The AM Forum

They are working out the bugs on the new Globaltuners skins.  I am listening to Tom Vu right now on 3875 through the Cleveland receiver.  Sounds great through the laptop with a decent set of headphones.  He's very weak on my own receivers and on the more local to CT Globaltuners receivers.  Band seems somewhat long tonight.

Hey there's KE7TRP!

Using Globaltuners on a laptop with a WiFi gives a whole new meaning to "Listening on the outside speaker..."

K7CBO in NMEX checking in....

Great stuff....

 

Nice.. 

Finally had a chance to work some east coast AM tonight on the "GLOB" "king 500C".

Nice time on 3873:

k1JJ on the 4-1000 rig just booming in..  That Delta loop is just killer out here.

HUZ steve.. finally got to say hi over the air.

Then we had W3JN on the GPT750!  What a Great old beat of a transmitter that is.

Then the band kinda faded.. Lots of noise now!  I think I am out of the picture. Someone is throwing carriers on 75 now and causing trouble. 

Great AM night! Its been a long time since east coast AM came in here like that.

Clark   

Man, it was FINE BUSINESS indeed working all of you, esp Clark with the killer Glob Queen!   And K7RLD in Washington, and N0BF in Colo were booming in here as well.

FB OM.

C

Mr VU velly velly lice in the Hanover Germany Gloabaltuner ..also the Huz man.

That receiver has a very low noise level and a nice low angle 65 ft vertical antenna...

I got in in time to say hello to Steve KL7OF for the 2nd time this season. Considering it was only 8 P.M. on that side the signals were surprisingly good.

From memory, there were about 14 different states represented in the group. We had coast-to-coast conditions for quite a while. The quality of the path did degrade some after 11 PM ET, but I was able to to copy K7RLD right up to his sign off. JJ with his Beverage was able to copy some really weak signals from California no one else could hear. K7RLD and KE7TRP had the best signals to my location.

Great fun. Let's do it soon again.

K7RLD, WA
N9UXY, NC
KB8ELG, OH
N8UUH, MI
KE7TRP, AZ
K6CBL, NM
KA0ARA, MO
KC3OL, KS
WD8BIL, OH
W3JN, MD
W3GL, DE
K1JJ, CT
K1KBW, CT
W2WDX, NY
??6TYJ, CA
KL7OF, WA

a few more I cannot remember...


** No Internet receivers were used or abused during the making of this post.

Nice... I really had a great time last night.  I have a cold and my voice is horse but I stuck in there.  Big signals.  Band seemed to fade them come back again right before everyone signed.

Clark

Yep, despite some snow static early on, last night (Sunday night) was one of the best times I've had doing coast to coast AM, ever.  It started out early on as a casual local roundtable, then as the night went on stations from out west started breaking in. The east coast guys then went into the gang-bang mode and said hello to each new arrival exchanging reports, equipment used, etc. It couldn't have gone smoother.  To finally hear some of the guys from AMfone we all know was a pleasure.  K0ARA, KE7TRP, KL7OF, KX5JT and KC3OL were some of these regulars who joined us.

We tried early on to generate some Calif activity, but it was tough. Finally, we were rewarded by three Calif stations, two running 100w and low dipoles. That's the best stuff to stretch all of us to develop better ears and listening skills.   Hope to do it again soon while conditions are good.


Some more stations we logged not mentioned above for Sunday Night:

WA1GFZ
KA2QFX
W2WDX
K9EME
NA7RH - AZ
N9UXY
N0BF - Colo
W6TJK - Calif
KD7NH - WY
WB6YEC - Calif
KF6SYD - Calif
KX5JT - LA
K7TOT - WY
K7AOK - WY


Thanks to everyone who particpated to make it a fun-filled night.  (The new 4X1 made it thru w/o a single crap-out - new record... ;D)

T

I looked at the clock and it was pushing 11:00 so had to hit the sack.
Shocking to go back to work after two weeks off. Clark you were strapping in Ct. Many good signals last night...

