I used the 30m band on the way down and switched between the FreeTrak16 and an OpenTracker OT1+ (AX25) The MFSK-16 was not overly successful, however there were only the two iGate stations that I was aware of, one in Tasmania (VK7KPC) and the other in Darwin (VK8JG). There were a couple of decodes from Katherine one by Peter VK7KPC and one by Joel VK8JG. At Pine Creek I switched over to my trusty OpenTracker OT1+ running AX25 on 30m was a lot better, with VK8KMD, VK6LD and VK4MQ all receiving me. The extra iGates make all the difference.
On the way home I switched over to 40m and MFSK-16. This proved a lot better with a reasonably consistent path back to VK8JG. We even managed a voice contact from just south of Pine Creek. I'm not sure how many iGates there are for AX25 on the 40m band, but that would be worth testing at some future time.
MFSK-16 on 40m taken from aprs.fi
Thanks to Joel and Peter for running the APRS Messenger iGates over the weekend.
