RADIO ARCALA SALUTES JOE TAYLOR, K1JT AND THE DEVELOPMENT TEAM OF FT8 MODE ON HF PLUS ACTIVATE 4M MS FSK441 AND 60M
MARKET REEF, OJ0BH/OJ0JR QRV: 12th–19th August 2017
Tuning the poor 20m band month after month represents a major frustration nowadays. Particularly on SSB, only the occasional DX signal breaks the sea of noise, consequently reducing activity levels even further. However, that very noise could be a new lease of life, if one were to copy signals below it. They are there every day. Indeed, with their huge antennas and state-of-the art receivers, DXers can dig even deeper into the noise and log plenty of good DX faster than one can think.
Martti, OH2BH/OJ0BH, and Henri, OH3JR/OJ0JR, will attempt to land on Market Reef this Saturday PM, weather permitting, and will immediately break the noise floor by getting FT8 QSOs underway. They will also hand out the OJ0 multiplier in the Worked All Europe DX Contest (WAEDC) and appear on a variety of traditional modes in the event of any available audible propagation. This is the week originally dedicated to a youth expedition to Market Reef, and to releasing options for selected 2018 DXpeditions, involving both youth and seasoned DX groups.
Demonstrating Amateur Radio to today’s youth thus sports a new booster shot, raising their potential interest to new heights.
A beta release of WSJT-X, version 1.8.0-rc1, included a new FT8 mode, featuring a faster turnaround, and it’s already a major breakthrough on the HF bands. FT8 offers “sensitivity down to –20 dB on the AWGN channel,” and contacts 4 times faster than JT65 or JT9. An auto-sequencing feature offers the option to respond automatically to the first decoded reply to your CQ.
https://physics.princeton.edu/pulsar/k1jt/Release_Notes_1.8.0.txt
