MM9SQL's Station Diary

The Grampian Hilltoppers put GB1TMH on the air on Saturday 22 August from the grounds of Touchdown Memorial Home for Horses, near Mulben in Moray. Touchdown were running their summer fair, so we took the mobile shepherd's hut along and spent the day on HF.

Touchdown look after horses and ponies at their sanctuary near Mulben, and they run equine-assisted therapy with veterans, ex-offenders and young people with additional needs. The Countrymen Club and Blue Unicorns run from the same site. We were there to put their name on the air for a day.

We finished with 303 QSOs, 275 different calls, covering 37 DXCC entities and 140 grids. We logged it in N1MM. On the wall we had DXChrono Desktop running in Special Event mode, so the hut could see the map and whoever we had just worked.

The station was a Yaesu FT-991 at 100W, a Comet trapped dipole for 40 to 10 m, and a separate 40 m dipole, both at 20 ft on the trailer tower.

Operating Hut

We started on 40m SSB just before 09:00 BST. That was the sociable bit: mostly G, GM, GI and GW, with a few continentals in the mix. 35 phone contacts in total, 34 of them on 40, and one lonely SSB QSO on 20. After that we went to FT8 and FT4 and the rate went up.

The band split for the day:

Band QSOs

10m 82

20m 74

40m 69

15m 64

6m 14

Modes: 238 FT8, 35 SSB, 30 FT4.

Peak hour was 15:00 to 16:00 BST, 48 in the log.

10 m being the busiest band was a bit of a surprise for late August from here. It was almost all Europe, so Es rather than a magic F2 opening. Same story on 6 m: we just used the auto ATU to put the Comet on 6, nothing special, and a short lunchtime Es burst from about 13:13 BST gave us 14 FT8 contacts into Germany, Italy, France, Switzerland, Slovenia and Croatia, then it was gone.

From a mobile shepherd's hut we still found Asiatic Russia on 20m in the morning (R8AU, UA0AV, RV0AR). Later on 15m we had Indonesia, China (BA5AN), Laos (XW4KV), VE3MZD, and a couple of US stations. CT3MD called in on 20m FT4. Nothing from South America, VK or Africa, which is exactly what the map looks like: Europe painted red, a handful of dots further out.

Thanks to Touchdown for having us.

Results Released: GM5G came 3rd in the open section

This report summarises the operations of station GM1TGY using the contest callsign GM5G during the RSGB FT8 Eclipse contest on 12 August 2026. The station was operated by MM9SQL and GM1TGY from Aberlour in Moray.

Station Configuration

• Contest Callsign: GM5G
• Operators: MM9SQL and GM1TGY
• Location: Aberlour, Moray (Locator IO87IK)
• Antenna: 40m dipole at 10m above ground
• Power: 600w
• Mode: FT8

Contest Operations and Log Summary

The contest took place during the afternoon and early evening, operating entirely on the 40m band. The wsjtx_log.adi file confirms a total of 87 QSOs were logged over the three-hour operating window from 16:30 to 19:30 UTC. The combination of 600w and the 40m dipole provided consistent performance throughout the session.

The spatial distribution of the contacts is plotted. The map indicates a high density of regional contacts across Europe. Consistent propagation was observed into Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, Poland, and Ukraine, alongside reliable local coverage within the UK.

Solar Eclipse Propagation Analysis

The timing of this short-duration contest was explicitly set to investigate propagation effects caused by the partial solar eclipse on 12 August 2026.

As the eclipse progressed, the reduction in solar radiation decreased F2 and E-layer illumination. Concurrently, the lack of solar energy resulted in a reduction of D-region absorption. The D-region is responsible for absorbing lower-frequency signals during daylight hours, so this sudden drop in absorption directly impacts propagation on bands like 80m and 40m. Essentially, the eclipse temporarily removes the typical daytime signal attenuation, allowing 7 MHz signals to travel much further than they normally would during the afternoon.

This physical change is evident when analysing the wsjtx_log.adi file. The reduced daytime absorption opened long-distance and intercontinental propagation earlier in the day than normally expected for mid-August. Notable DX contacts achieved during the eclipse window include:

• Asia: JA8EPO in Japan at 18:09 UTC and UN6GO in Kazakhstan at 17:14 UTC.
• South East Asia: 8H81YK at 16:55 UTC and YC2KTO in Indonesia at 17:23 UTC.
• Africa: ZS2PA in South Africa at 18:35 UTC.

The operations at GM5G successfully captured the propagation enhancements induced by the eclipse. The station hardware performed exactly as required, and the resulting log provides clear evidence of the ionospheric changes caused by the celestial event.

It’s been a busy week in the shack, or rather, behind the monitor getting the latest stable version of DXChrono Desktop ready for out the door. I’ve spent a fair bit of time "under the bonnet" on this one, focusing on making the map feel a lot more fluid and adding some of the integration features people have been asking for.

