Dale Cole (K8TS) of (also for reference) the Jackson Cascades Amateur Radio Society has offered some tips on how to determine when to work a DX station such as the Bouvet operation.
Go to: DXsummit.fi and open the site:
- When the site is open
- On the right-hand side of the screen, look for where it says “location.”
- Enter your grid square.
- Jackson is EN72th
- Chelsea is EN72wj
- Ypsilanti is EN82ef
- Use resources of QRZ.com to lookup yours
- You must login
- Search for the callsign of an amateur you believe lives in the grid square you are interested in.
- Click on the Detail tab.
- Scroll down the list to find “Grid Square.”
As I look at the chart, 30 meters looks best between 1400 and 0100z, 17 meters between 0200 and 1300z with a brief null at 1500z, and 15 meters from 0200 to 1200z.
You know what your station will do best…..check the chart for your best prediction.
Bouvet is currently only operating 30-17-15 meters. (Much of the equipment, including amplifiers is stranded on the boat). SSB on 15 has been chaos. There is much conversation about FT8 (which will probably be the best bet for us) about whether they are using WSJT-X or JTDX. JTDX allows them to transmit on different time slots than WSJT-X. They have repeatedly said they will be F/H in which they would be transmitting in the 00/30 time slot. Spots have been made showing them transmitting in the “odd slots” 15/45, which can not be done in WSJT-X in the F/H mode. They have posted that if you are not in the F/H mode, you will not get logged.
Last posted from the information pilot for NA, N2AJ, is that the operating frequencies for FT8 are 10.144 MHz and 18.110 MHz. Note that the latter is in the phone portion of the band where CW/Data is not allowed. Although it is illegal in the USA, it is legal in other parts of the world such as Japan.
Updated CW frequencies have not been posted. CW is getting a lot of “Deliberate QRM” FT8 has some pirates (as does others)—–and some bots. A log update is being hoped for over the weekend. That may eliminate some callers.
If you have Facebook, search for the 3Y0J page and get the latest updates and some video. I believe they are also using Twitter.
If this helps you, great…. If you are finding something that works, please share with us others who are still chasing.