10m, on the magloop.

Things have been quite active on 10m over the past few days, prompting interest in new antennas for the band.

For convenience, I generally use my 14Mhz delta at 28Mhz.  I was interested to see how well a magloop I built last year, nominally for the 15m band, would do in comparison to the delta.

The answer, in brief (for once!) is that the magloop, just ~40cm in diameter, performs at least as well as the delta, and probably a bit better for DX (because the delta's pattern at 28MHz is fairly high).

Let's play 10m!

I've been very happily working the band all afternoon, though propagation is very up and down, as usual.  Getting out well into Russia on just 15W, the remotely-controlled matching of the loop completely stable over hours of operation, even in the rain and a gusty, 45mph wind.

And to think that, if you want to buy a magloop, it's a minimum of about £400, three times that for the more 'professional' versions, although, ultimately, there is nothing to any design of magloop other than a bit of metal, a capacitor, and a means of turning the capacitor!

Receiving stations (FT8) mid-afternoon.

Going north - and G2 storm watch!

Last night saw a brief period of disturbance of the geomagnetic field at high latitudes, with a sharp swing of the Z (vertical) component to northwards.  A G2-level storm is forecast for 31 August through to September 01, which will make for interesting WSPR results-gathering and the following auroral Es for higher-HF band operation.

Image: Tromso Geophysical Laboratory.

This peak in the northwards trend - between about 03:20 and 03:50UT - is very clearly revealed in the 14MHz WSPR data gathered overnight.

Here's OE9GHV hearing my 1W.  The 03:24UT spike caused by the northwards-going field happens conveniently just before normal early morning propagation much affects the signal:

OE9GHV hearing MW1CFN, 14MHz WSPR

Next, how TF1VHF heard my 1W, revealing a spike at 03:46UT, consistent with the timing of the field peak at higher latitudes:

TF1VHF hearing MW1CFN, 14MHz WSPR.

And lastly, just to reinforce the data, how OE9HLH heard me, showing the spike in signal strength, again, as in the case of OE9GHV, timed at 03:24UT:

OE9HLH hearing MW1CFN, 14MHz WSPR.

Forecast aurora model at the time of peaks from central Europe.  Image: NOAA/SWPC.

Overnight WSPR at 28MHz

Intrigued by recent evenings' results at 14MHz WSPR, I decided last night to keep things going up at 28MHz.

Antenna in use was a vertical delta loop cut for 14MHz, operated at its first harmonic, at which frequency the radiation pattern is a 'bell', with high horizontally polarised lobes, and low vertically polarised lobes.  Unlike at 14MHz, the 28MHz pattern has a more directional, pseudo-dipole nature:

14MHz vertical delta loop radiation pattern when used at 28MHz.

Total number of received spots here between 19:20UT and 06:20UT was 78.

It was nice to see FY5KE hearing my 1W twice in the earlier part of the evening, across an all-sea path.  My 1W was heard at a very good -17dB (20:18UT), compared to M0UNI's -23dB from 10W, and G8CQX's -25 at 20W around the same time.

Spots I received (red) and I sent (green), 19:20-06:20UT 28-29 August 2019, 28MHz.

The only station that kept coming in all night was OH5XO.

I was interested to see if there was any evidence at 28MHz of the very brief, strong and repeating spikes in signal strength seen at 14MHz recently.  The rationale for this was that the cause of the spikes might be Es.

Whilst there were peaks and troughs developing over longer periods, there was no evidence of these very sharp spikes on this evening (28-29 August 2019) at 28MHz.  Here are the stations that provided sufficiently long datasets to draw a reasonable plot:

First, OH5XO, sending 200mW:

OH5XO received by MW1CFN, WSPR at 28MHz.

OZ7IT, sending 5W:

OZ7IT received by MW1CFN, WSPR at 28MHz.

IK1NET, sending 200mW:

IK1NET received by MW1CFN, WSPR at 28MHz.

ZB2TEN, sending 100mW:

ZB2TEN received by MW1CFN, WSPR at 28MHz.

