I wasn't hearing 3B9SP particularly well on 17m tonight and saw a K6 post that they were long path from Northern California.  Well that looked about right as the grey lines at both ends coincided well.  I tried LP but got almost exactly the same signal...S zero, Q 3.  Came back around to short path, 30 degrees from Colorado, and the signal started to pick up @ 2345 Z.  Tried moving the beam again and got a nice peak at 60 degrees, a skewed path from here for sure.  I was able to work him @ 2359 Z, beaming 60 degrees.  Still a nice signal in here at 0015 Z, but still strongest at 60 degrees.  I can tell they're beginning to fade a bit now, though.

Did the postmaster or agent at the buyer's end inspect the amp promptly?  If not, you may have problems.  Here's how a USPS claim works.

1.  Item damaged must be inspected by receiving PO.
2.  Shipper files claim (that's you because you purchased the insurance).
3.  Shipping PO forwards damage claim to receiving PO.
4 . Receiving PO verifies damage on claim and forwards form to USPS claims service.
5.  You receive reimbursement for item.

The key is getting the item examined promptly, including packing materials to verify the damage is actually from shipping.  A pitfall is if you didn't pack the item adequately.  Pretty much everything rests with the determination of the inspecting agent.  If the item arrived at a large PO, it's a good idea to get a ranking employee to inspect the item.  They may want to retain the item and packaging on site until the claim shows up from the shipping PO.

Since your item is homebrew, it may be difficult to establish value.  Sometimes printed copies of completed sales on eBay are helpful if you can find similar items that reflect the value of your item.

I recently received a damaged key (paddle).  I suspected a problem when the box had a rattle, so I unpacked it right in front of the local postmaster.  It made it nearly impossible for them to deny the claim.  The shipper still had to originate the claim, but it was only bureaucratic formality and the claim was approved with no problem.

The receiving PO should have explained this procedure to your customer when the amp arrived damaged since it was insured.

Well, I managed Qs with TT8TT tonite on both 40m and 80m for #209 on 80 and #285 on 40.  Sure helps when the condx straighten out.  The signal on neither band was very loud, especially 80, but fortunately there was very little competition on 80.  They are hearing well, I gotta give 'em that.  Lotsa local static here from an impending storm tomorrow...maybe even some snow.

A couple of months ago I added an Orion 2 to the setup here.  The radio provides much adjustability in the rx.  Pulling weak signals out of the static like these last two Qs is interesting and a good challenge for learning the rx's possibilites.  I was a little disappointed when I first brought it up, but the more I mess with it the better I like it.

Yeah, it was lots easier.  Especially once you got past 300.  I would call CQ and have a herd of Heards, myriad Myanmars, many Marions and plentiful P5s calling.  Nothing to it.  

Did I mention no PCs, let alone spotting networks?  If you were lucky maybe you had a buddy that would telephone you if he heard something good on.  You actually had to learn to tune to find DX.  And subscribe to a DX bulletin in order to know what was coming up.

Actually, I've worked over 100 countries on both 10 and 15 within 48 hrs on several occasions.  On 10m barefoot even...all in the CQWW...CW of course.

My great wall?  The Great Wall of China.  There weren't any.  No matter how high the flux and how low the A and K got...there were...NONE.  A billion souls and exactly zero hams  Same goes, as Peter pointed out, for ZA.  As I recall XW, XU and XV were on the banned list too.  YA was in absentia for many years also, as were 5A and 7O.  The best you could hope for was that there were enough countries active that you could at least make HR.  All pretty easy back in the salad days, dontcha know...


...if it waddles like a qrp'er and quacks like a qrp'er, it's a qrp'er...anon

I'm listening at the same time as W5RDW and hearing some 5s, 6s and 7s work him, but nothing in Colorado...

(ed 0041Z)  Just heard K0YW in Ignacio, CO work him.  That's about 300mi west of me.  Damn.

Well, I just worked them on 20m and I'll say this, the op pulled me out of a pile with quite a few east coast and southern USA callers and he was very weak here.  Good ears but maybe not running any power?

Also the QSO showed up nearly intantaneously on the online log.  Impressive considering the location.  They must have high speed internet.

Sometimes it's better to be lucky than good!

I only need 160m for ZL9.  160 may be a tall order given the constraints placed on the crew.  Keeping my fingers crossed.

I was lucky to be one of ZL9BSJ/P's 133 QSOs back in 2006.

Hey Gene,

Don't feel like the Lone Ranger.  I've never had particularly good luck with these guys...and I'm not talking specifically about just this operation, either.

Despite assurances that they're going to pay special attention to the West Coast or JA, as mentioned on the website, it's pretty much EU, EU, EU.

