Tomorrow morning, I’ll be flying from the British Virgin Islands to Antigua, followed by a 5 PM flight to Montserrat. The main challenge is that the only ferry to Montserrat was cancelled a few months ago, leaving small planes as the only travel option. I'm not even sure they'll allow me to take my large, long suitcase on board.
In any case, I’m bringing only the essentials that can fit into two pieces of luggage. All spare cables, the transceiver, the 12-volt power supply, and some hardware will stay in storage in Antigua. I’ll also leave behind the controller and rotator with its control cable, which saves over 10 kg in weight. I’ll be rotating the antenna manually—and fingers crossed for clear skies!
If everything makes it to the island, I’ll be active on Tuesday, October 22.
Today was incredibly stressful—by far the toughest leg of the expedition! I realized too late that I’d forgotten my travel scale at home, so I packed everything by eye. I ended up with three heavy suitcases and a "Pelican" case for the antenna. Thankfully, I was able to leave one suitcase in Antigua, offloading everything I could do without.
The real chaos began at the airport—constantly shuffling items between suitcases, weighing, then reshuffling again. At check-in, the staff threw a curveball: “Are you just flying to Antigua or in transit?” Then they asked me to choose which of the four bags could be delayed because they might not all fit on the plane! WHAT??? Considering I only have a 4-hour layover in Antigua before my next flight to Montserrat—where there are no ferries and only small planes, with no tickets available for the next three days—this wasn’t great news. With no other choice, I waved goodbye to my bags, praying they’d make it to Antigua with me.
The flight was only an hour, and as we landed in a rainy Antigua, I watched them unload the luggage. To my relief, I saw all three of my suitcases and the “Pelican” with the antenna!
My spirits lifted immediately, and I felt a fresh surge of energy. I left one suitcase behind in storage and checked in for the next flight. This time, there was no avoiding the hefty overweight fees, which ended up costing more than the ticket itself—but I had no choice. I checked everything in, keeping only a small carry-on (which should have weighed 5 kg, but was really 15 kg!) and a backpack (another 10 kg).
After passport control and security, I finally sat down to enjoy a cold beer and relax for a couple of hours. But then came the dreaded announcement: “Mr. [my last name], please report to the check-in counter immediately.”
Back I went, and they proceeded to empty one of my suitcases, questioning every item. What are these cables? What’s this rotator for? Cue my explanations about amateur radio, EME, and why anyone would need to communicate via the moon!
I made it back through passport control and security, and finally had 30 minutes to relax.
When they announced boarding, I saw my "Pelican" and one of my suitcases in the cargo hold, which was a huge relief.
The flight to Montserrat was just 20 minutes, with 7 passengers and a pilot. As I stood in line for passport control, I saw the “Pelican” and the rummaged-through suitcase, but my most important one—with the amplifier and transceivers—was missing. It had stayed behind in Antigua! They promised to deliver it tomorrow evening, October 22.
When I finally arrived at my operating position, it was already dark, but the location looked promising. The east seemed open, with about a 10-degree elevation, and the west faced the ocean—perfect for what I needed. I’ll have a closer look tomorrow in daylight, but it feels like a good spot. Hopefully, all my gear still works tomorrow.
When I woke up in the morning, doing my usual rounds, I found something particularly curious…… As it turns out, I am probably not the first EME enthusiast on the islands 0_0, unlike him, I have not been eaten by the local fauna yet.
Judging by the size of the dish, he must have been a CW enjoyer :D
Update 22 October 12:00 local
They’ve promised to deliver the lost luggage with the equipment by 17:00. If all goes well, I’ll try to set everything up for Montserrat (MR) shortly after.
Everything has finally arrived, and I’ve assembled the setup. Everything seems to be working fine. The eastern horizon is partially obstructed by mountains, so I can start operating from about 12 degrees elevation. The moon should rise in about half an hour, and I’ll be able to give it a try then.
The moon finally appeared from behind the mountains, but it was hidden by clouds at first, so I didn’t notice it right away. Working with the Big Guns was easy at first, but after about half an hour, I started getting interference that felt like radar, completely blocking all decoded signals at around 25 dB.
