Days 361, 362 and 363 – Some nice DX and just what is this ROS thing?

I started day #361 in what’s become the usual way, I had two 40m JT65 QSOs, working DK6AN and DG6AOY before switching to 15m SSB and talking with LZ1ND, Ted and 5V7MA in Togo.  I then spoke to HS0ZGQ, Joe in Thailand on 10m.  After that I worked I2OHO, Luciano and RA3GS on 20m followed by a special event callsign, II0ITA, Gian on 17m.   I moved down to 40m and spoke with TM100SP, Francois with his special ‘South Pole’ callsign and then worked Nigel, M0CVO and Peter, 2E0SQL, both of whom are Twitter friends that I’ve met in person this year.  I then worked PI4HAL, Okko on board the steamship “SS Rotterdam” and G8CQH, Pete in Birmingham.  I then spoke with 2E0JWJ, Dennis and G4PKP, John.  Finally for the day I worked two stations on 15m, V31NB, Norman in Belize for a new DXCC and W3JK, Ken.

It was quite good working Norman because I’ve spoken to him under his own callsign a few times this year, 5B4AIF.  Norman did a really good job of working his pileup, one of the best I’ve experienced.  Firstly he was changing his split frequency to keep people on their toes and it was on one of those changes that I worked him.  He asked me if there were many UK stations calling and as he’d been ‘spotted’ on Twitter I said that there were.  He then proceeded to tell the pileup that he wanted to work ten UK stations before moving back to working the rest of Europe and made sure that he did.  At one point he said that if anyone outside the UK were to call him, he’d increase the number of UK stations he worked so it would take even longer to get back to working anyone.  It eventually worked and the EU ‘zoo’ quietened down.  It quietened down far enough that even my lad, David, M6DHU was able to work him on just ten watts.  Well done, Norman, you did a sterling job.

On day #362 I first worked EO20X, a Ukrainian special event station and YO9ICT on 15m before QSYing to 20m and talking to S56KZ, Beno, EA7ISH, Frank, RA0ACM, Serge and SP9YFF/P, Jan.  I then spoke to LY2PX, Willy in Lithuania on 15m and IK0GDG on 40m.  Later in the evening I worked a nice run of JT65 stations on 40m, they were OZ1AXG, UR5XFQ, VA2DC, IN3ACW, RN6AM, KA2AEY and IK2DJV.

I had two QSOs on 15m JT65 to start day #363, firstly I worked LU2XPK, Oscar in Argentina via long path and then DM3VPJ, Uwe.  After that I spoke to VK6ANC, Rich in Perth on 10m followed by EO20UU, Bob on 20m.  I moved back to 15m to work RV9YP, Alex who had a huge pileup going, US1GCU, Leo and VU2CEO, San in India.  I then spoke to EK6TA, Hovik in Armenia and CU1EZ, Costa in the Azores on 12m.  After that I went to 15m again and spoke with CO6LC, Ori in Cuba, VK2IZI, Neil near Sydney, N2MM, Carol and VU2XO, Patel in India.

I’ve been hearing about the ‘ROS‘ datamode recently and wanted to give it a try.  I downloaded and installed it and after some messing about I managed to make it work and work quite well it did.  My first QSO was with VK6GWM, Glenn on 15m running just 20w.  I followed that up by also working UA3EKK, Anatoliy on the same band and UX1LW, Andy on 20m.  Although ROS seems to work well enough, I’m not sure it’s a mode I’ll use much.  It’s very wide bandwidth at over 2kHz and that in itself is good enough reason for me to steer clear of it as that seems a dreadful waste of space.  A little later in the day I spoke to M0MCV, Bob on 40m to wrap things up.  I often work Bob when I’m at the Martello Tower operating our contest station so it was nice to work him outside of a contest environment.

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