Topband: really weird propagation
This morning I saw T31EU posted many times on DXSCAPE on 160 so I turned on the rig to listen for him...at 1305 he was 20 over S9 but within a minute he had faded out completely..strangely enough I could not hear any of the stations calling him...within another couple of minutes his signals were back up and I noticed that he several times called stations who never came back to him..This pattern seemed to persist for the remainder of the morning until he faded out completely around 14:40.. Spaceweather.com reports a pending geomagnetic storm but nothing unusual at the time I was listening..there has been a prolonged period of over 20 days of zero sunspots so that probably has something to do with it..I do not think I will ever understand 160 meter propagation but that is one of the things that makes it so interesting _ Searchable Archives: http://www.contesting.com/_topband - Topband Reflector
Topband: propagation revisited
after reading all the comments by others concerning their experiences with propagation during the cq160cw contest over the weekend i reviewed my log to see what was going on since my experience was so different---i found that, after i deducted the usual suspects that are always over s-9 nearly everything else was typical of spotlight effect---for instance in one 20 minute time slot 18 out of 22 contacts were from WI and another time similar results from FL---remember that i only operated search and pounce--similar results were for PA and WA with surprisingly few CA and almost no northwest stations heard--practically no new england stations were heard--in fact nearly all the QSOs were from within 700 miles of my QTH--normally i hear and work many weaker stations that are well below s9 but they were simply not there to work--in fact it seemed like there was not as much activity as i expected and there were numerous large multikhz holes on the band which is hardly ever the case--both PJ2T and KV4FZ had the loudest signals i have ever heard from them while a JA opening simply did not occur---the only conclusion i can reach is that the geomagnetic storm reported on spaceweather.com was affecting 160 meter propagation in an unusual way--- and only stations with certain transmission characteristics were propagating and their signals were not subject to the normal amount of adsorption --doing only hunt and pounce gets pretty boring but i am no good at QLF and do not type well left handed--if it was not for my AEA morse machine i would not be able to operate cw at all _ Searchable Archives: http://www.contesting.com/_topband - Topband Reflector
Topband: Fw: really good conditions
- Forwarded Message - From: N7DF To: TopBand List Sent: Sunday, January 27, 2019, 9:03:56 AM MSTSubject: really good conditions Unbelievable signals in CQ160 this weekend..many stations 40over on my FT1000 and several TX and AZ signals pegged the meter at 60 over…PJ2Twas 35 over most of the time…lost my receiving antennas to storms in Decemberand had to use cage only…still have right wrist in cast so have to hunt andpounce only QLF but had fun…73 Larry _ Searchable Archives: http://www.contesting.com/_topband - Topband Reflector
Topband: really good conditions
Unbelievable signals in CQ160 this weekend..many stations 40over on my FT1000 and several TX and AZ signals pegged the meter at 60 over…PJ2Twas 35 over most of the time…lost my receiving antennas to storms in Decemberand had to use cage only…still have right wrist in cast so have to hunt andpounce only QLF but had fun…73 Larry _ Searchable Archives: http://www.contesting.com/_topband - Topband Reflector
Topband: N7DF QLF CW in SP
With my right wrist in a cast from surgery I will be doing search and pounce only in the Stew Perry this weekend I might be a little slow in responding to reports so please bear with meHappy New Year to all73 Larry N7DF _ Searchable Archives: http://www.contesting.com/_topband - Topband Reflector
Topband: roasting earthworms
the morning after a wind and lightning storm i found that i had a 20 over nine power-line noise problem on 160 meters on my triband beam it peaked north east on 20 meters i waited a couple of days to do anything about it because i knew that our small electric cooperative was overwhelmed with repairs but when there was no improvement i took it on myself to try to locate the problem tuning my car radio to a blank space between two stations on am i drove north on the main road up our canyon about a mile north the noise became very loud on the car radio and as i approached a side road it became overwhelming as soon as i turned on the side road i saw the problem the lower neutral wire was down and lying