation is not really good if everybody stays in FT8. I am curious to see if that is true ...
The shower was predicted to be good this year, and so my expectations were high for operating from my hilltop site. I set aside the whole day for which the maximum was predicted, even started early on the day (the previous years I got out too late). However, it appeared I missed the maximum which occured later than predicted this year, on the following day. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via MS on 144 MHz: 2021-08-12 09:25 09:40 GI4KSO IO64XK +05 +03 1177 km 2021-08-12 10:07 10:12 RO3X KO73FU +04 +18 1583 km 2021-08-12 12:40 13:00 OH7EBY KP43UL +03 +12 1069 km 2021-08-12 14:30 14:40 ES4RM KO49AL +13 +04 970 km 2021-08-12 18:08 18:55 RC3UE LP07NG +02 -02 1683 km 2021-08-12 18:57 19:08 EW7HA KO53PX +09 +02 1406 km 2021-08-12 20:20 20:45 RN3A KO85NV +04 +08 1612 km 2021-08-12 20:48 20:50 RW3PX KO83PX +06 +07 1729 km RIG: IC-9700, PA 300 W, 2 x 9-ele-yagi at 520 m asl The reflections on the 12th were modest at best. I was mostly monitoring and looking for new squares. That is also why all contacts were in MSK - that is were the activity is, allthough it may not be the best mode for MS with very short reflections. New squares can be found in Eastern direction for me, and I was looking particularly for R1NAE (KP74) and UA1ZFM (KP55) but it seems they were beaming East too that day. I heard R100KOMI (LP52) and R4YM (LO36), both over 2150 km, but reflections were too few to have a chance for QSO. Late in the evening, when I was beaming East, I heard EA2BFM (IN83) calling CQ. When beaming in the right direction I received many more reflections from him, but was unable to pass the final message, so this one was a miss as well. Then I had to leave for home, at about the time when the shower really started (so I learned later). RIG setup for MS with IC-9700 and Gemini 2-500 PA On August 13th I only monitored from home, and realized this was the day when I should have been on hilltop. Unfortunately my time was too limited to go again, due to family and guests. LA0BY in JO59FW wkd via MS on 144 MHz: 2021-08-13 08:40 09:00 DL3DQL JO61PH +04 +12 975 km 2021-08-13 09:00 09:20 IV3NDC JN65RV 37 26 1574 km 2021-08-13 09:47 09:55 HA2NP JN97SG +00 +07 1527 km 2021-08-13 19:16 19:28 RK1AS KP40UE +09 +16 1065 km RIG: IC-9700, PA 300 W, 9-ele-yagi at 100 m asl Lessons learned (again!): Be at the right place, at the right time. Everything else is a waste of time. On the positive side I was testing the IC-9700 which I used for the first time as my new transceiver. I was very impressed with its performance, and found it easy to use, even without consulting the manual much. The magic button is the NR function, which reduces the already low noise floor quite a bit. I feel that I hear very well now. I run digimodes still over the old audio-interface which I build for the IC-821H (the pin assignments is the same for the IC-9700). This gave me zero trouble in starting MS operation with the IC-9700. I may switch to a digital interface some time later, but heard from others that it requires tidy configuration and gives trouble occasionally.
The season started early this year, with the first signals received on May 19, but no QSO. The next opening was on May 23 around 08:10 UTC, but I only heard UW8SM and UR8GZ. The first real opening, or rather two, and very good ones, followed on May 25. The first opening lasted two hours from 10:28-12:44 UTC to Italy. My ODX were IU8MHG and IZ8HXG, both JM78TF, at 2441 km. The second one lasted for almost one hour, from 17:14-18:11 UTC and targeted EW, UT and UA6 for me. My ODX was RN6MA LN06UQ at 2508 km. Distances were in general very good. On this day I managed to work 6 new squares which is a lot for me. LA0BY in JO59FW wkd on 144 MHz via Sporadic-E: 2021-05-25 10:28 IZ8IBC JN70HR -10 -04 2155 km FT8 2021-05-25 10:35 S59GS JN75GW 55 55 1580 km SSB 2021-05-25 10:42 I7CSB JN71QQ 59 59 2057 km SSB 2021-05-25 10:46 IK6DTB JN72EG -15 -05 1983 km FT8 2021-05-25 10:49 IK8BIZ JN70EU +02 +13 2139 km FT8 2021-05-25 10:52 IU8MHG JM78TF -15 -01 2441 km FT8 2021-05-25 10:53 IZ8HXG JM78TF -15 -11 2441 km FT8 2021-05-25 10:58 IK7LJZ JN71SK 56 59 2087 km SSB 2021-05-25 10:59 IK8BIZ JN70EU 59 59 2139 km SSB 2021-05-25 11:09 IK8YTA JN70CV +07 +02 2133 km FT8 2021-05-25 11:10 IK0FTA JN61GV -06 -08 2011 km FT8 2021-05-25 11:12 IK0FVC JN61FW -10 -05 2006 km FT8 2021-05-25 11:14 I0OSI JN61GW -10 -12 2056 km FT8 2021-05-25 11:18 IU4CHE JN64GB +00 +03 1771 km FT8 2021-05-25 11:20 IW6CVN JN63OR 59 59 1812 km SSB 2021-05-25 11:23 IZ7FLS/6 JN62XS 54 59 1924 km SSB 2021-05-25 11:25 IV3GBO JN66OA 59 59 1558 km SSB 2021-05-25 11:29 IK8BIZ JN70EU 59 59 2139 km SSB 2021-05-25 11:34 IK8YSS JN70AU -01 +05 2136 km FT8 2021-05-25 11:45 I6YPK JN72DJ 59 59 1968 km SSB 2021-05-25 11:56 IU7EJB JN81AF -03 +02 2115 km FT8 2021-05-25 11:59 IK7EOT JN80PJ +05 +23 2224 km FT8 2021-05-25 12:02 IZ7NLJ JN81LB +05 +11 2146 km FT8 2021-05-25 17:21 RK6MF KN97QC +05 -09 2354 km FT8 2021-05-25 17:32 RN6MA LN06UQ -10 +10 2508 km FT8 2021-05-25 17:39 UT6LX KN89CJ -05 +12 2008 km FT8 2021-05-25 17:43 US8AR KO60RR +04 +14 1764 km FT8 2021-05-25 17:45 EW8AX KO52LJ +06 +22 1511 km FT8 2021-05-25 17:52 US3ITU KN88WA -06 -08 2203 km FT8 2021-05-25 18:05 UT8LE KN79WW -04 +22 1948 km FT8 2021-05-25 18:07 UV8IF KN88QH -05 +01 2154 km FT8 2021-05-25 18:08 UA6LJV KN97LE -05 -12 2326 km FT8 2021-05-25 18:11 US5AT KO60RR -05 -04 1764 km FT8 RIG: IC-706, PA 300 W, 9-ele-yagi at 9 m agd and 100 m asl (no big stn) Es contacts on 25.5.2021 plotted in map Most contacts were made in FT8, but some in SSB at least to Italy. Even though FT8 is not the most efficient mode in Es it works great at weaker signals and represents a big boost for the activity. I always check and call in SSB, but FT8 seems essential nowadays for working stations also via Es. But it is probably a good idea to call only those stations that have not been worked before and/or are in new SQR or DXCC. I heard many more stations than I worked, among them 9A2WB, 9A3TN, 9A5CY, 9A5ID, 9A7JCY, E73CV, E76C, E77T, E70T, ER1AN, I6JEI, I7OXH, I0JX, IK7JNM, IV3GTH, IV3NDC, IW3QTG, IW4ARD, IW8EHC, IW0FFK, IZ4AIK, IZ7ECR, IZ7NXM, IZ7QFM, IZ7UMS, IZ7XWC, IZ8DSX, IZ8YBE, IZ0NRG, RN3ZHL, RN6LU, RU7L, S51AT, S52EN, S55OO, S57A, S59F, S50TA, UR3ABM, UR4LSK, UR5LLW, UR5RAS, UR6EF, UR7IM, UT3UCP, UT7LK, UT8AL, UT9UR, UY1HY. On the DXC I saw afterwards that I was received by IT9FUR in JM77OT. Sicily is still on my wishlist... The next Es opening was on May 29, but it lasted only 5-10 minutes for me. Still I was able to work two stations, and hrd also IZ5IOR. Signals came up nicely, but too short for SSB. LA0BY in JO59FW wkd on 144 MHz via Sporadic-E: 2021-05-29 11:51 IZ0IXO JN52WA -12 +08 1995 km FT8 2021-05-29 11:54 I4EUM JN54ML -05 +02 1719 km FT8 While May was good for Es up in Norway, the first half of June was very quiet. Further down in Europe there were a few great openings but only one or two just barely reached the most southern regions of Norway. For me, the first QSO were on June 17, but not really exciting. Beyond those worked I heard also IW0BSQ, IK0FVC, IZ0UME and IZ0IXO. LA0BY in JO59FW wkd on 144 MHz via Sporadic-E: 2021-06-17 18:08 IK0WMJ JN61GW -04 -17 2007 km FT8 2021-06-17 18:13 IK0OKY JN61ES 59 59 2024 km SSB I was very briefly operating during the 3rd sub-regional contest from my hilltop location, and was lucky to catch a short Es-opening and worked one station. I also heard YT1EB in FT8 very strong but was only working SSB/CW for the contest, so I did not call him. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd on 144 MHz via Sporadic-E: 2021-07-03 17:00 YO2KCB KN15AE 59 59 1808 km SSB Finally we got a decent opening again on July 11, this time for one hour to Southern France. There was good activity in both FT8 and SSB, and signals were quite strong. The skip even extended to EA6 over > 2300 km, but did not last long enough to complete a QSO (I heard EA6SA and was heard by EA6SX). Looking forward to make it next time! LA0BY in JO59FW wkd on 144 MHz via Sporadic-E: 2021-07-11 16:12 F6DHI JN23RK -10 -07 1866 km FT8 2021-07-11 16:14 F6EBF JN24KD 59 59 1795 km SSB 2021-07-11 16:16 F5FEN JN25JC 59 59 1692 km SSB 2021-07-11 16:16 F1RDL JN25KU 59 59 1609 km SSB 2021-07-11 16:19 F1SA JN23BQ 59 58 1857 km SSB 2021-07-11 16:21 F6DRO JN03TJ 59 59 1934 km SSB 2021-07-11 16:33 F1RJ/P JN12MQ -10 +10 1983 km FT8 2021-07-11 16:35 F1JRD JN13WO +02 +15 1870 km FT8 2021-07-11 16:43 F8AVP JN25JJ +06 +22 1660 km FT8 2021-07-11 16:46 F6BEG JN25JS +06 +17 1619 km FT8 2021-07-11 16:52 F1HQM JN23LV +02 +00 1822 km FT8
The DX-Cluster revealed there was exceptionally good tropo over the North Sea. It was particularly good for stations in Southern and Western Norway. Unfortunately I was stuck at home, with a poor horizon. But I was monitoring, and heard the others working DX ;-) In the evening on May 30 some PA and DL stations came through on 144 MHz, and I could even work some. PA5Y and PA2CHR were my first Dutch stations on tropo from home I believe. I hope I can go to my hilltop site next time.
Right ahead of the Marconi Memorial Contest a huge high pressure area developed over Poland and gave me high hopes of finally having good conditions for once during a major contest this year. I chose to go to my hilltop site early on Sunday morning. The Hepburn forecast indicated rising chances for enhanced propagation from about 12 UTC, and so it was. Signals from OK appeared and came up nicely, but were not really strong. The weather was spectacular with lots of sun at my location at 520 m asl while the lowlands were covered with fog. Selection of my longest QSO: LA0BY in JO59IX wkd on 144 MHz via Tropo (in CW): 2020/11/08 5:51 DM3W JO62XE 889 km 2020/11/08 6:12 RA2FGG KO04GT 821 km 2020/11/08 7:00 UA2FZ KO04FK 850 km 2020/11/08 7:38 DL2YDS JO32PC 901 km 2020/11/08 8:39 GM4YXI IO87WK 792 km 2020/11/08 11:16 DK5OZ JO62GD 878 km 2020/11/08 11:19 DL0HTW JO60QU 1028 km 2020/11/08 11:22 DL7ULM JO62MS 814 km 2020/11/08 12:21 DL8UCC JO71EQ 950 km 2020/11/08 12:26 DL8VL JO71FG 996 km 2020/11/08 12:46 OK2R JN89DO 1207 km 2020/11/08 13:08 DL5DSB JO71EC 1013 km 2020/11/08 13:17 DM3Y JO72GH 885 km 2020/11/08 13:25 DG1VL JO61XF 994 km 2020/11/08 13:29 OL1B JO80IB 1166 km 2020/11/08 13:41 OL4N JO60VR 1047 km RIG: IC-821H, PA 300 W, 2 x 9-ele-yagi MMC contacts plotted in map After the MMC the tropo conditions became even better, and on Monday I could copy several DL and even OK stations on 2 m in in FT8 from home. In the early evening I got time to go to my hilltop again and I wanted to try higher bands. I set up equipment for 70 cm, 23 cm and 13 cm. Upon switch-on SP6GWB was solid on both 23 cm and 13 cm, so it was definitely a good day for microwave. A little later DB6NT and SP4MPB were worked with good signals. Surprisingly 13 cm worked equally well as 23 cm, even though I only had low power. Just a pity I had not taken 3 cm with me, as all those stations wanted to try. But activity was very low on higher bands. I tried 70 cm only in late evening, and worked LY8O easily even without preamplifier (I had damaged it due to some equipment problem). LA0BY in JO59IX wkd on 1296 MHz via Tropo: 2020/11/09 19:30 SP6GWB JO80JG 559 559 1146 km 2020/11/09 19:35 DB0VC JO54IF 559 hrd beacon 2020/11/09 19:45 SP6GWB JO80JG 55 55 1146 km 2020/11/09 19:56 DB6NT JO50TI 559 559 1072 km 2020/11/09 20:14 SQ6QV JO80JG 54 33 1146 km 2020/11/09 20:20 SP4MPB KO03HT 599 599 911 km 2020/11/09 20:49 DL6NCI JO50VI 519 529 1072 km 2020/11/09 21:22 SP6GWB JO80JG 559 559 1146 km RIG: FT-817ND, XVTR 15 W, 23-ele-yagi LA0BY in JO59IX wkd on 2320 MHz via Tropo: 2020/11/09 19:50 SP6GWB JO80JG 559 519 1146 km 2020/11/09 20:00 DB6NT JO50TI 579 559 1072 km 2020/11/09 20:10 OZ5SHF JO45VX 559 hrd beacon 2020/11/09 20:23 SP4MPB KO03HT 579 529 911 km RIG: FT-817ND, XVTR 2 W, 25-ele-yagi Hepburn indicated enhanced propagation also for the following Tuesday. This time I focussed on 70 cm (after having fixed the preamplifier), since it was the evening for Nordic Activity Contest. Hepburn was right also this time, and good but variable condx persisted during the whole evening. Strongest signals were received from East. It was really fun to participate in the NAC and I got a good result with 66 contacts in total. The longest distance contacts are displayed below. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd on 432 MHz via Tropo: 2020/11/09 21:30 LY8O KO24FO 559 599 1017 km 2020/11/09 21:45 DB0FGB JO50 559 hrd beacon 2020/11/10 18:02 DL4DTU JO60TR 529 529 1045 km 2020/11/10 18:20 SQ2SAT JO83XG 57 57 867 km 2020/11/10 18:36 DJ3AK JO52GJ 529 529 843 km 2020/11/10 18:46 SP1JNY JO73GL 559 579 759 km 2020/11/10 18:53 DK0IZ JO43SX 559 559 671 km 2020/11/10 19:00 SP2FRY JO83WR 539 549 819 km 2020/11/10 19:15 OH1ND KP00XL 579 599 623 km 2020/11/10 19:16 ES2MC KO29GG 559 559 780 km 2020/11/10 19:20 ES0FX KO08XL 599 599 660 km 2020/11/10 19:23 ES2DF KO29GG 529 559 780 km 2020/11/10 19:36 OH1RI KP10HQ 55 55 660 km 2020/11/10 19:39 OH3DP KP10TT 539 559 714 km 2020/11/10 19:42 OH0AZX KP00IF 59 55 554 km 2020/11/10 19:45 OH3TR KP11VK 57 57 729 km 2020/11/10 19:52 ES2AFF KO29EE 59 59 773 km 2020/11/10 19:53 ES1ATE KO29JK 57 57 791 km 2020/11/10 20:00 ES8PW KO18VM 57 55 760 km 2020/11/10 20:05 OZ7JRL JO54RW 559 559 562 km 2020/11/10 20:07 SN1I JO84CE 559 559 724 km 2020/11/10 20:21 DB8WK JO33XN 55 55 733 km 2020/11/10 20:26 OH4LA KP20LG 529 539 788 km 2020/11/10 20:28 OH2FQV KP20MF 52 55 793 km 2020/11/10 21:02 ES2JL KO29LL 539 559 799 km 2020/11/10 21:19 RA2FGG KO04GT 529 559 821 km 2020/11/10 21:21 LY2R KO15VS 529 559 902 km 2020/11/10 21:24 YL2AO KO16DK 579 599 783 km 2020/11/10 21:49 LY1CR KO15CL 529 559 845 km RIG: IC-821H, PA 120 W, 2 x 13-ele-yagi I could hear also ES4RM in KO49 and EU1AI in KO33 but unfortunately we could not make a two-way contact. I had set up also my 3 cm equipment before the NAC started, but no signals were heard. Interesting to notice that it was quite wet with fog at my location the last two days when the condx were at their best. Often I am above the fog during good tropo condx. NAC contacts plotted in map After three days of portable activity I am happy to have a break now.
