It is damnably difficult to radiate *much* power on 600 meters unless one has a lot of transmitter and real estate for antenna and ground.
The SCR-578 and AN/CRT-3 WWII 'Gibson Girl' lifeboat emergency hand-crank transmitters (500 kHz, A2) and other later emergency lifeboat stations typically used a two-watt input transmitter to a balloon- or kite-hoisted 300-foot wire antenna with sinker on braided wire to throw in the water for the ground. That actually made a fairly passable 500 kHz antenna system. Most hams will be lucky to achieve a few milliwatts ERP from a few hundred watts input power with small antennas not located over salt water. Up to 25 years ago I kept a receiver in my bedroom tuned to 500 kHz at night. There was once a fascinating world of maritime Morse traffic in the 420 to 510 kHz band, but it's all been gone since 1999. I miss it. I'm not holding my breath for WARC 500 kHz ham authorization, nor for Elecraft equipment to operate there. If it happens, I hope that A2 will sometimes be legal on 500 kHz, just like before 1999. I am glad the KX3 will be able to receive whatever is on MF well below the 160m band, with addition of the KXAT3. 73, Mike / KK5F ______________________________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:[email protected] This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