And, finally, how LA3FY/2 heard my 1W output, which is perhaps more spiky than my received signals, although this is mostly in the context of a developing pattern over a longer time span:

MW1CFN received by MW1CFN, WSPR at 28MHz.

More unusual propagation effects

Last night again produced some spectacular swings in received WSPR signals at 14MHz from short skip distances.  You can read about the earlier event here.

Here's the example of ON7KB, showing enhancements of up to 50dB, in very short, repeating bursts (you can also see multiple spots within most of the peak lines, typical of very strong signals):

This is very unusual and needs some explaining.  Any ideas?  The geomagnetic field was only slightly disturbed at high latitudes, leading to no more than Kp ~2:

Z field component, Tromoso Geophysical Observatory.

On the Question of Automation.

My blogging colleague, EI7GL, recently posted a fine script on his views concerning the ARRL trying to stamp-out automated QSOs in contesting.  You can read pages and pages of opinion, mostly against the decision, here.

You can find my initial thoughts about that under 'comments' in John's blog.

But this did prompt a lot of further thought, which I'd like to set out in what I hope is a balanced and objective way.

First, there is the concept of 'technology', and the concept of 'automation'.

A human can't make any radio communication without technology, for radio is beyond our natural senses and a means of communication that is therefore only possible by constructing a technological apparatus.  He or she can make communication without a machine doing it all on its own, having only once been set going.

So the argument is fully centred on the concept of automation alone.

What, then , is wrong with automation?  Does it allow any given radio station to do something that it would not otherwise be able to do?  Does a human affect it's performance?

Having just emerged from 44 hours out of 48 hours available for a JT9 contest, I can definitively say that the only thing that insisting on human-initiated QSOs achieves is turning what should be a test of a station's overall efficiency in getting a signal from one place to another into a test of human endurance.

 Is that what a radio contest is fundamentally about?  I absolutely think not.

Now, it's a well-known and regrettable fact that the radio community is heavily skewed towards the end of life's progression.  People get old, they might get more easily tired, and they might not last the course.

If they - and I - could simply optimise our stations so that they are working as best we can muster and set them going under automation, then what actually is the mischief in that?  It seems to me that the only logical answer is: 'none at all'.

The ARRL seems to be doing what humans, especially those of a certain age profile, tend to do in all walks of life: engage in nostalgia. Nostalgia, of course, tends strongly to focus on the good things, ignoring the bad and keeping us rooted in a place that has long past.  Facts don't really matter when it comes to nostalgia.  It's just what makes you feel good.

And that is the dangerous place the ARRL seems intent on going.  It is ignoring the plain and simple fact that a radio and its antenna can't be induced into miraculously making QSOs that only the presence of a human could allow it to do.

In the end,cheating in a radio contest - the mischief that the ARRL seems to be incoherently concerned about - isn't difficult, nor is it limited in the ways we can do it.  We might agree with a distant operator of the same cheating mind to log a QSO that never happened.  Some contests don't need a two-way confirmed log - making cheating easy if that's what you want to do.  A QRP station can switch to 1kW operation.

But automation?  Where is the realistic opportunity, over and above the foregoing, for cheating there? 

Digital radio is extremely popular, no matter what you personally think of it.  I fully accept the argument that digital is impersonal, given to simply 'points gathering', and in many ways, utterly mindless.

But digital is also revolutionary.  It allows the majority of operators, who can't erect big antennas - or even particularly efficient ones - to 'work the world' with relative ease, quickly, and during periods of the solar cycle that previously led to quiet bands.  It involves the engagement of computing technology and communication styles that are, as my young MW6 daughter will tell you, much more attractive to that generation than talking about a hip operation with a 75-year old who can do little more than complain and talk about valves!

The world moves on.  The ARRL should accept it probably has too many old, white, middle-class American men trying to cling to the past and reject the future.  It's what all committee-like structures tend to do, whether it's a fishing club or a radio society.