Enhanced tropospheric propagation over the North Sea was present for about a week. Unfortunately it did not reach up to the Oslo area on some of the days, or I was not at my hilltop site at the right time. Monday Sep. 14 I went out with 4 bands and was in high hopes, only to see that it all came to nothing, except for the nice view and some conversations with the general public. LA0BY Microwave + 70 cm setup The day after was NAC on 23 cm: The ducting between OZ and G made it worse than normal for me into southern directions. But eastwards there was a nice lift and so I worked rather many SM at good signals. ES0FX also made it into the log again, for 26 contacts in total, and all in CW. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 1296 MHz: 2020/09/15 17:25 SM4DHN JP60VA 599 559 171 km CW 2020/09/15 17:31 LA2Z JO59EJ 599 559 68 km CW 2020/09/15 17:39 SM6VTZ JO58UJ 569 559 185 km CW 2020/09/15 17:44 SM4DXO JP71SB 539 559 291 km CW 2020/09/15 17:51 SM0FZH JO99HI 559 579 450 km CW 2020/09/15 18:01 ES0FX KO08XL 529 559 660 km CW 2020/09/15 18:05 SM0DJW JO88WW 559 559 421 km CW 2020/09/15 18:10 SM0RJV JO89VJ 559 559 403 km CW 2020/09/15 18:28 SM3BEI JP81NG 559 559 378 km CW 2020/09/15 18:33 SM7GEP JO77IP 569 579 347 km CW 2020/09/15 18:36 SK0EN JO99JX 579 569 449 km CW 2020/09/15 18:40 SM5EPO JP80MC 559 569 352 km CW 2020/09/15 18:51 SM7DTE JO75CN 539 539 533 km CW 2020/09/15 18:54 SM7EYW JO65MJ 559 579 528 km CW 2020/09/15 18:57 SM7FWZ JO77EQ 569 559 331 km CW 2020/09/15 19:11 SM6CEN JO67AJ 559 529 297 km CW 2020/09/15 19:17 SM4GGC JO69RK 569 569 166 km CW 2020/09/15 19:32 SM0BHN JO89WI 579 559 408 km CW 2020/09/15 19:35 SM0EZZ JO89XG 559 559 415 km CW 2020/09/15 19:38 SK5EW JO79XB 539 559 313 km CW 2020/09/15 19:44 SM0BSO JO99BG 529 529 424 km CW 2020/09/15 19:52 SK0CT JO99BM 599 599 418 km CW 2020/09/15 20:08 OH0AZX JP90XC 559 539 513 km CW 2020/09/15 20:32 SK4AO JP70TO 529 419 280 km CW 2020/09/15 20:48 SM0NZY JO89WI 539 539 408 km CW 2020/09/15 20:58 OZ9PP JO47VA 559 569 333 km CW RIG:FT-817ND, XVTR 15 W into 23-ele-yagi During the rest of the week LA was spotted on different bands, but I was not QRV before Sunday evening, when signals where strong from OZ and SP1. I had hoped working G on 70 cm and 23 cm but I was just a bit too far inside the country to get into the duct. The DB0VC beacon came through on 23 cm quite well but there was no human activity. The main path over the North Sea was from EI/GI to SP. Being in the middle and just beyond the northern rim was no fun. Since not much was going on I was monitoring FT8 on 432,174 MHz and worked the little DX that I could hear. Monday evening, Sep. 21, I was not QRV before 19 UTC, even though I saw there had been good condx for most of the day. Since it was so late I took only 70 cm and 23 cm equipment. After switching on I could immedeately hear several beacons coming in with good signals. I started working on 70 cm into PA but heard also some stations from the UK first in FT8, and then worked G3XDY in SSB. With John I also tried on 23 cm and heard him, but my weak signal was buried in radar noise at his end. After I while I heard the SK1UHF beacon coming inn very strong on both 70 cm and 23 cm, and I focussed my attention to the South-East. I was very happy to work RA2FGG on 23 cm, perhaps the first contact between LA and UA2 on that band. But I could still work to South-West on 70 cm even though condx were on the way down. At 23 UTC I went home again, quite happy to have benefitted from the good condx. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 432 MHz: 2020/09/20 19:42 HF1J JO73FI -07 -03 771 km FT8 2020/09/20 19:57 DL7APV JO62JR 59 59 816 km SSB 2020/09/20 20:22 SP1MVG JO74JA +13 +00 707 km FT8 2020/09/20 20:24 SP1O JO73GK +08 +13 764 km FT8 2020/09/20 20:36 PA8KM JO32BS -16 -19 849 km FT8 2020/09/21 19:20 PA4MRS JO22HK -03 -10 918 km FT8 2020/09/21 19:22 PA1FER JO22II -09 -12 925 km FT8 2020/09/21 19:30 PA4VHF JO32JE 579 559 899 km CW 2020/09/21 19:31 PA2V JO22IM 599 599 908 km CW 2020/09/21 19:35 PA0SJE JO23VH 59 57 799 km SSB 2020/09/21 19:39 G3XDY JO02OB 57 55 1058 km SSB 2020/09/21 21:00 F5APQ JO00VW +00 +00 1150 km FT8 2020/09/21 21:04 F4HRD JO00XX +00 +03 1140 km FT8 2020/09/21 22:05 YL2AO KO16DK 539 559 783 km CW 2020/09/21 22:18 PA1BVM JO21RO -09 +00 987 km FT8 2020/09/21 22:23 PA1BVM JO21RO 529 529 987 km CW RIG: IC-821H, PA 120 W, 17-ele-yagi LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 1296 MHz: 2020/09/21 20:29 SP2HMR JO94DE 559 559 789 km CW 2020/09/21 20:32 RA2FGG KO04GT 569 579 821 km CW 2020/09/21 20:48 PA0O JO33HG 599 599 786 km CW RIG: FT-817ND, XVTR 15 W into 23-ele-yagi The next morning I could hear SK1VHF booming in on 2 m at my home location. Monitoring in FT8 revealed many stations from the Baltic area with strong signals. I decided to answer their calls with QRP (only 10 W) and I could indeed work all I heard without switching on the PA. It was actually the first time I could work into all these Baltic countries from home, so this tells how good condx had been. LA0BY in JO59FW wkd via Tropo on 144 MHz: 2020/09/22 06:54 LY8O KO24FO +00 -13 1026 km FT8 2020/09/22 07:00 LY1CR KO15CL -02 -20 854 km FT8 2020/09/22 07:02 YL2LW KO26CW +00 -09 865 km FT8 2020/09/22 07:04 YL2GC KO26AW +03 -16 856 km FT8 2020/09/22 07:17 LY2CX KO05NW -03 +03 769 km FT8 2020/09/22 07:19 YL2CZ KO06XW -03 -04 747 km FT8 2020/09/22 07:46 UA2FZ KO04FK +10 +09 857 km FT8 2020/09/22 08:05 RA2FX KO04GR -16 -14 836 km FT8 2020/09/22 08:11 ES8TJM KO18UM +02 -01 769 km FT8 2020/09/22 08:48 YL3AJE KO16VP -16 -18 859 km FT8 RIG: IC-706, 10 W, 9-ele-yagi In the evening I went again to my hilltop site, hoping the condx would last into the Microwave NAC. Upon switching on I immediately noticed it was over. Condx were so bad I first thought I had trouble with my equipment for 13 cm and 3 cm. I worked SM7GEP on both bands and SM6VTZ on 3 cm with rather lousy signals, and just heard SM7DTE on 13 cm. After one hour of hard trying I decided to give up and went home and call it the day. Now I have experienced FT8 in good tropo conditions on both 2 m and 70 cm, and I still cannot make up my mind if it is a good or bad thing. DX-Maps is flooded with auto-reported spots from stations like EI2FG, SQ6POM and F1NZC. One may lead to think something exciting is going on while it is just normal condx most of the time. Does the absence on CW/SSB spots indicate that condx are not really good? It is good to have one frequency where one can check how far the propagation reaches, but do we need to stay locked there? There is hardly anybody calling in CW or SSB anymore, even though it should be easy to work CW if signals are better than -10 dB in FT8. There is no point in my opinion to work FT8 with the S-meter being several steps up the scale. So how do we get rid of this desease again? For my part I may restrict my activity to contests if this habbit of misusing FT8 continues.
My activity was limited to few hours on Sunday morning. Flat band conditions did not look promising and enabled only few DX contacts this time. I display the complete log below just to show what one can expect to work from this remote edge in such European contest. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 144 MHz: 2020/09/06 5:15 5P5T JO64GX 55 55 567 km SSB 2020/09/06 5:33 DK3A JO44SK 559 599 620 km CW 2020/09/06 5:37 SF6F JO67QS 559 599 289 km CW 2020/09/06 5:50 DL1SUZ JO53UN 529 559 716 km CW 2020/09/06 5:55 GM4ZUK/P IO86RW 529 559 840 km CW 2020/09/06 6:01 DK2LB JO53LQ 55 59 700 km SSB 2020/09/06 6:06 7S7V JO65SN 55 59 519 km SSB 2020/09/06 6:35 SM4DXO JP71SB 59 59 291 km SSB 2020/09/06 6:36 SK4AO JP70TO 59 57 280 km SSB 2020/09/06 6:43 SK6AW JO67AQ 53 59 266 km SSB 2020/09/06 7:19 OZ4VW JO45UT 559 559 467 km CW 2020/09/06 7:22 SK0EN JO99JX 57 56 449 km SSB 2020/09/06 7:25 SM5DWF JP90JA 53 55 449 km SSB 2020/09/06 7:32 SK0CT JO99BM 55 55 418 km SSB 2020/09/06 7:39 SM6BFE JO68DQ 55 57 169 km SSB 2020/09/06 7:42 SM7NR JO76RC 53 59 513 km SSB 2020/09/06 7:46 SM7THS JO76WU 55 57 459 km SSB 2020/09/06 8:03 SM3BEI JP81NG 57 55 378 km SSB 2020/09/06 8:07 DL2HBQ JO53KV 59 57 677 km SSB 2020/09/06 8:12 OZ1BEF JO46OE 59 59 431 km SSB 2020/09/06 8:27 PC5T JO23KE 519 599 835 km CW 2020/09/06 8:35 SM0BSO JO99BG 55 54 424 km SSB 2020/09/06 8:45 SM0NZY JO99AK 529 529 415 km CW 2020/09/06 8:47 SM4KYN JO69XH 569 579 197 km CW 2020/09/06 8:51 SM0RJV JO89VJ 54 41 403 km SSB 2020/09/06 8:54 LA7VRA JO59HW 59 59 7 km SSB 2020/09/06 9:11 DL0SWG JO63AQ 57 59 704 km SSB 2020/09/06 9:34 OZ2LIN JO46OP 54 55 381 km SSB 2020/09/06 9:34 OZ5KM JO45VX 55 59 448 km SSB 2020/09/06 9:37 OZ9PZ JO46LC 53 52 443 km SSB 2020/09/06 9:51 DL6AA JO43JH 529 599 750 km CW 2020/09/06 10:10 SM6VTZ JO58UJ 569 599 185 km CW RIG: IC-821H, PA 180/300 W, 2 x 9-ele-yagi I heard SN7L and DA0FF for a short while but could not make it through the pile-up at their end. This makes not one 2 m contest this year with more than average condx...
