QRP surprise: Who says the bands are dead?

Nice surprise during yesterday’s SOTA activations in DM/BW: I wanted to test the endurance of the AA rechargeables, which I recently got for my FT-817 as a backup. Thus, activating with only 2.5W output power instead of the usual 5W. Antenna was a trapped EFHW for 15m-60m. I did not have any more expectations than 4+ QSOs per summit within EU with this setup.

On DM/BW-057, I got chased by ZL1TM on 20m. Later on DM/BW-228, I had 4 contacts to the US on 17m, one even to Arizona. (Both activations with the same set of batteries with a total operating time of 2.5h in CW)

Looks like there is light at the end of the tunnel of the sunspot cycle ! :slight_smile:

73 Jens HB9EKO

Activation of DM/BW-057

202002_16_DM-BW-057

Activation of DM/BW-228

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Hallo Jens, schön. Ich höre manchmal wie die SOTA Stationen von DX gerufen werden. Der ZL ist viel dabei. Hat auch noch einige VK3 die kommen. Danke noch für die QSO’s am Sonntag. Betr. schlechten Condx kannst Du meinen Artikel im HBRadio lesen. Mit CW geht es fast immer, egal wie die Condx sind. Awdh 73 de Nick, HB9DDZ

Hi Jens,
I heard ZL4AU (at the very southern tip of the South Island in Invercargill) working ON9CB at 0800 UTC on Saturday on 40m SSB at good signals each way. So the path is there when you are on the right band at the right time. I suspect neither of these stations were running QRP however. Conditions in general over the last 3-4 months have not been all doom and gloom as some would like us to think. Whether short path or long path or grey-line, whether 20m or 40m SSB or CW, contacts are being made between Europe and “Down Under” still - often with one end being portable with limited power and a limited antenna. Often these paths only seem to open for 10 or 15 minutes however and THAT is what I believe we will start to see changing first as conditions get better - longer windows of time when DX contacts are easier to make.

73 Ed.

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Hi Jens, Delighted to work you on 17M. Goes to show: Many photons in a watt!
All Best, Ken

Hi Ed,
I had the odd contact down under when activating with 100W, as I usually do for the DX S2S events. Since I can’t have an antenna at home and I exclusively do SOTA (or the occasional afternoon at the club station), I am lacking the big picture. I agree that it’s a matter of the right time and the right band. Having these contacts when activating with only 2.5W came totally unexpected, though. It’s a good motivation to start activations earlier in the morning and extend later in the afternoon, when the chance for DX is higher at least in theory.

73 Jens

Hallo Nick,
ja, das ist eine gute Motivation, auch bei QRP mal früher raus oder länger auf dem Berg zu bleiben.
Danke fürs Chasen und awdh.

73 Jens

Hi Ken,
Thanks for fishing my signal out of the noise on your side :slight_smile:

73 Jens

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There was something in the air yesterday indeed. During the activation my chasers closer to me had much lower signal and more distant ones were stronger than usual. On SSB I didn’t get nearly that far as you did, but I had interesting QSO with LA8BCA on 20m, who used same radio as me, FT-817 with 5w. I heard him very well, about 57, and he gave me booming 59. Interestingly, only five minutes before that I barely heard SA4BLM, but a bit later, wen I was listening in on another activator’s frequency (hoping for S2S, but Italy was too close), he was 59+!

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Had an overseas chaser from New Hampshire yesterday after a long time in ssb. Thanks to Bob, KD1CT.
73 Chris

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Hi Jens,
the early in the morning timeslot, I’m no longer sure of - today from DL/AL-171 I could hear VK3DET, VK3YFD and VU2XO on 20m SSB at up to S5 around 12 local (1100 UTC). Unfortunately, none of them could hear me (problem at my end) but all worked Mike 2E0YYY/P in the UK.

Perhaps short path is the better option at the moment?

73 Ed.

I unfortunately don’t have enough opportunities for activations to follow up on this regularly. End of Dec, I had a contact with ZL which was clearly long path, while about6 weeks later, this QSO was short path given the time of day. I don’t do much scanning of the bands though, my regular routine is first calling CQ and work the pile ups and then check with whom I could make a S2S. All DX were chasers though, no luck with working DX S2S when activating QRP.

73 Jens HB9EKO

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If the weather is OK, I plan to be out on Faschingsdienstag around the same time as when I heard the VK & VU stations to see if I can get a contact this time. However, I believe last Tuesday we had some PAE (Pre-auroral-enhancement) helping the propagation.

One can only try! But there is DX to be had even at the bottom of the solar cycle.

73 Ed.

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