Thursday, October 9, 2008

RTTY For All

A few weeks ago I had a few hours to play amateur radio during the CQ RTTY contest.  I was very surprised to find the 20 meter band chock full of RTTY DX!  In a matter of two hours, I worked Poland, England, Germany, Luxembourg, Portugal, Netherlands, France, Alaska, Spain, Italy, and a few others.  It was one of those days when you turn the radio on and all signals on the band are especially strong.  The interesting thing is I was using my 1/4 wave ground mounted vertical and about 75 watts of power.  It was a blast!

Since then, I decided to spend some more time on the digital portion of the bands.  I have worked a few guys on PSK31 but I really enjoy using any other mode besides PSK31.  Why?  Well for one, with a soundcard and free software, you can work a lot of different ditigal modes.  Each mode has a distinct flavor asscoiated with it.  It seems like PSK31 is used overwhelminly and I hope to change that.  I'll let you know how it goes!

73 for now de N0NS  Joe

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