11 meter is very quiet?

[Slowmover]

VERY strong crosswind across the Mojave and all of Arizona today on IH40.

I’m sure that’s what blew the signals away.

I have a load of “nothing”. Floor to ceiling and all 53’ of trailer.
Doesn’t weigh 7,000-lbs (load can go to a gross of 44,000).

25-pallets. 20,405 empty drink cans.

Guess I should get out the solder gun
an git to work.

Lessee . . 53’ horizontal at 13’ AGL, by . . . .

.

 

[Unit 75]

Just got a new Antron 99 put up 95 feet in a tree. Man does that thing talk! Spoke to triple 8 and 281 up in New York this evening with my bare footed 29LX. Also spoke to Tender Foot in Miami. I'm gonna love this

 

[cralt]

8:30pm and 6 is still rolling here in CT
SSB is dead. I guess the Ch6 AM guys make their own conditions lol


Drail from GA comes in at 9pm and silences the channel.

 

[S&W357]

Great DX today for sure. I’ve shut things down for the day. Tired of talking...

 

[AudioShockwav]

I love the sounds of sunspots.
This is the long start of a cycle but it will continue to get better as numbers increase.
I got hooked on radio working dx on ssb

23 channel Midland 13-895 and a mag mount gets you Montana on channel 16 lsb kind of goodness....
I love sunspots.

73
Jeff

 

[Rwb]

At 4 am oct 26 2020 11 meters at my home in southwest mo is so quiet you can hear a mouse fart

 

[S&W357]

pffftt...

 

[Rwb]

pffftt...

gawd mouse farts smell s&w357 haha HAHAHA

 

[Tokin]

gawd mouse farts smell s&w357 haha HAHAHA

Youve obviously never smelled a mouse queef. Makes a mouse fart smell like strawberrys hahaha!

 

[Radio-Check]

Howdy everyone from Ontario Canada,

New to the forum but old to the service of CB, Scanner and Shortwave radio hobby. Skip was amazing last night listening on 38 LSB. My question is I want to stay legal 12 watts and get a good base antenna to most of the work. I noticed the local guys here were calling CQ down to the USA last night and not being heard.

Before I make a purchase of a SSB base and base antenna, D104 I am wasting my time trying to shoot skip to the USA on 12 watts and just going to get stepped on because most are running power which is the IN thing now ?

Radio-Check

 

[red97k1500]

Howdy everyone from Ontario Canada,

New to the forum but old to the service of CB, Scanner and Shortwave radio hobby. Skip was amazing last night listening on 38 LSB. My question is I want to stay legal 12 watts and get a good base antenna to most of the work. I noticed the local guys here were calling CQ down to the USA last night and not being heard.

Before I make a purchase of a SSB base and base antenna, D104 I am wasting my time trying to shoot skip to the USA on 12 watts and just going to get stepped on because most are running power which is the IN thing now ?

Radio-Check

welcome, you could always just buy a used mobile ssb radio and run it off a power supply to start out with, if you don't want to spend a ton of money right off the bat.
when the band is open you don't really need an amp. I would try making contacts with 12 watts first, and see what happens. There will be times where you will easily be able to make dx contacts on 12 watts, and at other times some extra power would probably help.There are plenty of people both ham and cb radio operator's that don't own an amp. I don't know what you have for an antenna, but if it were me starting over again I would spend money on a good antenna first, before I spent 5 or 600 dollars on a base station.

 

[Tokin]

Howdy everyone from Ontario Canada,

New to the forum but old to the service of CB, Scanner and Shortwave radio hobby. Skip was amazing last night listening on 38 LSB. My question is I want to stay legal 12 watts and get a good base antenna to most of the work. I noticed the local guys here were calling CQ down to the USA last night and not being heard.

Before I make a purchase of a SSB base and base antenna, D104 I am wasting my time trying to shoot skip to the USA on 12 watts and just going to get stepped on because most are running power which is the IN thing now ?

Radio-Check

First welcome to the forum.
Second, reconsider the d104 depending on what radio you want to use. Most newer radios, 1980's and newer dont like the high z d104 head. The high z head will make you sound tinny. The Astatic DN50 is a low z that is compatible with all the Astatic "G" stands. Not real easy to find though.
I would suggest some audio processing.
Ive been quite happy with the UR6QW 8 band eq with compressor and gate.
I found if i wanted to use an Astatic G stand it had to be non amplified because the amplified mic proved too much with my radios mic gain plus the gain from from the UR6QW. You will love the compressor and audio out adjustments. I also modified the d104 head and put a dynamic element from a cobra hand mic in it fairly easily. If you want more details let me know.
Antennas, well running batefoot and wanting to shoot skip (poor skip ) i would suggest some beams, at least 4 element. The Maco M104C or 105C would be decent choices and I would mount them horizontally with a good rotor and control box.
Its going to be tough but try to stay off 38lsb. Call on 40, 39 or 37 and maybe qsy to a lower channel or upper sideband if youre still having issues. If you get away from all the traffic you should have good luck making contacts.
Thats how i would approach this.

 

[Radio-Check]

Great advice from you both many thanks ! Very cool gear Tokin. I have my heart set on a Hy-Gain SPT-500, reason being they are the only thing new
and sold locally here in Ontario. I am even surprised they even make 11 meter base station antennas anymore. It would be placed 40 feet up using LMR400 coax.

I fancy the President line of cb's from the 70's and would be getting them from the Bay. Restoring them is not a problem I have all the test gear, scope, signal generator, frequency counter etc, SAMS manuals and skill set to do the repairs.

Radio-Check

 

[BJ radionut]

Well Guys: Had a Blast during the Contest!
10 Meters was open for a couple hours early Saturday afternoon while I was running Solo on the board.
I only spent that little time because 15 meters (21 MHz) was being so productive.
The majority of the propagation was South from Central Ohio.
Brazil
Columbia
Uruguay
Argentina
Chile
All were worked, most with multiple contacts.
Then very briefly the Door Opened!!!
Spain...Portugal...France...England were worked.
Then I had a call from:
Azores, Islands
I quickly turned the 7 element that direction, and completed the contact!
Then once the antenna was turned MORE CALLS!
Canary Islands
Madeira Island
St Helena Island... All off the Coast of Africa.
To complete the contact on St. Helena Island, I moved the antenna a little more to South.
Then right at the noise threshold, I heard a very strange callsign. I called again using the partial I had heard.
Then pulled the callsign at just above the threshold and returned call again, and a reply with the callsign I was using and my signal report and Zone location was acknowledged followed by their Zone location and complete callsign again to make sure I copied all info correctly.
We completed!!!!
Here's where!!!

First Contact ever with that country!
Malawi

I was so pumped after that run, I had to take a short break before returning to 15 meters.
I hope the Bands Gods were equally giving to all!
I'll have more reports on the CQWW Contest thread, when I get time.
All the Best
Gary

 

[Rwb]

Howdy everyone from Ontario Canada,

New to the forum but old to the service of CB, Scanner and Shortwave radio hobby. Skip was amazing last night listening on 38 LSB. My question is I want to stay legal 12 watts and get a good base antenna to most of the work. I noticed the local guys here were calling CQ down to the USA last night and not being heard.

Before I make a purchase of a SSB base and base antenna, D104 I am wasting my time trying to shoot skip to the USA on 12 watts and just going to get stepped on because most are running power which is the IN thing now ?

Radio-Check

welcome to wwdx