IOTA weekend

I've listened in on 10m off and on all day today, but the band has been dead to me unfortunately.

The graphs on propquest are showing conditions are currently going up at the moment and are at their best they have been all day to me. A few signs of life on 11m now, so might be a chance of an IOTA contact or two for me on 10m shortly.

Same here zzzzzzzzzzzz , but from other 10m nuts I know around the Country its been the same for everyone on 10m SSB . IOTA very much like CQWPX back in March as regards propagation on 10m SSB .

Why don't you guys drop down to 20m ? I am getting comfy with 20m and only have a 1/2 wave wire. As I am a static mobile station 10m is a bit risky for me with 1 band antennas... can end up listening to a dead band too often, bit too quiet on there for me now.

I appreciate it is more difficult to operate a beam on though... size wise.

Its not much problem for a beam on 20m in the form of a Hexbeam , the turning radius isnt much more than my 10m monobander ( its the 3d profile is the difference ) . 20m does nothing for me whether using a 1/4w Vertical portable or a 2ele beam (hex) from home , but its whatever floats your boat . As we move into SC25 10m will get to easy to work stuff and I've already began to think on 4m SSB for late 2023 if I'm still on air then .

Is 10m a lot different, I have never been there before/yet.

"Is 10m a lot different" than what ? If you mean 20m aka the DX band aka the Easy band then yes at /around Solar miniumum , in two or three years not so much. A prime example would be the ARRL INT. DX contest held in March , on 20m its been possible to work many many stations from all over the USA for last few years where as I don't know if anyone in the UK has worked even one on 10m in the contest in the same time period .

Ok I thought it was different in that it was more friendly or a different QSO character on 10m. Yes I understand 10m is mainly closed now. I suppose 20m being easy depends on your DX aims, power and antenna choices. So far I did not find having to compete with stations running 1KW into a beam particularly easy, speaking for myself.... getting there with it though.

Well done , the main thing is to enjoy it. If you want a friendly band then the one that fits that most ( imo ) is 17m , much more a band for extended chats and propagation wise not much different than 20m

Maybe compete was the wrong word, share might be better. Compete is a decent description when it comes to the pile up scenario. You slowly learn how to approach things relative to your own station. I am imagining in 3 years 10m will become the new 20m for a few years through the cycle peak.

Thanks for the heads up on 17m. As I run strictly monoband antennas I tend to stay on 20m, for now anyway. At first I did find it a few things and not positive..... hard work QRP when foundation licence holder, inconvenient with antenna sizes vs earth, a bit discourteous, lots of adjacent station QRM, (in big part from not being heard well initially, so people come 1-2-3kHz away and block your listen/TX freq), calling DX seemingly for the big guns only, rather fast and short.

Lots of ignorant stations jumping on freqs without listening shouting call sign over existing QSO/respondent without listening first, people putting you on the cluster and then QRM tone players appearing on freq after 30 seconds. (clusters and spotting sites have done NOTHING for the skill set of radio operating in my opinion).Non stop stream of Euro responders when calling "DX" outside of Europe in a 25min grey line window, who rarely wished to chat when an M7.

Lots to contend with.

However I optimized every single aspect of the station including my operating approach for this band and have now overcome all of the problems and have a really good time. I made a 3,100, 4,200 and 5,900 mile contacts using a wire and 100W yesterday plus some of short hops around UK.

I can understand why some people do not like it though, far from being easy it is actually rather difficult to be a dx player without a big beam a KW in current conditions.

If you take a no compromise approach to everything you can manage.

Hi ILikeRadioSoDoYou , sorry no name
I think a lot of stations have the same problems,budget,space,neighbours,licence conditions,big DX stations splattering whilst your on a QSO.I only have 50 watts to play with, so I  try to make them count. Making some good contacts at the moment with my efhw, but not busting pile ups. Some days i get few contacts buts its part of the fun. And I would get fed up saying 5/9  50 times a night anyway. Use what you've got in the best way you can and enjoy.
take care
mark

Each individual will have fun vs frustration scales to balance. I knew I had to achieve the full licence pretty quickly, personally speaking. That was just one part of the barriers at least for 2020/2021 conditions that I had to endure and a legality based one so it was priority No.1 - I found Coronavirus was a great motivator and accelerator.

It is critical the keep it in the fun side of that equation of balance, otherwise you just QRT.

It is different for each person so we only have ourselves to work that part out. I found and was lucky enough to have another ham with much more amateur radio knowledge and experience than myself to help you through the tough parts.

In the end only you know what you are after.