630M group playing WSQ2 in VK & ZL

Recently the 630metre group has been very active on a new mode called WSQ2. This mode was developed by Murray Greenman ZL1BPU/ZL1EE and Con Wassilieff ZL2AFP/ZL2EE. After these two experienced some frustration with the weak signal non-QSO WSPR mode and slow QSO modes like Jason, they decided to create their own that was fast enough for QSO functionality.

Enter WSQ or Weak Signal QSO mode – it uses Incremental Frequency Keying (IFK), making it moderately drift-proof and easy to tune. It has no error correction and even though it’s baud rate is slower than Jason each symbol carries more information. It is equivalent of typing about 5 wpm.

There is a new sensitive waterfall display used for tuning and you can see signals on the waterfall down to -25dB. It uses long integration to defeat impulse noise and uses phase coherent keying so you can transmit using a typical LF/MF Class C, D or E (non-linear) amplifier without distortion.

WSQ uses 33 tones, spaced 1.953125Hz apart, resulting in a signal bandwidth of 64.4Hz, including the keying sidebands.

Couple that with being able to run the software on a low range notebook and you have a weak signal QSO mode down to -30dB that is definitely worth a look.

WSQ Website Link
Yahoo Group Link

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