In August we had nice and calm summer weather for some time, without resulting in extraordinary ducting. When Hepburn indicated a good lift to the UK I decided to give it a try. My focus was on 70 cm and up, and so I set up antennas for 70 cm and 23 cm to start with. Immediately after switch-on at around 18 UTC I heard the PI7HGN beacon on 70 cm, which is unusual. Also other beacons from SM/OZ were well above normal, on both 70 cm and 23 cm. DB0VC was audible on 23 cm. Still, it was not the solid ducting across the North Sea that I had hoped for. I easily worked PA0O on 23 cm and G4KUX on 70 cm, but then there was not much more I could hear. When listening on 432.174 MHz in FT8 I noticed some UK stations getting through, but only at low signal levels. After some troubleshooting (the recent Windows update loaded som drivers for my USB-to-serial interface that did not work) I was able to operate in FT8 by switching manually between RX/TX. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 432 MHz: 2020/08/14 19:02 G4KUX IO94BP 559 559 958 km CW 2020/08/14 21:10 21:14 M0CVX IO93XB -11 -12 1011 km FT8 2020/08/14 21:33 21:35 PE0DNY JO33BE +00 -10 805 km FT8 2020/08/14 21:51 21:57 G4NBS JO02AF -17 -23 1084 km FT8 2020/08/14 22:09 22:10 PA5Y JO21VO -09 -14 980 km FT8 RIG: IC-821H, PA 120 W, 17-ele-yagi This was actually the first time I was working FT8 on VHF/UHF from my hilltop site. Given the low signal levels this was the only way to make some contacts. I was impressed with how well the MSHV software was able to decode stations well below my noise floor. I also noticed that signals above ca -16 dB were audible, and I guess when FT8 shows -15 to -14 dB it should be possible to work the stations in CW. I also heard FT8 signals on 23 cm but did not try to decode them due to interface issues. Since the propagation apparently was not very good for me, and the activity low, I did not set up antennas for the two higher bands (13 cm & 3 cm) this time. This event gave me valuable insight in the importance of digimodes on the higher bands, and also in the challenges involved in operating multiple microwave bands from the portable site. Back at home I optimized my microwave setup for more rapid deployment. I mounted the FT-817ND, which serves as IF unit, on a solid aluminium box to provide a pedestal, and also fitted the Pico-Keyer, an IF switch for selection between multiple transverters and an interface for digimodes in that box. Cables for each of the bands were packed separately in order to avoid getting confused and losing valuable time. Now I feel ready for the better tropo ducting to come!
My log is not impressive at all this year. On August 12 I was mainly trying to work some far distance contacts from the hilltop location, but had not much success. Only RU4NG and RA3VGV worked out. From EA2AGZ I received a 25s S9 burst over 2170 km distance, but that was it all (in SSB we might have succeeded). I had some challenges with the new Gemini 2-500 PA operated at 300 W in FSK/MSK due to over-temperature (it was 26 deg C outside and perhaps a few more in the car). On August 13 I worked from home to give a few points in the MS-Sprint Contest. Testing the PA again, the Gemini 2-500 PA worked flawlessly. Reflections seemed better on August 13 than on August 12. I received many good bursts from stations in UA/UT at distances beyond 1900 km, despite my mediocre take-off, but did not try to call those that were very far away. No new squares worked this time, as few expeditions were around (probably due to Corona). I felt the Perseids shower was not too good this year, but I may have picked the wrong operating times. Coordination with family imposed some restrictions for me. LA0BY in JO59FW/IX wkd via MS on 144 MHz: 2020/08/09 15:40 16:20 G0SYP IO83TK 26 26 1063 km FSK 2020/08/10 12:55 13:05 G1KAW JO00EW 26 26 1183 km FSK 2020/08/10 20:52 21:18 EI9E IO61AX +00 +04 1440 km MSK 2020/08/12 07:53 07:58 GI0OTC IO65QE +10 +08 1158 km MSK 2020/08/12 09:05 09:30 DF9PX JO30JF 27 27 1112 km SSB 2020/08/12 09:52 10:00 S50L JN75ES 27 26 1598 km FSK 2020/08/12 10:15 10:30 F4VPC IN87VV 47 48 1581 km FSK 2020/08/12 12:40 12:58 UT8AL KO61WP 27 47 1705 km FSK 2020/08/12 14:00 15:00 RU4NG LO48RR 27 26 2169 km FSK 2020/08/12 15:05 15:20 UA1OEJ KP94VN 27 26 1572 km FSK 2020/08/12 16:24 16:45 RA3VGV LO06PI -01 +04 1821 km MSK 2020/08/12 20:05 20:15 IV3NDC JN65RV 27 26 1574 km FSK 2020/08/12 20:26 20:35 LY2WR KO24FO 27 26 1026 km FSK 2020/08/13 06:30 06:48 OE1ILW/P JN77XX +00 -03 1376 km MSK 2020/08/13 06:50 06:56 HA6VV JN97WS +03 +00 1484 km MSK 2020/08/13 08:04 08:14 S51ZO JN86DR +03 +00 1517 km MSK 2020/08/13 10:56 11:04 PA5Y JO21VO +04 +13 971 km MSK 2020/08/13 11:15 12:06 S56P JN76PO 36 26 1516 km FSK 2020/08/13 12:55 13:09 YU7MS KN05FG +03 +07 1761 km MSK 2020/08/13 14:58 15:20 G4BAO JO02CG +02 -04 1061 km MSK RIG (Aug. 12): IC-821H + PA 300 W, 2 x 9-ele-yagi Digimodes have become very popular and this has led to many more stations being active in 2 m MS. This is good but the entry into MS through digimode interest also has some unfortunate side effects. One of these is the confusion about period length, and some (but not many) people are now using 15 s periods for 2 m MS. I tried my best to convince a few locals to stick to 30 s but this issue is obviously confusing. Some of them mostly operate FT8 on 6 m and perhaps 2 m, and for FT8 it is always used 15 s period, so they apply it also to MSK for MS. With the advent of FSK, the 30 s period was established for MS on 2 m, however, the software now offers two alternatives. So it is very easy for newcomers to apply 15 s periods. I think we need more discussion on this subject and perhaps standardize again on one period length. I see that 15 s has the advantage of making better use of very long reflections and is good for FT8 used via Tropo, but the loss of efficiency due to switch-over (typically 1-2 s) is higher. If people have poor timing, the loss of efficiency easily gets worse, but we probably have to assume that people keep their PC clock well synchronized. I may be pissing in the holy grail, but I think it would be good if 15 s periods would be used for FT8, MSK and FSK as standard. It will not be easy to establish everybody using the same period length, unless people are forced by having the software gurus (K1JR, LZ2HV) remove the other option from their programs. Until this happens, I will happily continue to use 30 s periods for MSK/FSK MS. Another lack of standardization manifests itself in the use of two digital modes. The problem is that not everybody is �in the same room� anymore. There are two calling frequencies, 360 for MSK and (still) 370 for FSK. For judging activity I found it most useful to monitor 360 in MSK, since 370 in FSK is very quiet and everybody seems to be on 360 in MSK these days. Compared to last year, more stations are using the QSY technique (CQ QRG) in MSK, but many are still not. From a hilltop location, there are signals received during both periods via tropo and it is very difficult to actually work somebody on 360 due to QRM. In a big shower it is absolutely mandatory to move away from the calling frequency. Why does it take such a long time to apply a technique in MSK that has been well established in FSK? What would be a good concept for QSY away from the calling frequencies, MSK down and FSK up? There is no standard that I know of. MSK works fine if bursts are not too short, but it does not always decode. The preformatted message cannot be modified in MSK, as it is possible in FSK. When monitoring in MSK while away from shack, the screen may be full of calls but one cannot see how long the reflections actually have been. For skeds I therefore still favour FSK, because it gives the operator some judgement and makes better use of short reflections. I guess we probably have to live with two digital modes, and perhaps even more to come. More time will be spent on troubleshooting and less on air. Can the software gurus modify their programs such that decoding is done in multiple modes simultaneously? Thanks for all the good MS activity, and for the contacts to those I have worked.
The season started as usual around mid May, with some good openings on 6 m. This year I intended to explore using FT8, to understand why it has become so popular over the last years. I practiced first on 6 m and made several interesting contacts with new squares or even DXCC. Then I monitored also on 2 m when the MUF was high at the appropriate distance. My equipment on 2 m at home is quite modest: An old IC-706 with PA 300 W and a 9-ele-yagi at 100 m asl. My horizon is reasonable from SE to S, but elevation > 5 deg in others. The first 2 m event was on May 25, but it was a very weak and patchy opening. After two contacts in FT8 I went calling for some minutes in SSB on 144.300 MHz but nothing was heard, so I went back to 144.174 MHz and worked one more station in FT8. The next one was on May 29, the day of the most outstanding opening in Europe, with about 19 h continuous MUF > 144 MHz at least somewhere. Unfortunately it was not the best event for Scandinavia above 58 deg northern latitude. I had been following the development for many hours on DX-Maps before I was actually able to record anything on the 2 m band up in Norway. The first FT8 signal was logged by my PC while I was enjoying dinner (of course!). Only 20 minutes later I luckily noticed what was going on. This was when the Es cloud was finally moving a little further north. My observations started in FT8, and I was able to work two stations on 144,174 MHz but I heard several more. As soon as the signals were stronger I started calling in SSB on 144,300 MHz. I managed to work a few stations in SSB there despite much QSB. FT8 proved again less efficient for Es, but I was very happy to have worked IS0FWY in FT8 for a new DXCC over a difficult distance (may not have been possible in SSB). I was at the edge of the reflection area, and I did not hear any other LA working Es. Two days later, on May 31, there was a short but good opening to South-East. Thanks to alerts from SM0KAK and SM6VTZ in a freshly established alert system I made it to the radio just in time (we had a barbecue with guests and so I had to sign out from it for 20 min). I hear the first signals in FT8 but quite strong and so I decided to call only in SSB, It seems it was the right decision - 22 QSO was very efficient for the opening of 22 min. LA0BY in JO59FW wkd via Es on 144 MHz: 2020/05/25 10:17 10:19 UT4UEP KN49WV 1658 km FT8 2020/05/25 10:16 10:20 UT3UX KO50IG 1666 km FT8 2020/05/25 10:27 10:32 UT4NJ KN48KQ 1718 km FT8 2020/05/25 hrd in FT8: UT9UR in KO40 2020/05/29 16:04 16:08 IS0FWY JM49LH 2296 km FT8 2020/05/29 16:13 16:15 IK5RWX JN52US 1911 km FT8 2020/05/29 16:19 IK5ZWU JN53VB 1879 km SSB 2020/05/29 16:20 IK0WGF JN52VC 1985 km SSB 2020/05/29 16:24 IW0FFK JN61FS 2025 km SSB 2020/05/29 16:24 I0SJX JN61FU 2015 km SSB 2020/05/29 hrd in FT8 IZ5EME, IK0RNU, IZ0CLS, IK5QKE, IZ5IOR, IZ5ILU, IK4CBO, IW4AOT and EA2Z 2020/05/31 15:56 HA6IGM JN97UO 1497 km SSB 2020/05/31 15:56 YU7ON KN04AX 1781 km SSB 2020/05/31 15:56 YU7ACO KN05RD 1800 km SSB 2020/05/31 15:57 YT3N KN04LP 1839 km SSB 2020/05/31 15:57 YU1ES KN04GT 1811 km SSB 2020/05/31 15:57 YU7PAA KN04AX 1781 km SSB 2020/05/31 15:58 YT4KU KN04ET 1807 km SSB 2020/05/31 15:59 OM5CC JN98JD 1417 km SSB 2020/05/31 15:59 OM5CM JN98DF 1396 km SSB 2020/05/31 16:00 YU2KU KN04ET 1807 km SSB 2020/05/31 16:00 YU1PXF KN04KP 1837 km SSB 2020/05/31 16:01 9A3QB JN95HN 1687 km SSB 2020/05/31 16:01 9A2C JN95IN 1689 km SSB 2020/05/31 16:02 YU1EV KN04CN 1829 km SSB 2020/05/31 16:03 9A3TU JN95EH 1709 km SSB 2020/05/31 16:04 YU5PD KN04EB 1886 km SSB 2020/05/31 16:04 OM5KM JN98BG 1388 km SSB 2020/05/31 16:04 HA4XN JN96LX 1544 km SSB 2020/05/31 16:07 9A2SB JN95GM 1690 km SSB 2020/05/31 16:08 HA4ND JN97MJ 1502 km SSB 2020/05/31 16:09 YU7BJ KN05EI 1750 km SSB 2020/05/31 16:18 YU1EM KN04FP 1827 km SSB Heard also YO2NAA, HA5OO, HA9AL, YU7KB and OM6DC in FT8. Mid-July was lucky to catch a major Es opening while being on DXpedition to north- western Norway. The contacts made from JP21MX can be found in the trip report. July 26 was the last day with Es on 2 m for me. The opening was weak and unstable, and I did not succeed in completing a contact. In FT8 I heard SV8PEX, I7OXH, E77T, IK7NXM, IK0IXO and YU7ON. SV8PEX was at the unusual distance of 2355 km. So how useful is FT8 for Es? It seems good to have one channel where "everybody" is listening ang monitoring for propagation. It works very nicely and better than SSB/CW when signals are weak. It is also good to handle several signals in narrow channel at the same time. But its benefit fades when some signals are very strong. The decoder saturates already when there is one strong station within the passband of the SSB-filter, with the effect that weak stations cannot be seen anymore (one can notice that effect from the noise disappearing on the waterfall display). The QSO efficiency of FT8 is good when signals are weak. A QSO can be completed in 1-2 minutes even if the signal strength is below -15 dB in FT8. But signals become audible to the ear when the signal rises above -15 to -10 dB. CW would work fine above that threshold. Efficiency of SSB will beat that of FT8 for signals above -10 to -5 dB (in FT8) as it allows for several QSO per minute. The advantage of SSB in terms of QSO efficiency will be even higher in a pile-up case when both stronger and weaker stations are calling. I remember in the old days I once worked 8 complete contacts in one good MS burst of ca 2 minutes duration, which would not have been possible in FT8. Another but related issue with FT8 is the choice of period. It is almost inevitable that stations in the same area will end up using different periods. This creates a lot of interference, bringing about the loss of sensitivity described above. Using 15s is adequate for Es but much shorter would not make sense due to switch-over time and perhaps time synchronization error between stations. My conclusion about using FT8: It works best in weak signal conditions, and is good for monitoring propagation because there usually is lots of activity in the same channel. But if the signals are stronger one should switch to SSB/CW and spread out in frequency. This is at least the way I will set my priorities, but the success if of course dependent on "everybody" else listening on SSB around 144.300 MHz. Perhaps using a spectrum scope or two receivers can help monitoring both 174 and 300 simultaneously?
I went on DXpedition to North-Western Norway; see JP21/22 trip report.