on the ground between the first two light poles on the spur line going down the road i checked the first pole beyond the break and found that i could get a spark off the ground wire on the side of the pole i called the electric cooperative and they sent out a crew and strung a new line between the poles surprisingly none of the four residences on the quarter mile long line past the break had reported the downed line and had not experienced an outage of electric service the 7200 volt transformers at each residence had been connected to the neutral side of the transmission line through the ground wires on the individual poles even though the ground conductivity here in the desert is extremely poor after the new wires were installed the noise from that source was significantly reduced _ Searchable Archives: http://www.contesting.com/_topband - Topband Reflector
Topband: yes virginia there is an antenna that works from 160 to 10
637P-1/1A Transportable (fixed direction) Log Periodic Antenna The 637P-1A is a directional HF Antenna for tactical or fixed station use. It can be operated from 1.5-30 MHZ with a gain of 7.5 to 12 DB between 4-30 MHz and below 4 MHz, it has an unidirectional pattern. The antenna is rated to accept power levels of 10 KW PEP or average. Model OE-85 is rated for 3 KW and OE-86 is rated for 10 KW. The only difference between the two models is the RF Connector on the balun. The average VSWR is 2:1 and the Front to Back ratio is 7.5 db to 12 db depending on several factors. It is 75' High (on a 80 foot mast) and requires a plot of land that is 310 feet by 200 Feet It is designed to be stowed in a frame 57" x 35.5 " x 92" and can transported by truck or air. It weighs 1270 lbs. I tonly costs $55,000 _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: 1984 CQ article on building a cage antenna
There was a misprint in the article It says in one place 20 4 cage wires it should have said twentyfour cage wires I do not know how the editors got it so wrong the original manuscript had it correct _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: alternative to shunt fed tower
In the April 1984 issue of CQ magazine is an article on how to build a folded cage monopole around a tower with yagi antennas on top You can get a copy from the CQ Magazine archives CQ Magazine Archives - April 1984 _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: radial wire alternative
This had worked well for radials in the desert of New Mexico both on the ground and elevated American FarmWorks Poly Wire, 1320 ft. at Tractor Supply Co. The conductors are stainless steel and havr about the same ohmic resistance as galvanized wire _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: Saved by my BOG
This morningaround 1300Z i saw on dxscape that tx5twas on 3655 ssb since 80 meters ssb was one of the two band modes I stillneed them on I thought to give it a try on my cage all I heard was a constantunbroken static crash so I started switching around to different antennas tosee if I could hear them on anything I found that my west facing experimentalBOG was the only thing that I could hear them on this antenna has never worked very well foranything before so it was quite a surprise especially since in its presentconfiguration it violates just about everythingI have read about BOGs it is about 300feet long made of twisted pair military communications wire lying on the groundand running downhill at right angles to an overhead 7500 volt 3 phase powerlineand beside a barbed wire fence and a one inch diameter steel cable lying on theground marking the property line it isunterminated and the receiving end is connected to a ten turn winding on aferrite core of unknown properties the other end of the winding is connected tothe wire I dropped down into the abandoned well hole I commented about in anearlier post the secondary winding ofthe toroid is a hundred turns of wire connected through a length of rg6 coax toa polimar preamp this configuration wasarrived at after various hookups with matching transformers and single wiretuners that gave the best signal to noise ratios over powerline noise on westcoast stations but it never has workedfor anything else another surprisingthing about the BOG is that it picks up a warbling signal around 7 mhz that I donot hear on any other antenna 30 milesto my west is the white sands missile range and there are frequently strange rf signalson hf vhf and uhf coming up from there including one time a multigigawatt EMP thatwiped out the programming on my ft1000mp but that is another story anyway I got my qso with tx5t73 larry n7df _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: the problem is..
