Nice weather here, up to 87* today, but there's a front coming through, so it's cooling down and hopefully we'll get some rain. There's a winter storm warning for the Rocky Mountain Nat'l Park, extending up through the Medicine Bow Range, which starts at the Northern end of the Never Summer Mountains. 6~12" of snow forecast, with winds up to 65MPH. Over on The Plains, they're having winds of ~40+ PH, with gusts going to 75MPH. And NOAA has issued a severe blowing dust warning fo most of the Eastern part of the state.
Tried my hand at just monitoring 6 Meter Meteor Scatter last night for the April Lyrids, and was rewarded with this:
The highlighted entries in the log are people calling "CQ", and from the recorded signal strength levels, I could have worked most of them. But not being the Night Owl I used to be, I was fast asleep. Still, that's a whole lot more than I expected to receive just using my 20 Meter vertical antenna. I have a 6 Meter dipole I'm planning on putting back up, and a 5/8ths wave 6 Meter vertical that will be going up as soon as my son and I dig the holes and set the poles. I had a very similar 6 Meter antenna back in SoCal that a friend had loaned me, and when the band was open, it was really, really, really good.
Have a good weekend, and be safe out there!
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Driest spring I can remember since moving back to CO in 1997.
ReplyDeleteYeah, I started watering the yard last week. Between the new seed in the back, and the "weed-and-feed" in the front, it needs a bunch of water to kick-start it.
DeleteIntriguing readout of the log. What is the digital mode in use?
ReplyDeleteWe stayed below 80 today with gusts to 40 and that quickly cooled down in the evening. You guys were actually warmer than AZ for a change.
The program is wsjt-x, and the mode selected is MSK144.
DeleteYeah, it was a gorgeous day to be out doing yard work. I think I'm about 99% thawed out now, and completely out of hibernation!
We had snow yesterday...
ReplyDeleteAnd today it's 53*, overcast, and very windy. Might get some rain tomorrow, but I'm not counting on it.....see WSF's comment above.
DeleteWhat a co-inky-dink. I was just on 6m MS a few minutes ago. Had my first MS QSO last weekend. A very unusually laid-back mode and WSJT immediately grew my respect for the guys who did it with a key and by ear. When you see QSOs play out over five or ten minutes or more with automatic send and repeat, think of doing that by hand.
ReplyDeleteConventional wisdom is that a beam is a good thing, but you've got to know where to point it and that isn't exactly obvious. My only advantage there is that the entire country is basically north and west of me, so pointing slightly west of north is as good as anything.
Yeah, Joe did an amazing job with his program. You can get "solid print" on stuff you can't hear, and can barely detect on the waterfall display. I still haven't seen any "live" MS QSO's yet. I've read to just point your beam at the radiant of a shower and you'll get good results.I'm thinking of building up a little 6 Meter WSPR beacon with a RaspberryPI to run it.
DeleteYep, weather is still being 'spring' weather... Hot/cold/hot/cold WINDY!!!
ReplyDeleteOh, yeah...the WIND! My ex is out here for a few days to visit our son, and they went down to Pikes Peak to take the cog railway up to the summit.
DeleteThey only went up to 12,400' because of high winds above that elevation. He said the main reason they shut it down above that level is that the winds pick and blow chunks of the track ballast at the train, and it breaks the windows in the train!