Ken wrote: It's been my experience that even with marginal conditions (when even QRO doesn't work), as long as you have a decent antenna, 5w is plenty even on SSB. Now if I'm ever forced to use a marginal antenna, I'll consider going to 10w (not 15.2 - thanks for the heads up!) or maybe 100w.
------------------------------------------------------------------------- I enjoy QRP work too, when I'm working other QRP stations. I keep my power output near 5 watts around the QRP calling frequencies. When I'm roaming the bands and have the wick turned up on my K2/100 to a full 100 watts out, and if another station says they're running QRP AND has a decent signal, I'll QRP to match. If the other signal isn't real good, it's not uncommon for that operator to have trouble copying if I QRP as well so I'll stay QRO. Personally, I get a kick out of digging for whispers in the noise at times, so I'm likely to respond to a very weak signal and not complain about a signal dancing in the noise. Of course, when CDX are good even QRPp can boom in from almost anywhere. When considering QRO, I avoid getting excited unless I can jump my power by a factor of 8 to 10. For example, it makes sense to me to add a 100 watt amp to a 10 to 15 watt K2. That pushes up my signal about 1-1/2 S-units at the other end. Any less of an increase is of marginal value, in my experience. So, if I were to QRO further I'd not consider it worthwhile to go from 100 watts unless I ran something in the range of 800 to 1000 watts. Most QRPers have had the fun of going extreme QRPp when the bands are open and noticing how tiny of a signal can still be copied. But there's another experiment that's also very informative, even when the bands aren't at their best. If copy is decent, have the other station cut power by half - 3-dB or about 1/2 S-unit - and see if you can really notice the difference. Sometimes I can't even be sure of a 6 dB change, a drop to 1/4 the original power by the other station, under typical band conditions with QSB, etc. Ron AC7AC _______________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Post to: Elecraft@mailman.qth.net You must be a subscriber to post to the list. Subscriber Info (Addr. Change, sub, unsub etc.): http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/subscribers.htm Elecraft web page: http://www.elecraft.com