I’m honestly baffled—Montserrat has a population of 2,500, about 100 tourists, no industry, no port, and the airport is barely served by five small planes. Yet somehow, I’m getting this kind of interference! Where is the world heading…?!
An hour later, people started reporting that they couldn’t hear me. I checked the TX coaxial cable and, sure enough, frequent bending had caused the SWR to spike to 2. I quickly swapped it out with a spare, and it seemed to work fine after that.
The antenna is set up on the roof, with the cables running through the apartment window, so I had to keep running back and forth between the roof and inside to adjust the azimuth and elevation. Half of those runs were pointless because the moon kept disappearing behind the clouds, forcing me to return to the roof every few minutes, hoping to catch a clear shot of the moon in between.
The radar-like interference kept turning on, then fading, or stopping entirely for short periods, which allowed me to squeeze in a few QSOs during the quieter intervals.
After two and a half hours of this constant back-and-forth, I was completely exhausted.
I quickly packed up the antenna, covered the amplifier, and grabbed a couple of hours of sleep.
I had hoped that turning the antenna to the west would eliminate the QRM, but unfortunately, the situation hadn’t improved much by morning. Still, I managed to log 15 QSOs and am hoping that the next moon pass will be more successful.
2024-10-23,04:10:00,2024-10-23,04:10:00,OK1DFC,JN79,1296.100999,Q65,-18,-15,,,,
2024-10-23,04:11:00,2024-10-23,04:14:00,PA3DZL,JO21,1296.100999,Q65,-24,-23,,,,
2024-10-23,04:15:00,2024-10-23,04:18:00,UA3PTW,KO93,1296.100999,Q65,-21,-22,,,,
2024-10-23,04:19:00,2024-10-23,04:22:00,OK1KIR,JN79,1296.100999,Q65,-22,-19,,,,
2024-10-23,04:40:10,2024-10-23,04:40:10,NC1I,FN32,1296.100999,Q65,-29,-25,,,,
2024-10-23,10:51:00,2024-10-23,10:54:00,G4CCH,,1296.100999,Q65,-23,-20,,,,
2024-10-23,10:56:00,2024-10-23,10:58:00,SM5DGX,JO89,1296.100999,Q65,-20,-18,,,,
2024-10-23,10:59:00,2024-10-23,11:04:01,ON4AOI,JO21,1296.100999,Q65,-25,-22,,,,
2024-10-23,11:40:00,2024-10-23,11:42:00,OK2DL,JN79,1296.100999,Q65,-18,-18,,,,
2024-10-23,11:48:03,2024-10-23,11:48:03,IK2DDR,JN55,1296.100999,Q65,-26,-23,,,,
2024-10-23,11:49:00,2024-10-23,11:52:00,HB9Q,,1296.100999,Q65,-12,-20,,,,
2024-10-23,12:07:00,2024-10-23,12:10:00,VE6TA,,1296.100999,Q65,-29,-18,,,,
2024-10-23,12:31:00,2024-10-23,12:38:00,W2HRO,FN20,1296.100999,Q65,-25,-23,,,,
2024-10-23,13:26:00,2024-10-23,13:26:00,W5LUA,EM13,1296.100999,Q65,-23,-26,,,,
2024-10-23,13:30:00,2024-10-23,13:34:00,K5DOG,,1296.100999,Q65,-25,-21,,,,
I managed to catch some sleep during the day, set the radio to run FT-8 on the HF bands (which turned out to be quite popular), and began investigating the interference issue.
I brought a wideband SDR with me on this trip and used it to scan the spectrum. Right on the IF frequency, 144.100 MHz, there was massive QRM at an S9+10 dB level, and it appeared to be modulated by radar pulses. It seems to be completely overpowering the IF reception.
I went through all the video recordings of the noise I captured at OY, KP2M, VP2V, and now here at VP2M. The noise sounds identical in all cases. Interestingly, I’ve never encountered this issue when operating inland—only near the sea.
