Walt Davidson said :

If you think the Pacific is tough from the East Coast, you should try
working that part of the world from Western Europe with wire antennas!
It's actually easier on 3.5 MHz than on the higher bands.

I can imagine it must be very tough, and especially with a 400W power
limit. I'd wager even a modest tower with a 4 or 6 element yagi would
be rough for the South Pacific.

On the other hand, the Middle East (e.g. YI, YK, etc) is a snap from
here.

....Which are extremely difficult to work from the east coast of NA.
Propagation seems to die anywhere east of 4X. I've Israel and Jordan
easily a couple of years ago (only a couple of 4X's this past 12
months), but never a YK or beyond. When I se YIs spotted, they're but
a faint whisper here, if anything.

On the other hand, I'm less than 3 miles from one of the rarest
entities on the bands...4U1UN. A couple of weeks ago it was activated
for one day -- a day I happened to be home with nothing better to do
than follow them all over the bands. Unfortunately for them, nothing
was open above 15 meters so they were only working locals on 10 and
12, and little more than locals on 15 and 17 that day, but I managed
to snag them on all bands I operate on within a couple of hours.

I look to entities like 4U1UN, FP, CY0 and CY9 (any maybe YV0 if they
ever get on the air) as a consolation for missing the P5 and never
hearing any of the rare southeast Asians. I can hit these with my eyes
closed, although FP, CY9 and CY0 are too close to get on 10 and 12
when those bands are open.


73 de Peter, W2IRT
(ex-AB2NZ, VE3THX)

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