Daytime 20m band stinks recently - DXing Forum at eHam.net

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Daytime 20m band stinks recently	Reply
by AF3Y on April 11, 2008	Mail this to a friend!
For the past 4 or 5 days, the 20 meter band has more or less been in the toilet. For instance, I have been trying to snag YI9PT on 20 SSB for the past 3 or 4 mornings, and basically have run out of voice (and Patience). He calls "US Only" but then shortly announces that he cannot hear any US stations, and when he goes back to listening anywhere, the Europeans put the darn wall up as usual. He is a solid 55 to 57 here in SC, so I wonder why he cannot hear us. He must have some local noise there in Iraq. I know there are stations bigger than mine, running 1.5KW (and ++) here, that must be trying, but obviously they cant reach him either. We sure need a sunspot or two, or three, or four...... 73, Gene AF3Y

RE: Daytime 20m band stinks recently	Reply
by KA3NRX on April 11, 2008	Mail this to a friend!
I was under the impression that Radar has been running a wire antenna? And is waiting for his Stepper IR to arrive. Saw that on an internet blog somewhere. Anyone know the status of his antenna situation? As for 20 meters, you are correct. It's that time of year. As we progress through the spring, we should start to see better band openings toward EU in the late afternoon hours, say around 4pm-6pm. The problem we will more than likely face is that as we head into summer, the band will be pretty dead, with much in the way of static. Especially in the late morning and early to mid hours of the afternoon. Ever hear of the summer doldrums??? By the time late afternoon hits, you should see some openings to EU and AF, with that switching toward the Pacific/VK/ZL the later into the evening/wee hours you get. Hate to say it, but that's the way it will be until things start churning sunspot wise. It was like that 20 years ago, but at least back then, you saw improvement with sunspots on the increase. Ugh!!!! Vince P KA3NRX

RE: Daytime 20m band stinks recently	Reply
by N3QE on April 11, 2008	Mail this to a friend!
Sometimes I have a hard time telling lack of activity from lack of good propogation. 40M has been really very very interesting as of late, with lots of long skip, but on my casual tunes through the band I often notice the lack of short skip first. 20M is I think affected/afflicted with the same issue. It is not reliably booming to W. Europe for me like it usually does in the morning. But if I'm persistent, I do turn up some W. Europe activity, and then I find later in the day lots of interesting stuff to S. America and the Pacific. The lack of short skip makes the "first glance" at 20M and 40M very misleading. I've heard DX stations work through a long line of East Coast stations but I hear almost none of the E Coast stations.

RE: Daytime 20m band stinks recently	Reply
by AB3CX on April 12, 2008	Mail this to a friend!
Most every band in my part of Upstate NY is poor this week. Squeezed out YK9G today on 20M, they had a weak signal. European openings here usually start 8 AM, on 20M. Today the Europeans were a whisper. We're still at the near bottom of the cycle.

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