It always seems like they're on the wrong band/mode at any given time, at least for my part of the world.  I'll admit to not chasing this operation very hard as I have TT confirmed on multiple bands, but I could use 40/80/160m.  Disturbed conditions haven't helped.  Right now the A=42 and the K=5.  Shoot.

Earlier today I saw a bunch of spots for 6m into EU.  OK, I get that.  If 6 is open, go for it.

Hey, whatever.  They can work whomever they like.  No skin off my nose here, but just an observation.

Signals were pretty good here in Colorado on all bands.  Yes, I know...what a difference a thousand or 1500 miles makes.  I understand your frustration with 160m where timing is everything.  I was lucky that they decided to show on 160 (and 80 too, actually) just before my sunrise.  I really didn't have any greyline enhancement, but at least it was still dark here.

10m was another thing altogether.  The signals were all over the place, depending on the A and K indexes.  The day I worked them on 10 they were extremely weak, but the excellent operator picked out my call OK.  Those that say you don't need an amp on 10 don't operate there enough!  That may be true when conditions are good, but sometimes you need to just brute force it through.  By contrast, on the previous day the 10m RTTY signal was S9.  Interestingly enough the day I worked them on 20m, of all bands, they were right down in the mud.  Again, disturbed conditions.  And it apparently wasn't just me, as they were calling repeated CQs and having trouble starting a run.

Of all my QSOs, I needed the amp on 160, 80, 20 and 10.  They were worked easily with 100w on all other frequencies.  I even made a QRP QSO on 17m.  They were crushingly loud on 30m, S9 +20 db.  All in all, I thought it was a great effort and I had no problem working them anywhere I wanted.

Just for the record, my antennas are pretty simple; a 3L tribander for 10-15-20 @ 70', a 3L tribander for 12-17-30 @ 60' and a HyGain HyTower for 40-80-160.  On 160, the HyTower is configured as a trapped inverted L.  No special RX antennas on 160.

Hey Chris.  This story gets even better.  The call on the bottom of the key is XV5AC.  Turns out it belonged to one John Lunsford, who called himself Chester on the air.  He was instrumental in getting the ban on Viet Nam lifted.  It never occured to me to Google the callsign until this thread jogged my memory about the key.  I got multiple hits, but here's an interesting one:

http://qsl-history.webs.com/jinnybeyerpagetwo.htm

Scroll down below the picture of Fr Moran, 9N1MM, to the "Viet Nam story."  Holy cow, the key has some history!

Also some nice photos of old Chinese QSLs, (just so I can't be accused of hijacking the thread!).

The stations we worked used Vietnamese amateur callsigns starting with XV prefixes, only adding to the irony.  All the MARS ops were American G.I.s of course.  Yet another governmental mystery.  

Several years back I purchased a Vibroplex bug on eBay.  When it arrived, I was amazed to turn it over and find a Vietnamese callsign inscribed on the bottom.  I'm at work now or I could give your the callsign.  No doubt the bug made the trip to and from Viet Nam with a G.I. MARS op.  A nice piece of history and a real bonus that I hadn't expected when I bought the key.  I wouldn't be surprised if the seller was unaware of the significance of the call.  How would you like to have been the original owner of the key, no doubt a ham (all of us MARS ops were), marooned in Viet Nam and on what would have been the ultimate DXpedition but prohibited from using it in the ham bands?  Arrgh...

Back in the day it was only the OTs that had worked China.  Nobody had DXCC #1 as China was simply unavailable for years and years.  There were also a number of countries on the FCC's "banned" list.  One of the FCC's rules was that no one contact a country that "objected to" amateur communication, and a number of them did.

I was in the army during the Viet Nam war and worked for a time at a MARS station at Ft Leonard Wood, MO.  We worked Viet Nam daily running phone patches just outside the amateur bands using amateur equipment (Collins, Drake, and Henry).  Viet Nam was on the banned list.  The irony wasn't lost on me that I was routinely working one of the rarest, indeed entirely unavailable, countries in the world while I couldn't contact that country as a civilian for DXCC credit!

The first Chinese station that I ever worked...back in the 1980s...was BY0AA in Urumqi.

That was in western China, but far north of Tibet.

http://hamgallery.com/qsl/country/China/by0aa.htm

That was quite a DX catch back then.  It was one of the only "official" Chinese stations on the air.  I actually got a QSL direct.  China was about to come out of looong period of radio silence.

Yep, that's exactly what I got, sorry.  They weren't even off the air yet and you had decided that you couldn't do it!

What ever you do, don't take any advice.

As Peter likes to remind us:

And soon there will be DX for all...although more for some than for others.