Hi Al & vhfers
The 10 GHz guys are all excited about the red blob this morning, but
there is no activity. When I quit last night just before 02:00, the red
blob was looking quite impressive. It went from VE3 down to Florida in a
thin line. It is there this AM but not as pronounced. It would be
really nice to hear reports from others who were inside the "blob" to
see how it related to their experience with typical CW and SSB paths.
The APRS map is generated by (obviously) APRS signals that are
typically low power small gain antennas so their coverage is quite
small. Such signals are heavily influenced by local conditions where
inversion layers will provide huge improvements within say 200 miles but
no farther. Our situation, with higher power and bigger antennas
already provides the gain needed to extend coverage well beyond those
short ranges.
I am reminded of the experience of Ross Hull back in the early 1930's
on the 5 meter band. Modulated oscillators and whips were the typical
setup. Coverage was 15-20 miles. Ross had been to Brandt Rock, South of
Boston and saw a telephone company radio link that used a high gain
array to cross Cape Cod Bay. He duplicated that array on his 5 meter
station located on Selden Hill in West Hartford and immediately started
contacting hams in the Boston area all the time. They all thought he was
a bootlegger as no one had ever heard signals from so far away. All
because he put up a big antenna! His coverage went from LOS paths to
diffraction and tropo scatter range immediately. This revelation got
him on the road to discovering the mechanism of tropospheric refraction.
I was well out of the path of the big red blob but did note some slight
enhancement on WA3EOQ. We are talking about maybe 5 dB on average. On a
500 mile path a 5 dB improvement sure comes in handy as signals are very
weak. Path loss is around 240 dB +/-. I did work N2SLO on Long Island
in New York and his signal might have been a bit weaker than normal.
Not sure how to explain that. Maybe a case of path QSB alone. Maybe we
worked on a QSB trough!
So did anyone note any anomalous long haul contacts during the evening?
Inquiring minds want to know.
Dave K1WHS
On 10/26/2022 9:13 AM, Al W9KXI wrote:
I got on later than usual last night and was rewarded by numerous good
contacts, culminating with Bob K8TQK. There was little to no
enhancement between the two of us as his CW signal was quite weak,
almost as if he was running without the amplifier. Regardless…we
managed.
WA3EOQ, KO4YC and W1XR had their usual Nice signals here. Always nice
to get them in my log.
Re the Red Blob. I didn't see much enhancement here but we were on
the edge of it. Having said that, I did point the beam South for FT8,
called CQ and worked Phil off the side of the bam and Dave off the
back corner.
VE3KG. Nice to work Dave for the first time and have FN24 (new grid
on 222) in my log. With the hills here in FN12ne, FN24 is a tough
direction for me.
DISTANCE (KM)
GRIDSQUARE
MODE
Jeff
K1TEO
330
FN31
SSB
Ron
WZ1V
373
FN31
SSB
Howard
WA3EOQ
348
FM09
SSB
Dave
K1WHS
500
FN43mumbojumbo
SSB
Cornell
KO4YC
477
FM17
SSB
Jim
W1XR
706
FM19
SSB
Chip
W1AIM
447
FN34
CW
Phil
WA3NUF
267
FN20
FT8
Dave
K1WHS
500
FN43
FT8
Dave
VE3KG
311
FN24
CW
Bob
K8TQK
630
EM89
CW
73,
Al - W9KXI
FN12ne
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