Longest DX to date

[MitchellB]

The ham radio gods must have been been active last night as I was able to make my longest DX to date from NC on 40m at 8167 miles to ZS6CCY in South Africa. Of course he had a much nicer antenna setup that I can only drool about, especially compared to my little off-center dipole and less than 300 watts of power.
I realize that many of you hams have gone much further with less, so I thought I ask what is your best DX contact, band and what antenna & power were you and/or the contact using?

[pmh]

My best “heard” was 17001km on 380mW with my Comet H422 In V configuration.

This was into South East Australia with my Ultimate3s WSPR transmitter, but a nice spot.

I can get most places around the world: India, Canada, America, South Africa, etc, with 30w using JT65 and FT8 data modes. My JT65 is usually 15W.

When on phone I never go above 100W, which gets me around 3500 miles, as a rough guess. Not checked for some time what my best is., though conditions aren’t really that great at the moment.

10m got me heard in the Falkland Islands, recently, but I didn’t have an exchange. Mostly I am on 17m, 15m, 20m.

Kind regards,



Phil

[K7KBN]

Kerguelen Island from Las Vegas. Basically the antipodal point. About 25 watts on 15 CW (Novice portion; 21.153 MHz if the crystal label was correct), 1959. 58 years ago this month.

[MitchellB]

I'm surprised more folks have not talked about their DXing stories.
I am not good enough with my CW to use it yet, but Vegas to Kerguelen Island (had to look that up) with 25 watts is amazing work.
The best I ever did running 100w barefoot was just barely under 5000 miles to Serbia in Europe on 40m voice. I could often hear stations much further away clearly, but could never break that 5000 mile limit transmitting until I was fortunate enough to add a linear a few months ago. I try to keep the amp down under 300 watts until I can upgrade my coax & tuner, but just that little bit of extra transmitting power has helped alot.

[AndyG0CCX]

I've not had an HF antenna for years, since someone kindly stole the 25' aluminium pole holding up one end of my G5RV (and my 2 year old son needed my shack for a bedroom - he still has it, 27 years later!)

I used to have a triband beam and thought that going 'down' to just a wire would put an end to things HF-wise. But a quick look through the logbook shows a VP8 Falklands and a ZP5 Paraguay in September 88, a JH0 Japan, a TU2 Ivory Coast and a 3DA Swaziland in March 1990, amongst a host of European, US and Canadian contacts. All running the TS930s barefoot - the 1990 DX QSOs mentioned were all on 10m. So wires and relatively low power can work, if the conditions allow. I wonder if I'll ever be able to do that again, given the declining band conditions.

.

[CLCurtin9]

I also contacted ZS6CCY in South Africa last year on December 18th. It was my 3rd HF contact after just setting up my first station. I was using a G5RV at about 40ish feet with 100 watts.

[W8MLS]

I think this thread is a good idea as I primarily chase DX. A lot of variables make long distance DX harder or easier on some days. Your band, mode, propagation, antenna, time of day and power all contribute to the mix. My longest contact would have to be New Caledonia long path at about 18,300 miles. The longest that I know my signal propagated is about 24,000 miles as I worked a JA one time and we both heard our own echo's. No doubt the EME guys are the heavy weights as they pull off the long distance contacts as they bounce signals off the moon. Tthat is about 480,000 miles not including the distance to the OP on the other side of the earth. With the right antenna working long distance DX is not all that hard. My tower is only 40' high. If I could get it to 80' the same antenna would gain about 6 - 10 db depending on the direction. That would open up a whole new world to me.

[5B4AJB]

I once called a friend on 2m FM (with 2.5W) who lived less than a kilometre away and a German answered.
750 odd km on VHF! QRP!! beat that :P

Turned the 19 element beam round and went to 25W, signal report was the same

[edit] I was G0TSU back then...
[edit] [edit] actually, I might have been G7IGW

[W8MLS]

I once called a friend on 2m FM (with 2.5W) who lived less than a kilometre away and a German answered.
750 odd km on VHF! QRP!! beat that :P

Turned the 19 element beam round and went to 25W, signal report was the same

[edit] I was G0TSU back then...
[edit] [edit] actually, I might have been G7IGW

I would say Tropospheric ducting was your friend that day. Of course with a 19 element beam your EIRP was not QRP. Shows my point it's in the antenna.