The new year started well with tropo conditions to the South from Oslo. Nothing as spectacular as the new World records that where established earlier that day between D41CV and G/GM, but they allowed me to run the AGCW-DL VHF/UHF-Contest for the first time. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 144 MHz: 2020/01/01 13:48 DF9OO JO41QW 898 km 2020/01/01 13:51 DK1OM JO42UV 790 km 2020/01/01 14:04 DJ5QX JO42UN 827 km 2020/01/01 14:06 DK2EA JO50UF 1086 km 2020/01/01 14:09 DL3DQL JO61PH 977 km 2020/01/01 14:11 DL6BF JO32QI 872 km 2020/01/01 14:13 DJ7XG JO42RG 861 km 2020/01/01 14:17 DL6YBF JO31OX 915 km 2020/01/01 14:19 OK1TEH JO70FD 1119 km 2020/01/01 14:23 DK1PZ JO41TH 966 km 2020/01/01 14:25 DL2OM JO30SN 1066 km 2020/01/01 14:28 DR4U JO32LA 915 km 2020/01/01 14:29 DL1NEO JN59KV 1121 km 2020/01/01 14:33 DL2ARD/P JO60AR 1032 km 2020/01/01 14:38 OK1SC JO70OB 1139 km 2020/01/01 14:40 DK7AJ JO51ET 908 km 2020/01/01 14:41 DL7ULM JO62MS 814 km 2020/01/01 14:43 DF2CK JO61XF 994 km 2020/01/01 14:45 DF3OL JO52EJ 843 km 2020/01/01 14:46 DK6NJ JN59WL 1170 km 2020/01/01 14:48 DM1PIO JO72BM 855 km 2020/01/01 14:50 DJ5RE/P JN59XM 1166 km 2020/01/01 14:51 DL7GW JO62SL 852 km 2020/01/01 14:56 OK1KCB JN79GB 1238 km 2020/01/01 14:59 OK7CM JO70KJ 1097 km 2020/01/01 15:00 DF0MU JO32PC 901 km 2020/01/01 15:03 DL2DRG JO70JU 1046 km 2020/01/01 15:04 DL7YS JO62NM 843 km 2020/01/01 15:06 OK1HMP JO70EB 1127 km 2020/01/01 15:07 DL3AMI JO50MX 1001 km 2020/01/01 15:10 DJ2QV JN58UA 1331 km 2020/01/01 15:16 DL1HQE JO51XK 953 km 2020/01/01 15:22 OK1ZHS JO70EC 1122 km 2020/01/01 15:24 DL8YE JO32TC 896 km 2020/01/01 15:25 DL6ZXG JO51KU 904 km 2020/01/01 15:26 DL5SE JO60AJ 1069 km 2020/01/01 15:31 DL4MA JO50UQ 1035 km 2020/01/01 15:41 DL1ALF JO50RL 1057 km 2020/01/01 15:47 OK5TK JO70MB 1136 km 2020/01/01 15:49 DF0WD JO42FD 882 km 2020/01/01 15:52 DL2YDS JO32RG 880 km 2020/01/01 15:56 DL5YM JO72BH 878 km 2020/01/01 16:04 DL5DSB JO71EC 1013 km RIG : IC-821H + PA 180 W, 9-ele-yagi at 450 m asl LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 432 MHz: 2020/01/01 13:56 DK1UF JO42HT 807 km 2020/01/01 16:42 DB6NT JO50TI 1072 km 2020/01/01 17:17 DJ5FK JO42IS 811 km 2020/01/01 17:30 DL1SUZ JO53UN 716 km 2020/01/01 18:00 DL7APV JO62JR 816 km 2020/01/01 18:09 DK5DQ JO31QH 986 km 2020/01/01 18:19 DM2EUN JO60IV 1018 km RIG : IC-821H + PA 120 W, 17-ele-yagi at 450 m asl LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 1296 MHz: 2020/01/01 18:27 DM2EUN JO60IV 1018 km RIG : FT-817ND, antenna mount XVTR 15 W, 23-ele-yagi at 450 m asl On 70 cm I also heard OK1TEH and DL2OM but could not complete a QSO. Later in the evening even 23cm opened up but perhaps only for stations at high altitudes.
When Hepburn forecasted a solid yellow/orange enhancement area over Copenhagen and further towards SP I had high hopes for the evening. So I brought the whole range of bands up to my hilltop location, but the propagation did not reach as far as expected. Also activity seemed quite low and not many contacts were made. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 432 MHz: 2019/09/21 18:52 DG0VV JO62RM 55 53 846 km 2019/09/21 19:00 OK1TEH JO70FD 519 hrd 1119 km 2019/09/21 19:08 DL6NCI JO50VI 549 529 1072 km 2019/09/21 19:27 DL8QS JO43KH 559 559 750 km RIG : IC-821H, PA 120 W, 17-ele-yagi at 450 m asl I could not hear any unusual beacons on 70 cm, but OZ7IGY and OZ1UHF were solid 599. The picture was almost the same on 23 cm, except that DB0VC and SR1KOL came through. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 1296 MHz: 2019/09/21 18:46 DG0VV JO62RM 519 529 846 km 2019/09/21 18:49 OZ9OE JO66CB 59 59 444 km 2019/09/21 19:55 PA0T JO33JC 559 579 801 km 2019/09/21 20:50 DB0VC JO54IF 599 hrd 639 km 2019/09/21 22:20 SR1KOL JO74SE 559 hrd 707 km RIG : FT-817ND, antenna mount XVTR 15 W, 23-ele-yagi at 450 m asl I was also QRV on 10 GHz: Despite hearing a whole range of beacons, including DB0VC and OZ9GHZ over more than 500 km with 599, there was no activity. During a sked I briefly heard PA0T but he faded away too quickly. If conditions like that would appear two weaks later during the IARU Reg1 UHF/SHF Contest it would be a different story ...
The propagation forecast indicated only a minor enhancement area over Denmark, so my expectations were not high. Sunday morning I spent a little less than 6 hours on beating the noise. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 144 MHz: 2019/09/08 4:38 DF0TEC JO73CE 57 59 785 km 2019/09/08 4:45 DF0YY JO62GD 559 579 878 km 2019/09/08 4:53 DL1SUZ JO53UN 569 599 716 km 2019/09/08 5:07 DL0SWG JO63AQ 569 559 704 km 2019/09/08 5:14 DF0MU JO32PC 579 599 901 km 2019/09/08 5:26 SN1I JO84CE 559 599 724 km 2019/09/08 6:50 GM4ZUK/P IO86RW 519 559 840 km 2019/09/08 8:57 UA2FZ KO04FK 559 599 850 km RIG : IC-821H + PA 180 W, 2 x 9-ele-yagi at 520 m asl I managed to work some of the usual suspects, but not SN7L. A big surprise however was GM4ZUK/p as my first ever tropo contact with Scotland (it is so difficult because we have mountains perhaps 700 m high in our path). During none of the contests we had enhanced propagation this year, so I really hope now we get some ducting during the IARU Region 1 UHF/SHF and MMC contests.
As in previous years, my focus was on working new squares which gets increasingly harder. Luckily a few expeditions activate closer squares, otherwise the potential partners are around 2000 km distance or beyond. This year I was using MSK144 for the first time, and this was good, as most of the random activity appeared to be on 144.360 MHz in MSK. I first tested with the WSJT-X software but switched to MSHV due to its better user-friendlyness (the same software can handle both FSK441 and MSK144). MSK seems to be convenient for activity monitoring, as both calls are displayed upon reception of a proper burst and often even the square. But the habit of QSY away (e.g. calling CQ 334) from the crowds seemed not as established yet as it was for FSK. It seems that the FSK441 calling frequency 144.370 MHz is not very useful anymore for judging activity, as most people call on 360 in MSK. But I like to use FSK for skeds, as it is possible to use partial decodes. I was also operating in SSB on a few occasions, in order not to forget about this exciting style of operation. The list below shows all of my MS contacts during the Perseids: LA0BY in JO59IX/FW wkd via MS on 144 MHz: 2019/08/08 18:05 18:20 DJ6AG JO51EQ +05 +01 917 km* MSK 2019/08/11 06:00 06:24 YO2LSP KN05NR 27 26 1730 km* FSK 2019/08/11 13:00 13:45 YO2NAA KN05NS 26 26 1725 km* FSK 2019/08/11 14:00 14:12 DK2DTF JN49JU +15 +10 1126 km* MSK 2019/08/12 11:15 12:20 R1OAK LP05MH +10 +00 1640 km MSK 2019/08/12 14:00 14:10 UA3MBJ KO87QV +05 +11 1537 km MSK 2019/08/12 14:10 14:30 UA4UK LO14MA +11 +02 2043 km MSK 2019/08/12 17:05 17:30 LA/SM5EPO JP76HD 27 26 721 km* FSK 2019/08/13 01:39 01:46 R5WW KO81BQ +16 +04 1819 km MSK 2019/08/13 02:13 02:44 RG3R LO03VK 27 26 2009 km FSK 2019/08/13 02:50 03:16 US8AR KO60RR 26 26 1754 km FSK 2019/08/13 03:20 03:27 DK3XT JN49FE 27 36 1209 km FSK 2019/08/13 03:28 03:35 S51S JN75ES 27 26 1598 km FSK 2019/08/13 03:58 04:06 IV3NDC JN65RV 38 37 1576 km FSK 2019/08/13 04:40 05:04 RM5P KO84VH 27 26 1736 km FSK 2019/08/13 05:05 05:40 RW3QJA KO90PH 27 26 2086 km FSK 2019/08/13 06:11 06:22 GM0EWX IO67UL 27 27 1017 km FSK 2019/08/13 07:39 08:08 F4EZJ JN05DK 27 36 1758 km SSB 2019/08/13 08:18 HB9FAP JN47PH 37 37 1411 km SSB 2019/08/13 09:10 09:20 UA3PTW KO93BS +19 +02 1787 km MSK 2019/08/13 09:22 09:52 R5AO KO86VA 27 26 1642 km FSK 2019/08/13 10:22 10:30 RA1TL KO67PX 27 26 1306 km FSK 2019/08/13 10:45 11:15 R3UG LO17FJ 27 26 1839 km FSK 2019/08/13 11:40 12:05 UT8AL KO61WP 26 38 1705 km FSK 2019/08/13 12:05 12:12 RA3EL KO82AX 27 26 1725 km FSK 2019/08/13 18:20 18:34 EW7AW KO54DC +15 +04 1357 km* MSK 2019/08/13 18:38 18:55 UT9NA KN49EF 26 26 1648 km* FSK 2019/08/13 19:00 19:14 S59R JN76OM 36 26 1524 km* FSK 2019/08/14 07:42 08:05 DK2EA JO50UF 27 37 1082 km* SSB 2019/08/15 05:35 06:20 IV3GTH JN65RU 26 26 1578 km* FSK 2019/08/15 11:28 11:49 EM44T KN38GR 26 26 1616 km* FSK Contacts marked with * were made from home in JO59FW (800 W and 9-ele-yagi) RIG in JO59IX: IC-821H + PA 180 W, 2 x 9-ele-yagi at 520 m asl I found the Perseids this year to be quite good for working long distance, even though I was (for family reasons) not at my hilltop site during the best hours. My longest contact was with RW3QJA over 2086 km. I copied UA6LQZ in LN09DA and LZ0C in KN22XS several times, both at distances of more than 2200 km. Both were observed several times during the morning of Aug 13. The maximum seemed to have occurred about as predicted, from 05-15 UTC on Aug 13. The shower had a steep rise and a long tail. Reflections were not so good on the day before the predicted maximum but very good also the days after.
