EU activity heard since Friday on 136kHz normal CW:
OE5ODL (559), SM6PXJ (579), OZ8NJ (569), ON7YD (559), DJ5BV (559),
DJ5DI (569), PA0KDM (549), PA0BWL (569), DK5PT (569), HB9DCE (449QSB).
Activity this weekend was much lower than recent weeks (maybe people were
taking a break and enjoying the better weather?) - nevertheless, the final
tally here was 10 countries heard and 6 worked. There was certainly no
shortage of Gs calling CQ, but noticibly fewer stations for us to work, and
I managed nothing new at all this week. Both G3XDV and PA0BWL have made
improvements and were putting out their best signals ever.
Conditions seemed quite good, if a little noisey at times, and CFH was
audible virtually all day during both Saturday and Sunday, dropping into
the noise only briefly late morning.
The local variation in signal strength was again very apparent on Sunday
morning when HB9DCE's signal was poor with both G3YXM and myself, but
Berth was getting R5 reports from GB2CPM and G3XDV - the reverse of the
situation Mike reported last time. It would be very interesting to establish
for certain whether this is due to an enhancement effect (i.e. Mike and
Peter were receiving better than other stations either side) or a
cancellation effect (i.e. Dave and I were in a null). Perhaps we could set
up a 'reports pool' for noting simultaneously the strengths of stations in
Switzerland and Italy (whose signals seem to produce this effect over the
UK) by a number of observers?
Regards John G4GVC near Leicester, IO92JP
** TX: Synth + 400W RF from modified 'G3YXM' Mosfet PA **
** RX: TS-850S with 3 x CW filters and 0.5ppm TCXO **
** Ant: Inv-L 60m long, 6m high at feed end, 12m high at far end **
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