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| 40m from 7am-7pm local time |
With the Solar cycle heading on a downward trend I have been reading how 40, 80 and 160m may be the bands of choice for QSO's. Since my MFJ 1788 will only venture down to 40m and at the best of times I have found it to preform like a wet noodle on this band. I decided this weekend to give WSPR a go on 40m using 1 watt to see what results I got. My 1 watt signal was picked up throughout Canada and the U.S. There was a one off to Spain but the consensus from
WSRP.net was on 40m my DX was going to be North America. There was one odd report which repeated itself over and over, it was from WY1R saying he was hearing me on 6m?? Not to sure what that was all about. I also was checking with
PSK reporter looking at WSPR mode and funny thing was there was never any hits for my call?
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| 40m from 7am-1am local time |
6 comments:
Hi Mike, I will look out for you on 40 m WSPR. My HYEndFed performs very well on 40-20-10 meter. Outside these bands I can tune for good SWR but efficiency is not perfect. With the Solar Cycle in mind I prefer 40 meter. 73 Paul PC4T
Good evening Paul very nice to hear from you, this weekend I hope to give 30m and 20m a go to see what type of results I get. I plan on giving 30m a go at dawn and sunset.
73, Mike
Hi Mike,
I'm not sure why pskreporter doesn't work for wspr. I can't make it show any hits from anyone. Wsprnet.org seems to be the best place to go.
I'm also a balcony ham but my mfj loop is the 1786, so no 40m (not like the 10m option is getting much use these days). My 40m hamstick with a single counterpoise does a pretty good job. Lots of US stations and a few Europeans around sunset but I'm running high power - 10w.
Best of luck.
73 Paul VA3ZC
Good afternoon Paul, nice to hear from another balcony ham. I was visiting your QRZ.COM page and I read that you are working on your CW. For a low power balcony ham it has been a great mode for me. I was concerned that SSB would bother the neighbours. The 40m meter part of the Mag loop antenna is like a wet noodle but it does get me down to the States. Have you had any issue with your loop at all? I have read over and over again how folks with the loop have had issue. I had a small issue when it was delivered to me but I was able to repair it myself.
73,
Mike
Hi Mike,
My loop was second hand and covered in silicone goop. I cleaned it up and built a horiz. mount for it then stuck it in a patio umbrella stand, then on the balcony table. I did have to expand the little coil inside it to get reasonable swrs. All bands except 17m for some reason. No problems with the control unit.
Yup, ssb seems like a non starter here. I do mostly jt65 these days but that is pretty boring. Hope to be making cw contacts soon.
73,
Paul
Good morning Paul, I have my loop on a tripod covered in with a BBQ cover. The cover does not seem to affect the SWR at all. I had to do the same thing with the tuning loop inside the antenna. It's good you were able to find a second hand loop. It took me some time to get the code up to speed for a decent QSO. I then took on the adventure to move to the next code level of contesting. With regards to contesting I still use a code reader (MRP40) when the contest speed goes the way of a woodpecker.
73,
Mike
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