In the end, if humans really do find digital radio too dull, unrewarding or otherwise not worth bothering with, they will do something else.  They might return to SSB and a chat.  It's a lovely thing to do, much more rewarding, in terms of how your day goes, than sending a warble via a PC.  But it's slow.  It's noisy if everyone else wants to watch TV or sleep.  It's not what everyone wants.

And there is a distinction to be made, of course, between one digital mode and another.

FT8 and the like are particularly mindless and impersonal.  But try OLIVIA, Hell, CONTESTIA, ROS and the like, and you find yourself essentially writing enjoyable real-time messages between the operator on the other end.

Sadly, because the western mind dominates in radio culture, 99.99999% of operators vote with their feet, reject these enjoyable 'ragchew' modes, and go collect as many DX and points as they can with the mindless modes.  In the end, people get what the people want.

The ARRL must be careful not to be as hypocritical as, it has always seemed to me, the Amish community of its parent country.  The Amish reject modern technology, without ever defining a cut-off point for 'modern', and accepting some technologies (e.g. carts, machined wood, tools) without ever explaining why those are perfectly fine.  In other words, the Amish base their culture on nostalgia for the past, 'the way things were'.

Let's not be so lacking in objectivity, but embrace the future, see what it brings, use what suits and throw out what we don't.

Remarkable WSPR Spikes

There was a forecast yesterday for a sudden transition from Kp ~1 to Kp ~4 into the magnetic midnight period in the UK.  Again, it was time to listen to what happened to WSPR signals as the disturbance progressed.

There's a lot of data to process, but a couple of signals really stand out already.

First, here's how the geomagnetic field (horizontal component) varied:

Image: Tromso Geophysical Observatory

In essence, the field rapidly commenced its disturbance at 22UT, and equally suddenly relaxed around 02:30UT onwards.

Here's how G0CCL's signal, only 353km away from me, responded:

The clearest method to plot this was with a stepped line, which works very well, except for the fact it masks the signal dropouts as the disturbance commenced and restored.  This is how it looks without connecting lines:

But the most incredibly dramatic effect is that as the field snaps to quieter conditions - two sharp peaks, increasing the received signal by about 25dB (a factor of 316), between 02:26 and 02:50UT!

That is, without doubt, the most incredible effect of any geomagnetic disturbance I've ever seen.

The effect was also seen, in a somewhat different pattern of even more pronounced peaks, in the example of ON7KB's signal.  ON7KB is 17 minutes ahead of G0CCL in terms of Earth's rotation, but notice how the increase in received signal happens a full hour before G0CCL:

It's a good thing that these two stations, at least, are transmitting the high, 5W output that they have chosen to use.  That's because those following the trend of very low outputs of 0.1-0.5W, whiilst they do climb sharply out of the noise and into detection as the field changes, they only do so for three or four spots.  Whilst that clearly highlights the effect of the changing field, it doesn't make for a very good plot.


No doubt there are more surprises in the depths of the dataset, which is safely stored and awaiting analysis...

48 Hours

Well, I had a good sleep overnight.  Quite welcome, because I only managed about four hours over the past two whole days!

The reason?  The Russian Digital Radio Club's JT9 Activity Days.

I'm not at all a contester, but JT9 is nice and slow, allowing me to read an article in a magazine whilst gathering points.  Using JT9 also lets me be nostalgic about the years where JT9 was a superb way of gathering long-haul DX in a much less mindless way than FT8 and FT4.

Things were going reasonably well until 22UT on the Saturday.  Propagation was typical for the current solar conditions at 14MHz.  Activity slowed down a little for an hour or two, seemingly as people in the east went to sleep, or took a well-earned break.

Then, Windows 10 decided it wanted to update.  Feeling sleepy, I allowed it to go ahead.  After 20 minutes of blue screen, my soundcard interface generated the dreaded 'Error in audio input' message.  For the time being, I just rolled back to the previous version, and resumed activity for a while.

Now I took two hours off to sleep.  When I got up, band conditions were not so good, and continued to deteriorate for the remainder of the contest.  The geomagnetic field was a little disturbed at high latitudes, leading to me only managing about 60 QSOs on the Sunday - about two-thirds what I managed on the previous day.

