[Moon-net] GM4ISM 3.4 Ghz AW results

[Mark GM4ISM]

Hi all
This weekend's activity on 3.4 GHz was most rewarding, and whilst I 
obviously have some work to do to get the station working well, It worked 
just well enough to allow a few contacts to be made.
On Saturday, some minor bugs and family commitments caused a late start, but 
once I had the dish pointed at the moon, I was pleased to see a little moon 
noise. (about 0.1dB now I have measured it as best I can) This was just 
enough to aide tracking, though very easy to miss. My tracking system has no 
feedback into the shack.. effectively I have AZ and El control, optical 
tracking when it is clear, and a practiced knowledge of the speed of the 
actuators, such that I was able to stay on the moon most of the time.  Room 
for improvement though it must be said, a lot of effort went into keeping on 
the moon.. I could make it easier for myself HI
Heard on Saturday were OK1CA at M , G3LTF at T copy, W5LUA O- M other 
signals heard not identified. signals definitely degraded as the evening 
progressed.
VE6TA was detectable only on Winrad, far to weak to read any CW, though I 
suspect QRSS would have been viable, the trace was clearly visible and 
reasonably constant
No QSOs resulted on Saturday, though several people reported some marginal 
copy of my signals

Sunday, a minor tweak to the preamp gained a little lower noise figure, but 
not much. Sun noise now 7.2dB
Conditions seemed better though, and I completed with G3LTF fairly easily.. 
not strong, but good M copy. (the only QSO that is not a country First HI)
OK1KIR was good copy O much of the time, bit was struggling to hear me.. a 
couple of periods he sent almost nothing but M report, and I responded in 
kind with my RO report . Finally I got rogers.. Hard going but worth the 
effort. This is probably a first GM to OK on 9cm
A test with Al W5LUA resulted in a lot of T reports clearly heard.. not very 
encouraging, then suddenly Al was able to hear me better and the QSO 
completed.. #3 in the bag.
A good report from F2TU was obtained later, and finally a very easy QSO with 
Willi LX1DB OO.  RST reports exchanged Willi was 539, and I got 449 back.

>From these contacts I seem to be hearing about the same level as I am being 
heard. This ties in with the performance of my preamp which is as far as I 
can tell about 0.5dB nf
It is obvious though that the dish is not delivering the expected gain, and 
thus I will need to do some work on the feed.
Much room for improvement. I have a second Toshiba amplifier to add in, or a 
200W TWT, (but no power supply.  help anyone??)
If I can illuminate the dish properly and can generate more power, reduce 
the TX losses to the feed etc, I will be able to gain several dB, putting a 
few more stations in range.
Thanks to Peter for arranging skeds, and for all who listened so hard for 
me!

As a matter of interest, users of the HB9Q logger may have noticed GM6BIG 
logged in.
David is only a few miles from me, and has a 2.4m dish, about 15w at the 
moment.
He has a little more work to do, and was not really fully ready. Though he 
listened, David did not hear anything on Saturday.. Not sure about his 
results on Sunday.

I am looking forward to a few more tests once I have got the station 
optimised.
GL to all on 9cm
Mark GM4ISM
www.dc2light.co.uk
More pictures on the website shortly.