Back on the Virgin Islands, I initially suspected a cell tower was causing the interference, but it seems I was wrong. It’s more likely caused by small marine radars, like those on yachts, likely something like a Furuno radar, which is overloading the G4DDK LNA.
It seems this LNA is simply not suitable for island environments with lots of yachts and their radar systems around.
Today, I’ll start by switching to my old LNA. If I still can’t hear anyone within half an hour, I’ll swap it out for the German one, which has a slightly worse noise figure but is more resistant to interference.
The lunar pass started off well—I could hear myself, and the setup seemed solid. SWR was 1.1, with 200 watts of power. I made a few QSOs before the radar interference kicked in. After that, I could only hear stations with large setups, and whenever the QRM faded, I could catch a few signals. Then, I checked the SWR again—2.3!
I swapped out the cable and managed to make one QSO, but when I checked the SWR again, it was still over 2. Reports started coming in that my signal had dropped significantly.
Thus began the “night dance with the tambourine”: changing cables, flipping them, patting them down, even stroking them—though what I really wanted was to chop them into small pieces. This was all done in short bursts between running back and forth from the antenna to the apartment.
By 3 a.m. local time, I’d had enough. My nerves were shot. I apologized to everyone, packed up the antenna, covered the amplifier to protect it from the rain, and went to bed.
8 QSO (total 23 )
2024-10-24,04:58:00,2024-10-24,04:58:00,G0LBK,,1296.100999,Q65,-23,-24,,,,
2024-10-24,05:04:04,2024-10-24,05:04:04,DL4DTU,,1296.100999,Q65,-23,-26,,,,
2024-10-24,05:30:00,2024-10-24,05:30:00,DG5CST,JO60,1296.100999,Q65,-17,-15,,,,
2024-10-24,05:33:00,2024-10-24,05:36:01,PA9RX,,1296.100999,Q65,-24,-22,,,,
2024-10-24,05:40:00,2024-10-24,05:42:00,DF3RU,JN59,1296.100999,Q65,-26,-23,,,,
2024-10-24,05:42:00,2024-10-24,05:50:00,OK1IL,JN69,1296.100999,Q65,-26,-28,,,,
2024-10-24,05:58:00,2024-10-24,06:02:00,DK4RC,,1296.100999,Q65,-18,-16,,,,
2024-10-24,06:09:00,2024-10-24,06:16:00,SP7EXY,,1296.100999,Q65,-27,-24,,,,
I need to solve this cable issue first thing in the morning, but I’m not sure how. Due to the overweight on the flight here, I had to leave most of my tools with the house owner back on VP2V. All I have with me is a soldering iron, side cutters, pliers, and a set of screwdriver bits. With a population of just 3,200 on Montserrat—including babies and the elderly—it’s clear finding tools here is a lost cause. Plus, tomorrow is election day, so everything will be closed. Thankfully, I have my NanoVNA, so in the morning, I’ll check all the cables.
At 7 a.m., I started a full diagnostic, and my mood instantly improved. My reworked 15 mm TX coax turned out to be fine, but one of the phase patch cables was the culprit—cold soldering! It turns out I was operating in linear polarization instead of circular for most of the time, meaning both my signal and the one I was receiving were at least 3 dB weaker!
The second issue was discovered during transit—my semi-rigid coax between the feed and the LNA had been crushed and torn, which also hurt reception and degraded the noise performance at the input.
I dug out some old phased SMA jumpers and slapped on adapters. The screws are a bit short, so the whole setup is now held together with electrical tape and plastic clamps. It looks pretty ridiculous, but it works!
The sun is giving 4.5 dB, SWR is back to 1.1, and I’ve got 200 watts of power—ready to go.
The radar is still making noise, but if it causes problems, I’ll swap out the LNA tomorrow.
The lunar pass was a disaster. Initially, all the callers crowded around 1000 Hz. I could see three strong signals, but none were decoding. Here’s a little advice for future operations with small field setups like mine: if you’re not HB9Q or OK1DFC, the strategy of “I’ll just stand here, and they’ll see me anyway” DOES NOT WORK!
