As a practical matter there are several 2 kHZ segments of each band that are now devoted to 24x7 JT65, FT8, and other digital modes. Weak signal CW work - eg working rare mults or even just weak guys from common mults - in those segments just isn’t gonna happen.
Substantial parts of 80M and 40M have been pretty bad for several years now with SAILNET and other automatic modes. Tim N3QE > On Nov 27, 2017, at 3:43 PM, Roger Parsons via Topband > <topband@contesting.com> wrote: > > As we all know, CQWW produces huge activity on all HF bands. This year I was > hearing stations up to well above 1850kHz. I have found that trying to run > Europe is often more productive in the 1840-1850 segment, presumably because > it is less crowded than lower in frequency. > > > Late in the contest I started to CQ on about 1842kHz, and after a while, and > several QSOs, was told (on CW): "Please QSY. 1840 is reserved for FT8. Good > luck in the contest." Ignoring the fact that nobody has a reserved frequency > on any band, I thought OK, don't want to upset anybody, and moved to > 1842.9kHz. Shortly, the same message arrived. > > My (probably incorrect) understanding is that FT8 stations are using USB with > a carrier frequency of 1840kHz. So a CW station on 1842.9 should be out of > their passband. I did listen carefully and could not hear any FT8 > transmissions above 1842.2. (I have multiple receive antennas in a very quiet > location.) > > I believe that FT8 transmissions in principle use a microscopic bandwidth, > but it appears they actually need a wide clear channel. > > Yes? No? > > 73 Roger > VE3ZI > _________________ > Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband _________________ Topband Reflector Archives - http://www.contesting.com/_topband
