The last full weekend in April was not
a red letter one for the log here. There had been a big X-Flare
during the week, and while the Charged Mass Ejection was not
expected to hit the Earth, there did appear to be some impact.
I have grown to expect first a
blackout, then an actual improvement or enhancement of prop on the
higher bands as the ionosphere “settles down” following such a
flare. Either I missed it, or it just did not happen.
There was no time to get in front of
the radios the day of the flare itself, but I did manage to get into
the glow of the dials Friday night about 8 P.M. ( 0100 April 26
GMT). The WWV sweep did give some indication that the high bands
should be in good shape ( times GMT):
0119 WWV 2500 S-9+10 DB
0120 WWV 5000 S-9+20 DB
0121 WWV 10000 S-9+30 DB
0122 WWV 15000 S-9+20 DB
0122 WWVH 15000 Easily audible behind
WWV
0123 WWV 20000 S-5 with QSB
0124 WWV 25000 S-4 rapid, deep QSB
Getting to the bands themselves, the
only audible signal on the ten meter band was the VY0SNO beacon on
28182. It did have a fairly nice signal, 579, but there appeared to
just be no activity in North America to be heard. ( this often seems
to happen on ten. There will be good prop as indicated by the
presence of beacon signals, but no one on the air to take advantage
of it) There were, however, no signs of beacon signals from Central
or South America.
There were a few signals on 12 meters,
but mostly on SSB and mostly US stations in ragchews. A move down to
17 meters brought the first DX of the evening with JN1NOM calling CQ
at 0129 on 18076 logged with a 549 signal. He seemed to be getting
no takers. Just up one click at 18077 was RU9NC at 559 with lots of
flutter. US stations from the New England area had good signals that
were strong and steady, but Midwest and West Coast stations were weak
and fluttery. On to 20 meters.
First tuning did not bode well. There
was nothing at the bottom or the band but OK1HB on 14007 calling CQ
at 0132 and not finding any company. Further up the band, US stations
were working each other with nice, strong, steady signals, a sign of
good short skip. The band appeared very short. I did find a pile up
uncharacteristically high in the band at 14028, but it turned out to
be on W1AW/1, the centennial ARRL station down one, listening up.
All were near local strength. This was not looking good.
As I tuned the edges of the pileup I
heard a weak, fluttery signal about 14029. the rhythm of his calling
did not match those of the pileup, so tightening up the selectivity
and working the passband tuning on the R-75 a bit, I was able to tell
he was not trying to work W1AW, but seemed to be working his own
pile. After about five minutes of getting one letter at a time when
he did sign his call every few contacts, I found the jewel of the
evening: A65CA in the United Arab Emirates! He was really down in the
grass with echo and flutter.
It had been a long stressful day at
work and the eyelids were getting heavy. Its funny how concentrating
on CW can lead to the forehead clunking down on the table if you
don't watch it! So it would be one more sweep of the band to see if
any other Middle East stuff would come through.
It may be “cheating” a little to
check DX Summit to some, but if you can't hear them what does it
matter...and if you do, well you just saved a little time. The
“cheating” would come if you heard the signal and just assumed it
was the target and logged it in the SWL column. So when I use DX
Summit, I force myself to fully copy the callsign and at least one
callsign of stations he is working to get it in the “heard”
column.
There was a spot for TA3AX on 14010. Tuning down there, sure enough I found him, but closer to 14009.9
by my accounting ( with the 250 Hz dual filters, that distinction IS
important!) He was in pretty steady at 559. This made me wonder if
the A65 I had heard earlier had his beam pointed another direction
and I had been hearing him perhaps on backscatter or multi path and
the TA3 had his pointed more my way. He was calling CQ when I heard
him and I got no clues to that from stations he was working, so that
is just a guess.
