Rik Strobbe wrote:

Everybody who is involved in extreme narrowband mode such as QRSS and DFCW
will confirm that signals that are 10 to 20dB below the 'normal CW'
detectable level can still be copied and lead to a QSO.
OK, it takes about 30 minutes or more but this time period is accepted for
Meteor Scatter contact on VHF (I believe that the time limit for a valid
QSO is 2 hours for MS).
Nothing wrong with being a 'die hard' CW operator, but that is no reason
for  neglecting the fact that extreme narrowband modes are superior to
'normal speed' CW when it comes to signal to noise ratio. Both theory and
practise proves this.

Tell me Rik, why is there no qrss(LMCW) when the band is noisy like lots of
qrn/static about.
It should not be a problem if you can read signals 20 db below the noise.
My ANSWER after monitoring and experimentation with  spectran is that the qrn
chops the long dashes and you cannot be sure if it was lots of dots. This does
not happen with normal cw because  one can read words in between the crashes and
conduct a qso even with a weak signal.
The qrn was very bad at the weekend but I did work PA0KDM, gave him 229. Also
worked OK1DTN gave him 569, his first qso with the UK.  There is no substitute
for the real thing, and it only takes a few minutes for a proper qso.
If you have to spend an hour or more to conduct a qso and only under ideal
conditions with qrss then that is hardly state of the art communications, plus
the fact that one is cluttering up an already
narrow band. Morse practice could be the answer.
One other point, some qrss qso's are pre arrange so one knows who is expected on
the frequency
and the rest is GUESS WORK.- I have been listening and watching and some claimed
qso's are doubtful.
G3KEV

73, Rik  ON7YD