most dxpeditions only spend one or two nights on 160 ssb because they have so few qsos on ssb and can work more stations on cw and unless you are lucky enough to check those nights or spend all your time monitoring them you will miss it if the pilot stations would announce on the reflector a day ahead of the planned 160 ssb date and time they would have a lot better response and a lot more people would have a chance to add a new one on 160 ssb _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: spider article
The link got left off here it is https://spaceweatherarchive.com/2018/07/20/spiders-and-space-weather/ _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: spider web propagation
how spiders help us understand electrical charges in the ionosphereSpiders and Space Weather _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: beverage selector
Visiting a contest station in the midwest a few years ago I noted the unique beverage selector switch the various beverages were labeled COKE PEPSI HEINEKEN VODKA COFFEE and WATER _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: BUG (beverage underground)
I recently had a 250 foot deep test well drilled near my hamshack and the well was powder dry all the way down so rather than waste a perfectly good hole in the ground I dropped a wire down it all the way to the bottom and hooked it up to my receiver it was totally quiet of powerline noise while my above ground beverage had a 3 Db noise The BUG did not pick up any radio signals either but you cannot have everything _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: sorry wrong number
should be 2068-625526 https://www.sportsmansguide.com/product/index/us-military-surplus-20-gauge-phone-cable-new?a=2185687 _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: more BOG wire
just got latest Sportsman's Guide catalog 1640 foot roll of military communications wire for 20 dollars plus shipping order number is 2068-635526 at sportsmansguide.com _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: BOG wire
1,640 feet of military surplus communications twisted pair wire $19.99 plus shipping sportsmansguide.com item 2048-625526 _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: unintended text
sorry about all those question marks I composed my text in Microsoft Office and copied it then pasted it into yahoo I guess some of the characters are different between the two systems 73 Larry _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: thr rest of the n7df story
In my younger days I was anavid contester and especially welcomed the challengeof 160 meters This was mostly the result of acquiringseveral Collins 273W-1X antennas on a military surplus sale which proved to be outstanding low band antennas after some minor modifications Over the years I accumulated towers and antennas to put together a serious contest station But my military assignments prevented anything permanentuntil my retirement I found a nice little acreage in the Sacramento Mountains ofsouth central New Mexico but it unfortunatelyhad a lot of RFI from a 1950s era power grid Even so I put up some antennas and got on the air After my brother K0HGW joined me in retirement we bought a 140 acre tract of landin the Tularosa Basin that was 4 miles from the nearest power lines The RFI noise level was essentially zero and we startedbuilding our contest station Weinstalled one of the Collins antennas and a 3 wavelength beverage aimed at Europe Then I had a stroke and my brother was killed in a car wreck and thatended the contest station antenna building I partially recovered from the stroke but haveresigned myself to just entering CW contests since I now have a speechimpediment from the stroke In fact my neurologist tells me that this is very good for my recovery from the stroke Ispend most of my time on 160 with one of the Collins antennas from my QTH in the mountains Ihave been trying to get around the noise problems with a lot of cooperation from the electriccooperative and various types of receiving arrays but it still gets up over S9a lot of the time OK - so the reason for this narrative is that I haveseveral towers and antennas that would makea pretty respectable contest station and I am willing to donate them to any groupthat will come get them and put them touse This includes two of the Collins antennas that are worth $30,000 each Ifanyone is interested they can contactme at n...@yahoo.com for details _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: Adding a parasitic reflector to a vertical
From southcentral New Mexico working Europe on 160 meters is pretty much an exercise infrustration with a single vertical antenna. So I decided to see if I couldimprove on things by adding a parasitic reflector element to my cage antenna. Since I could not find any specificinformation about doing this I decided to experiment a little and see what Icould come up with. After looking at a lotof designs for two element antennas and taking into consideration the physicalparameters of being in a juniper forest I finally came up with a design that Icould build. My antenna is a Collins27W-1X conical monopole fed with an MFJ 998 remote tuner located in a 120 footdiameter clearing. The parasitic reflector would be 88 feet southwest of the monopolein a small clearing. From what I coulddetermine from various sources, in order for it to be effective at thatdistance, it would need to be resonant at 1.787 MHz to provide maximum gain at1.825 MHz. The reflector elementconsisted of a 30 foot tall section of 2 inch diameter irrigation pipe restingon a plexiglass sheet with a top hat wire strung at right angles to the linebetween the transmitting antenna and the reflector. In the opposite direction a ground radial waslaid out along the ground surface. Aftera lot of measuring with an antenna analyzer and cutting to length the top hatwire ended up as 86 feet 4 inches long and the ground radial at 112 feet 3inches to get resonance at 1.787 MHz. The bottom of the vertical is connectedto the ground radial with a clip lead so it can be taken out of the circuitwhen I want the monopole to be omnidirectional. The array turned out to be veryeffective in changing the pattern of the monopole and there is a markedimprovement on signals from the northeast both in North America and from Europeas realized in the recent 160 meter contest. The best measure, though, turned out to be courtesy of WD5COV who isabout 125 miles southwest from me. Hissignal is usually about 40 over S9 when he has his 4 square pointed myway. After installing the parasiticelement his signal dropped to about 20 over S9 on peaks. Unfortunately the antenna has not improved mynoise problems but that is another story. N7DF _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: use the wasteland
