Gale Force DXing

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Since last night we have been suffering from gale force winds which are still hitting us hard up here on the hill. Despite the antennas taking a pounding from the wind and rain, conditions have been excellent on HF with lots of DX stations coming through on 17M, 20M & 40M. Last night (Friday) I was hearing stations from Peru, New Zealand and Stateside coming in strong on 20M. At 21.44 utc I made QSO with Cuba when I worked CO6LC - 5/9 on 20M. Later on 40M, I heard lots of big signals coming in from the U.S, at 22.31, I came across Richard - VE2ZVZ/P, who was on a camping Dxpedition in the forest of MONTREAL. We managed the QSO with QRM making it difficult at times but still getting there in the end with a 5/5 report.

The wind was so bad this morning I had to move one of my Motor Cycles away from a scarily bendy old tree and park it up in a more sheltered space. The WX continued to get worse and during the morning the power lines were blown down somewhere near the local sub station, we had no power for a couple of hours until it was repaired. With the continuous gale force gusts, I am expecting one of the wire antennas to come loose or fall down. Fortunately, I must have done a good job the last time I changed the guy ropes as they are all holding up so far.

We decided that with all the excitement and lack of sleep from the howling wind noise all night, it was not such a good idea to do the unnecessary 170 mile round trip to the Ham Fest in such bad WX. We were going for the run out, so instead we went for a more localised drive around and at the same time a play on 20M from the mobile. The band was busy as I drove and it wasn't long before I worked a couple of European stations on 20M (Slovenia and Spain). My 50W signal was doing well getting through straight away with 5/9 reports on the trusty Yaesu Field Marshall - FT-100.

At 12.58 utc on 14.239 MHz, I worked VK4KW in Australia with a 5/9 report from my mobile from nearby to my QTH. Once again the Yaesu FT-100 HF/VHF Transceiver worked fantastic with the help of the chassis grounded Maldol HFC-20 mono band antenna, performing very well indeed with another good DX contact in the mobile log.

Snapshot of the FT-100 during the mobile contact with VK4KW

VK4KW - TOOGOOLAWAH, AUSTRALIA

Providing that there are no more damaged power lines, I will continue listening out for any DX or any other interesting sounding stations I might receive during the remainder of the weekend.

Comments

Phaze58 said…
There are times when I am dead jealous of your position up on the moors ,aaand then there are times when I am glad I am half way down a 1400ft bowl. All of my antennas managed to stay vertical-ish.and I am glad I didn't manage to erect my f-23 2 meter antenna last week I don't know if it would have stood up to that gale .Congrats on keeping all yours up , from that QTH it's quite an accomplishment.
I will be updating my blog with pictures and comment from the National hamfest. hope to talk to you later but by for now .73 to you and lou and baron says Woof arf whine .. to dudly :)
9:55 am
MØYKS Simon said…
Hi Phil, glad you enjoyed yourself at the Hamfest. I thnk that you were lucky not putting your new antenna out in the wind just yet, yep mine are not not going anywhere at the mo. They are all installed pretty well when it comes to deflecting bad WX. (thankfully)

Your new blog background looks good, I like it a lot better than the original. I will have a look when you do your next post.

All the best, catch up soon. 73
6:40 pm
Unknown said…
Congrats on keeping all yours up , from that QTH it's quite an accomplishment.I am belongs to hamradiolocator company where you can find cool ham radio products .
7:34 am
Unknown said…
Congrats on keeping all yours up , from that QTH it's quite an accomplishment.I am belongs to hamradiolocator company where you can find cool ham radio products .
7:34 am
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