The Cape Crusaders ….Don N1DT and I finally back on the road again to activate Dumpling rock on Saturday …. and it felt great !!
We arrived and set up the generator and truck station by 6:45 AM local time ….started on 75 phone … band conditions were very poor … Solar Flux was 70 .. A index 5 .. and K index 0 … static levels were S9 or better … Difficult to copy through the crashes …. only worked five Qs on 75 phone …. KD3CQ… N3HIS ….
We then went to 40 phone …. band conditions were no better …. almost every QSO was a struggle through the static and noise… 19 QSOs… 2 on 40 CW …. worked a few of the regulars …VE3TPZ… K8YTO… VE1REC
VO1RYL … KD3CQ …. 2 on 40 CW …..
After the event I received an email from a local ham friend George KA1PS … about 40 miles away … He said he could copy us on 40 phone and hear others calling us but we could not hear him and did not go back to him … we were using a 33 foot vertical wire on the back of the truck … vertically polarized … he was using a horizontal dipole … horizontally polarized … the difference in signal with these conditions can be as much as minus 20Db …. on ground wave this is more than enough difference for us not to be able to hear him or copy him … add the high static level on 40 to this and we can understand why we did not hear him …
At 1247 UTC we went to 20 phone …. the band was stretched out … not much short skip … still had a high static level … We had a QSO with VA2ASS/W1 on Ground wave …. he was on Cape Cod on vacation running 5 watts… That call is CORRECT … seems that Canada issues calls with that suffix … we worked VE6ASS many years ago..
When I asked him he how he got the call … he said when the officials looked at him they said they had an appropriate call for him … that call is no longer active …. We worked a few familiar calls … K9PVZ (ARLHS #1000) … WA5TDK …. W5AZO Patty and W5AXN …. VO1RYL…
By noon the 20 meter band had completely gone in the tank … We could copy WA8REI working stations on the Gulf coast … Joe W5PVZ … etc … but we could not work WA8REI or W5PVZ … we had lost the propagation but being further west the W8s… W9s and W0s still had it as they were further west ……
Our last QSO was with Jim KA3UNQ on 40 phone ….. he is always there ….
Stats …
22 States
4 DX Stations … France … European Russia… Virgin Islands …. Ukraine
23 ARLHS Members
Phone CW
75 5
40 20 2
20 55 6
————————————
80 8
Total 88 QSOs
A big thanks to all of those who hung in there to work us under miserable propagation conditions and the QRN …
Don N1DT and I will be out to activate another light for the International Lighthouse/Lightship Weekend on Aug 18th.
Keep the Flame
Don N1DT #962 and Whitey K1VV / W1AA