Hunting TT8TT QRP on 10

Good Morning, Long Path Open

Yesterday morning there was a very nice opening on long path between EU and VK/ZL. I was hoping similar conditions would be today. And sure enough. Running QRP I logged couple of VKs and best of all ZL2IFB who was calling CQ at 14.060 i.e. in QRP window. He was on qso when I found him. Unfortunately, there was lots of QRM happening and tail ending during his qso so I was losing hope to make the qso. Once his qso was over it was utter chaos. Many QRO stations calling without listening. They kept calling and calling.

As I tried to work Gary already yesterday I thought he might make a quick QSY up or down. I first checked up.. nothing, then down and there he was calling CQ. I gave my call three times and he got me. We had a nice QSO. I later found out that he had worked quite a few low power EU stations so the conditions on 20 were really exceptional.

TT8TT With 5 Watts

TT is reasonably easy to work from OH-land. I have many contacts but none running QRP. So I was putting lots of hope for this pedition. Great ops copy small signals. Maybe it was a bit too early to give it a shot, since pileups have been massive, but since conditions were really nice on 10 today I decided to try. If nothing else more practice in cracking pileups with small power.
The op was great. Worked systematically the pileup, copied calls without the need to give call twice and the runrate was very nice. There was suprisingly little qrm happening, so it was very smooth. I was able to listen the pileup and follow the previous callers and zero my calls right on the frequency to his passband.
He went systematically up and I was following. When he started over from bottom I followed. Half way up on the second go he finally copied my call and all time new one on QRP was in the log. All this in 20 minutes.

It get better than that!

Right after my QSO. I went to their online log and my qso was already there.

... and even better.

I requested direct QSL, paid the fees via paypal, made a small donation, and got emails back confirming all this.

I think the Italian DXpedition Team is going to set the bar very high for peditions to come.

The picture below is a screenshot from my Flex 1500 PowerSDR software. This is live from TT8TT pileup from my QTH with my 3 el yagi. Pileup is almost 10k wide!

Lonely ZD9UW

Once I got my paperwork done from TT I checked the band conditions to Tristan de Cunha. The rumor was that this would be the last day of operations. I checked from the excellent DXsummit cluster the previous known frequency for ZD9 and that was on 10. I tuned my Flex to 28.460 and there he was. Lonely calling CQ with signal barely audible above the S5 noise level. No callers, just lonely calling CQ. The band conditions had started quickly dropping from what they were just 30 minutes ago when I worked TT. Fast decision. Heat the big amp, change of station from QRP to QRO, change of antenna connections. The amp was already on 10 and tuned for the antenna system that I was going to use. Tuned my TS-590 to correct QRG, set the split while amp was heating up. The band was really dropping fast. Yes, green light finally. No time to check, just give it a go. Gave my call once. He came immediately back with 55 report. ZD9 in the log.

RYRYRY

I don't like RTTY. I prefer PSK or even JT65HF. I have worked quite a bit of RTTY but for some reason, it is not my favourite modes. Maybe it is the software issue, just have not found software I like. For QRP work it is very nice when band conditions are good, but when band is down it is just awful to get a decent copy. It is also very prone to QRM and lids. When working RTTY it is brute force that rules. I know people who have destroyed their amps on RTTY contests. 

And so it was with 5U. Brute force. Back to QRO station. Practically all the digimode QSOs over past several months I had done with my Flex, so getting everything organized i.e. ALC, mig gain, TX DSP processing off, etc. was a bit of a hassle. I tuned the rig manually to 10m RTTY and found the 5U5U. The copy was mediocre at best. For checking the audio level I decided to call with amp on standby. Nothing happened. The USB connection between TS-590 and my PC had died. Great.. reboot that was. When the PC came back alive the station had vanished.

After few minutes he came back, but now on 15. So I QSYd to check the validity of cluster spot, and there he was. Big signal on 15, excellent copy. I tuned the amp and set the split to +2500. Less than 10 calls, and 5U was in the log.

It took more time to set everything up than work the station. I don't like RTTY.