Poor cndx on GW/NW-062

Old Reflector
1

Conditions on the HF bands today were probably the worst I have seen in twelve months, having said that, I managed to work a very weak Tom M1EYP/P on 40m cw first thing this morning and the superb trio of uniques from Steve G1INK/P, Peter GW3TJE/P and Jim GM0CQK/P, my fifth chased summit was from Richard G3CWI/P, thanks to all stations.

When conditions are this bad, lately I tend to nip up to Hope Mountain to play radio and get a little bit of R & R, as was the case today.

I opened up on 145-FM as usual and managed to work 10 of the regulars, despite increasing desensing from the radio masts.

After a QSY to FE on 60m ssb, Don G0RQL came back to my initial call with a superb 59 signal, followed by Paul G0HNW, John GW4BVE, and G4WHA, but it was a struggle with them all except Don.
Biggest shock of the day was the fact that Alistair GW0VMZ and I could not complete our QSO under these conditions, I never thought it could ever happen, Alistair being one of the most consistant strong signals on 60m, apologies Aliastair but we give it a fair go.

I QSY’d to 40m ssb where conditions were worse if anything, and only Barry MW3PXW was worked, he was visiting his Dad, Arthur GW1LDY and to be fair I could see his house from the summit and could have made the contact on semaphore, hi.

Another QSY, this time to 7.032 cw and hey presto, 9 contacts in quick succession with 4 DXCCs worked, long live the code and all who use it, hi.

Thanks for the spots and to all chasers worked as follows…

145-FM, GW1LDY, MW3PXW/M, GW7AAV, 2E0NHM, GW1GBH/M, M3TMX, G1KLZ, 2E0HJD and G4BLH.

5.3985-ssb, G0RQL, G0HNW, GW4BVE and G4WHA

7.070-ssb, MW3PXW

7.032-cw, F5AKL, DJ5AV, PA0HRM, DL4FDM, HB9AGH, DL6UNF, F6CEL, F5CQ, and HB9AFI

Here’s to the next one.

73 Mike GW0DSP

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In reply to GW0DSP:

Conditions on the HF bands today were probably the worst I have seen in twelve
months

The IPS website showed that conditions were well below expected yesterday, with the critical frequency around 4MHz over the UK.

I had a listen around at lunchtime today (Sat) and things seemed terrible. I could just copy the beacons on 5MHz and RAF Volmet was not quite S1 instead S9. I was intending to pop out and hoover up the a couple of 1 pointers like Goseland Hill or Wether Law but with HF conditions looking so dire I went for a bike ride instead. A quick 23 miles of pedalling made up for not climbing anything, but I did ride to the top of Henshaw Hill (NT060544). The view North was stunning with Ben Vorlich (SS-008), Stuc a’Chroin (SS-010), Ben More (SS-001), Stob Binnein (SS-002), Ben Lawers (CS-001) crying out to be climbed.
I was surprised just how obvious Ben Lawers was as it’s about 60 miles away!

I’ve checked now and RAF Volmet is romping in but the beacons are still not too strong. So this is two weeks without an activation from me and that has made me determined to get out on Monday. It’s not a bank holiday up here but I’m off anyway. The wx for tomorrow suggests wind, snow, hail, more wind and rain so that’s sounds an ideal day to manufacture some 2m antennas for Monday, just in case the sky wont play along with my plans :slight_smile:

I’ll see if I can find something unique for you to listen for on Monday, Mike.

Andy
MM0FMF

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In reply to MM0FMF:

Hi Andy, ok on all of your comments. 60m was chronic again today, but not quite as bad as yesterday.
Me and Steve AAV both live approx in the central section of the country and usually get the best of both worlds on 60m, being equidistance from the far north and south of the uk, but this worked against us over the past 2 days with longer skip going straight over our heads.
Every contact was a real struggle.
The strangest one was that I couldn’t get a whisper out of Peter GW3TJE/P on GW/SW-026 on 60m-ssb, but when we QSY’d to 60m-cw, we exchanged reports at 599 and 589.

Sounds like you had a good day out on the bike, 23 miles eh, phew!! I could do it if the bike was a 650cc, hi.

Good luck with your proposed activation on Monday, I’ll be listening as usual.
I won’t be out on Monday, the A55 along the N. Wales coast will be a car park with the bank holiday traffic.

I might be doing NW-070 and NW-071 on Tuesday, xyl and grandchildren in tow, so probably quick activations, unless I can talk Anne into a lovely tram ride with the grandchildren from the top of The Great Orme into Llandudno for a bit of shopping, hi.

73 Mike

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In reply to 2E0HJD:

In reply to GW0DSP:
2M ssb has been rock steady, with lift conditions on friday! its just a matter of optimising the right freqs especially if your out on a
summit :wink:
Mick

As for 2m ssb being rock steady, I find that hard to argue with Mick.
As for optimising the right freqs on a summit, I did do, 7.032 cw :wink:

Mike