A couple of signals at -20 to -24 dB that are less than 200 Hz apart block decoding in 90% of cases. The key rule is to skip one cycle and be mindful not to “stand on someone’s head”!
In general, within half an hour, as the callers began to spread out, the radar turned on and completely blocked reception. To make matters worse, strong gusts of wind inflated the dish like a sail, and just to keep things interesting, it started to rain—eventually escalating into heavy rain.
Since the antenna and the amplifier are on the roof of the guesthouse, I had to constantly run up and down the stairs to adjust the antenna and check the azimuth and power amplifier settings. After two hours of this chaos, I only logged three QSOs (for a total of 26):
2024-10-25,06:52:00,2024-10-25,06:52:00,RW6HM,LN14,1296.100999,Q65,-25,,,,,
2024-10-25,07:31:00,2024-10-25,07:36:00,SA6BUN,,1296.100999,Q65,-25,-20,,,,
2024-10-25,08:03:00,2024-10-25,08:12:35,SP5GDM,,1296.100999,Q65,-25,-20,,,,
In the morning, after assessing the situation, I decided to try the second LNA. Although it’s not as sensitive as the G4DDK, it might be less prone to intermodulation interference. However, with all the patch feed replacements and “improvements,” a quick disassembly wasn’t possible anymore. So, I rigged up a way to attach the second LNA to the side. The result is a bit of a “Frankenstein” setup, but now I can switch between the two in under five minutes!
At moonrise, I’ll start with the SULNA. If reception is poor, I’ll quickly switch to the G4DDK. Here’s hoping tonight’s moon is more promising than yesterday’s!
The fourth lunar pass was relatively successful: the moon remained visible most of the time, so aiming wasn’t an issue, and although there was a bit of a breeze, it was manageable. However, right at the start of operations, a class X solar flare hit:
The flare began precisely at 07:00 UTC and lasted four hours. In the near-equatorial zone, where I’m located, it seems to have a much stronger effect than it does in mid-latitudes—I can’t think of any other reason why the pass became so unidirectional. Suddenly, I was receiving signals much better than I could send them, and all signals were notably weaker than usual, down by 5-8 dB. For those with 3m dishes, there was hardly any chance at all.
Initially, I suspected an issue with the amplifier, but the power meter consistently read the usual 200 watts with an SWR of 1.1, even though I checked each connection to the antenna multiple times. In total, I logged 9 QSOs during this pass, bringing my total to 35 QSOs.
2024-10-26,07:22:00,2024-10-26,07:22:00,OK1UGA,JO80,1296.100999,Q65,-25,-26,,,,
2024-10-26,07:55:00,2024-10-26,08:08:05,UA9FAD,,1296.100999,Q65,-31,-26,,,,
2024-10-26,08:55:00,2024-10-26,09:00:07,DM2CFH,JO61,1296.100999,Q65,-24,-26,,,,
2024-10-26,09:06:00,2024-10-26,09:20:10,PA0BAT,,1296.100999,Q65,-29,-26,,,,
2024-10-26,09:34:00,2024-10-26,09:44:00,PA3FXB,JO33,1296.100999,Q65,-31,-26,,,,
2024-10-26,10:07:00,2024-10-26,10:12:03,YO2LAM,,1296.100999,Q65,-26,-20,,,,
2024-10-26,10:24:00,2024-10-26,10:28:02,DK3WG,JO72,1296.100999,Q65,-31,-20,,,,
2024-10-26,10:50:00,2024-10-26,10:50:00,F4KLO,JN18,1296.100999,Q65,-29,-23,,,,
2024-10-26,11:42:00,2024-10-26,11:48:00,EA8DBM,IL18OH,1296.100999,Q65,-31,-23,,,,
I decided to leave the setup intact until October 27, hoping for improved conditions. I’ll try to operate for a few hours in the morning, until 11:00 UTC, before taking a couple of hours to prepare for my flight to Antigua.
Big thanks to all my supporters:
Frank (NC1I)
Zdenek (OK1DFC)
Francesco (IK2DDR)
Toshio (JA6AHB)
Jan (PA3FXB)