No propagation enhancement was forecasted, so I took only 2m equipment with me to the hilltop site on Sunday morning. I could make only a few contacts, but surprisingly enough SN7L came through nicely over a very respectable distance. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 144 MHz: 2019/07/07 4:40 DH8BQA JO73CE 529 419 785 km 2019/07/07 5:11 RW2F JO94XV 519 599 790 km 2019/07/07 5:23 DL1SUZ JO53UN 539 559 716 km 2019/07/07 5:43 SN7L JO70UR 55 59 1075 km 2019/07/07 6:07 DF0YY JO62GD 519 559 875 km 2019/07/07 6:31 DK3WG JO72GI 539 539 880 km RIG : IC-821H + PA 180 W, 2 x 9-ele-yagi at 520 m asl
Very nice tropospheric ducting developed over the North Sea, but the predictions indicated that mostly stations in Southern Norway would be in the duct. I decided to give it a try anyway, and went to my usual hilltop site at Tryvann. I started working some contacts on 2 m but it was really quiet on the band around 144.300 MHz. 70 cm seemed open as well to some extent. While I was setting up the 23 cm station, I was monitoring activity in FT8 on 144.174 MHz. It was a real chaos there, with the "local" stations (SM6/OZ) being at S9 and the DX below S5 on the meter. I could indeed copy many DX stations from DL/PA/G but did not bother to attempt calling, as it appeared to me a waste of effort using FT8 in such fine conditions. Unfortunately the 23 cm band was very noisy from that location, so I took down everything and moved to another site nearby but further away from the suspected commercial interference sources. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 144 MHz: 2019/06/28 18:16 G4SWX JO02RF 539 549 1033 km 2019/06/28 18:37 DL6YBF JO31OX 559 579 915 km 2019/06/28 18:52 PA2M JO21IP 559 559 999 km 2019/06/28 18:59 PA0JMV JO21PM 539 529 999 km 2019/06/28 19:42 DF0WD JO42FD 56 57 882 km 2019/06/28 19:49 PA0FEI JO33BC 539 539 814 km RIG : IC-821H + PA 180 W, 9-ele-yagi at 520 m asl LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 432 MHz: 2019/06/28 18:45 DL6YBF JO31OX 529 539 915 km RIG : IC-821H + PA 120 W, 17-ele-yagi at 520 m asl After having set up the antennas at the other site, still in same locator, but a little lower in altitude, I started working on 23cm and it went well. With DL1KDA I reached a new square on that band. It was time to try 10 GHz which I had not used for years. DB0GHZ came inn nicely on 10 GHz, but NIL from PA0JUS at only slightly longer distance, even though he was booming on 23cm. Attempts with DL1KDA failed as well initally. Two hours later DB0GHZ was up to 599 and I asked Alex to try again. I was taken by surprise when his call in CW was quite strong, and he instantly came back when I replied. This was my first contact with DL on 10 GHz, a new square and a new ODX (being 700 km more than the previous!), and moreover with my home square. The other day, Saturday, the conditions still prevailed but I could not go to my hilltop site before the evening. By then the duct had moved more east and propagation to central Germany was gone for my location. Beacons came in well on both 23cm and 3cm, and were even improving in late evening. DB0VC was heard the first time on 3cm but unfortunately there was no human activity from that area. On 23cm the duct even reached into Poland, but zero humans as well. Anyway, it was a nice experience for me working microwave and I will surely try another time in good conditions. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 1296 MHz: 2019/06/28 21:36 DL1KDA JO30EP 559 419 1073 km 2019/06/28 21:56 PA0JUS JO33NB 59 59 800 km 2019/06/28 22:41 DL1KDA JO30EP 579 539 1073 km 2019/06/29 18:46 LA3SHF JO48AD 559 hrd 255 km 2019/06/29 19:48 OZ8ZS JO55RT 579 539 465 km 2019/06/29 19:54 OZ9PP JO47VA 559 579 333 km 2019/06/29 21:30 LB2SHF JO38RB 559 hrd 283 km 2019/06/29 21:35 SR1KOL JO74SE 559 hrd 707 km 2019/06/29 21:37 OZ9GE JO66CB 59 59 444 km 2019/06/29 22:00 DB0VC JO54IF 599 hrd 639 km 2019/06/29 22:01 OZ7IGY JO55WM 559 hrd 501 km RIG : FT-817ND, antenna mount XVTR 15 W, 23-ele-yagi at 450 m asl LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 10386 MHz: 2019/06/28 20:18 DB0GHZ JO34WE 559 hrd 666 km 2019/06/28 22:08 OZ1LPR JO44UW 59 55 564 km 2019/06/28 22:10 OZ7Z JO44VW 55 52 563 km 2019/06/28 22:22 DL1KDA JO30EP 559 529 1073 km 2019/06/28 22:18 DB0GHZ JO34WE 599 hrd 666 km 2019/06/29 19:14 DB0GHZ JO34WE 599 hrd 666 km 2019/06/29 20:00 DB0VC JO54IF 579 hrd 639 km 2019/06/29 20:09 OZ1CTZ JO46OE 599 599 431 km 2019/06/29 20:10 OZ9PP JO47VA 579 589 333 km 2019/06/29 20:40 OZ5SHF JO45VX 559 hrd 447 km RIG : FT-817ND, antenna mount XVTR 1 W, 48cm Procom dish at 450 m asl
The Hepburn tropo forecast looked promising for the evening, so I decided to go to my hilltop location at 500 m asl despite the grim temperatures (-5 deg C). Upon arrival, I set up 2m and 70cm antennas first, but I also took along my 23cm equipment (you never know ...). Immediately after switching on, my most optimistic expectations were exceeded: Stations from the Baltics and Ukraine had good signals on 2m, but even better on 70 cm. But I could not trust my ears when I heard UA6AQN calling CQ on 70 cm, and he even replied on my call - this was really incredible! So I favoured 70 cm and the log was soon filling up with lots of DX, some in squares that I still have not worked on 2m. RZ6DD and R6AM from LN04 became my new ODX on 70 cm, both > 2600 km in distance. Over the evening I had a rather stable duct to UA6 but only on 70 cm. After two hours of operation it felt I should try also on 23 cm, so I reconfigured my setup to have only 23 cm and 70 cm antennas up. And it appeared the condx were good also on 23 cm, but of course much fewer stations were QRV. LY, EW and SP were worked easily. I knew that UA6 was calling on 23cm but could not hear anything. Unfortunately stations in Ukraine are not allowed to operate on 23 cm, I am sure it would have been possible to make a QSO. Late in the evening I changed my configuration back to 2 m and 70 cm antennas. Then RZ6DD and UA6AQN came in on 70 cm even stronger than before and asked for 23 cm ... I was QRV until about 24 UTC, but did not work anything new in the last hour, while UA6AQN was still rolling in. The only station I heard but could not complete with was UY5HF on 70cm. Can it get any better? LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 144 MHz: 2018/11/22 17:11 EW2BZ KO34OD 1185 km 2018/11/22 17:14 UR5LX KO70WK 1899 km 2018/11/22 18:00 EU1AI KO33SV 1219 km 2018/11/22 18:04 UR3VKC KN68NO 1911 km 2018/11/22 18:07 UT9UR KO40XD 1632 km 2018/11/22 18:09 EU1AI KO33SV 1219 km 2018/11/22 18:11 LY3DE KO25SJ 1015 km 2018/11/22 18:19 US8AR KO60AR 1683 km 2018/11/22 18:24 UR8GZ KN66RT 2082 km 2018/11/22 18:25 UT8AL KO61WP 1705 km 2018/11/22 18:28 EU3AI KO22CE 1201 km 2018/11/22 22:43 UY5HF KN66HP 2059 km RIG: IC-821H + PA 180W + 9-ele-yagi LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 432 MHz: 2018/11/22 17:17 UR5LX KO70WK 1899 km 2018/11/22 17:18 EW2BZ KO34OD 1185 km 2018/11/22 17:26 UT4LA KN89CW 1954 km 2018/11/22 17:30 UT8AL KO61WP 1705 km 2018/11/22 17:33 EW6X KO45IM 1173 km 2018/11/22 17:41 UA6AQN KN96VC 2448 km 2018/11/22 17:42 EW6FS KO35LB 1110 km 2018/11/22 17:44 LY3DE KO25SJ 1015 km 2018/11/22 17:49 LY1FX KO25TL 1014 km 2018/11/22 18:30 EU3AI KO22CE 1201 km 2018/11/22 18:32 UR8GZ KN66RT 2082 km 2018/11/22 18:35 LY2CH KO15OV 864 km 2018/11/22 18:47 EU2AA KO34KI 1153 km 2018/11/22 18:49 RZ6DD LN04MX 2606 km 2018/11/22 18:51 R6AM LN04NX 2611 km 2018/11/22 18:54 UT8LE KN79WW 1937 km 2018/11/22 19:27 R6AM LN04NX 2611 km 2018/11/22 19:38 LY2R KO15VS 902 km 2018/11/22 20:18 UT6UG KO50EI 1634 km 2018/11/22 20:38 UT3UCP KO50GM 1628 km 2018/11/22 20:42 UT8AL KO61WP 1705 km 2018/11/22 20:43 UT5VD KN68MT 1889 km 2018/11/22 21:46 US5WU KO20DI 1369 km 2018/11/22 21:53 RZ6DD LN04MX 2606 km 2018/11/22 22:09 EU2AA KO34KI 1153 km 2018/11/22 22:12 UA6AQN KN96VC 2448 km 2018/11/22 22:26 SQ5TF KO02WT 1050 km 2018/11/22 22:33 LY2BBF KO24PR 1048 km 2018/11/22 22:36 UR8GZ KN66RT 2082 km RIG:IC-821H + PA 120W + 17-ele-yagi LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 1296 MHz: 2018/11/22 19:44 LY2R KO15VS 902 km 2018/11/22 19:49 EU4AX KO13VP 1060 km 2018/11/22 19:57 LY2HM KO15CX 809 km 2018/11/22 19:59 EW6FS KO35LB 1110 km 2018/11/22 20:02 SP4MPB KO03HT 911 km RIG: FT-817ND + XVTR + 23-ele-yagi About 80 % of my contacts were made in CW, the others in SSB, and none in FT8. UT6UG wanted to try in FT8 but I could convince him to give SSB a chance and it worked easily. Signal reports were mostly in the high end (559-599) so what do you need FT8 for then? In hindsight, it seems I should perhaps have operated more on 2 m. RA6A claimed on DXC a contact with me on 2 m, but unfortunately was not in my log. I remember hearing another station calling me during my QSO with UT8AL - probably RA6A. Working UA6 on Tropo on 2 m would have been nice. However, in the heat of the moment I decided to focus on higher bands, after having received better signals on 70 cm than on 2 m. Next time we have such fine tropo ducting, I will try to assemble antennas for three bands on the same mast. Then it will be easier to test and monitor on all simultaneously, and not lose precious time for changing antenna configurations. RZ6DD kindly provided a soundfile of our 70cm contact (tnx Alexander!). Back home I did a little path analysis for the longest distance contacts with RZ6DD and R6AM. The path profile shows there were no mountains between both ends.The surface pressure map from British MetOffice shows there wass a huge high pressure area over Lithuania, approximately at midpoint of the path.
The Hepburn propagation forecast indicated a slight chance of some tropo enhancement. When starting operation early on Sunday morning, the band was flat. However, after 2-3 hours signals from distant stations in DL became audible. DR9A came in constantly for more than 5 hours with good signal, and was in fact the strongest station on band in my location. Later even HB9FAP got through on tropo, and got quite strong after I worked him. For most paths the tropo was weak and unstable, which made it challenging to complete QSO. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 144 MHz: 2018/11/04 5:50 DF0MU JO32PC 901 km 2018/11/04 7:04 DM3W JO62XE 889 km 2018/11/04 7:21 OL7C JO60JJ 1074 km 2018/11/04 7:36 DM3D JO62LI 859 km 2018/11/04 8:20 DL6BF JO32QI 872 km 2018/11/04 8:29 DR9A JN48EQ 1264 km 2018/11/04 9:47 DA0FF JO40XL 1057 km 2018/11/04 11:29 HB9FAP JN47PH 1411 km 2018/11/04 11:45 DL0XS JO42RG 861 km 2018/11/04 12:15 DL6IAK JN48IX 1230 km 2018/11/04 12:22 DL2OM JO30SN 1066 km 2018/11/04 12:41 DL0LN JO31QX 913 km RIG: IC-821H, PA 180W, 2 x 9-ele yagi I could hear several other stations, like DF4XG, DJ7R, DL4LBK, DL7ULM, DL8QS, DL8UI, DL0GTH/p, DL0HTW, DL0STO, DL0WAE, DM5D, OK1KKD, OK2A, OL1C, OL4N, PA2CHR and SN1I. I guess the QRM level in the South made it difficult for those to hear me, since most probably used 4-10 dB more power than me.
Nice tropo conditions appeared for the first time for this autumn, as predicted by Hepburn. I started off with antennas for 2m and 70cm but changed to 70cm and 23cm after ca 3 hours when condx appeared to be better on 70cm than 2m. Activity seemed very low given such good propagation. Perhaps more stations were using FT8? LA0BY in JO59IX wkd on 144 MHz via Tropo: 2018/10/10 17:55 SP2MSM JO83XC 883 km 2018/10/10 17:56 SP2DDV JO83VE 870 km 2018/10/10 18:38 LY3A KO25DB 975 km 2018/10/10 18:42 SQ2SAT JO83XG 867 km 2018/10/10 20:12 SP5HD KO02NI 1063 km 2018/10/10 20:15 EW3AA KO12TC 1184 km 2018/10/10 20:18 LY2HM KO15CX 809 km RIG: IC-821H, PA 180W, 9-ele-yagi LA0BY in JO59IX wkd on 432 MHz via Tropo: 2018/10/10 18:44 SQ2SAT JO83XG 867 km 2018/10/10 18:47 SP2CNW JO93AI 861 km 2018/10/10 18:51 RA2FX KO05XB 864 km 2018/10/10 18:55 LY3A KO25DB 975 km 2018/10/10 18:58 SP1N JO73GL 759 km 2018/10/10 19:00 SP1NQN JO84ML 720 km 2018/10/10 19:15 SQ2EEQ JO94WC 855 km 2018/10/10 19:23 DJ4TC JO63PN 731 km 2018/10/10 19:47 SP2FAV JO94MA 832 km 2018/10/10 23:11 EU4AX KO13VP 1060 km RIG: IC-821H, PA 120W, 17-ele-yagi hrd also SQ8NGX LA0BY in JO59IX wkd on 1296 MHz via Tropo: 2018/10/10 21:23 SP4MPB KO03HT 911 km 2018/10/10 21:30 SQ2SAT JO83XG 867 km 2018/10/10 21:37 LY2HM KO15CX 809 km 2018/10/10 21:40 SP2DDV JO83VE 870 km 2018/10/10 22:40 LY3A KO25DB 975 km 2018/10/10 22:45 EU4AX KO13VP 1060 km RIG: FT-817D, XVTR 15 W, 23-ele-yagi hrd also SP5XMU and SP2CNW The maximum distances were almost the same on all three bands. The QSO with EU4AX on 23 cm was actually the first contact between LA and EW on that band! I am looking forward to work more 23cm in future.