[Sixmeters]

My best “heard” was 17001km on 380mW with my Comet H422 In V configuration.

This was into South East Australia with my Ultimate3s WSPR transmitter, but a nice spot.

I can get most places around the world: India, Canada, America, South Africa, etc, with 30w using JT65 and FT8 data modes. My JT65 is usually 15W.

When on phone I never go above 100W, which gets me around 3500 miles, as a rough guess. Not checked for some time what my best is., though conditions aren’t really that great at the moment.

10m got me heard in the Falkland Islands, recently, but I didn’t have an exchange. Mostly I am on 17m, 15m, 20m.

Kind regards,



Phil

Digital Modes = Blah Blah Blah blah blah...

Maybe you don't realize that digital modes are a type of CW - Continuous Wave - its either on or off, no sinusoidal Single Side Band - voice.
So is it truly a QRP type mode? NO! First - QRP with that type of transmitter would be less then 1 watt, second - QRP using other modes is 5 watts or less. Two operators, both using digital modes - is no big deal..

Half way around the world is about as far as you can go with HF, unless it is Long Path..

ON higher frequencies - which by the way is a lot easier - since you have less ambient noise, you could quite possibly communicate via a large dish to the edge of space or at the least the whole way to the Mars Rover..

The minimum distance from the Earth to Mars is about 54.6 million kilometers.
The farthest apart they can be is about 401 million km. 249,169,848.087 Mi
The average distance is about 225 million km. 139,808,518.253 Mi

With a one-way time delay of around 13 minutes, it certainly isn’t a matter of sitting down in front of a computer /monitor and waggling a joystick.

Most hams wants instant gratification - I want it now!

The people that calls themselves hams, waste our times using useless digital modes when their signals are already 599 using faster modes - even CW, only to prove to themselves that it must be "The Best" mode available - all the time!

Most people that uses digital modes today doesn't even know how to send and decipher Morse code.

[Sixmeters]

I would say Tropospheric ducting was your friend that day. Of course with a 19 element beam your EIRP was not QRP. Shows my point it's in the antenna.

I've worked Japan on 6 meters from Western Pennsylvania with just 65 watts SSB and a dipole antenna, doesn't mean that I can do it all the time, or even occasionally, but it can be done.

VHF is mostly Line Of Sight - hence if two operators were standing atop two identical 1000' tall towers, 48 miles apart, they would be able to see the light blinking atop the other tower - on flat / level ground. Even then, your little Motorola FRS walkie talkie with 1/2 of 1 watt would easily talk the 48 miles, as long as it wasn't raining, snowing, or a Geo Magnetic Storm.

I watched TV out of Texas, Iowa, Florida, Boston Mass from Western PA when it was still analog - on the day they turned off the analog signals of other stations on the same channel.. That was with a television antenna 18' off the ground using 100+ feet of Belden Quad Shield 9913 TV coax...

[W8MLS]

I've worked Japan on 6 meters from Western Pennsylvania with just 65 watts SSB and a dipole antenna, doesn't mean that I can do it all the time, or even occasionally, but it can be done.

Line of sight had nothing to do with you working JA on 6 meters. That's all propagation which I am sure you already know. When 6 is open it does not take a lot of power. Do you know what the Solar Flux index was when you worked them? Needless to say working JA on 6 is a BIG deal. Way Cool..

Best I have done on 6 is California. I got my tower and 6 meter beam up in 2015 so propagation has not been great. Maybe in about 4 or 5 more years it will come up.

[vu2nan]

In the late 1970's I could work the Americas from India on 20m CW with a homebrew tube QRP (15W DC input) and an inverted vee antenna. Low band noise was a key factor.

73,

Nandu.