Yes today XZ0A was one of the best signal strengths I have
heard them. Heard them almost daily the first week or so,
then nothing for a few days when the east coast was hearing
them well. Today propagation returned to southern ILL area,
I turned the receiver on and he was 569 from the west bev..
later changing to NE bev.. hope a lot made it today, when he
was strong here there were a lot of cq's and not working many.
Shows what can be done if they stick with the band for a few
weeks. Wonder why the "natives" from dx locations are usually
so weak and heard so little..maybe no commitment to top band?
73 Merv K9FD
P.S. To address your last question, remember that XZ0A was running
a big amp to a 180 foot vertical with multiple Beverages! This
path and distance on 160 is not for casual operators running barefoot
to a piece of wire...of course 3W5FM is only using 150 watts to a 60'
vertical but he is 100' from the South China Sea. What WAS proved
by the XZ0A operation is that the long/skewed/refracted/reflected path
(does that cover all politically correct bases?..hi) is surprisingly
consistent for well-equipped stations at each end of the path.
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