Tom,
Does this mean you will be able to last through an old buzzard transmission without blowing up the rig?

The only Crapout I know of was kl7of.   Was keyed up and bang..  He was gone.. Something about a cap... He came right back on in a few minutes.

C

Yep, no problems. I even had it in high-tap all night to really stress it.  No arcs or smells all night.  I do have to buy some of that "corona dope" to dope some of the bandswitch spots that tend to corona when I push the audio too hard.  Other than that, I'm now confident enuff to drive it with my FT-1000D. I usually use a tube exciter fearing a flashback to wipe out the SS finals.   This let me put on the west beverage and high delta loops in dual diversity reception last night - to pull out those weaker Calif stations.  That's basically the same system I use for European DX (except switched west) and also works FB for weak AM signals.

BTW, you did well using the 100w Viking early on - especialy hearing the weak ones..

T

Wow, three stations from Wyoming! Go figure.

I need to tune up the 160 M Vee on 75 since it points west.
I didn't have much snow static last night. Most of it was to the south of me.
Drilling and blasting the new afterburner chassis

Are these things going to be a nightly occurrence?    :D  Or are you all spent from the holiday break?   :(

Probably not nightly but who knows. Much of it depends on conditions. But if you get on nightly, it will be nightly.

We called for you last night several times, but I guess you weren't around. I want to hear your new antenna.

For sure.

heheheh - Yep, we be bad and nationwide!


John, we called for you about three times, figgering you might be around.   I could be on at any time. In fact, right now I'm listening to 3870-3890 looking for a spot to possibly start up a few calls out west...  I see from the sun map it's dark in Calif now.

T

Tom is back on 3885 stiring up a huge amount of AM.

I have a theory.   We are all bouncing off toms antennas and our signals are directing back across the US.   :o


Everyone is down around 10 to 20 DB.. Real noisy.. Then there is tom at 50!  I repeat 50 DB over.  LOL


C

I wanna be Tom when I grow up!

Well, let me go fire stuff up.  maybe I can squeeze in an hour before I have to hit the hay.

Yeah, but Tom never really grew up. That's his secret! Stay young, it's good for the soul.

Got the 80m aerial laying in the garage, iff'n the winds die down long enough maybe I can get it slung up this week. Need to find the solid state sticks for the big rig, too. You guys are just having waaaaaay too much fun.  ;D

okay it looks like I missed out again b/c by the time I got there everyone had gone or the band had shut down or something.  I also had some really nasty noise 10 dB over 9 from 1700 khz all the way up through 40 meters, no telling what that's coming from.  After nulling that out, weird stuff happening in the shack too, ferrite cores on feedlines getting hot and the tuner changing on me so something in there must be about to pop with a lot of RF on the externals.  Time to have fun solving problems, tuners, noise... ;D  glad I ordered some new higher current padder caps for the tuner so they're already on the way.

To bad.. I was waiting for you to get on...  Lots of east coast guys signed. Its a weekday and its late out there.. They where strong the entire night.  BIG west coast signals on 3870 now.  OK, AZ, NM and CA all booming in. 

Get it fixed!  AM seems to be at a peak this year.


C

Yeah, Toddy, we miss you on the Wat's Fer Dinna get together.
We moved down 3kc to '30...

Kind of threw me to see this thread show up as being started by me ...I'm assuming that one of the admin guys pasted  some of the latter posts to the earlier 80 Meters is Hot thread into this new thread and I got tagged as originator because the first pasted post this thread was form me.   Probably a good idea as the earlier post title was getting a bit dated.

Can't say signals from here were part of the live  from coast to coast fun as I was just "listening on the outside speaker" via Globaltuners at the time.  The most I can push out to the low dipole antenna here on 75 AM is about 150 watts from either the ART13  or the GRC19 setups. Will give it a try next opportunity I have though.  I did manage to get some low power 80M CW into the Hanover Germany Globaltuner from my GRC9 one night last week. 

