On the last day of the DXpedition, I was able to get my computer set up to make a couple quick recordings of PT0S on the low bands. Both are long path (near my sunset), nearly a 12,000 mile path from Guam. Long path bearing is 157 degrees and I was listening on my new 160 degree Beverage.
On 80m, I do some VFO A/B switching so you can hear the pileup on the split frequency. The JA’s are several S-units down from normal since I am hearing them off the back of the Beverage.
On 40m, there was a lot of QRMing and “frequency cops” going on. Everyone says how well behaved the Japanese operators are in pileups. This proves that wrong. Still, almost all Japanese hams show very good courtesy on the radio, but the numbers of lids in Japan is increasing. During PT0S where was a lot of intentional QRM, even out of JA. I suspect this was due to the rarity of this entity in this region. As a side note, I think someone else was using JF3SUL’s call.
Even though the path is longer, signals were better via long path than short path every time. Short path is over Japan and Europe, and is about 9,800 miles in length. In comparison, the 80m signal was at times 579 on LP but at most 559 SP.
I did copy PT0S well on 160m on two occasions, via short path. Signal was Q5 copy both times but very weak – not workable strength with my antenna. I regret that I did not have everything connected to make a recording, and they did not appear on TB the last day until just after my sunrise. I wonder if a long path 160m QSO would have been possible, but there was no mutual darkness on this path. My sunset missed their sunrise by about 10 minutes. This probably was just enough to kill any chance because my experience from here is that 160 propagation dies within a couple minutes following sunrise. That said, I have a very solid path into PY2 on 160 and LP signals were much better here than SP, even though I have better “ears” (longer Beverage) into Europe.