There were slightly enhanced tropo condx to OH, but DL was difficult. PA3BIY at the end was a big surprise! Hrd also DL3TW, OH6NG, SN1I and YL2AJ. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 144 MHz: 2018/09/04 17:53 DH5BS JO64RB 678 km 2018/09/04 18:18 OG60F KP01TK 615 km 2018/09/04 18:26 OH1AU KP10CM 637 km 2018/09/04 18:32 OH1TP KP01SU 621 km 2018/09/04 19:37 OH1ND KP00XL 623 km 2018/09/04 19:38 OH1OP KP10CR 637 km 2018/09/04 19:53 OH6KTL KP02OJ 623 km 2018/09/04 20:23 OH0AZX KP00IF 554 km 2018/09/04 20:34 ES0FX KO08XL 660 km 2018/09/04 20:41 ES5PC KO38HJ 921 km 2018/09/04 20:57 DF0MU JO32PC 901 km 2018/09/04 20:59 PA3BIY JO22HB 957 km RIG : K3 + XVTR + PA 180 W, 2 x 9-ele-yagi at 520 m asl
Guided by the Hepburn tropo ducting forecast I chose again Sunday morning for some activity, and it seems it was a good decision. A little lift over the North and Baltic Seas was enough to cross the 1000 km mark a few times. I heard also DF0WF, DM5D, DM7A, OL1R (no ears), OL7C, ON8CF/p and SN1I. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 144 MHz: 2018/09/02 4:03 DA0FF JO40XL 1057 km 2018/09/02 4:10 SN7L JO70UR 1075 km 2018/09/02 4:18 DF0TEC JO73CE 785 km 2018/09/02 4:46 G0VHF/P JO01PU 1075 km 2018/09/02 4:50 G3XDY JO02OB 1058 km 2018/09/02 4:54 DL1SUZ JO53UN 716 km 2018/09/02 5:16 DL0GTH JO50JP 1038 km 2018/09/02 6:09 DH5BS JO64RB 678 km 2018/09/02 6:19 DL0HTW JO60QU 1028 km 2018/09/02 6:28 DF0MU JO32PC 901 km 2018/09/02 6:34 SP2FRY JO83WR 819 km 2018/09/02 8:07 OL4N JO60VR 1047 km 2018/09/02 8:23 SP1JNY JO73GL 759 km 2018/09/02 9:02 DM4EE JO64KE 657 km 2018/09/02 9:27 DL3SWS JO53WH 745 km 2018/09/02 9:50 DL7AFB JO62JA 894 km RIG : K3 + XVTR + PA 180 W, 2 x 9-ele-yagi at 520 m asl
My goal was to work some new squares and to participate in the MS SPRINT Contest. Sunday from afternoon to late night I was in my hilltop location in JO59IX, mainly working to east. All contacts were made in digimode FSK441 with WSJT. LA0BY in JO59IX/FW wkd via MS on 144 MHz: 2018/08/12 06:54 07:00 OE3FVU JN78VE 27 26 1351 km * 2018/08/12 12:36 12:54 R3PAC KO93CQ 27 37 1797 km 2018/08/12 12:54 13:02 RW3TJ LO16XG 46 26 1973 km 2018/08/12 13:12 13:26 RV3IG LO17FJ 27 26 1839 km 2018/08/12 14:02 14:30 UA3IDQ KO66JF 27 27 1355 km 2018/08/12 16:35 16:45 RK1AS KP40UE 27 27 1050 km 2018/08/12 18:06 18:16 HB9FAP JN47PH 27 27 1411 km 2018/08/12 18:22 18:46 RZ3RZ LO02RR 26 38 2035 km 2018/08/12 18:50 19:20 UT8AL KO61WP 27 39 1705 km 2018/08/12 19:28 19:50 GI0OTC IO65QE 28 26 1158 km 2018/08/12 20:00 20:12 LZ2FO KN13KX 27 26 1957 km 2018/08/12 20:34 20:45 RW3PX KO83WR 27 27 1776 km 2018/08/12 21:28 21:48 OY4TN IP62NB 38 38 972 km 2018/08/12 21:50 22:25 GM4GUF/p IO68TB 26 26 998 km 2018/08/12 22:28 22:34 E72U JN94JU 27 26 1766 km 2018/08/12 22:45 23:07 R3PA KO93JV 27 26 1816 km 2018/08/12 23:18 23:57 UT2EM KN67QV 27 26 1983 km 2018/08/13 00:00 00:12 UT2UB KO40UO 27 26 1582 km 2018/08/13 08:42 08:58 G4DCV IO91OF 27 26 1196 km * 2018/08/13 09:17 09:26 G7RAU IN79JX 27 26 1485 km * 2018/08/13 09:29 09:48 PA3BIY JO22HB 27 26 947 km * 2018/08/13 09:50 10:14 IV3NDC JN65RV 38 26 1574 km * 2018/08/13 10:17 10:37 G1KAW/p JO00EW 28 29 1183 km * 2018/08/13 10:40 10:49 DL9LBH JN59ID 27 26 1200 km * 2018/08/13 10:54 11:02 HA6VV/p JN97WV 38 26 1471 km * 2018/08/13 11:15 11:21 DG1VB JO61RC 37 26 1000 km * 2018/08/13 11:35 11:40 IW2BNA JN45ON 27 26 1601 km * 2018/08/13 11:46 11:52 HB9AHD JN47IM 27 26 1385 km * 2018/08/13 11:55 12:11 UT9UR KO40XD 39 27 1641 km * 2018/08/13 12:24 12:30 OE1ILW/3 JN77XX 27 26 1376 km * 2018/08/13 12:36 14:48 PA2CHR JO32DB 27 37 913 km * 2018/08/13 18:30 19:14 UT3UX KO50HJ 39 26 1652 km * RIG: 180W into 2 x 9-ele from JO59IX (* 600 W into 9-ele from JO59FW) I was very happy to work 4 new squares (IO65, IO68, KO66, LO02). UA3IDQ was using only 40W into 11-ele-yagi, UT8AL only 20W into 21-ele-yagi and GM4GUF/p only 80W into 3-ele wire-Quad. I cannot really tell how this shower compared to earlier years, but I guess it was not bad, since I succedded with low power stations. It found it again confusing that many stations used MSK144 as another digimode with a separate calling frequency. Unfortunately I could only receive on MSK144, so I may have missed some stations. I do not see a distinct advantage of MSK144 vs FSK441 to justify the distraction. I will probably make MSK144 work for the next shower, but hope that the MS activity one day goes back to one standard mode (or even to SSB in good showers!).
No particularly condx, so only the usual suspects made it into the log. Lost DL6YBF and G4CDN in noise. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 144 MHz: 2018/08/07 18:57 DF0MU JO32PC 901 km 2018/08/07 19:25 ES5PC KO38HJ 921 km 2018/08/07 19:39 YL2AJ KO16OX 798 km 2018/08/07 19:44 SN1I JO84CE 724 km 2018/08/07 20:09 SP1MVG JO74JA 707 km RIG : K3 + XVTR + PA 180 W, 2 x 9-ele-yagi at 520 m asl
This time both weather and propagation was favourable, and quite a number of good DX contact were possible. Nice tropo to western part of Germany on Sunday morning, which allowed me to work some of the friends near my home area. I was also very happy to work YU7ON for an unusal distance and ODX, probably via MS burst which lasted long enough to exchange all details in CW. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 144 MHz: 2018/07/08 4:12 DK5DQ JO31QH 986 km 2018/07/08 4:25 DF4T JN39NR 1162 km 2018/07/08 4:32 DF0DA JO30JF 1112 km 2018/07/08 4:41 DA0FF JO40XL 1057 km 2018/07/08 4:46 DH8BQA JO73CE 785 km 2018/07/08 4:55 DL0AC JO30EJ 1100 km 2018/07/08 5:15 DL1SUZ JO53UN 716 km 2018/07/08 5:30 DL0LN JO31QX 913 km 2018/07/08 5:41 YU7ON KN05FG 1759 km 2018/07/08 5:45 RW2F JO94XV 790 km 2018/07/08 5:46 DF0MU JO32PC 901 km 2018/07/08 6:11 DK3WG JO72GI 880 km 2018/07/08 6:36 DF9WB JO30JF 1112 km 2018/07/08 6:47 DL6YBF JO31OX 915 km 2018/07/08 7:43 G4SWX JO02RF 1033 km RIG : IC-821H + PA 180 W, 2 x 9-ele-yagi at 520 m asl
There was a nice tropo duct to the South, reaching not very far but good for some unusual contacts. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 144 MHz: 2018/07/03 17:00 PA2RU JO32LT 829 km 2018/07/03 17:30 DL6YBF JO31OX 915 km 2018/07/03 17:33 DL6BF JO32QI 872 km 2018/07/03 17:55 SN1I JO84CE 724 km 2018/07/03 18:01 DB6NT JO50VJ 1068 km 2018/07/03 18:05 DL9BDM JO33RL 749 km 2018/07/03 18:12 DH8BAT JO43KQ 708 km 2018/07/03 18:50 DL1BME/P JO42JW 792 km 2018/07/03 18:53 DB3BS JO42EU 805 km 2018/07/03 18:59 DL2OM JO30SN 1066 km 2018/07/03 19:01 DL6AM JO42QH 856 km 2018/07/03 19:23 DF0WD JO42FD 882 km 2018/07/03 19:24 DM7N JO42AH 868 km 2018/07/03 19:51 PA4VHF JO32JE 899 km 2018/07/03 19:52 DL1YAW JO41DX 902 km 2018/07/03 19:53 DP9X JO41PU 908 km 2018/07/03 19:53 DL4OAT JO42OG 862 km 2018/07/03 19:55 DK1UF JO43KC 773 km 2018/07/03 19:56 DL9OBD JO42QN 829 km 2018/07/03 20:01 DL8YE JO32TC 896 km 2018/07/03 20:04 PA3BIY JO22EB 963 km 2018/07/03 20:18 DL1OBF JO42NG 863 km 2018/07/03 20:29 SP1MVG JO74JA 707 km 2018/07/03 20:41 DH8BQA JO73CE 785 km RIG : K3 + XVTR + PA 180 W, 2 x 9-ele-yagi at 520 m asl
My activity was limited to a few hours on Saturday evening. Tropo propagation was quite poor, despite the fine weather. I almost could not hear DF0MU over 900 km (we manage a QSO in akmost every contest), but conditions where slightly better to SP. With SN7L I was lucky again, over a very respectable distance (we also work in most contests). All in all only 11 contacts made it into the log. I hope for better propagation in the IARU R1 UHF Contest in October. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 144 MHz: 2017/09/02 18:26 DL1SUZ JO53UN 716 km 2017/09/02 19:04 SP1JNY JO73GL 759 km 2017/09/02 19:07 DF0YY JO62GD 878 km 2017/09/02 20:05 SP2FRY JO83WR 819 km 2017/09/02 20:37 SP1N JO73VN 777 km 2017/09/02 21:18 SN7L JO70SS 1068 km 2017/09/02 21:53 DF0TEC JO73CE 785 km RIG : IC-821H + PA 180 W, 2 x 9-ele-yagi at 520 m asl
This year my time was very limited, and I focussed on stations operating from new SQR. Saturday I was in my hilltop location in JO59IX, Sunday I was at home but mostly busy with family. All contacts were made in digimode FSK441 with WSJT. LA0BY in JO59IX/FW wkd via MS on 144 MHz: 2017/08/12 14:05 14:20 LB6GG KQ50KG 37 26 1464 km 2017/08/12 15:07 16:02 UY5UZ KN59BT 37 26 1668 km 2017/08/12 16:33 16:43 GW4BVE/p IO72QT 27 26 1230 km 2017/08/12 16:45 16:57 GW8JLY IO81JM 27 26 1277 km 2017/08/12 17:46 17:52 EI9E IO61AX 27 26 1454 km 2017/08/12 17:55 18:06 UA1ANA KO69BW 27 26 1187 km 2017/08/12 19:17 19:35 R1NI KP61VS 26 29 1258 km 2017/08/12 20:32 20:38 9A5M JN95GO 27 38 1680 km 2017/08/12 21:18 21:35 EW8W KO42TO 26 26 1418 km 2017/08/12 21:38 21:45 UA3LID KO64CN 38 26 1418 km 2017/08/13 09:15 09:24 EI/ON5GS/p IO54PC 37 27 1322 km * 2017/08/13 09:30 09:50 S59R JN76OM 39 26 1524 km * 2017/08/13 11:25 11:35 EW3AA KO12TC 27 26 1191 km * 2017/08/13 11:47 12:05 R1AY KP50BS 27 26 1082 km RIG: 180W into 2 x 9-ele from JO59IX (* 600 W into 9-ele from JO59FW) Nice to see LB6GG being active from Northen Norway, and with good equipment, so it was very easy to work him. Much more difficult was UY5UZ who had only 45W RF out and a 7-ele-yagi. Trials with RV3IG (LO07FJ), RA3RF (LO03WK), RW3TJ (LO16XG) and IN3TWX (JN56NQ) were not successful. As usual for the Perseids, there were a number of rare squares on air activated by DX- Peditions (thanks!). I noticed good activity from Russia, Belarus and Ukraine. This is nice as most of my "white" areas are in Russia. I was happy to work 6 new squares among my few contacts. It was a bit confusing that many stations used MSK144 as another digimode. It would be easier if only one digimode would be used, particularly when working random (so far FSK441 seems to persist on 144,370 MHz).
As usual for these 24 h contests my intention was to participate for a few hours to give participants the opportunity to work LA and perhaps some good DX. The Hepburn forecast looked promising, so I picked Saturday evening as the appropriate time. When starting at about 17 UTC the condx were still flat. But already an hour later the beacons SK6VHF and OZ7IGY had risen in fieldstrength, and condx allowed working into DL on 144 MHz. They soon improved further, and after working DA0FF in JO40XL over >1000 km I decided to re-assemble my antenna and add 70 cm on top. This turned out being successful, as I could contact DA0FF also on 70 cm. Now more stations had realized that condx were good and called towards Scandinavia. I managed to work mainly into DL on 2m, whereas SP, OK and PA appeared outside the duct for me. Around midnight DA0FF was strong on both bands, and just for fun I gave a shout on 2m without PA and they heard me well. Now also OZ4VHF and DM0PR beacons where quite strong. But activity was declining and condx started to fade, so I dismantled at 1 UTC for a good sleep. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 144 MHz: 2017/07/01 17:44 DH8BQA JO73CE 785 km 2017/07/01 17:49 OZ1ALS JO44XX 558 km 2017/07/01 18:00 OZ6TY JO55XE 538 km 2017/07/01 18:01 SM6NZB JO58RB 217 km 2017/07/01 18:08 SM7FMD JO77FW 313 km 2017/07/01 18:25 5P6T JO46SC 436 km 2017/07/01 18:30 SK7MW JO65MJ 528 km 2017/07/01 18:33 DM4EE JO64KE 657 km 2017/07/01 18:34 SM7HGY JO86DR 486 km 2017/07/01 18:53 DL6YBF JO31OX 915 km 2017/07/01 18:59 DF0MU JO32PC 901 km 2017/07/01 19:03 OZ5ESB JO45GK 521 km 2017/07/01 19:20 DL0LN JO31QX 913 km 2017/07/01 19:54 DK0TEU JO43OS 696 km 2017/07/01 20:17 DP4D JO42DC 888 km 2017/07/01 20:23 DA2T JO41QW 898 km 2017/07/01 20:53 DA0FF JO40XL 1057 km 2017/07/01 21:08 DL0SX/P JO44SN 606 km 2017/07/01 21:12 DR1H JN59OP 1149 km 2017/07/01 21:19 DL1SUZ JO53UN 716 km 2017/07/01 21:23 OZ9FW JO65CO 495 km 2017/07/01 21:29 OL7C JO60JJ 1074 km 2017/07/01 21:30 DK0SM JO41UW 896 km 2017/07/01 21:32 DK0OA JO41WX 891 km 2017/07/01 21:45 DK0B JO41HG 977 km 2017/07/01 22:01 DL1YAW JO41DX 902 km 2017/07/01 22:06 DL0BRB JO43LX 675 km 2017/07/01 22:11 DG8NCO JO50VH 1077 km 2017/07/01 22:14 DC1NNN JO60BE 1092 km 2017/07/01 22:17 DL4LAB JO53BQ 700 km 2017/07/01 22:18 DK2LB JO53LQ 700 km 2017/07/01 22:20 DK5DQ JO31QH 986 km 2017/07/01 22:27 DF0XG JO51KW 894 km 2017/07/01 23:14 SN7L JO70SS 1068 km 2017/07/01 23:21 DK0MB JO41TW 897 km 2017/07/01 23:45 DL2ARD JO50RK 1062 km 2017/07/01 23:57 DL0HTW JO60QU 1028 km 2017/07/02 0:35 DK0FW JO51AB 992 km 2017/07/02 0:42 DB6NT JO50VJ 1068 km RIG : IC-821H + PA 180 W, 2 x 9-ele-yagi at 520 m asl LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 432 MHz: 2017/07/01 20:13 OZ1ALS JO44XX 558 km 2017/07/01 20:57 DA0FF JO40XL 1057 km 2017/07/01 21:01 OZ1SKY JO56DG 413 km 2017/07/01 22:48 SM6CEN JO67AJ 297 km 2017/07/01 23:03 DF0MU JO32PC 901 km RIG : IC-821H + PA 120 W, 17-ele-yagi at 520 m asl July-Contest 2 m Antenna in JO59IX Looking forward to catch more tropo in the late summer and autumn.
