John Mock wrote:
While 'standing on the soapbox', i'd say that i'd like to encourge folks to use the high power mode to let stations who have trouble hearing SO-50 or AO-51 to work satellites and get started. I would hope that folks who use mode J-FM on a regular basis would use coastal/oceanic passes, or SO-50, to say hello to their friends and/or talk at length about the weather.
Please don't send them over to SO-50 to 'talk at length'. Too much of that is observed sometimes on the weekends now. :)
Part of the trouble that I observed with AO-51 is some stronger stations (without PL) or illegal cordless phones, are blanking out the uplink. I had trouble after the switch to V/U. I usually run 2 watts to a CP KLM beam. Even with the rig boosted up to 45 watts, I couldn't overcome whatever/whoever was blanking out the sat most of the time. Out of two passes this morning, I made only one contact. Lots of stations on, but only the strongest seemed to make it over whatever was blocking us. Strange that I didn't have that trouble at all when it was in V/S mode earlier.
Ernie W8EH