Thursday, March 15, 2012

Video: My first QSO on 50 Mhz in 2012 with OH6NG



The above is a video of my first QSO on the six metre (50 Mhz) band this season. I saw that there was some activity on the band on DX Sherlock so switched on the Icom IC-746 and spun the VFO and suddenly I could hear morse. There were two OH stations (Finland) on different frequencies. I called on this one and he came back to me. He was 569 here on my fixed dipole, which ain't bad at all. Last year my first QSO on 6 metres was on May 1st so perhaps this is a sign of things to come? Well, we can always hope! Below is a map from DX Sherlock showing activity on 6m, including my own QSO, at the time.


Some time before this, earlier in the evening, there were some strange band conditions. I heard EI4KF putting out a CQ but there was no audible tone. I listened as he worked a couple of G stations and they had no tone either. Whatever conditions were present meant the tones were not coming through. Indeed EI4KF was giving the G stations a "441" report indicating an absent tone. I never encountered that in my previous two seasons on 6m. Below is a short (and poor quality) video of EI4KF with the absent tone.

I should also clarify that I worked EI4KF before the OH6 station, so technically EI4KF was my first 6m QSO of the season, but OH6NG was my first "outside Ireland" QSO of the year!


7 comments:

  1. Congratulations on the contact!

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    1. Thanks Mike. Interesting to hear a nice signal on the band so early.

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  2. Trying to be as good as me with my 6m contact into Europe on the 30th December!!! That was the one I worked on 100watts on the long wire when you were up with me... I think you bring RF Propagation with you!!!

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    1. Tony, no-one will ever be as good a VHFer as you were in your hayday!

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  3. Hi Anthony

    Intresting to see there was no sign of any Aurora on the signal, there was some reported on 6m yesterday,
    maybe it was AU E's which I have never seen so not sure about how it affects tone.
    the OH6 was a great signal
    best of luck on 6 I hope its a good year after the disapointment that was the 2011 E's season

    73

    Trevor
    EI2GLB

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    1. Trevor, I have a video of EI4KF CQing which I will try to upload to YouTube when I get the chance. It was fascinating. I recorded it on the FT-897 then I went downstairs and worked him from the shack on the 746 but I have no recording of me actually worting him.

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  4. Trevor, I have now added that video of EI4KF's CQ with absent tone. Let me know what you think.

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