[amsat-bb] SAT contacts and eQSL (And LOTW)

[John W Lee]

Hello Jay, 
I dread getting into this discussion because it will cause an 
avalanche of e-mail! 

First of all,  E-QSL's  don't count for any meaningful awards. 
Too bad.  It would be nice if they did.
I still upload my logs every month faithfully year after year. 

LOTW confirmations DO count for DXCC and WAS.

I spent a lot of time figuring out what it took to get satellite 
QSO's uploaded that actually were correct. 

I don't know how many log programs actually export all the correct
required info for satellite contacts.  My program does not, so what I've
been doing is this:  Exporting the non-satellite contacts and satellite
contacts
separately.  This way I can massage the ADIF file to make the satellite 
contacts correct for LOTW and E-QSL.

Satellite contacts need to have some additional information: 
1. The  "band" or "freq"  should be the UPLINK frequency (your transmit).
2. Then you need "band_rx"  <band_rx:4>70CM, for instance.
3. Then you need "sat_name"  <sat_name:5>AO-51 for instance.
4. Then you need "prop_mode"  <prop_mode:3>SAT  for instance

Any contacts that match all the correct info will be confirmed as
satellite
QSO's. 

These changes in the ADIF  file are not hard to do unless you operate on
a lot 
of different satellites then you have to do them in bunches.   Recently
all of my 
Sat QSO's are on mode J "V/U"  so I just have to do a wholesale "add in"
of the
"band_rx" and "prop_mode" part on every QSO.

When I log the QSO's in the computer I put the sat name  in the "comment"
field.
So when editing I do a wholesale change (search & replace)  "comment"  to
"sat_name".

Not a big job, and it makes things work.  I've got a few countries
confirmed on 
LOTW for satellite QSO's but I have a feeling there are a lot of folks
that uploaded
their stuff without the required info, so the confirmations don't happen.

And I get a ton of  "70CM" and "2M"  FM   E-QSL's which I know are not
right.

Also, I went and exported all the AO-40 QSO's, fixed the file up, sent it
in to LOTW 
and don't think I got a single confirmation on any of it.  Too bad again!


Does this help ? 

73,
John, K6YK