The biggest change is the map itself. You can now zoom in and out using the mouse wheel and drag the world around to see where the greyline is heading. I’ve also tweaked the Maidenhead grid squares; as you zoom in for local work, it’ll now pop up the 4-character squares (like IO87) automatically. It makes the whole experience feel much more interactive when you’re hunting for that next multiplier.

I’ve also added a couple of new logbook options. You can now link your QRZ.com logbook directly, so your recent contacts show up as markers on the map alongside Cloudlog. For those who prefer to keep things offline, there’s now support for local .adif files too.

Other bits and bobs in this release:

• Watch List: A new widget where you can keep an eye on specific callsigns. If they pop up on the Cluster or PSK Reporter, you’ll see them in their own dedicated panel.
• PSK Reporter: Added some quick-switch buttons so you can toggle between "who hears me" and "who I hear" without digging through settings.
• Fixes: Sorted out some oddities with great-circle lines crossing the poles and made sure the Aurora overlay stays pinned where it should be when you’re zooming about.

Going forward, the plan is to settle into a bit of a routine with a new stable release every Wednesday. It keeps the momentum going and means I can get fixes out to you lot a bit faster.

As always, you’ll need to download the new version from the website, extract it, and overwrite your old file. Just make sure you keep your config.yaml so you don't lose all your setup and API keys!

You can grab the update here: https://desktop.dxchrono.com

Full technical notes are over on the Changelog, or just hit the 'I' key in-app to see the new About box.

After 2 months of development, I put DXChrono Desktop live and available for purchase today, which kicked my anxiety into high gear. But after some long testing with GM1TGY & GW4VXE, I felt it was ready for prime time, with landing pages built, Stripe set up as I decided to charge for it, and a custom-built licensing system on the work CRMs backend.

DXChrono Desktop brings all the features of the web version to the desktop, with better graphics, dx cluster, psk reporter integration, satellite tracking, and a ton more, all for a one-off fee of £15.00

If you're interested, you can find out more at https://desktop.dxchrono.com

Results are out, we came third!

QSO Summary

Last weekend was the RSGB FT4 Activity Day Contest (it ran over two days). This year, GM1TGY, as GM5G, took part running in the Multi-op two-radio category. This meant the main Kenwood TS890S had all the antennas and ran a Kenwood TS990 all the time on 40m.

Conditions on the higher bands were poor. 15/10m on Saturday never really opened, but 20m and lower were okay, though there were periods when we had just run out of people to work, so maybe a little more activity would have been nice. Sunday morning, however, was very busy towards Asia (Japan, China, Australia) on both 20m & 15m, and that kept us going along with 40m European stations until the end.

We did find that activity on 160m seemed low. I'm not sure if that was conditions, the times we went on the band, or some other unknown reason, but we could have done a lot better numbers-wise there.

Plotted QSOS

DX Chrono Desktop Running on Raspberry PI 5

I have been struggling a bit with Pygame on my Raspberry Pi 5 running Wayland, but last night I finally fixed the last couple of bugs, mostly related to the day/night terminator overlay and I have to say its working really well, currently running it in my shack and also on the shack tv at Charlie GM1TGYs so we shall test for a few days just to make sure its good before we start looking at public release

Been a fairly productive few days on the Cloudlog dev branch, mostly focused on performance, usability, and a few long-overdue features.

On Air Widgets (Finally)

One of the nicer additions this week is a proper embeddable “on air” status.

There are now two options:

• /widgets/on_air/YOURCALL → iframe-style widget
• /widgets/on_air_image/YOURCALL → SVG badge

The SVG version is probably the most useful. It’s lightweight, updates automatically, and can be dropped into QRZ pages, blogs, or wherever.

It shows:

• ON AIR / QRT
• Frequency + mode (or SAT if applicable)

Also spent a bit of time making sure it behaves nicely:

• Sensible caching (not too aggressive)
• Dynamic sizing so it doesn’t look awful with longer text
• Proper sanitisation so nothing explodes in SVG land

DX Highlighting – Much Smarter Now

This has been bugging me for a while.

Previously, Cloudlog would only highlight DX properly if the distance was already stored, which meant perfectly valid QSOs could get ignored.

That’s now fixed.

We now:

• Fall back to gridsquares (and VUCC grids)
• Calculate the distance if it’s missing
• Pick the actual furthest QSO rather than “first one that matches”

Result: more accurate DX highlighting without relying on perfect data.

DX Cluster Improvements

Quite a bit of work went into the cluster side, too.

