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Re: [VHFcontesting] Weird ft8 contact on 2M. Did anyone else see it?

To: vhfcontesting@contesting.com
Subject: Re: [VHFcontesting] Weird ft8 contact on 2M. Did anyone else see it?
From: Alexander Svirsky <as@shawsheen.com>
Date: Mon, 20 Jan 2020 13:09:30 -0500
List-post: <mailto:vhfcontesting@contesting.com>
Paul, I'm sure you're talking about a weird FT8 reception and not a 2-way QSO.

I have also seen something like this happen. Last summer when I left the radio and the computer on overnight after a contest I apparently received one side of a QSO attempt in the South Pacific, on 432 IIRC. I have no explanation for this.

My WSJT-X installation on Linux apparently by default saves a sound recording of every 15-second window, and it saves a log of all messages received and sent. I have set aside the sound samples and log entries of that reception.

Perhaps you also have the sound samples and original log entries for your reception. Check you WSTJ-X folders to see if you have them. I'm not sure how to recreate them easily as WSJT-X "playbacks" to see what really happened. I've thought about dedicating a computer and radio to just logging VHF FT8 freqs for crazy receptions like this, but I'm sure the sound files would eat up disk space quickly.

I don't think we're seeing a software issue. The message wasn't random and the grid square and the calls received make sense. I suspect that VHF freqs sometimes bounce and propagate in unexpected ways and the FT8 algorithm may be sufficient to decode a mouse fart on the other side of the planet.

Alexander N1PRW

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