Tried to work them today on 15 meter FT-8 but no joy. I noticed most of the stations that they worked had very strong signals. They are popular! Waiting for better band conditions here.
The FT8 crowd is completely missing the point. It's supposed to be a super weak signal mode, used when all other modes have failed. What's the point of using it when signals are 20dB over?
You have to work them where they are, and FT8 is where they're operating the vast majority of the time. I've yet to see the Chad DXpedition spotted on SSB when I'm awake and not at work. I'll gladly try to work them on SSB if given the chance.
I'm waiting for TT8RR to get rolling on CW but no love yet outside of 30 meters - at least not that I've seen. I still need a few more confirmations for my CW endorsement on DXCC Got TT8XX on 15m FT8 ... I couldn't care less what mode they use when it's an ATNO for me. But now I can hang out and try to find them on CW Dave W7UUU
I'm glad that I have them on 20 and 15 already because it's a royal Dumbass Fest right now on 21310 with tt8rr, there are three hams, two W4's and a K5 asking what country Chad is in on 21310 chatting like it's nothing and jamming the frequency. Really now they are arguing that it's not a country but Africa, the sheer dumbness of some hams is amazing. The amount of people who are clueless as to what Listening 10 to 20 up means is amazing.
I guess even if some hams hear the TT or any Dx pedition for thasat matter say 'UP' that they still don't understand what 'UP'means. An example; A local over on 2 meters said to another ham trying to work 3G0Ya on 20 meters ssb a few minutes ago that when he said up this ham cranked his audio up to max thinking that the 3G was telling him his audio was low. The guy on 2 meters said that even after cranking his audio and processor to max he still couldn't get thru to make the qso.
Yep... You gotta go to where the fish are. I worked them about an hour ago on 17 FT8. Haven't even heard them on SSB or CW. Yet! ...And yeah that is an ATNO for me!
RR was on 17m CW this afternoon but conditions weren't great. He was weak but Q5 copy most of the time but I have a feeling he wasn't hearing stations well either. He took anywhere from 5 to 15 seconds each go-round before replying to a station. I tried for over an hour but no love today - the pileup was HUGE with a split field running up almost 10 KHz The UP lids were out in force as well - one guy sending "UP LID UP LID UP LID" at 15 WPM over the top of the DX for what seemed like minutes.... and TONS of "tuner-uppers" on top of him as well. Hopefully things will settle down a bit soon... alas, I'm off to Detroit for a week on Wednesday so I only have tomorrow and Tuesday left to try to snag them on CW (I have them on 15 FT8 at least) Dave W7UUU