I have on at least one occasion "worked" someone on AM where my signal was unreadable at the other end direct, but was being copied by a midpath Globaltuner we both were linked to.  This was an interesting excerise but obviously not a legitimate way to chase DX wall paper of course. Lately I have been keeping  the laptop "tuned" to the Cleveland Globaltuner during the early hours of the Saturday morning Old Military Radio Net to copy the New England stations when the band is still long.  Works out quite well to fill in those types of holes in coverage

Tom and Steve were coming through the Hanover tuner the other night quite well.  The frequency was amazingly quiet over there - no QRM  at all any only minimal static.  I'm thinking the lack of QRM might be due to 3875 being outside where the EU stations can operate on 75. 

You are correct about 3875 in Europe Chris. You will hear no amateurs on that freq. As long as no commercia/utility stations are on that freq, we have a clear shot. Making the link from the east coast of the USA to Europe on AM is very possible, as shown by the many contacts made on 3705 kHz in the last few years. If you happen to be up at around 0500Z, check it out.

Most of the signals from out west the other night were pretty good. Some were outstanding. I guess there was some good action last night too!

Yep, 75M AM has been like a spring - all wound up and just needing a little budge to make it explode.

I've found in the past that January is the perfect month to kick off new ham campaigns related to building, "nets"  or just getting on the air. By March, activity peaks out and starts down towards spring. So now is the perfect time to get the AM station working well for at least a couple of months of peak activity - maybe longer.

Another subject - the tough task of getting our audio balanced for long distance work, like coast to coast.  I've gotten good audio reports locally, but received a report last night from a good friend in W7 land that my lows were too bassy for fading that is often frequent. I heard a tape and agree. So today I rolled off the bass and added more high end. Hope to try it out tonight.  The art of matching our unique voices (and all the warts) to the audio curve for a particular job is truly an art.  Last night I heard a few stations that were tough to copy only cuz of too much mid bass and little highs. While others like W8BAC and N7UA had great audio for both rag chewing and DX.   There IS a perfect group of EQ settings for each station and voice.

I know there's times when Huzman sounds absolutely superb! Then other times he has a little too much mid bass. It's often a lot to do with the condition of our voices on a particular day too.  When we've been burning the wood stove, watch those mid bass lows. Even from morning to night can make a big difference in voice characteristics.  Though, there are some with such great voices - it doesn't really matter much for them... ;D  I'm not one of them, for sure.

T

BTW, one of the highlights last night on 3885 -  working Dick, K9DIC. He had a short mobile whip hanging out the window of a high rise Condo in Chicago. He was runnning a Valiant at 100W.  He talked about needing an AM fix so bad it came to this.. and was planning to buy a place in the country with LOTS of acres for antennas.

N7UA had a huge signal from Wash state with his 6 el wire array at 150'. A few east coast guys were heard saying, "wow, look at that signal!"

I also realized my own southwest antenna (2el loops at 190') favors Georgia/Texas/ southern Calif, beaming 230 degees.  The path to Wash and Oregon is about 295 degrees and the pattern tapers off significantly.  I almost went outside today to rotate the ropes and move the loops more NW, but realized I'd have to take down two 40M wire beams to do it... not!  So we all have our problems.


We also discussed the idea that the east-west USA path is very difficult because of the 100% land path. Maybe one hop takes place on land for east to weat coast, dunno. Working Europe even twice the distance over water is much easier. So when you work a weaker station coast to coast, be proud of it cuz it is not an easy thing under average cornditions. The static is usually much higher too, looking west across the large landmass and vice versa.

T

I've noticed the noise difference you mention Tom. There is almost always less noise when I listen on my Northeast directional antenna than when listening on the Southwest antenna. In my case, it's not only the landmass (to the West) versus mostly ocean (to the East) but local conditions too. To the Northeast, there are very few houses nearby, almost none with a few miles. But to the West, I am looking through most of my neighborhood (dozens of houses). So I'm sure I get more local noise too.

