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 81 
 on: Yesterday at 03:58:25 PM 
Started by KM4SII - Last post by KD6KVL
Boy, I see the east coasters working EU all night on 80 and sit there and wish they'd qrx so we can hear them better out here.......No way. 

 82 
 on: Yesterday at 03:54:23 PM 
Started by KM4SII - Last post by W2IRT
They current trend of working DXpeditions 30 or 40 slots is getting excessive, I usually only work them once per band and cover the 3 modes,

For CY0S 9X5RU and V26EI I just worked them when I heard them and didn't worry if I needed the slot, I used to try to promote once per band but what's the point there is no gentleman in this hobby anymore, people would knock there mothers out of a wheel chair to beat someone to a QSO, it's dog eat dog now,

I doubt it was ever any different. Chuck Brady and his massive 20m SSB pileups, BS7H with 75kHz wide CW piles and hundreds of others since I got on the air.
It's Darwin's Last Stand now, as it was then.

As for those who work 30 or 40 slots, more power to 'em, if that's their choice. I think my personal best is 28 (Malpelo and the first Ducie operation), in the days before FT8. While it may seem excessive to you, to many others it's just fresh challenges or more time to practice. Nowhere does it say that my license forbids me from working any station more than 10 times in total. So long as you operate within the strictures of your license and with a modicum of courtesy it's all good in my book. There's a difference between fighting tooth-and-nail with a hundred other callers to be heard by the DX and deliberately blocking the guy who was chosen instead of you.

There are also a ton of DXpeditions where you just can't blow them out on all bands, for whatever reason. The current operator in Mayotte, for example, is very weak to NA most times so a couple of QSOs is plenty. Or anybody in the far east; good luck working them from Zone 5 on 40, 80, and 160. Not saying it can't happen, but it's far less likely than the higher bands for most of us.

 83 
 on: Yesterday at 03:32:13 PM 
Started by N2JFA - Last post by KC0W
Any  recommends for varmint
determent type support rope.   Thank's   

 You guys need a reading comprehension course..............The question says NOTHING about there being sun damage to the antenna support rope. The first person says UV resistant rope is needed and the rest blindly follow along.

                                                                  Tom KH0/KC0W
   

 

 84 
 on: Yesterday at 03:32:13 PM 
Started by KM4SII - Last post by W2IRT
I started dxing in the 1970s. Back then the common practice for working a rare country was 1 qso and if you had any uncertainty a 2nd qso. And, for example, if that 1st qso was SSB you would try for a CW.  There wasn't a reason to work a dxpedition on every conceivable band and mode.
And in the 1970s, a heart attack or stroke at home was almost an automatic death sentence. Today we have paramedics and other first responders trained to provide basic and advanced life support, and who can administer medications that didn't exist 50 years ago. There are defibrillators in grocery stores, schools, and airports with instructions for untrained people to use them. I'll stick with the technology of 2023, thanks.

Don't think for a minute that if today's style of gear and antennas were available to DXpeditioners in the 1970s that they'd have only stuck to CW and a bit of phone. I look at operators like AA7JV as modern-day Danny Weils, adventuring across the Pacific in new and amazing ways.

 85 
 on: Yesterday at 03:26:50 PM 
Started by WA7OK - Last post by WA7OK
Thank you much for the prompt replies.

 86 
 on: Yesterday at 03:12:16 PM 
Started by ZL1BBW - Last post by ZL1BBW
Just pulled out of the shed a couple of rotors and control units I bought a few years ago.

Rotor # 1 works just fine with small dark brownish control box.

Rotor # 2 ah well, this has a more modern looking control box with left brake right buttons its top n bottom different colour's, BUT when I push the brake button its makes a very harsh more than buzzing sound, quite mechanical, and it does not rotate when I push the left or right button.

What am I doing wrong? or is it more than than me?

Thanks

 87 
 on: Yesterday at 03:09:36 PM 
Started by KM4SII - Last post by NU1O
Mason, you have started an interesting topic. I'm pretty sure that you will have 300+ entities in not too distant future and you will have many many Challenge points, too. I think it is unreasonable from anyone to expect you to just sit idle when DXpeditions happen to go to places you have already worked. What does an Honor Roll guy with 3000+ Challenge points to do? Sell his radio equipment and start collecting postage stamps instead?  ;D ;D ;D

Someone earlier in the thread mentioned the importance of donating to DXpeditions. I look at it this way. When someone gives you one of your last 20, 30, or 40 entities, why not buy him a lunch?  ;D ;D ;D

Better yet, let's help them in advance. When you are at the 300+ level, ATNOs don't happen very often and I suspect $100 or so for an ATNO is a reasonable support to help this hobby of ours going.

Marvin VE3VEE

I agree.  Work whatever you want, Mason.

Mason is a college student.  I think we should wait for him to graduate and get a full-time job before telling him he needs to contribute.  I'm sure he's paying for OQRS to get these countries confirmed and that's enough for now.

 88 
 on: Yesterday at 03:09:05 PM 
Started by W2IRT - Last post by WO7R
CY0S was easy to work and we all should have expected it to  be easy to work.

Because it was close, as semi-rare ones go, then except for 10m sometimes being too close, we are going to have a 5, 10, maybe 20 dB advantage (for once) on our brethren in Europe.  Don't know what it is, but look it up on VOACAP or something.  It was surely significant.

So, we get through with a lot less skill this time because when five stations figure out where the DX is going to be next, the winner is going to be among the louder of the five.  This time around, that's likely to be one of us.  So, of course it is going to take less time. . .and even a little less skill.

When the situation is reversed it means not only do we have to have the skill, we have to have a little luck in being perhaps the only station that guesses right or at any rate, none of the louder ones (as heard by the DX).

So, no, work CY0S and like stations if you enjoy it, that's what we're really here for.  But it isn't much of a warmup for winning through even for something as innocuous as 1A0KM.


 89 
 on: Yesterday at 03:03:04 PM 
Started by W2IRT - Last post by NU1O
And the professional baseball player that hits a 90 MPH fastball needs to hone that skill daily or soon he won't be a professional baseball player any more.



Let me reiterate, none of us are the equivalent of major league athletes. To suggest we are is laughable.

If you need to constantly work pileups to be able to find out where the DX is listening you must have cognitive issues I don't have.  I worked the 9X on three bands.  The pileups were not that big.  I was in and out of all three in under 15 minutes.  I wouldn't come close to comparing that expedition to a top 50 most wanted so I don't know what skills you honed by working them on every band.

Pileups are just not as hard as some of you are making them out to be.

 90 
 on: Yesterday at 02:51:27 PM 
Started by KM4SII - Last post by KD6KVL
You'd give up fishing after catching one of each species of fish from the same body of water? 
What do you work on the radio? 

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