W2LJ QRP .... Do More With Less

///////////////////////////////////////////
A word to the wise

Posted: 26 Sep 2016 06:51 PM PDT
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/feedb...m_medium=email

I'm sure that many of you have heard about the data breach that occurred at
Yahoo. A word to the wise. If you have a Yahoo account, sign in and change
your password.

Yesterday, I tried to check my email (I use the web based Yahoo email
client) only to discover that my account was blocked. It appeared that
someone was trying to access my email, or change my password, only to
fail too many times at guessing the answers to my security questions.

With the help of Verizon, I was able to change not only my password, but
also my security questions. So that issue is taken care of. But before you
get to the point that I reached, it would be best to be proactive if you
have a Yahoo account.

72 de Larry W2LJ
QRP - When you care to send the very least!

///////////////////////////////////////////
Nibs bitter the butter

Posted: 26 Sep 2016 06:28 AM PDT
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/feedb...m_medium=email

Remember that TV commercial from the 1970s? I think it was for Jif peanut
butter. Basically, the point was that the peanut butter company removes the
little "nib" from between the two peanut halves before processing, because
including them taints the sweetness of the peanut butter.

I had to deal with a bunch of nibs yesterday during the NoGA Peanut Power
Sprint. My "nibs" were RTTY stations on 40 Meters that pretty much made
the band useless for CW. I believe it was the CQ WW RTTY contest that was
in full bloom, with RTTY stations going right down to the very band edge.

There was a time, way back in the 90's, that Digital ops respected a line
around 7.055 MHz or so - where they would go no lower in order not to
disrupt CW operations on the band. And I would know as I was pretty heavy
into RTTY and the TOR modes at the time. I see that "gentleman's agreement"
has been pretty much shot to Hades.

20 Meters was in good shape, however, so that took away the sting of not
being able to make many contacts on 40 Meters. When all was said and done,
I made 25 contacts, most of which occurred on 20 Meters. Without having my
log to refer to, I believe only 5 QSOs happened on 40 Meters.

The smart one was Marc W4MPS in North Carolina. Marc was able to find this
little tiny spot between two very strong digital ops, and he just ran the
frequency like the pro that he is. Most of my 40 Meters contacts were from
searching and pouncing. I tried calling CQ for a while on 40 Meters, but it
proved to pretty much just be a waste of time.

My best contact on 20 Meters was with a station in Washington State.
Again, without my log in front of me, the call escapes me - it was an N7
station - that much I remember. Anyway, he was about 20 over 9 to me in
NJ. 20 over 9 with only 5 Watts from 3,000 miles away. He almost knocked
the earbuds right out of my ears. So much for the "QRP equals weak signals"
argument!

And that's an argument that needed to be refuted on Facebook again this
morning. On the "100 Watts and a Wire" page - someone asked how many
members are truly QRP. In the middle of the answers, a German op came on
with the old "It's all in the listening station" fallacy" again. "The
better question to ask is, Who has a big enough station to hear QRP.?"

Blech!

Obviously, I had a big enough station to hear QRP signals yesterday; and
all I was using was a KX3 and a PAR END FEDZ 40/20/10. And if I could hear
QRP stations just fine with that - then what's anyone else's excuse?

The excuse turns out to be that there are a plethora of Hams out there who
really don't understand propagation and antennas. They believe that power
is everything, and as it turns out, nothing could be farther from the truth.

72 de Larry W2LJ
QRP - When you care to send the very least!