I went on DXpedition to Lines�ya, together with some good friends from Germany; see JP43/44/51 trip report.
For this year the astronomers expected an outburst of the Perseids, so I was eager to see if it materialized. Due to family I could not spend much time but focused on hunting new squares during the maximum. Unfortunately my generator did not want to start so I was a bit short on energy from my hilltop site. LA0BY in JO59FW/IX wkd via MS on 144 MHz: 2016/08/12 08:50 09:00 RW3PX KO83WR 27 26 1776 km IX 2016/08/12 09:30 09:40 RO3X KO73FU 27 26 1583 km IX 2016/08/12 09:53 10:05 F6DRO JN03TJ 37 37 1943 km IX 2016/08/12 11:30 11:32 EI9E IO44WD 38 26 1408 km IX 2016/08/12 13:23 13:43 EW7T KO53EV 27 27 1375 km FW 2016/08/12 14:03 14:06 TF3CY/p IP24JF 27 27 1407 km FW 2016/08/12 15:00 15:13 RU1MS KP40XD 38 27 1079 km FW 2016/08/12 15:25 16:00 9A/OK2ZAW JN83FO 27 26 1861 km FW 2016/08/13 06:24 07:10 UA1OEJ KP94VN 26 26 1586 km FW 2016/08/13 07:35 07:56 M0HOM IO93QO 26 26 973 km FW 2016/08/13 08:06 08:45 RA1TL KO67CX 26 26 1260 km FW 2016/08/13 09:21 09:23 S50C JN76JG 27 28 1546 km FW 2016/08/13 09:30 09:45 YU7C JN95SS 26 26 1686 km FW 2016/08/13 10:40 10:46 GM4VVX IO78TA 27 26 874 km FW 2016/08/13 11:03 11:10 DM5TI JN68FF 27 27 1308 km FW 2016/08/13 11:18 11:31 DF1SO JN48PO 27 36 1262 km FW 2016/08/13 11:31 11:41 IV3NDC JN65RV 27 27 1574 km FW 2016/08/13 11:41 11:52 DO9EE JO41GU 26 26 907 km FW 2016/08/13 12:45 12:55 OE1ILW/3 JN77XX 26 26 1376 km FW 2016/08/13 12:58 13:10 MM0GYX IO87IP 26 26 830 km FW 2016/08/13 13:15 13:50 F6BEG JN25JS 26 26 1619 km FW 2016/08/13 14:00 14:22 ON5DRE JO20KW 27 26 1060 km FW 2016/08/13 18:45 19:10 TF3ML/p HP93KU 26 26 1701 km IX 2016/08/13 19:35 19:55 GM6VXB/p JO07KU 27 26 611 km IX 2016/08/13 20:00 20:19 UR4EWZ KN87CX 26 26 2113 km IX 2016/08/13 21:00 21:27 R1NW KP71HU 26 26 1302 km IX 2016/08/13 21:37 21:57 HB9FAP JN47PH 47 26 1411 km IX RIG FW: IC821H, PA 500W, 9-ele-yagi at altitude 100 m asl RIG IX: IC821H, PA 180W, 2 x 9-ele-yagi at altitude 520 m asl From what I observed I can confirm that the shower was quite good. Reflections were many and strong on the 12th in the afternoon, but because of generator trouble and bad weather I was not QRV for as many hours as I hoped for. I was lucky to complete with TF3ML/p, GM6VXB/p and UR4EWZ in the evening of the 13th when reflections were generally poor. UR4EWZ was surprisingly easy with 20 sec S9 bursts over such a long distance. I had heard him already from my home-QTH earlier, as well at UT4LA. R1NW and MM0GYX were both operating with only 50W output power. All in all, the shower was very good for me. I was very happy with the results, as I managed to work 8 new squares. Really impressive to see two stations active on Iceland simultaneously. Many thanks to all who bothered to work me and in particular the expeditioners who activated rare squares!
I went on DXpedition to Oppdal, together with friends and family; see the JP42 trip report.
LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo and Aurora on 144 MHz (> 800 km): 2015/11/07 14:03 UA1ASA KO48GH 55A 59A 1032 km 2015/11/07 14:44 DM3W JO62XE 559 599 890 km 2015/11/07 16:20 GM4VVX IO78TA 56A 53A 890 km 2015/11/07 16:55 DA0FF JO40XL 559 599 1058 km 2015/11/07 17:25 DL0HTW JO60QU 559 599 1029 km 2015/11/07 17:57 RK1AS KP40UE 55A 55A 1052 km 2015/11/07 18:16 DF0MU JO32PC 57A 59A 901 km 2015/11/07 18:30 RA1AC KO49VV 55A 55A 1061 km 2015/11/07 18:43 LY2WR KO24FO 59A 59A 1017 km RIG : K3 + XVTR + PA, 180 W, 2 x 9-ele-yagi at 520 m asl Due to the Aurora I became QRV earlier than planned. Unfortunately the activity from Scandinavia and Baltic countries was quite low. Even some good Tropo contacts were possible, but condx were quite unstable. Hrd also OL90IARU, R1DM, GM4PPT and GM3UCI.
LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 144 MHz (> 800 km): 2015/11/03 17:10 DL6KA JO30DS 55 51 1061 km 2015/11/03 17:12 DF0MU JO32PC 59 59 901 km 2015/11/03 17:22 PA4VHF JO32JE 52 55 899 km 2015/11/03 17:25 DG0VOG JO60QU 57 55 1028 km 2015/11/03 17:28 DL5FDP JN49LP 529 559 1154 km 2015/11/03 17:30 DL9AJ JO52CJ 559 559 844 km 2015/11/03 17:31 DK5YA JN49NX 559 559 1116 km 2015/11/03 17:33 DQ1200HI JO42QD 529 559 875 km 2015/11/03 17:36 DF1JC JO31OG 559 559 993 km 2015/11/03 18:00 DG0VOG JO60QU 59 59 1028 km 2015/11/03 18:04 OK1NG/P JO60UQ 59 59 1050 km 2015/11/03 18:14 DK5ON/P JO41IW 55 59 903 km 2015/11/03 18:19 DL6YBF JO31OX 539 539 915 km 2015/11/03 18:20 DF1JC JO31OG 539 559 993 km 2015/11/03 18:25 DL4DWA JO61QH 559 559 978 km 2015/11/03 18:28 DL6BF JO32QI 529 559 872 km 2015/11/03 18:30 DK5YA JN49NX 559 539 1116 km 2015/11/03 18:32 DL2ALF JO50IW 529 519 1005 km 2015/11/03 18:34 PA3C JO33FD 559 559 803 km 2015/11/03 18:38 DL2VNN JO61QH 529 549 978 km 2015/11/03 18:45 PA2RU JO32LT 599 599 829 km 2015/11/03 18:46 DL3YEE JO50LX 559 559 1001 km 2015/11/03 18:47 DF7KF JO30GU 579 559 1048 km 2015/11/03 18:50 DF0CCC JO32PC 599 599 901 km 2015/11/03 18:51 DJ9MG JO52TC 59 59 877 km 2015/11/03 18:52 DL1VPL JO61UA 59 59 1014 km 2015/11/03 18:56 OK1ES JO60RN 59 59 1061 km 2015/11/03 18:59 DF0HF JO50SF 559 559 1085 km 2015/11/03 19:00 DL6NAA JO50VF 579 599 1086 km 2015/11/03 19:01 DK7AW JO51ET 559 579 908 km 2015/11/03 19:23 OK1DOY/P JO60UQ 59 59 1050 km 2015/11/03 19:24 DL1OBF JO42NG 59 59 863 km 2015/11/03 19:30 PE1BIW JO32BT 59 57 845 km 2015/11/03 19:47 DH7OT JO52FF 53 53 862 km 2015/11/03 19:48 DL2ABO JO41RT 53 55 911 km 2015/11/03 19:49 DL5ME JO52SD 59 59 873 km 2015/11/03 19:52 OK1JAX JO60VR 57 59 1047 km 2015/11/03 19:52 DL8AAV JO52DH 55 57 853 km 2015/11/03 19:53 OK1UXH JO60VR 57 57 1047 km 2015/11/03 19:53 DH1DM JO61TB 55 55 1008 km 2015/11/03 19:54 DM2EUN JO60IV 55 55 1018 km 2015/11/03 19:56 DH3NAN JO50NC 55 55 1098 km 2015/11/03 19:59 DO3MXK JO62HJ 559 559 851 km 2015/11/03 20:00 DM1TS JO61OC 59 59 999 km 2015/11/03 20:02 DM2ECM JO62GJ 54 54 851 km 2015/11/03 20:04 PA2CHR JO32DB 59 55 922 km 2015/11/03 20:04 DG1DTL JO61PH 55 55 977 km 2015/11/03 20:05 DJ5QX JO42UN 57 58 827 km 2015/11/03 20:06 DM1CG JO30GU 56 51 1048 km 2015/11/03 20:06 DK5QN JO42FA 59 58 896 km 2015/11/03 20:07 DK5DQ JO31QH 59 55 986 km 2015/11/03 20:09 DK2EA JO50SF 57 55 1085 km 2015/11/03 20:11 DL8YE JO32MC 559 559 904 km 2015/11/03 20:13 DF9IC JN48IW 519 519 1234 km 2015/11/03 20:14 DF0WD JO42FD 599 599 882 km 2015/11/03 20:15 DF7VX JO41KP 579 579 934 km 2015/11/03 20:17 DD9OR JO42RB 559 559 884 km 2015/11/03 20:18 DJ3AK JO52GJ 59 59 843 km 2015/11/03 20:19 PA3BGM JO33CE 54 59 803 km 2015/11/03 20:20 DL1YAW JO41DX 59 59 902 km 2015/11/03 20:23 DJ7YP JO42GB 59 59 890 km 2015/11/03 20:27 DH6DAO JO41CN 559 559 949 km 2015/11/03 20:28 PA4VHF JO32JE 599 599 899 km 2015/11/03 20:30 DK0OG JN68GI 559 559 1298 km 2015/11/03 20:32 DL6YEH JO32VA 579 559 903 km 2015/11/03 20:33 DL1YEN JO42GI 579 559 858 km 2015/11/03 20:34 DL1RTL JO62PH 559 579 867 km 2015/11/03 20:35 SN2DX JO93AI 559 579 861 km 2015/11/03 20:38 DL1OJ JO42QI 599 599 852 km 2015/11/03 20:40 DL2DTJ JO61UA 53 55 1014 km 2015/11/03 20:41 DJ2IA JO61WN 55 55 956 km 2015/11/03 21:02 SO3Z JO82LJ 529 429 927 km 2015/11/03 21:06 DL9OBM JO52BM 559 599 830 km 2015/11/03 21:08 DL1HSF JO61FR 59 59 924 km 2015/11/03 21:11 DL5EBS JO31LH 559 559 992 km 2015/11/03 21:25 UA2FT KO04LT 559 599 839 km 2015/11/03 21:27 SP1JNY JO73GL 59 59 759 km 2015/11/03 21:59 OK1TEH JO70FD 529 529 1119 km 2015/11/03 22:03 DL7MB JO62QK 559 559 854 km 2015/11/03 22:09 OK7GU JN69QT 57 55 1143 km 2015/11/03 22:21 DL7ULM JO62MS 559 559 814 km RIG : K3 + XVTR + PA, 180 W, 2 x 9-ele-yagi at 520 m asl Squares worked during Nov NAC. Very nice to have good tropo condx again during the NAC. I enjoyed it a lot. Many thanks for all contacts!