By now the sleepies were really
attacking hard, so one more quick sweep up the band turned up more
strong US stations including W1AW/2 on 14027.3 with the strongest,
steadiest signal of the evening, pushing the R-75 s-meter to + 20
db. The only European heard in the evening was found on 14037 at 0144
in the form of IZ8EFD coming in 559. I caught him signing with
another station who was quite strong when he came back. A bit of a
surprise when he identified showed him to be from Venezuelan using
the special call 4M5M, logged at 589. This sort of confirmed to me
that the band was fairly short. It was also time for Lights Out”!
A bit of a reflection here: I
remember the earlier years of DX-ing where nothing would keep me away
from the glowing dials. Sleep could be easily pushed back, either
with coffee or a Coke or just sheer will. Age has brought on a more
clearly defined “wall”. Either that or the Sandman has a bigger
shovel these days!
In the perfect DX-ers world, I would
have been up before sunrise checking the post flare prop. But in the
real world of older age, lack of endurance I have noticed following
cancer treatments a few years ago ( not sure what it did, but there
has been an effect from the chemo and radiation that has been
noticeable even now—but, cancer free eight years now!! No
complaints!) and our Saturday morning ritual of a leisurely breakfast
with the wife and I, on the weekend mornings if I sleep in, it is
usually mid morning or later before the radios light up. ( It is JUST
a hobby, isn't it! )
As it was, it was almost 10:00 A.M.
Texas time before the tubes lit up. My old friend Drake 2B was lit
this morning alongside the R-75.
This was the weekend for a Swiss
contest so I anticipated a lot of European activity on 20 meters.
Wrong! It was like the night before. US stations were very strong and
steady, as if first hop prop was relatively short. At 1455 GMT, the
pileup on W1AW/1 was deep and strong, with the Drake analog S-meter
staying above +20 db most of the time.
I still prefer the mechanical
S-meters. On the Drake, in the Fast AVC mode, the needle bounces
around a lot, while in the Slow mode it sort of floats around. On the
old Hallicrafters SX-111 it really bounces around with each dit and
dah on cw and flies around vigorously on SSB or fading AM stations.
As an aside, in addition to being
great on the ham bands, the SX-111 is really great for for broadcast
DX-ing on the 41 meter broadcast band and on 31 meters, too. Even
though it is a ham bands only receiver, the WWV bandswitch position
allowing reception of the 10 mHz WWV allows enough tuning range to
get fairly far down into 31 meters and the 50 kHz IF provides
excellent selectivity on AM in the wider bandwidth positions that
provides quite pleasant AM reception. There is no actual calibration
for the 31 meter band, but as one who developed methods of
determining frequency long before accurately calibrated dials or
digital readouts I have my ways of knowing where I am!!! Just ask
any other old time DX-er! ( Maybe that should be the subject of a
future blog entry!)
The mechanical S-meter on my old SX-96
is much larger and seems more damped than the 111's. The '96 might
have different AVC characteristics as well, having been designed more
as an SWL receiver than as an amateur receiver. The digital bar type
S-meters just are not the same! But back to the subject at hand.
After noting several stations from the
“4” and “7” call districts pounding into Central Texas,
tuning down the band showed almost nothing below 14025. Finally one
weak signal was heard calling “ CQ Test” around 14030 with lots
of QSB. It was the first station heard working the Swiss contest:
HB9CA, working mostly fairly close in European stations with few of
them audible here at all, and the ones that were, too weak to ID.
Over the next few minutes, only three other HB's were found. One
unusual thing for this time of the morning on 20 was noted: a South
American, PT5WF, was trying to work some of the Swiss stations in the
contest. He was weak and fluttery, probably aggravated by the fact
that he certainly had his beam pointed away from me and toward his
would-be targets. Or perhas it was backscatter.
