Thursday 28 May 2009

Six metres is not a band I know very well and I have a very modest station. The transmitter is my FT-817 and the antenna is a dipole in my loft, made from some copper pipe I had left over from a plumbing job and fixed 'beaming' east and west.

On Monday evening, there was a great sporadic E opening and even a bit of tropo to help things along. Even with my limited set up I soon filled a page in the log with stations from southern and eastern Europe, but as is the way with 'E' openings, I took a break to get a cup of coffee and when I returned to the radio some 15 minutes later ..... silence ..... the opening was over.

Encouraged by this, I thought I would have a go at the 6m Activity Contest on the following evening. But conditions could not have been more different. No Es and no tropo. I finished with a miserable 240 points, with a best "DX" of under 50km, but I guess this is what makes amateur radio such a facinating hobby.