After the exceptional 4500+ Km copy on 2M by PJ4VHF of our beacon D4C/B at 144.436, we are now collecting information to improve our beacons using more technology.
We receive an interesting e-mail from EA8FF – Mark regarding tropo conditions from D4 to EA8 and any possible compare using his sophisticated rig:

“I had a telephone call from EA8TX the day that D4C was received in the Caribic ( I didn’t know that
there was a beacon in D4). I put an corroded  7 ele yagi up  that was lying on the roof for more than
15 years  and connected  to an  IC275H which I found under loads of dust and got D4C/B with the s-meter at end stop. At a certain moment I disconnected the antenna and still heard D4C/B abt 25 db
above the noise.
This to say that tropo propagation in West Africa can be extreme.
I have been listening to D4C/B for about a month now and the signal has allmost never disapeared,
maybe 30 minutes in a month time.
Today tropo condx were bad, it was even raining here yesterday, so I made 2 screenshots showing
the reception of AIS by shipplotter  on the right and D4C/B on the left. This morning there was no DX
on AIS, but the D4C/b was still 40 dB above noise.

This evening the Mindaloo AIS beacon was showing from time to time and D4C/B was 50 dB above noise.

My point is that AIS is a good system to monitor propagation in case there is nothing else, but WSPR
is a much better system if you have people on the other end.  I think there is more than 30 dB
advantage between the 2 systems……”

We have no experience in those kind of systems to study tropo, so we appreciate any hints in this direction…

The story keeps rolling…