It was time for a WWV sweep to
get an idea of what's happening. It was time to use the R-75 for this
because of the keypad frequency entry making it quick work. Besides
the Drake was not crystalled up for other than the 5, 10 and 15 mHz
WWV's Again, times are GMT. ( 1500 GMT is 10:00 A.M. Local time
here...CDT)
1507 WWV 2500 Inaudible
1507 WWV 5000 Inaudible
1508 WWV 10000 S-9+ 20 DB
1509 WWV 15000 S-9+ 20 DB
1509 WWVH 15000 Well audible behind
WWV
1510 WWV 20000 Carrier Just audible
1511 WWV 25000 Carrier Just audible
It appears the higher bands are not
being helped out much by the earlier flare, and, in fact, seem a bit
depressed from their usual activity. A check of ten meters showed just
a few beacons. Those beacons are a really good indicator of band
activity and no matter where in the world you may be, there should be
some of these little low power stations pumping out 1 to 5 watts 24
hours a day. One really good list can be found on one of the pages
on QSL.net.
This particular morning, pickin's were
rather slim. Once again, times are GMT for these beacon loggings:
1514 WA4ROX/B 28285.9 RST559
C ( “c” in RST reports indicates a
chirping signal)
1519 LU2ERC 28193 RST339
Argentina
1520 LU2FB 28197 RST339
Argentina
1521 PY2WFG 28203.3 RST449 Brazil
1525 NP2SH 28275 RST559 QSB
Virgin Islands
After only a few South Americans were
heard calling CQ endlessly without response, as is my habit, I began
working my way down toward the lower bands. The stop in twelve
meters was not long with one station, K5XB, heard on backscatter,
again heard calling CQ with no takers. The only other CW station on
the band was from Madeira, CT3HF.
Once again, I fear that people are
giving up on the bands too easily.It appears that some may make a
quick tune through and if they do not hear a gaggle of stations, go
on somewhere else. It may be that two things could help this
situation out. One would be for those working stations to post them
on DX Summit or other spotting networks and for others to spend some
time calling CQ. Checking the beacons on ten meters should be a
“given”. And again, the clue of atmospheric noise other than
static crashes or local man manmade noise should be an indicator that
more time should be spent trolling the waters. So many times I have
heard DX stations, sometimes quasi-rare ones even, calling CQ to no
avail!
It might be that DX-ers of today are
missing a bet in not making use of some of the patience of our
forebears. It may be a clue to our changing culture that we all look
for instant gratification even in our DX-ing!
A jump down to 15 meters did result in
finding some of the activity in the Swiss Contest. Several HB9
stations were heard with moderately strong signals from 1515 to about
1700 GMT. Interestingly enough, many of them were working South
American rather than North American stations, while most were working
other Europeans on single hop prop.
A check back up on ten meters at 1700
( noon local time) showed some of the South American beacons a little
stronger, but not much activity. Two big surprises came, however,
while listening on 28200. On this frequency a network of beacons
around the world transmit in turn, so it takes listening on the
frequency several minutes for the cycle to complete. While there was
no ham activity at all noted in the cw part of the band one one SSB
QSO noted in the phone band, beacons from South Africa and Hawaii
were heard! ZS6DN was heard at 1705 GMT with a good RST569 signal,
and KH6WO heard at 1707 GMT with an RST559 signal. This is very
early for hearing KH6 signals here on ten meters.
After a break for a few hours, a trip
back to the radio saw a number of South American beacons coming in
much better than in the morning, along with some strong signals from
Florida beacons. Once again, there were few actual QSO's
heard...mostly South American stations. But one jewel was there
lurking, once again indicating that the band was open but either no
one was home or it was open to an area where little people live. At
2158GMT, down on 28006.25, up popped FK8DD in New Caledonia calling
CQ!
Hence the day went. The Saturday of
the last weekend in April would not go down in the annals of DX
history was being all that great. One last check of twelve meters
was worth the stop however, at 2237GMT there was 3D2RH on 24894.1 on
Rotuma. Not a new one for my overall country count but a new one for
twelve meters! Listening for a while when the band does not
immediately serve up something is, indeed, worth it.