The good tropo condx observed earlier this week continued into the contest. Signals that came across the Baltic Sea were extremely strong at times, but did not reach very far into the more southern regions. It was great fun to operate from Norway, being again at the end of a duct. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 432 MHz: 2015/10/03 14:31 SM7GVF JO77GA SSB 59 57 397 km 2015/10/03 14:37 DG8LG JO44VP SSB 59 55 596 km 2015/10/03 14:39 OZ1IEP JO55XU SSB 59 58 465 km 2015/10/03 14:45 OZ1FDH JO65CS SSB 55 55 476 km 2015/10/03 14:50 SK7MW JO65MJ SSB 59 59 528 km 2015/10/03 14:52 OZ9GE JO66CB SSB 59 59 444 km 2015/10/03 14:53 OZ1BV JO54WA SSB 59 54 666 km 2015/10/03 14:57 DL3LAB JO44XS SSB 59 59 581 km 2015/10/03 14:58 DK4LI JO44WQ SSB 59 59 591 km 2015/10/03 15:10 SP1JNY JO73GL SSB 59 59 759 km 2015/10/03 15:16 OZ6OL JO65DJ SSB 59 59 518 km 2015/10/03 15:23 DF1AN JO63SX SSB 59 59 689 km 2015/10/03 15:52 OZ9FW JO65CO SSB 59 55 495 km 2015/10/03 15:58 DL1SUZ JO53UN CW 539 599 716 km 2015/10/03 16:02 DL0HB JO53KB SSB 59 59 769 km 2015/10/03 16:34 SB7W JO65RL SSB 59 59 526 km 2015/10/03 16:36 DK2ZF/P JO43WJ SSB 59 55 734 km 2015/10/03 17:01 OZ1SKY JO56AG SSB 59 59 414 km 2015/10/03 17:08 DJ6TK JO44RT SSB 57 59 579 km 2015/10/03 17:13 DK2OY JO44WS SSB 59 59 581 km 2015/10/03 17:30 LY2WR KO24FO CW 559 599 1017 km 2015/10/03 17:38 UA2FT KO04LT CW 529 559 839 km 2015/10/03 17:43 SP2CHY JO94GO SSB 59 59 760 km 2015/10/03 17:48 SP2MKO JO93CB CW 519 559 895 km 2015/10/03 17:51 DL6AA JO43JH SSB 59 59 750 km 2015/10/03 17:52 DL8QS JO43QH SSB 53 59 746 km 2015/10/03 17:57 PI4GN JO33II SSB 55 55 776 km 2015/10/03 17:58 OZ1BEF JO46OE SSB 59 59 431 km 2015/10/03 18:08 OV3T JO46RG SSB 59 59 419 km 2015/10/03 18:16 DL4LAB JO53BQ SSB 55 51 700 km 2015/10/03 18:16 OZ2ND JO46LD SSB 56 55 438 km 2015/10/03 18:19 OZ1GPZ JO54TU SSB 57 59 572 km 2015/10/03 18:26 OZ7JRL JO54RW SSB 59 59 562 km 2015/10/03 18:31 DK7C JO62GD SSB 59 55 878 km 2015/10/03 18:38 DF0MU JO32PC CW 559 599 901 km 2015/10/03 18:50 DD0VD/P JO64NN SSB 59 59 619 km 2015/10/03 18:51 DG4VW JO64NN SSB 59 59 619 km 2015/10/03 19:06 DL4HG JO53CM CW 599 599 719 km 2015/10/03 19:12 SP1O JO73GK SSB 57 59 764 km 2015/10/03 19:25 SP2WPY JO94FL SSB 55 55 768 km 2015/10/03 19:32 SM7DTT JO65LJ SSB 59 59 527 km 2015/10/03 19:41 SP1NQN JO84ML SSB 59 59 720 km 2015/10/03 20:00 SM7WSJ JO67WI SSB 57 57 344 km 2015/10/03 20:06 SQ1GU JO74TE SSB 57 59 709 km 2015/10/03 20:27 SM6ESG JO67CC SSB 59 57 331 km 2015/10/04 5:47 OH1ND KP00XL SSB 59 59 623 km 2015/10/04 6:05 SK6QA JO58UB SSB 59 59 221 km 2015/10/04 6:07 OZ9PZ JO46LC SSB 59 59 443 km 2015/10/04 6:08 SM6L JO57XQ SSB 57 57 265 km 2015/10/04 6:10 SK0EN JO99JX SSB 59 59 449 km 2015/10/04 6:14 SM7NR JO76RC SSB 59 59 513 km 2015/10/04 6:18 DL0LN JO31QX SSB 55 55 913 km 2015/10/04 6:24 SA6CBY JO57XP SSB 59 59 269 km 2015/10/04 6:28 SM6VTZ JO58WI SSB 59 59 193 km 2015/10/04 6:29 SM7EYW JO65MJ SSB 59 59 528 km 2015/10/04 6:32 SA6AIN JO68UD SSB 59 59 266 km 2015/10/04 6:47 OZ7IS JO65DQ SSB 59 59 486 km 2015/10/04 6:55 SM4L JP70WS SSB 54 55 297 km 2015/10/04 7:04 YL2LW KO26CW CW 529 579 853 km 2015/10/04 7:06 LY2BUU KO25AH CW 559 599 945 km 2015/10/04 7:21 ES6FX KO37OW CW 559 589 970 km 2015/10/04 7:27 YL2FZ KO37QI CW 529 539 1004 km 2015/10/04 7:38 SM0GWX JO89XG SSB 59 59 415 km 2015/10/04 7:54 SM3BEI JP81NG SSB 55 57 378 km 2015/10/04 8:01 SM4DXO JP71SB SSB 59 59 291 km 2015/10/04 8:24 ES5PC KO38HJ SSB 59 59 921 km RIG: IC-821H, PA 2 x MRF648, 120 W, antenna 2 x 13-ele-yagi (V�rg�rda) Squares worked on 432 MHz. Having worked 66 contacts with 10 DXCC (no LA!) at an average of 600 km/QSO was a reasonable result on 70 cm for my northern location. I also tried working on 23cm but the number of stations being within reach was quite limited. I did not set up the 3cm dish, as I felt too busy on the lower bands. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 1296 MHz: 2015/10/03 16:44 DK2ZF/P JO43WJ CW 559 559 734 km 2015/10/03 16:51 DC6UW JO44VJ SSB 59 55 623 km 2015/10/03 16:51 OZ6OL JO65DJ SSB 59 59 518 km 2015/10/03 16:55 SM7GEP JO77IP SSB 59 59 347 km 2015/10/03 17:16 OZ1IEP JO55XU SSB 55 52 465 km 2015/10/03 18:53 DD0VD/P JO64NN SSB 59 59 619 km 2015/10/03 18:54 DG4VW JO64NN SSB 59 59 619 km 2015/10/03 20:32 SM6ESG JO67CC SSB 59 56 331 km RIG: FT-817ND, antenna mount XVTR, 15 W, antenna 23-ele-yagi (F9FT)
LA0BY in JO59FW/IX wkd via MS on 144 MHz: 2015/08/10 06:26 06:36 SP/OK1MU KO13MX 27 26 1008 km 2015/08/12 06:03 06:17 GW8JLY IO81JM 28 26 1253 km 2015/08/12 06:36 06:44 OE1ILW/3 JN77XX 27 26 1376 km 2015/08/12 06:48 06:55 HB9SLU JN36MU 27 26 1472 km 2015/08/12 07:24 07:54 OH9EKT KP38SP 26 26 1263 km 2015/08/12 08:22 08:35 LA8KV JP52QQ 38 39 310 km 2015/08/12 09:35 09:48 LY/OK2ZAW KO23BX 28 26 1057 km 2015/08/12 09:52 10:14 IK4ADE JN54OE 26 26 1752 km 2015/08/12 10:52 11:03 G4KGC IO92RG 27 26 1089 km 2015/08/12 11:12 11:22 G3WZT IO90UX 27 27 1202 km 2015/08/12 12:20 12:22 EI9E IO43XW 28 26 1403 km 2015/08/12 12:30 13:05 DL/IN3TWX JN59KV 27 28 1117 km 2015/08/12 13:15 13:26 DG2KBC JN58MI 27 27 1289 km 2015/08/12 13:30 13:52 G4LOH IO70JC 27 27 1474 km 2015/08/12 17:14 17:24 RM1A KO59BU 27 26 1093 km 2015/08/13 06:55 07:10 TF3CY HP94AD 48 26 1742 km IX 2015/08/13 08:05 08:38 IW7DEC JN81GF 26 26 2123 km IX 2015/08/13 09:30 09:42 S56P JN76PO 27 27 1517 km IX 2015/08/13 10:00 10:12 9A5RJ JN86EL 37 26 1546 km IX 2015/08/13 13:20 13:24 HB9FAP JN47PH 39 37 1406 km 2015/08/13 14:05 14:40 UA1ZFG KP69NA 27 26 1467 km 2015/08/13 14:43 14:45 RU1A KO48VR 27 27 1101 km 2015/08/13 14:53 15:24 DM3W JO62XE 27 26 888 km 2015/08/13 15:24 15:33 DL1KDA JO30FQ 27 27 1059 km 2015/08/13 16:04 16:12 S54O JN75NT 26 27 1601 km 2015/08/13 19:00 19:30 LY2WR KO24FO 28 26 1026 km RIG JO59FW: IC-821H, 600 W, 9-ele-yagi at 100 m asl RIG JO59IX: IC-821H, 180 W, 2 x 9-ele-yagi at 520 m asl Did not make so many contacts this year. I was hunting for new squares but this starts to become challenging as it often involves long distance and/or stations using low power. I had a couple of unsuccessful trials when I was in JO59IX. Not sure I was QRV during the peak, reflections never lived up to usual �Perseid style�. I was lucky to complete with IW7DEC Roberto over 2123km, quite a long distance for medium power. Nice and unusual QSO also with TF3CY Benedict who produced big reflections over 1742km.
I went on DXpedition to Glenna mountain cottage, together with friends and family; see the JP41UA trip report.
LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 144 MHz: 2015/07/04 17:25 OZ7KJ JO46ML 59 59 401 km 2015/07/04 17:26 DL0SX/P JO44SN 59 59 606 km 2015/07/04 17:28 OZ1ALS JO44XX 59 59 558 km 2015/07/04 17:29 DF0MU JO32PC 59 59 901 km 2015/07/04 17:31 OZ5GX JO57FJ 59 59 288 km 2015/07/04 17:41 DL7AU/P JO54VC 59 59 657 km 2015/07/04 17:43 DM4EE JO64KE 55 59 657 km 2015/07/04 17:51 DK2LB JO53LQ 59 59 700 km 2015/07/04 17:53 DK3BK JO53WH 59 59 745 km 2015/07/04 17:58 PA1T JO33JF 59 59 788 km 2015/07/04 18:07 DG7TG JO34WE 59 59 666 km 2015/07/04 18:09 DG3XA JO43WJ 59 59 734 km 2015/07/04 18:12 DG8LG JO44VP 59 59 596 km 2015/07/04 18:19 OZ1BUR JO46HI 59 59 421 km 2015/07/04 18:33 SN7L JO70SS 559 599 1068 km 2015/07/04 18:37 DL4LAB JO53BQ 59 59 700 km 2015/07/04 18:38 DK2OY JO44WS 59 59 581 km 2015/07/04 18:40 SK6BA/P JO67HN 59 59 291 km 2015/07/04 19:23 DM3W JO62XE 559 599 889 km 2015/07/04 19:31 DK0TEU JO43OT 59 59 692 km 2015/07/04 19:38 OZ3PY JO45UM 59 59 499 km 2015/07/04 19:40 5P6T JO46OE 59 59 431 km 2015/07/04 19:42 OL7C JO60JJ 59 599 1074 km 2015/07/04 19:49 DH8BQA JO73CE 57 55 785 km 2015/07/04 20:02 OZ7A JO55RT 59 59 465 km 2015/07/04 20:38 PA5MS JO21RQ 559 559 978 km 2015/07/04 20:55 DA0FF JO40XL 59 59 1057 km 2015/07/04 21:03 DR1H JN59OP 59 559 1149 km 2015/07/04 21:37 OL4A JO60RN 59 59 1061 km 2015/07/04 21:43 OZ5ESB/P JO45GK 59 59 521 km 2015/07/04 21:44 OZ1IEP JO55XU 59 59 465 km 2015/07/04 22:14 RM1A KO59BU 55A 55A 1078 km 2015/07/04 22:21 YL2PJ KO36QM 55A 55A 1045 km 2015/07/04 23:14 DL8VL JO71FG 529 599 996 km 2015/07/04 23:21 DF0WD JO42FD 55A 55A 882 km 2015/07/04 23:31 LY2BUU KO15XH 55A 59A 941 km 2015/07/04 23:33 DK5DQ JO31QH 559 559 986 km 2015/07/04 23:42 DF0DA JO30JF 59 59 1112 km 2015/07/05 1:26 ON4KHG JO10XO 559 559 1125 km 2015/07/05 1:47 DF0YY JO62GD 559 599 878 km 2015/07/05 2:19 UA2F JO94XV 599 599 790 km 2015/07/05 2:28 ON5LL JO21RF 559 599 1027 km 2015/07/05 2:31 OZ1HDF JO55UN 599 599 495 km 2015/07/05 3:17 DF0WF JO62XR 559 599 830 km 2015/07/05 3:27 G5LK/P JO01QD 559 599 1142 km 2015/07/05 3:28 DK2ZF/P JO43WJ 599 599 734 km 2015/07/05 3:32 DC1NNN JO50SF 59 59 1085 km 2015/07/05 3:45 DL0LN JO31QX 55 59 913 km 2015/07/05 3:51 SA7W JO86FP 59 59 500 km 2015/07/05 4:04 DP4D JO42DC 56 59 888 km 2015/07/05 4:37 DL0HTW JO60QU 59 59 1028 km 2015/07/05 4:51 DF0GEB JO51DI 559 599 959 km 2015/07/05 5:00 DR1B JO33TP 55 59 729 km 2015/07/05 5:14 DL6YBF JO31OX 559 559 915 km 2015/07/05 5:16 SF7WT JO65QQ 559 599 503 km 2015/07/05 5:32 LB6DG JO59FJ 599 599 66 km 2015/07/05 6:31 SM6BFE JO68DQ 599 599 169 km 2015/07/05 6:37 LY2NA KO15JC 539 559 900 km 2015/07/05 6:41 SM4HFI JP70TO 559 559 280 km 2015/07/05 6:47 LY2HM KO15CX 529 559 809 km 2015/07/05 7:00 YL3AG KO06WK 529 559 762 km 2015/07/05 7:03 UA2FT KO04LT 559 599 839 km 2015/07/05 7:05 UA2FL KO04FQ 559 599 828 km 2015/07/05 7:19 DK3WG JO72GI 559 559 880 km 2015/07/05 7:22 SP1JNY JO73GL 559 599 759 km 2015/07/05 7:24 SP1NQN JO84ML 559 599 720 km 2015/07/05 7:34 SN1D JO83BQ 529 599 773 km 2015/07/05 7:36 OZ/DL6CGC JO57EA 599 599 330 km 2015/07/05 7:37 DL7ANR JO62PM 59 59 844 km 2015/07/05 7:55 DK0OA JO41WX 59 59 891 km 2015/07/05 7:59 DK0SM JO41UW 59 59 896 km 2015/07/05 8:26 DK2CK JO42CG 59 59 871 km 2015/07/05 8:27 DR3A JN49LM 59 59 1168 km 2015/07/05 8:45 DJ5FK JO42SH 559 599 856 km 2015/07/05 8:59 DF5HD JO43WN 57 59 715 km 2015/07/05 9:41 DL1SUZ JO53UN 559 599 716 km 2015/07/05 9:43 DL5XJ JO54AE 559 599 645 km 2015/07/05 9:45 DL8YE JO32TC 579 559 896 km 2015/07/05 9:57 DL1OBF JO42NG 59 59 863 km 2015/07/05 10:05 DK0GM JO42DD 55 59 884 km RIG: K3 + XVTR, PA 2 x MRF245, 180 W, antenna 2 x 9-ele-yagi (V�rg�rda) Squares worked on 144 MHz. LA0BY in JO59IX wkd via Tropo on 432 MHz: 2015/07/04 20:13 OZ9FW JO65CO 59 59 495 km 2015/07/04 20:14 OZ1ALS JO44XX 59 59 558 km 2015/07/04 20:15 OZ9GE JO66CB 59 59 444 km 2015/07/04 20:17 OZ9PZ JO46LC 59 59 443 km 2015/07/04 22:02 OZ7JRL JO54RW 599 599 562 km 2015/07/05 2:06 OK2A JO60JJ 599 599 1074 km 2015/07/05 2:23 UA2F JO94XV 599 599 790 km 2015/07/05 4:10 DF0MU JO32PC 59 59 901 km 2015/07/05 4:19 SA7W JO86FP 599 599 500 km 2015/07/05 4:27 DA0FF JO40XL 559 599 1057 km 2015/07/05 6:03 PI4GN JO33II 59 59 776 km 2015/07/05 8:13 DL0LN JO31QX 59 59 913 km 2015/07/05 8:23 DK0PU JO31JN 55 55 967 km RIG: IC-821H, PA 2 x MRF648, 120 W, antenna 17-ele-yagi (Wisi) Squares worked on 432 MHz. Picture of setup for 2 m and 70 cm