The Thursday night fox hunt was interesting. Due to some poor conditions, one of the foxes was not being heard well, so another station jumped in to provide the 2nd fox.
The result of that was that some stations (ahem, me, among others) ended up working all three foxes.
They won't count 3 as 3, though, but I am still keeping a perfect score after four weeks.
Week 5 of the QRP Fox Hunt brought two foxes who were within 500 miles of my location (not a good situation on 20 meters) and a persistent birdie/buzz that drifted slowly across the fox's frequency and completely covered him up.
I was able to work Doc in New Mexico fairly early, although the QSB (fading) was fierce at times. Wayne, in Baton Rouge (375 miles from me) was a considerably more difficult challenge.
I started hearing him around 8:50 as the sun dropped below the horizon and brought better short hop propagation, but the interference from the whatever-it-is was unrelenting. I finally relocated to the YMCA parking lot down the street, where Wayne's signal was a solid 599, and I was able to work him at 9:25, with 5 minutes left in the hunt.
So I am holding a perfect score still, 10 for 10. But it gets a little harder each week.
Just finished up printing out QSL cards for 3 DX stations, 1 DX station that goes via a U.S. address, and one F.I.S.T.S. contact.
That brings me up to date on my cards for a while. Hope they respond.
I'm watching the DX cluster, and there's a party going on on 6 meters tonight. 9s working 6s, 2s working 7s, makes me wish I had a 6 meter rig to play with.
Every good thing must come to an end, they say, and my streak of two fox nights ended this time when I was completely unable to hear anything on the east coast all night.
Conditions on 20 meters last Thursday were, shall we say, "variable", and after a lot of waiting, I was able to work Don, NK6A, in California, by catching a long fade cycle that let me get in a call, swap info, and get his response before he dropped back into the noise. But K4BAI in Georgia was not heard all night, although I occasionally heard the pack calling him.
So the propagation gods have decreed I will not get a perfect score this season, and expectations go down into crushing disappointment. Well, maybe not that bad. I am willing to settle for a 19/20?
Looking over the logs, I was not alone in missing one of the two foxes. It looks like only three stations remain at the top of the list, and only five or six one rank behind. On with the hunt!
I went out to the truck at lunch today and listened to 4O3T (Serbia) and the pileup chasing him for a while. Then I went up the band and heard Larry, K0LWV calling CQ and we had a nice QSO. Larry cut his power to 5 watts to see if we could do QRP-QRP, and we could.
In other matters, I have mentioned that I was going to get an Icom IC-718 soon. I think I may have mentioned HAM-COMM 06 as the time I would be getting it.
As often happens, other priorities came along, so I am still on my trustworthy MFJs for the moment. But the delay has also resulted in somewhat of a change of mind regarding the radio I plan to get.
I began to become interested in the rigs that allow the control head to be separate from the main body of the radio, for example the IC706MKIIG. A smallish control head can be remotely mounted from the RF part of the radio, and can also be removed to discourage thieves. The problem there, of course, is the near $1000 price tag on the radio, somewhat (somewhat?) above my threshold.
But in the last few days I have been looking at the Yaesu FT857D which compares pretty well to the 706, and for $300 less (including the deals available now). Most of the complaints about this radio have to do with the comparative sizes of the displays; many feel the 857 display is a little small. But when you are coming from a radio that doesn't have a display, there's not much room for complaint.
The 857 is about $130 more than the 718, but I think it will make a much more enjoyable mobile radio than the 718, and will be more versatile in mounting options, so unless I have another change of mind, I think that's the way I am going.
Last Thursday's fox hunt was a 2-fox success, so I stay just 1 behind the perfect scorers. My analysis indicates that there may only be 2 still in the perfect ranks; they're falling fast as the propagation demons take their toll.
On a sad note, I see that Small Wonder Labs has discontinued the DSW series of QRP radios. My first QSO on 20 meters was with my (late lamented) DSW-20 that I found on Ebay, that was the mainstay of my CW ops for quite a while. The DSW was a sweet little radio, more so when you consider the low cost. I for one will miss it.