WSPR results
near-realtime WSPR spot rankings are available here. http://www.wa2zkd.net:8088/
Congrats to the various kiwi owners that have top rankings, KD2OM, OE9GHV, KPH, KA7OEI and others
Congrats to the various kiwi owners that have top rankings, KD2OM, OE9GHV, KPH, KA7OEI and others
Comments
Could you additionally do a "rolling" 24h-version instead of the counts since 00Z? And maybe a 1h version for the thrill
I think the labels for "60" and "60eu" are interchanged though. At least it doesn't match the definition in kiwiwspr, where I've only set 60eu.
Managed to game it, er I mean "tune my band selection" to go from 42nd place to about 10th.
And to think that a few years ago, using an amateur tranceiver running 24/7 on practically all bands, I was consistently in the top 3 world wide. I must have been more competitive back then :-)
Regards,
Martin - G8JNJ
Compared to the amount of effort previously needed to get good results it seems like cheating, maybe it is just an "off the shelf" service now adding ears out there for people who want to test TX whereas before it was a bit more of a radio and hardware challenge.
Look a little more closely at the very top spotters and the spread from the "center of mass" and I think you'll find that these things still matter a lot. In particular, a few dB of difference in the noise floor can make a very large difference in spots. Low take-off-angle and good grounds in the far-field, e.g. salt water, can help too. Some of the tools we are now using to measure this with KiwiSDRs are helping to highlight these and make discovering problems and even improving stations easier.
I've had a couple of shots at WSPR, ages ago, setting up single band antennas then finding the area had a very poor take off for that band or just hitting a quiet spell for another band/antenna, I'd never have had the time or energy to go through many physical antennas and equipment while trying to allow for propagation so gave up quickly. The "Service" bit I was referring to to was mainly the RX and reporting back end, it still needs antenna work and noise reduction but the work and variability of getting the signal from a receiver, to correctly set up software, then on to the net is wrapped up so well now it's all about the physics.
The Kiwi has been invaluable in tracking noise down here, I could never had afforded a realtime full HF spectrum analyser so would not have spent the time learning about this particular case and how to reduce it's effects, what I don't know is how to quickly tell a low noise setup from a comparatively deaf one.
I'm still trying to work out how to compare two antennas and receivers at the same location using WSPR, I have nulls at 90 degrees to each other and two different noise signatures through the day, I might have to run a second set of wspr receivers without uploading spots just logging decodes locally then allow for the nulls to spot the right antenna for the band.
I suppose I could use something that is transmitting microwatts in a digital mode a couple of kilometers away and decode it here on both, wouldn't help with the nulls but could angle those so they are equal angle off the direction. Dig out my rarely used Flex-1500 and see if that still works.
I suppose I could use another SDR on the same antenna too, it's funny after having used the Kiwi for a while I tend to forget there are others, when I do use them I find myself always wanting to "zoom out".
5m, 5m! my whole garden is only 5m wide, you've got it easy, when I was a lad they made us wind baluns with our toes, blindfold, while doing our times tables in Morse using only our forehead on a (sharpened) rock.
BTW the WSPR stats thing is quite addictive, connected both Kiwi's to the same antenna so I can work on the other then plotted graph lines to see if I could see trends for the various bands.
Thanks.
Oh and whoever is beaming that "You need another Kiwi" voice into my head, just stop now.
I count at least 13 WSPR bands you simply must have running which means you need at least TWO Kiwis. I'm thinking you really ought to have three...
I do have spare BBG or two now I think about it, so just capes...
BTW the voice sound like smeagol "It needs it, WSPR"
But you'll have to get your own since I'm not willing to part with any of my FOUR...
(we're all going to need to go into therapy soon)