>From west of St. Louis the eclipse totality was beautiful. I did not DX from here, too noisy. And I was too busy anyway with the family watching the eclipse.
Before I left home in Joliet I setup the R8A with it's on/off timer to come on unattended at 12:15 pm to 2:30 pm. This may sound easy but that was last Thursday, the day we left home. So, every day since I have recorded that same time period. I also preset the radio and Quantum Pro loop to 1410khz. The antenna is in my attic with my 2 1/2 foot wire wound loop hanging above the Quantum - air coupled together and also tuned to 1410. They are aimed SW/NE to null Elgin, ILL. I am using a Sony audio recorder that I setup and turned-on on Thursday before we left. I had to "beef up" the battery supply using two sets of "D" cells in series parallel for a heafty 3V source. It has to last seven days! I won't know if all this worked OK until I get home tomorrow! Wading through the seven days of recording (15 hours and 45 minutes) will be easy. During playback with total recorder I will search by the elapsed time for the brief few seconds of dead air when the radio shuts off and then the turn on the following day. Sounds crazy but I hope it worked OK! And, while in the St Louis area, I dropped in for a visit the other day with Earl Higgins. Many of you may not know that Earl is severely handicapped, but a very capable DX'er. He was planning on a trip west of St. Louis to view the eclipse and to DX from a quiet spot out there. I hope the trip worked out well for him. Tom Jasinski unattended in Joliet, IL _______________________________________________ IRCA mailing list IRCA@hard-core-dx.com http://montreal.kotalampi.com/mailman/listinfo/irca Opinions expressed in messages on this mailing list are those of the original contributors and do not necessarily reflect the opinion of the IRCA, its editors, publishing staff, or officers For more information: http://www.ircaonline.org To Post a message: irca@hard-core-dx.com