Had a good evening on the radio last night using JT65/JT9 modes! For supposedly poor to fair propagation, Europe was booming in during the early afternoon. Later in the evening, there was lots of stateside action, with a few Europeans thrown in for good measure … all at 10 to 20 watts.
Most of the action was on 20 meters, but 40 and 80 were doing well also. I actually made my first JT-65 contacts on 80 meters, loading up my 31-ft vertical. I’m going to try and get up an 80 meter end fed this evening.
It looks as if we may get some action from the approaching hurricane. The latest predictions show a high probability that we will AT LEAST get rain, tidal flooding, rip currents, and erosion at the beaches. I will most likely be at work 24/7 during the storm and aftermath if this happens, since I am part of the team that maintains my city’s communication system. In the meantime, we’re performing pre-storm checks to make sure everything is operating properly.
73 de Dick N4BC
P.S.
I did get home today at a reasonable hour and in between showers I put up an end-fed multiband antenna with a 9:1 UNUN. It seems to tune well on all the bands, and the S-meter says its a bit better than the vertical. I haven’t had a chance to check it out with the analyzer yet. I’ll give it a whirl tonight!
Dick