Digi modes, like Marmite, are either loved or hated, not much inbetween.
As many of you know, I have been involved in the development of digi modes for over twenty years now with Dr Joe Taylor K1JT. The early development was for Earth-Moon-Earth and Meteor Scatter communication. In the past we had used high speed CW with tape recorders for sending and receiving MS bursts. All good fun and before the advent of cell phones and email, skeds were arranged either/or by mail or the 20m band if one was licenced.
Over the years many modes were tested and discarded as more efficient modes with error correction built-in evolved.
Back in 2013/14 I was working Japan during the summer Es season on 6M using JT65 without any competition at all. Eventually a G3 enquired how I was getting all these far east contacts logged on 6M when nobody else was hearing any sign of long-haul comms. When I explained my methods, there was much poohooing and in modern speak thumbs down to me and my methods.
When the 2015 Es season started I was astounded by the high number of EU stations calling Japan and the far east with digi modes. It was now hard for me to get a look-in with my very modest setup comprising an Icom IC-736 into a homebrew short boom 5 element LFA yagi mounted on the back wall of my terraced house. As the terrace ran basically north/south I had to beam over my concrete tiled roof for moon-set. This threw my angle of radiation right up, and I was getting the moon reflections at about 20 degrees. However I managed to work Lance, W7GJ running barefoot.
Eventually a mode called FT8 by Dr Joe Taylor K1JT and Steve Franke K9AN evolved specifically for long-haul 6M Es DX. It was released on 29th June 2017. My log for that date shows I worked PA5JS followed by Kev G0CHE - both of whom had been experimenting the digi modes with me. The HF fraternity soon picked up on FT8 as solar cycle 24 was fading and worldwide comms were extremely poor using legacy analogue modes. The rest, as they say, is history. A stripped down version named FT4 came into being. It is half the cycle of FT8 resulting in it being 3db down in efficiency.
FT8 for all its controversy has helped many to learn basic computer skills marrying their rig to PC and visa versa as well as keeping the HF bands alive during the solar minima.
The late Bill Somerville, G4WJS, was responsible for tidying up the WSJT suite of apps and giving them a professional look.
Does it replace CW and/or SSB? No, it is just another string to the bow so to speak. The doomsters and gloomsters would have you believe it is the death knell of Amateur Radio as we know it, but then if we look back to 1939 when Single Side Band was introduced, they forecast that it would never last!
FT8 is limited to a maximum of 13 characters including spaces giving minimal contact detail as do DX contacts using legacy modes.
100W of FT8 is the equivalent of 1kW of SSB.
I decided to have a day on FT4 & 8 using a maximum of 10W into a single wire loop in my loft on 17, 12 & 10M bands.
The result speaks for itself.
| Africa (Reunion Island) | 1 |
| Asia | 6 |
| Europe | 2 |
| North America (US Virgin Isles) | 1 |
| Oceana (Indonesia) | 2 |
| South Atlantic/MM | 1 |
DXpeditions are turning more and more to FT8 due to its efficiency. A lot are using MSHV, an app capable of running six streams simultaneously. Although this is not Fox & Hounds mode it is advisable to operate in F/H mode when calling them as this will clear you, the hound of QRM when they pick you up to complete the QSO.
I did not use F/H mode on the 2nd & 3rd most wanted DXCC’s and consequently lost both contacts after being picked up. Lesson learnt.
The three most popular apps for FT8 are WSJTX, JTDX & MSHV. I prefer JTDX for HF.
FT8 is a low signal mode, not a low power mode.
Attached photos are:
A 6M digital opening to the far east (top)
My log for the 10W ops on 21/08/2023 (left)
My 6M EME QSL card (below)
I strongly recommend to anybody contemplating adding FT8 to their operating modes to watch this lecture by Dr Joe Taylor, Nobel Laureate in Physics for his discovery with Russell Alan Hulse of a 'new type of pulsar, a discovery that has opened up new possibilities for the study of gravitation'.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=233HQs_8JGQ
Be aware that FT8 is a key down mode as is AM & FM so use the rig output power allocated to AM as a power guide.
Dick Hide G0LFF
