[600MRG] conditions from the west side

[Larry]

Looking at WSPR reports over time continues to fascinate me. The day to 
day changes in "propagation" can be huge and mostly unexplainable.

As I have reported in the past, my summertime RX conditions are very 
much poorer than my winter RX conditions. This is due to both the 
irrigation system nearby producing RF noise and the need to take down 
all the eastward Beverages to allow farming the field.

I have two westward short Beverages that are useless when the pump is 
running. The Hi-Z phased array has been my best RX antenna this year 
although some nights it doesn't seem to hear a thing. I also have a Flag 
that is usually pretty good but it has been slammed with pump noise this 
summer. The other day I turned it to minimize the pump noise, hoping to 
see some improvement. The noise went down but I lost the daytime path to 
VE7BDQ. Last night I let the Flag listen all night. It heard XIQ better 
than the array and also heard sky wave from /20 and BDQ quite well but 
got nothing at all from the more northern WSPR station even though they 
were hearing me.

I intend to move the Flag out another 200 feet soon and that should 
help. And, after the last Alfalfa cutting, I will roll out the Bev's and 
be back to "normal" RX capability.

There is a lot more variation in the daytime ground wave path to VE7BDQ 
than I would have expected. Some days it's very stable with +/- 1 dB 
variations over time. Some days, there is 10 or more dB variations. I 
have seen no correlation with WX or other observable conditions.

The daytime path to /20 is a bit longer and is very unstable with days 
where the signal is almost CW QSO strength and other days where it is 
undetectable. Sky wave after dark is always very good but lots of QSB.

Having the ON4KST logger available is very helpful with real time 
co-ordination. It allows fast decisions on operating styles/modes/times 
based on what is happening NOW rather than what happened yesterday.

73,

Larry - W7IUV / WH2XGP
DN07dg - central WA
http://w7iuv.com