DX with the Gainmaster HW CB antenna

 

Propagation is remarkable at the moment. Or is it the new half wave CB vertical? Did not expect to work the DX on 12m I did! It is hard to capture the map since some DX was near the date line. I really am surprised by this CB vertical. It certainly is way better compared to the 12m full wave loop on my experimental halo antenna. Notice the contact with Luxemburg, this DXCC is into the skip zone for me. It probabely has been backscatter or groundwave propagation, I really don't know since his signal was pretty consistent.

The fun is that at some point I worked St. Eustatius (PJ5) on 12m RTTY. I use DM780 for the occasional contact, since I actually never do RTTY. But for some reason I thought lets see if there is still activity on the old PSK31 mode. Remember 14.070 MHz years ago? Packed with stations like 14.074 FT8 is now... Well, surprisingly there are still PSK31 stations active. I made some QSOs and even made an Olivia QSO. Not too happy with the Olivia mode though, the transmit cycle is too long. Even the IC-7300 with 100W gets warm that way. Anyway.....it was a nice experiment.