since most of the band between 1900 and 2000 KHz is seldom used it seems that the best solution to the FT8 isue is to move contacts using this mode up to a frequency in this segment like 1980 or so. _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: electromagnetic effects on space weather
I wonder how much effect contest weekends have https://arxiv.org/pdf/1611.03390.pdf _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: Heavy Metal
Both of the broadcast transmitters have been sold73LarryN7DF _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: Toroids
I have had a large number of inquiries about the toroids. Since these are special units and are quitevaluable, the choice of who I give them to has been based on what use they willbe put to. I needed to know if they willbe actively used in developmental experimentation and if they will be madeavailable to other hams for experimentation and use. W3LPL has asked for the toroids and based uponhis record of state of the art experimentation and development as well as hiscontributions to amateur radio and willingness to share the benefits of thematerial to the ham community the toroids will be shipped to him. Thank you to everyone who responded to theentry on the reflector. 73 Larry N7DF _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: lots of toroids
I have a box of toroid cores, ferrite rods and beads that I would like to give to someone who is into serious experimenting. This is from the personal workshop of Bill Amidon, It contains over 100 toroid cores of every size and color imaginable. It weighs over 20 pounds and fits into a large size Priority Mail shipping box. If anyone is interested please e-mail me. n...@yahoo.com _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: different propagation north vs south
Some time ago there was a post about some research done on trans equatorial propagation that was done by a lady researcher in australiaFollowing up on her research in some of her published papers she seemed to imply that the difference in polarity between the north pole and the south pole has a really significant effect on many aspects of the electromagnetic spectrum with regard to the incidence of coronal mass ejections, interaction between the terrestrial and the sun's magnetic field and cosmic ray impingement in the earth's atmosphere and geomagnetic field.With the decrease in both terrestrial and solar magnetic field intensities detected in recent years some really strange things may be in the offing.I have lost the links that I once had to these references but a lot of the information is available from the website spaceweather.com.It is a fascinating study to say the least and it seems like the topband is a good place to experience the weird effects that she was researching.73larryn7df _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: A midsummer nights contest
With the QRN levels the lowest that had been seen in several weeks it looked promising when WD5R was banging in half an hour before sunset. Five hours later with a stunning 12 contacts in the logs WD5R was still 20 over S9. Several weak, fluttering signals were being heard with occasional bursts of dits and dahs from meteor trails. It was an interesting experience and I did not regret spending the time but I think I will wait until fall to spend much time on 160. Maybe a brief excursion during field day.BTW check out the celestial light show in the western sky just after sunset. he bright stars you see are Jupiter and Venus. They will keep getting closer together each evening or the next several days and then begin pulling apart as Venus gradually becomes dimmer. _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: looking at the ionosphere
The VKs seem to be on the ball again Actually looking at propagation as it is happening http://www.news.com.au/technology/science/aussie-student-proves-existence-of-plasma-tubes-floating-above-earth/story-fnjwlcze-1227379756018 _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: telegraphers abbreviations
Here is an interesting website that answers where a lot of CW abbreviations came from. Text messages do not even compare http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_vault/2015/05/11/history_of_telegraph_operators_abbreviations_used_by_telegraphers.html _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: just in time for CQWW
At 2200Z an X6 class solar flare erupted directly in line with the earth. Major disruption of radio propagation can be expected for the next 6 to 10 hours according to NASA. If a CME results further effects may become effective during the next several days. Check spaceweather.com for developing information. _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: instant update on solar flare
at 2210z the intensity of the flare was downgraded to an x1.9 still pretty bad for ionosphere though and the possibility of further flaring within the next 24 hours is listed as around 40% _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: what happened to SP
The NASA solar observatory reported that an X1 class solar flare occurred at o500Z on October 19 resulting in a geomagnetic storm that lasted until 1100Z During this period earth's ionosphere was severely impacted and high frequency radio propagation interrupted _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
Topband: where the lightning strikes
A new real time lightning strike map page from germany http://www.sciencealert.com.au/news/20140207-25798.html _ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
