Dx in South Texas

[Philpoh]

Haven't heard 91AU001 Indonesia in Ohio since Oct 2012.
Also waiting on Libya to come back in, saw on DX cluster your qso's ghutch.

20m last night was quite, couple of the contacts:
Spain, Slovenia, Maritime mobile Norway, Sweden, Germany, and a new one JW7VRA Svalbard @6pm.

Got back on around 10pm heard couple Kazakhstan stations - signals 4/3.
Tried to contact them but kept getting qrm to be able to have a reliable qso.
Moved up to find the qrm and made my next contact into Senegal 6V7S 5/9.

Philpoh

 

[ghutch]

It is slower here in Texas.....Europe in the morning then seems the pacific is starting to come in. I was able to hear 234 and 151 this morning....both at the noise level! Too weak. I'll get them, also saw a other rare spots on dx27 Tanzania and Lebanon did not hear either station on my side. Australia New Zealand in the early afternoon.
A couple new divisions lately for me are Iceland a maritime mobile and Western Samoa. Mustafa 91 and Nathaniel 79 are coming in almost daily....nothing from Japan or Thailand yet. South America is open all day.....about the only ones I did not hear today were Suriname and Peru. Suriname was on a few days ago but i was not able to get him! Most days you can work almost every division in the continent up thru Central America. Good stuff. I worked Nicaragua and Guatemala both yesterday, they are somewhat rare for my area as well as Cuba. Well it's about time to give a listen good luck guys !!

Philpoh dxman cools contacts and card, mustafa sent me an email couple days ago looking to QSL ! He did send me a qsl card and postcard of a outdoor marketplace, that was cool. Senegal? Is that on earth?? Or backside of mars??!

 

[ghutch]

Dx this afternoon Sunday 24th. 430 to 700 pm CST
Conditions per VOACP showed low propagation from south Texas. The gulf coast of Texas was in a sea of blue...not good!
Stations I received from 430 pm to 600pm cst with 5/5 + signals were, north east USA, Canada, Brazil, Venezuela, Argentina, Costa Rica, Chile, Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic,
Curaçao, Barbados, Martinique, Hawaii, Haiti. 13 divisions that had signals I feel positive I could have made contact with, most of these divisions had multiple stations calling CQ. I only worked a couple dx activations but with low conditions this is not bad! For a couple hours. 13 that I heard easily 5/5 or better.
About 600 pm the pacific started low....and never gained any momentum. The pacific stations never gained signal strength. From 600 to 700 pm cst I could hear Tahiti, New Zealand, Hawaii and one exception was 172 New Caledonia at 5/5-7 for about 15 minutes. The New Zealand station 41sd133 took my call but we just could not make contact on the qsy freqency. I heard him later calling, followed and he worked japan 25 division. Both were right at the noise level.
Tuned around the band and was able to copy French conversations? On several frequencies just above the noise levels.
All and all an operator could have contacted 16 or so divisions in 2 1/2 hours....with what is considered bad band conditions! Not bad in my book? Great conditions for dx contacts....even if he computer says it can't be done. 73 and good dx guys.

 

[Philpoh]

Conditions on Friday/Sat/Sun seemed down on 20m, no contest going on.
I always look at dx conditions but don't worry about them - even in poor conditions on 20m made some great contacts.

Couple I qso's this weekend on 20m:

Friday - 3 to 4 noise level
4X4FR Israel 6:20pm
TA4AU Turkey 6:45pm
9K2UU Kuwait 11pm
heard South Sudan and couple A Russian stations.

Sat - 3 noise level
HZ1TT Saudi Arabia 10am
VK6ANC Australia Perth 8pm
LT5X Argentina 8:30pm - furthest south I've talked
UN8GEQ Kazakhstan 10:30pm
UK8ZC Uzbekistan 11:26pm
4Z4UR Israel 12:19pm
also heard 20 or so Asiatic Russian stations - usually after 11pm

Sun - no noise level - all basketball all day!

 

[ghutch]

Great stuff philpoh ..... (11 was good but not that good!! Cool contacts, man I would love to hear those calls on 11!!....just hearing 234 and 151 was a wonder.

 

[Philpoh]

For me 20m was/is the way to go, I'd say 95% of my DX contacts have come between 14.175 and 14.225 which your General 2nd test would cover these frequencies.
Since putting up a rotatable 20m dipole in Jan this year I have had over 200 qso's and 89 different countries, on 11m maybe 5 new countries since Jan.
If you are a rag chewer or DXer or both then adding your Ham license is a great ideal!! Practice online.
Getting my license has expanded everything I love about DXing, 11m is like an old friend I can go back to while 20m gave me an excuse to buy new equipment.

Got on late after 10pm couple contacts on 20m:
RX0AK A Russia
RW9UL A Russia
LW3DC Argentina
CX6DZ Uruguay
UI8U A Russia
RK9UN A Russia
RA9AJ A Russia

 

[ghutch]

Ya killin me! Philpoh.......great contacts!!
:tongue:I have begun to read some test questions.....looks like we have a year or so....IF 11 has not peaked
. I looked last nite for a ham class near me...nothing close. Austin is the closest 225 miles{Cry_river}

 

[Philpoh]

ghutch sent you a PM.

Got on around 8:45pm and started hearing couple A. Russian stations scanned the 20m band and got a new one EY7AD Abdur from Tajikistan 5/5 at 9pm.

Philpoh

 

[ghutch]

That's another division that must be n mars?!, philpoh great !!
Took 6 tech tests on the web passed 5 more study!! I have a few days to get it all and go for the general ? I feel I can pass the tech now...with a little study of the gen might be do able ??

 

[Philpoh]

Great news ghutch, keep it going!
Fun stuff to study, bet you know most of it already.
I'd take both Tech/Gen at same time, then the next question is what equipment to buy and antennas to build!!

Heard couple good ones Sat mourning on 20m - huge contest:
B3C China
YE1K Indonesia
UP2L Kazakhstan

Philpoh

 

[ghutch]

Both tests at once is the plan!!
Just logged 341da/0 East Timor activation....510
Guam on 530 62 division was not able to get thru
Both are 5/5+ here....much pile up on both!

 

[Philpoh]

Start designing your antennas ghutch, your soon to have few more freq's open to you!
Huge ssb contest weekend, stayed on 20m for the most part.

Couple of the new ones:
D44AC Cape Verde
D3AA Angola
J5UAP Guinea Bissau
4U1TTU Geneva
3V8BB Tunisia
YE1K Indonesia
KH2KY Guam

Stations heard could not contact:
BY4IIG China
B3C China
DU1JI Philippines

Philpoh

 

[Lil'Yeshua]

Just made a contact with 288 in Tuson,Az on ch.28 am from my mobile in Monroe,nc. It's impossible to get 288 to reply unless conditions which are rare and are exactly right. A local on a base station nearby contacted him first running 200 watts so I thought I'd jump on the opportunity with my CRE-8900 and running no power. Cool!

 

[Lil'Yeshua]

There's some kind of CQ contest on 28.505 USB
http://www.cqwpx.com/rules.htm
http://youtu.be/B-uIReiI5hs

 

[Lil'Yeshua]

Motor Mouth Maul just came out of nowhere and dropped the hammer on John Denver who was blabbing his usual drivel swallowing him while and played a neat little song pertaining to what he just done. It reminds me of JAWS. That's when I like MMM doing what he does. I'm happy now