During better propagation conditions, I generally used 5-8W with JT9 from my vertical delta loop.  Under the present solar minimum, I had to use at least 10W, and sometimes as high as 50W for the really tough ones.   I managed to complete QSOs on 40, 20, 17, 15 and 12m, though most were on 40 and 20m.

Incidentally, I discovered that my 17m delta does a very good job on 15m (twin fed), possibly better than my dedicated 15m delta, due to a better location.

48 hours is a very long time to operate continuously, and is a very unfriendly format for those - like family people - who can't just sit down for two solid days.  That does matter when we are losing the older operators, and not finding younger ones to replace them.

Still, for once in my life, that's what I did, and I totalled 536,315km, potentially with 3500km more due to a logging format error in one or two records.

Looking at last year's results, that total should see me reach fairly high up in the rankings, despite being a wire antenna operator on 14MHz.  The best thing is that there were quite a large number of people taking part in this reminder that JT9 continues to be a great weak signal mode.

Oh, and the solution to the Windows 10 update sound input error?  Turns out it's very simple: just go to Settings>Privacy>Microphone>Allow apps to access microphone (you can deselect all the ones you don't want to do this if you want).  Works fine!

Whatever shall be done?

Yes folks, once more, we are seeing this page increasingly (and irritatingly) often at WSPRnet:

This is a big problem for the radio community, because all our WSPR results come from this single source.  Despite robust promises by others to offer an alternative, I'm not aware that anyone has actually produced the goods yet. 

It always seemed to me that WSPRnet should be subscription driven, perhaps a few dollars each year from each user.  It's a price worth paying if we lose these constant and often long drop-outs. 

Baltic memories

It's funny what gets me excited.  This week, it's been the 'Baltic Way' Award activity, which has been extremely popular on the bands.

This activity was of particular interest to me, as my grandfather was born in Vilnius, Lithuania in 1911.  I have to say I really enjoyed chasing the stations around the bands!

I managed much more than the required 30 points, but once the database reached 30, it issued the award anyway.

My Lithuanian grandfather, Adrej Lasowski (centre)

Down the A55 road...

Yesterday, I took an hour to receive some WSPR from Penmaenmawr sea front, where you can park a car very close to the sea, with an open aspect from SSW to ENE.

Penmaenmawr.  Image: J. Rowlands/Pixaerial

Fantastic, drive-up and operate coastal location - Penmaenmawr, North Wales (IO83ag).

A potential disadvantage of this position, though very convenient, was that it lies right next to the A55 highway, carrying a large volume of traffic.  Surprisingly, only the very occasional car produced any ignition noise - and most of those were actually very new, premium brand cars!

The result from this site proved to be exactly the same as the previous day's outcome from the west Anglesey coast - with the crucial exception that there were a very significant number - 38% - of stations heard at the coast that were not heard at all by my delta, back home.

Let's go to the West Coast!

Having found good results yesterday down at the north coast of Anglesey, I decided to place my mobile whip in a position with a wider aspect to the Atlantic for 14MHz WSPR reception.

So, off I went to the west coast of Anglesey, down a little-known, single track road that eventually took me to a small cove, the sea being just metres away.

Already very autumnal.  Looking out west over the Irish Sea.

This is not 'at the surf' operating, where the antenna is less than half a wavelength from the water.  That's a lot of effort, and becomes increasingly impractical and uncomfortable in poor weather.  The water is roughly between 10 and 40 metres away, depending on the tide.

The open horizon to the west was certainly a big improvement over my previous location for US stations being heard by my simple mobile whip.  Here are the results of 21 reception cycles at 14MHz:

Now, the mobile whip yields a median 4.5dB better receive signal than the full wave delta loop located at 300 feet amsl, on top of a copper mine!

Undeniably, simply being by the sea, with a clear environment, is enormously beneficial, even in a car with the simplest of antennas.  Even JA9TTT comes in stronger, where the path is presumably from the east, behind the coast. That may be a hint that lower noise, rather than stroger singals, is the cause of the good performance from the whip, althouth I have managed number 1 in the WSPR DX listening challenge from home more than once. 