UI & Behaviour

• Status is now a proper badge (instead of boring text)
• Handles connection states better (connecting, reconnecting, etc.)
• Tooltips now actually make sense

Filtering

• Added mode filter
• Added “New DXCC” filter
• Improved how spots are held until worked status is known

RBN Fixes

Tightened up RBN detection so it stops misclassifying random spots as skimmers.

(That regex was… optimistic.)

Track Band

New option to track the radio band automatically, or turn it off if you prefer manual control.

DX Cluster in the QSO Screen

This is probably the biggest user-facing change.

You can now enable a DX Cluster tab directly inside the QSO interface.

• Live WebSocket feed
• Click a spot → fills the QSO form
• Optional auto-QSY to your radio

It basically removes the need to bounce between pages.

QSO Form – Faster & Less Chatty

Moved a bunch of calculations client-side:

• Distance
• Bearing
• Locator handling

This removes a load of AJAX calls and makes the form feel much more responsive.

Same logic as before, just running in the browser now.

FT8 / FT4 + Band Logic

Updated frequency lists and tightened up band/mode detection.

Should now be a lot more accurate when Cloudlog tries to guess:

• Mode from frequency
• Correct band segments

Particularly noticeable on VHF/UHF and some of the edge cases.

General UI / QoL

A mix of smaller improvements:

• Pagination no longer resets every time the table redraws (finally…)
• Per-user control over QSO fields & tabs
• Cleaner contest UI with stats
• Better handling of manual mode input
• Fewer JS errors when things aren’t initialised properly

Under the Hood

Bit of housekeeping too:

• Centralised DXCC checks (less duplication)
• Removed some questionable direct $_GET usage
• Reduced unnecessary redraws and DOM work
• General performance tweaks across the board

Final Thoughts

This release isn’t about one big flashy feature — it’s more about:

• Making things faster
• Making things more accurate
• And removing a bunch of small annoyances

The dev branch is looking pretty solid now, so aiming to get this rolled into a stable release soon™.

More tweaks incoming as always.

Last weekend saw the annual BARTG RTTY Contest. Like last year, I took part with Charlie GM1TGY operating as GM5G in the M/S High Power category, one radio. In the same category last year, we came #3, so I had some hope that we might have been able to improve on that, but it wasn't to be.

2 am Saturday, and on the shack's TV running DXChrono, I could see that the aurora was pretty much sitting on top of us. The result was that 80/40m was really slow going. I think most of the night we were on 80m.

Plot of all the QSOs

We knew Saturday morning we would have to go QRT as we had just replaced the SPID RAK rotator that turns the EAntenna 59+. It was, for some reason, binding, so tower over. Found the issue: a jubilee clamp was getting caught, stopping full rotation (doh). So we made some modifications and got back on the air around 16:00z. I was optimistic that 15/10m would be open, but the aurora hadn't really shifted. Hence, I ended up sitting on 20m running with a very good rate, but as night drew in and the aurora conditions dived again.

In the end we had run out of people to work around 01:00z so decided to call it and get some sleep rather than work nothing however we was back on air before sunrise around 06:00z the rate however was slow and it was just a matter of jumping between 20/40m looking for QSOs when the rates dropped 15m opened up briefly on Sunday and on 10m I worked just 3V8LL.

As Sunday afternoon progressed, conditions worsened, with more auroral flutter and distorted signals, followed by periods of the bands just going totally dead with no signals to be seen. It stayed in this pattern up until the very end.

That said, the shack was working perfectly, using a Kenwood TS890S (FSK keying), Gemini 1200 amp and our usual selection of antennas

• EAntenna 59+ (20-10m)
• 2el Phase for 40m
• 40m Dipole
• 80m Quarter-wave Vertical
• 80m Dipole
• K9AY for RX

We finished the contest early at midnight after running out of callers, spent over 40 minutes on 80m calling CQ to myself, but we ended up with 534 QSOs, not including Dupes.

Contest Summary

Maybe next year will be better

Surprisingly, I managed to get a few solid hours of sleep last night, which should mean I won't feel so shattered during the 2am start of the BARTG Contest on Saturday morning. This morning, I've been putting together contest cheat sheets that Charlie GM1TGY and I use at every event, which include a breakdown of the important rules and last year's results. I'm not keen on the forecast for Aurora activity over the next couple of nights; it could lead to very slow rates and fluttery signals. However, perhaps big antennas and plenty of power will save us.

It's been surprisingly nice weather in North East Scotland today, although it's only 13°C and we've had bright sunshine. I did, however, notice that hayfever season has started, but it made for a very pleasant walk around the village at lunchtime.

I didn't manage to get on the air until the afternoon when I spotted a Telegram message from Peter G0ABI saying he was doing a POTA on RS-44 in GB-4846. I worked him, plus a few others, then tried SO-50 just before dinner, working F4BFX for the very first time; it's always fun to work a new station.