The good thing is that this large area of very cold air over the USA is creating very quiet conditions on 75 meters. This should be a good week for long distance contacts.

CQ Japan AM!!!   Are there any Japanese AMers out there?  How about Other asian AMers?  I hear Russia and asia very well the last few eves on 80 M SSB...That is the over water path for those of us on the West side of the USA 

Another great time on 3885 tonight for about three hours. Finally worked Rob, K5UJ... ;D   Lots of good guys breaking in all night, maybe 30-40 AM stations.

There was a noticable lack of W6/W7's tonight.   Maybe I figured out why.  I received the email below from a station in Mexico. (XE2)    He said he tried to break in but there was ssb QRM on  3888 on ssb in Calif.

I know from experience that when there are stations talking close to the operting freq like that, the DX will not call in out of fear of causing a conflict.  Whether that was the real reason or not, we still need to have a DX station listen for us and make sure the freq is clear out to the coast in the future.  Otherwise we could be spinning our wheels.


Here's the email:

" hi jj tried to break on cw but two w6 on 3888 was qrm ur sig on sb104 , you were vy strong s9, others s2....,I am only batt power here and work 160,80,40,am and 15 cw and ssb a little, lots am.
i am w7*** / xe2 half of the year, then in tucson rest of year.
hope to work u from  tucson soon then some day from mex...norhtern sonora..73 joe w7***."


T

Hey Tom thanks again for all the advice on antennas.  Great to work you, Steve and Paul VJB.

I listened from about 6:30 Pac Time and the eastern crew was PW.  The only signal of any significance was Bill kd0hg.
Bob on Whidbey Island

Rob nice to finally hear you on the ray-ro Tuesday night !


Right now 0900-1000GMT Wednesday on 3885 I've been working booming signals from the central Gulf region.

KX5JT John near Lafayette, Louisiana is running an antenna just 35 feet up, a DX60 !! (ok the SB200 brings it up to 100W)

W0XV Jeff in southwest Mississippi has a W0VMC 4x1 rig sounding just great.

Yeah Paul nice working you this morning!  Jeff and I wondered if you drowned in your coffee!  ;D  You were sounding great into the Gulf coast but as you noticed toward the end the band did start petering out.  I'm working on raising wires up to 45 or 50 feet and eventually getting a more amplifier for the DX-60 to drive.  There's an early morning group of AMers on 3.885 starting about 3 am Eastern (2 am here in Central) that I really enjoy listening too.  Sometimes I can get in there with them but I do need a little improvement to make it all the way up the east coast for a solid roundtable.  

Your transmitter audio is smooth as velvet, truly a pleasure to listen too.
Hope to work you again soon OM 73.

Thanks for the flowers, John !
You've got the Dixie Sixty sounding good too -- the audio characteristics are ideal for clarity under this morning's conditions, while not sounding like "space shuttle audio."

Yes, what started out for the dog as yer basic Morning Pee became a Full Investigation of Something that Crossed the Woods in the Night.  So we had to go chase it down (unsuccessful / long gone) and that burned up the rest of my radio time this morning.

Sorry for the abrupt exit.

Thanks for telling me about the continued morning gathering.  I wonder what happened to Dave, W4QCU and N8ULN, Jim, who used to spend a couple hours as "The Breakfast Club" on exactly 3885. Dave had a thing about being right on frequency. Sometimes I'd get in there early, maybe down a couple kc, and he wouldn't rest easy until we all moved.

OK FINE ! as Irb would say.

I have Dave's email addy; will drop him a note.

Thanks Paul same to you.  One good thing about operating in the mornings is the local noise level is much more agreeable.   I'm pretty sure I'm dealing with an occasional battery charger from a switching supply and something else that seems to be on only in the evenings which makes me suspect a plasma tv somewhere.  In the mornings, none of this seems to be on.

Rob