At 18:54UT, I sent a single, 1W WSPR transmission.  I chose N2HQI as a good receiver, who reported the following results at around that time.  Note the strange, multiple reception reports for my station (note also that with the old WSPRnet database interface, you can display way more results than with the new one, which is limited to just 999 spots):

If we take -5dB as my report, then that puts me 11dB above G0CCL, itself a top-performing station.

Return to the sea!

The weather has turned very autumnal here in North West Wales recently.  High winds more typical of winter, and a very cool airstream have dominated the last week.

My simple /M station, at a different location, working JA, last year.

These are the kinds of conditions that prompt me, like some animal seeking the last fruits of summer, to visit the coast with a HF radio in tow.  Not that I'm far from the coast anyway - just a couple of kilometres, in fact!

So, I decided to see this year if WSPR reception at 14MHz is better down on a small peninsula - Point Lynas - that projects into the Irish Sea from the northeast 'corner' of Anglesey.

/M location: Point Lynas and lighthouse, Anglesey.  Image: J. Rowlands/Pixaerial.com

It's not the widest expanse of sea you've ever seen from the coast, but it does have a nice, clear path to the NW, where signals from the far west of the US come in.

The comparison I was running was hardly fair.  At home - elevated and on a copper mine with a clear view of the sea, I had my vertical delta loop into a FT-450 and a laptop to decode.

At the coast, I had a car with nothing more than a simple, magmounted mobile whip, feeding a Kenwood TS-480SAT and a Raspberry Pi to decode.  The ground here is hard schist rocks of very poor characteristics.

My initial problem was to address RFI from the Raspberry Pi.  After lots of attention to possible ground loops and so on, I found that the easiest solution, and a very effective one, was to power the Pi and its screen from a 22Ah Lithium power pack.  This lasts for several hours.

And the results of about 45 minutes of WSPR data gathering at 14MHz?  Very surprising, given the difference in antennas.  On the longest path, with a direct, clear line across the sea to AA7FV, my mobile whip was hearing that station at -24.5dB, compared with only -27dB for the delta loop.  In other words, nearly twice as strongly into the whip.  K5XL also came in 1.5dB stronger into the whip.

You may want to stop me there and say it was some difference between the hardware.  That's possible, but in practice isn't supported by the other results, which vary in both directions.  Stations for this table were those heard consistently over the operating period (16:58 - 17:44UT, 19/08/19)

 
Overall, the two, very different antennas yield the same, or very nearly the same outcome!  That's quite an amazing result for such a simple antenna, albeit one in a good, yet not perfect seaside location!  The next test will have to be from a location with more sea horizon to the west; it's actually quite difficult to get car access to the coast around here.

This gives a lot of encouragement to the significant fraction of the radio community that only ever operates from mobile or portable situations - a number certainly destined to increase as ever-more electronic RFI blights our home-based radio lives.

RDRC JT9 Activity Day

'Dear Fellow Radio Amateurs,

 

We invite fans of digital modes of radio communication to JT9 Activity Days «Make haste slowly» which will take place from 00:00 UTC Saturday August 24 to 23:59 UTC Sunday August 25, 2019 on all HF-bands from 160 to 10 meters. Repeated QSO can be made on different bands.

 

The obligatory condition of each QSO is to preserve in adif file of the Log: the received locator. The occupied places will be distributed according to the sum of the distances to correspondents. The result of each participant in the totals will be presented in the overall standings, including separately by bands.

 

We announce the following prize contests:

• «A picture is worth a thousand words» - The winner of the contest will be awarded RDRC pennant for the largest number of QSOs with correspondents who are at a distance of more than 10.000 kilometers. If the number of QSO is equal for two or more participants, when determining the winner the sum of the distances will be taken into account first, and then the number of bands on which these QSOs were made.

• «As the call, so the echo» - One pennant of the RDRC will be drawn in a lottery between the participants in this competition with a result of over 100,000 kilometers.

