I’m hoping to try out 80m CW on Friday from G/NP-028. I hope there will be some UK chasers. I’m also hoping the aerial works as it’s too large to try in my garden. I can also try SSB but I don’t know how well my 5W will work on phone. I’ll post an alert before I go.
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5W of SSB should net you a reasonable number of contacts now we are past the summer, if you alert for SSB I will be listening for you as I am just putting up a new 80m dipole (doublet) up to replace my G5RV doublet which came down courtesy of Branagh a few days ago!
Hi Richard,
Good idea! It might be worth emailing Dave G4IAR so he can tell the WAB ops via their reflector, to listen for you on 3.760-SSB. Roy G4SSH is a big fan of CW on 80m but he’s away just now. G4OBK Phil will try to work you and a few other 80m regulars like Don G0RQL if they see the alert, though Devon is maybe asking a lot with 5W.
Good luck.
73, John
OK I will try CW and SSB and alert for them both. I just hope the aerial tunes ok! I’ll also take another wire which I know works on 40m and 20m.
Richard,
I made a portable 80m dipole last week (thin wire, 1:1 balun, RG174 feeder) currently in the back garden on my 9m Sotabeams travelmast. It’s getting good reports for my QRP CW.
I’ve never activated on 80m before. I want to try it out ‘in the field’ and am happy to go to my local SOTA summit, G/CE-005 Wendover Woods (10-min drive + 20-min walk away) on Friday to try an 80m CW S2S with you.
Roughly what time of day are thinking of?
Andy.
At the moment it’s likely to be about 10.00UTC. But time and summit may change so watch this space!
I’ll look out for you Andy, since i’m currently stucked at home for weeks.
Laurent
I be listening for ya on 80m 
karl
Yesterday Dave G3TQQ and I tried 80m qro from G/SP-004 Shining Tor and Dave worked several stations on 80-ssb but I didn’t have any luck on 80-cw but had success on 40, 30 & 20-cw. I am still puzzled about this, as I did alert and check the frequency!
73
Nick
I haven’t had much luck on 80m using a doublet resonant around 6MHz, and matched with an Elecraft T1 AATU. 5W from FT817.
I normally use the antenna on 40m / 60m / 30m.
Spurred on by this thread, I am going to cut an 80m dipole, and aim to be on a summit with it around 10:00 UTC tomorrow - unless the activity time changes, in which case I will ty to fit in!
73
Adrian
OK change of plan. I am able to use the car tomorrow so I can go a little further afield and activate a new summit for me. So I am going to do Birks Fell G/NP-031 and hope to be there for 10.30UTC so slightly later. I hope that fits in with everyone. I’ll be doing 80m CW first - I’ll try to remember the microphone for SSB.
I have this awful feeling that after all this coordination my antenna won’t tune on 80m! I’ll have 20/30/40/2 though.
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There is a thread somewhere about the use of coils in the 60m/40m link so that a linked 20/40/60 dipole is near resonance for 80m also. I have used mine several times this month with more success than 60m on several occasions. Allan, GW4VPX/P, and I made pairs of coils and they turned out to be very different but both sets worked.
Might be out with them on SW-012 Saturday pm.
I will try to find and add a link to that thread:-
Allan’s coils on post 8
73, Rod
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My coils are smaller than Allan’s and hang differently.
The hooks attach the coils to the link insulator; the croc clips attach inside so the screws don’t need to stick out and be a nuisance. They are stored in a toilet roll centre which protects from chafing in transit.
In use:-
These are the Mk2 coils which are a close copy of the final version of the Mk1 - the Mk1s were very much a try it and see what happens, giving resonance points way outside the band initially but ending somewhere mid-band depending on pole, ground and weather, so the ATU is still used.
May be something helpful here.
73,
Rod
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I’ve used a SOTABeams Quadbander loads, which is a full 80m dipole, and the results have been great even with 5w out of an FT-817 on SSB. Spotting will get you contacts.
Have fun!
Regards, Mark. M0NOM
Thanks Laurent, I should be setup and 80m CW QRV about 10:00 to 10:15 UTC a bit ahead of Richard. Weather forecast good.
Richard,
I should be at home around that time tomorrow.
I did put your call in my HamAlert app, so my phone will beep whenever you stick your head out …
Of course 10:30 UTC is not the best time for 80m …
As a note : just a one-time experience with an 80m dipole …
I once did a one-man QRP fieldday on a Sunday morning in 2017 , I started with a full size 80m dipole at low height (top at only 5m), so had to shorten the legs to abt 17m … SWR was OK, but I couldn’t get any station that I heard … called and called, no use …
Then changed to a prototype endfed antenna that I now use for all my SOTA activations : 9.15m wire, 3.5m coax, no counterpoise at all (but I do use a 4m CP now for SOTA)
Top of wire was at 6m, bottom of wire at 1m … and suddenly I could work any station that I heard … I made 62 QSO’s in abt 4 hours, all with 5W.
73,
Luc, ON7DQ
You’re right of course about the time of day.
I’ve been getting great results (at home) with my new homemade 80m dipole late afternoons and evenings. But I’ve just been calling CW on 80m (with 10W) to no effect (12:00 UTC). The band seems dead. Now, is that because it’s the middle of the day here and D-layer absorption is at a maximum or because nobody is listening because they think propagation will be awful?
So, I’ve just run WSPR at 1.0W on 80m (3.5926) and other WSPR stations are receiving me all over the UK and north-western Europe. Now, I know WSPR can reach the parts other beers, er, I mean, other modes cannot reach, but ……
Probably, the human ops are all out to lunch. Hopefully, the SOTA chasers won’t be on Friday.
With a ear on 2m hopefully for an s2s from Tryfan GW/NW-006 also? 
73 Allan
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I’ll also be on 2m FM but that will be after I’ve done HF. I’ll keep an eye on SOTA spotter though and switch if I see you are active.
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I bought some wire and kite winders from Sotabeams at the Norbreck rally a couple of years ago, and today I got around to building an 80 / 60 / 40 linked dipole using dimensions from the SotaMaps calculator.
Nice wire to work with, very reluctant to tangle - looking forward to trying it on GW/MW-026 tomorrow.
It’s too big to play with in my garden, so I may take an analyser with me tomorrow and spend some time fine tuning. (I’ll take the T1 AATU as well, so I should be able to try it on air first).
Thanks Rod @M0JLA for reminding me about the loading coils for 160m, I might work on those soon…
73
Adrian
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