11 meter propagation

[Laidbackdx]

I have been hearing no dx for the past 3 weeks hope it comes back around soon

[ThaDood]

Being September, Sporadic "E" season is done, for the most part. Oh, you might get some brief "E" openings, but now there's Aurora and Meteor Scatter to listen too on 27MHz. Hopefully, Winter "E" season will be good this Christmas, as it was dreadful where I am last year. WWV on 25.0000MHz makes a nice 24hr propagation beacon for this, (While we still have it.)   

[shadypyro]

I been hearing Channel 6 and Channel 19 lately on the Washington Websdr, and just heard something on the highway channel however i didn't make out what it said..

[R4002]

CB channel 19 is often active in the D.C. area, especially on I-95 and I-495. I can tell you that there are several base stations that transmit high power on 27185 AM near the I-95/I-495 interchange in Virginia, either talking to each other or the truckers on the channel.  It can get quite busy during traffic jams and during bad weather.   The VDOT motorist assistance and supervisor trucks often have CB equipment in them (a lot of the snow plows do as well) to monitor trucker chatter on 27.185 / ch. 19. 

[Beerus Maximus]

Band opening today 10/9/2018 around 11 AM Eastern. Lots of Great Lakes region stations (Detroit, Ontario) rolling into the Boston area. 38 LSB is hopping.

[R4002]

I was messing around with Chris's KiwiSDR the other day and heard from French language chatter on 27295 USB (channel 29 USB) along with the usual DX on 37, 38 and 39 LSB (mostly stations from Texas working New England operators).  Nothing heard outside the legal 40 channels.  Lots of AM activity on 27025 (channel 6), 27085 (channel 11), and 27265/27285 (channels 26 and 28) all AM mode and all stateside traffic.  The Latin American frequencies were silent, at least yesterday.

[ChrisSmolinski]

I was messing around with Chris's KiwiSDR the other day and heard from French language chatter on 27295 USB (channel 29 USB) along with the usual DX on 37, 38 and 39 LSB (mostly stations from Texas working New England operators).  Nothing heard outside the legal 40 channels.  Lots of AM activity on 27025 (channel 6), 27085 (channel 11), and 27265/27285 (channels 26 and 28) all AM mode and all stateside traffic.  The Latin American frequencies were silent, at least yesterday.

Unfortunately my sky loop is not very good on 11m (it is way too much wire). Let me know when you want to try some 11m listening on it, and I can switch over to the 11m dipole (which is closer to a 12m dipole, I really need to shorten it a bit).

[R4002]

Will do.  What frequency is your "11 meter" dipole cut for?  Because if its 26.000 MHz or so, I'd leave it as is.  I have used a 108" whip for 11 meter DXing and monitoring and that's resonant at 26.0 MHz (108" without the stainless steel spring) as a quarter wave vertical it gave me excellent SWR up into the higher parts of 27 MHz.  There's a lot of DX (especially out of Latin America, but also out of the USA) on the lower channels (starting at 25.165 MHz or 25.615 MHz, which is channel 1, band A on most export radios or "10 meter" radios).

[ChrisSmolinski]

I forget the exact frequency, but it seems to be resonant just below 26 MHz. I've actually not fixed it due to 1) Don't fix what isn't broken (or seems to be working) and 2) Laziness.

[R4002]

Since it seems to be working I would just leave it - the de facto export or freeband frequencies start around 25.6 MHz or so, plus having it closer to 25 MHz or 26 MHz would be better than having it closer to 29 MHz or 30 MHz. 

I say leave it as is.  Then buy a CB vertical

[ChrisSmolinski]

Would you expect significantly better performance from the vertical, due to lower radiation angle? The dipole is up pretty high, not sure how high offhand, but well over a wavelength. Which is so much easier to do at 11m than 40m 

Verticals provide surprising performance, of course for skywave propagation the polarization doesn't mean as much as it does for local comms, but putting up a vertical would certainly be helpful.  In addition, it will improve your local/local-ish monitoring capability and an 11 meter vertical can be used for monitoring VHF low band and 10 meters.  I've had excellent results with a simple 1/4 wave (102" or 108" whip) with ground plane(s).  If you go with a higher performance vertical like the Antron-99/A-99 or IMAX 2000 then yes, much lower angle of radiation and the associated performance increase.

A 102" whip is resonant at 27.5 MHz and a 108" whip is resonant at 26.0 MHz.  I lean towards the 108" or 9 foot whip.  Of course, if you can get a regular base station CB vertical then go with that.  Put it up nice and high and you'll be surprised how much ground wave/direct wave stuff you'll hear locally, not to mention skywave propagation.