• «Half a loaf is better than no bread» - One pennant of the RDRC will be drawn in a lottery between the participants in this competition who will show the best results on each of the bands.

 

Certificates of JT9 Activity Days «Make haste slowly» in electronic form will be reawarded with all participants at whom the sum of distances up to correspondents will exceed 50.000 kilometers.

All certificates for contests and days of activity, since 2019, are loading on site http://awards.rdrclub.ru/certificate/

 

Reports in adif-format (.adi) should be sent to e-mail address 01-10(at)rdrclub.ru before 23:59 UTC on August 30, 2019. The report file should be named by your callsign (for example RK3DSW.adi). In your letter specify the last name, first name, patronymic, postal home address.

 

We are waiting for you on August 24 and 25 on the band frequencies for JT9!

JT9 Activity Days «Make haste slowly» RULES: http://www.rdrclub.ru/dni-aktivnosti-rtsrk/825-jt9-activity

 

- 73! Russian Digital Radio Club -'

14MHz Overnight unique

Continued good performance and noise management here, as, apart from TF3GZ - in a rather different geographical and geomagnetic position to me - I was the only one on this side of the Atlantic to hear K6SFC, putting out 5W, last night (17/08/19) at 14MHz.

All receivers of K6SFC's 5W 14MHz WSPR signal, 24 hrs back from 07:50UT, 17/08/19.

Much the same story in receiving VE4KE's 5W, which is even more surprising, given his much better position for getting across to Europe:

All receivers of VE4KE's 5W 14MHz WSPR, same time range as previous plot.

If this morning's good weather persists, I may well take a 1/4 wave vertical and WSPRlite down to a west-facing beach tonight. 

It might be only a wire, but...

I decided to listen to 40m WSPR using my SDRPlay RSP1a receiver last night.  It's been a while since I visited that band.

The RSP1a is pretty sensitive, broadly on a par with my FT-450 transceiver.

My antenna for 40m is a half-sloper, fed against a tower at only 6m above ground (I am already 100m above the local area, on a low ridge and steep slopes).

I was pleased, despite this arrangement's simplicity, to be the only northern hemisphere station in 24 hours to hear LU3HO's 5W WSPR signal at 23:44UT (-27dB SNR).

Yet again, the message is simple: environment (position), environment (noise) and environment (ground).

The strange world of JTDX Facebook group

Following on from my first test of JTDX against WSJT-X yesterday, I posted a link to the Facebook group 'JTDX' (not to be confused with other JTDX groups).

For sure, there is not a lot of activity on that group, and I must have joined it for any useful hints on optimising JTDX for WSPR use, of which I found none.

Add caption

But as is inevitably the case, anything that looks like criticism brings out the worms from the wood.

Immediately, a US-UK pair of members asserted, without any evidence to back their claim, that "we all know the truth" about JTDX's [superior] performance.  My test was, the UK operator claimed, "bogus" - again without saying what aspect of the test I had knowingly misrepresented.

The admin for the JTDX FB page - presenting himself as DL5NAM - wanted to know what the arrangement for the test was, and how I had split the signal for testing.

My simple approach was merely to record WSPR time slots (21 of them), and decode each recording using both software in turn.  I even made sure to record half the audio with JTDX, and half with WSJT-X (there was no difference in spot number or SNR, no matter how the audio was recorded).

So there was no need for complex signal splitting or multiple software incidences.

If anyone can reasonably argue that audio recordings compared through the two softwares are not a valid means of presenting signals for decoding, then I would be pleased to receive the observations.

If, instead, people just want to assert, shout and insult their way to 'correctness', then I have no interest, thanks.

A check was made of 'live' decodes against what the same software then decoded when the audio recording was run through it.  There was no difference in the number of decodes, or their reported SNR for either of the softwares.

So, for the moment, until I hear persuasive arguments to the contrary, my method, whilst not the only way of comparing WSPR performance between softwares, is probably the easiest by far - and entirely valid and reliable in its findings.

JTDX vs. WSJT-X

For a long time, I've been wondering whether JTDX has fallen behind WSJT-X in its sensitivity to WSPR signals.

For some reason, I never simply saved a set of receive runs and worked out the numbers.

So, this morning, that's exactly what I set out to do.

Reception was carried out at 14MHz using a Yaesu FT-450, in a stable operating temperature, having run continuously over the past 36 hours.  Recordings of the time slots were made, and then played back for decoding 'offline' by each software.

Number of 2-minute time slots: 21 (42 minutes total data gathering)

Time of recordings, including gaps between switchovers/other activities: 07:18UT - 08:20UT.

Recordings made using JTDX v2.0.2-rc139 (Release Candidate) as the receiving software:

JTDX decodes: 97
WSJT-X decodes: 105

Recordings made using WSJT-X General Release 2.1.0 as the receiving software:

JTDX decodes: 104
WSJT-X decodes: 117

Combined spots for all runs:

JTDX total spots: 201
WSJT-X total spots: 222

Only in one time slot (07:38UT) out of 21 did JTDX decode (one spot) more than WSJT-X.

A check was made that 'live' decodes were no different to decodes from saved recordings.  There were no such differences.

So, the firm conclusion is that WSJT-X is 10.4% better than JTDX, at least in their current forms, accepting that both softwares are in continuous development, and that the JTDX version used is a RC, not a General Release version.  Importantly, JTDX developers have tended to focus on FT8-based HF DXing aspects of their software over the past months, whereas WSJT-X WSPR performance has been improved - clearly rather successfully.

It's likely that, at different times of the day, notably into the later evening at present, when most signals are weak at 14MHz, WSJT-X will prove to outperform JTDX by a wider, possibly much wider margin.  More on that as data is gathered...

New WSPR kid on the block.

It's nice to see a fairly new, 24/7 WSPR receiver operating these past few weeks at 2E0PYB.

Unlike the majority of operators who have to work in RFI-blighted, urban environments, 2E0PYB enjoys a wide open, rural setting with no significant noise.

East (2E0PYB) and West (MW1CFN) WSPR coverage.

That there is no noise is readily apparent if you keep a close eye on 2E0PYB's results on WSPR, which I encourage you to do.

I've noticed that, during daylight, 2E0PYB will report a 2-3dB stronger signal from many transmitters than I will.  This is sometimes down to the former station using a pair of phased verticals, which has fairly strong directionality, and that system is aimed NNW/SSE.  But not always.  Sometimes, that station is using just a single vertical.

My station seems to do better in the depths of night, which is lengthening considerably, now it's mid-August.  Then, my vertical delta picks up stations, like AA7FV and KD6RF (01-03UT), that 2E0PYB does not pick up at all, even when the signal here is at relatively good levels of about -22dB SNR.   That may be due to extremely low arrival angles to my station, which has a clear view of the Irish Sea horizon and a copper mine for ground.  2E0PYB may well have better reception than I do to the east, especially in the early mornings.

That low reception angles are involved in the dark hours is yet again demonstrated by a comparison of stations hearing me, and those hearing another good performer, G4UGD, who was using twice my output power:

As far as K5XL's distance, this is how both stations were receiving him 13-14 August.  My reception is stronger into the early morning, even though K5XL ceases to be heard altogether by both stations within 15 minutes of one another.  Or, in other words, simultaneously, when the difference in longitude is taken into account. Overall, my reception was 2dB above the 2E station, but it is to be seen if I can keep that up over time:

In a one-day WSPR chellange test (14-15 August 2019), I managed 235 unique spots on receive, against 2E0PYB's 225 spots.  This was despite my being at a big disadvantage in also transmitting at a 20% rate, whereas the other station was 100% receive.

The great thing about having more well-operated stations in quiet locations is that it pushes the rest of us to keep our own stations in good order.  In that respect, and many others, the arrival of 2E0PYB is very welcome indeed.

TF1/M1CFN

The family managed to get away from it all this past week, in one of our fairly regular visits to Iceland.

Strokkur erupts!

On this trip, I decided to take a WSPRlite transmitter along, putting 200mW from a 20Ah lithium battery pack into a simple, 2-radial elevated 1/4 wave vertical.  

Would all this make it through the ever-increasing steps of security at the airport?

The lithium battery has to be carried in hand luggage, which I knew about and complied with.  Other than the usual rummage through the bag, there was no problem with this.  My antenna analyser was unfamiliar to security staff, but they just said "I won't even ask what this is", which seems a bit of an odd thing to say when they are supposed to be doing exactly that!  The WSPRlite wasn't even examined.

The antenna and coax went into hold luggage, and wasn't apparently a cause of concern, as the bag had not been physically examined.

On arrival, radio matters were the first priority!  My son is a good tree climber, and there were plenty of birch trees of a good height from which to hang the vertical.  But, because of the density of branches, it was actually very difficult to climb any tree.  All the rocks are, because of glacial and water erosion, rounded in Iceland, so a 'sling' was also rather difficult to arrange in a hurry.  

No problem!  We then realised that we'd completely failed to see a fibreglass flag pole (which was obvious, as you can see, just a few steps away from the car parking!)  Like most Scandinavian countries, just about every house has a flagpole in Iceland.  So, up went the wire on the lanyard, which was of perfect 7m height to hold the vertical wire above ground.  A small amount of trimming the wire, and we were down to 1.2:1 on the analyser.  Off we go!

Spot the antenna!

For the first few days of the trip, geomagnetic conditions were fairly quiet.  As a result, my signal was heard with typical regularity and consistency across Europe from early morning, and then into the US and Alaska in the evening.

The week's spot trace looks like this (the green box indicates a few hours of battery recharging):

As you can see, nothing much to write home about in the first four and a half days.  Propagation conditions are not so good, so DX distances are not great.  

All spots of TF1/M1CFN (1 week) courtesy DXplorer

But in the last two days or so, a coronal high speed stream impacted the Earth, taking us up to G1-G2 levels.  The effects are very clearly evident in the above plot.  

The best receiver for my signal, reporting over 400 spots, was DK6UG, plotting out like this:

DK6UG hearing TF1/M1CFN, 200mW, 14MHz WSPR.

Another very consistent spotter was 2E0PYB, who has a good, quiet rural location for receive.  Very curiously, his reception of my signal did not seem to suffer very much at all in response to the geomagnetic disturbances, and in fact, relative to at least two of the earlier (quiet) days, actually saw an enhancement (which I have reported upon many times in the past):

2E0PYB receiving TF1/M1CFN, 200mW, 14MHz WSPR.

It's worth restating that difference during disturbed periods between 2E0PYB and DK6UG, which is reinforced by looking at the reports from OZ7IT, a very respected and long-term WSPR operator.  My signal drops off a cliff as the disturbance takes place:

OZ7IT receiving TF1/M1CFN, 200mW, 14MHz WSPR

The real outlier in the whole dataset was from just 76km away, i.e. my groundwave, as reported by TF1VHF.  As you would expect, his reports were essentially flat throughout the week, typically around the -27dB mark.  Then, between 17:46 and 19:10UT on August 06, a huge pike in signal strength, reaching -10dB:

TF1VHF receiving TF1/M1CFN, 200mW, 14MHz WSPR.

What was the cause of the spike?  Whilst I thought it could be the weakening geomagnetic effects, the local magnetometer in Iceland (and other data) doesn't seem to support this theory, because the field was largely uneventful and the time:

I did consider whether seismic activity might have caused the spike.  There were some minor tremors at the correct time locally (you could feel their gentle shaking if sitting down or lying in bed).  But minor tremors are essentially constant in Iceland, so one would expect more spikes like this.  My dataset is too short to make any firm conclusions. 

That said, if we look closely at the TF1VHF reports, we can see there is another spike, much smaller, representing a ~6dB enhancement, at 01:32UT on August 04.  It seems we might be able to rule out geomagnetic effects for this event, because the field in Iceland was as flat as a pancake all day:

All told, I think the spike was probably an enhanced patch of ionisation against a background of a relaxing magnetic field.  Even so, it's quite an event.