so ive been licensed for about 6 years now and mostly done HF stuff, some VHF contesting here and there, but ive always been kind of obsessed with the idea of EME ever since i heard a guy at my club talk about working stations off the moon on 2 meters. seemed completely insane at the time but now i actually want to try it.

my question is really about the antenna side of things because i feel like thats where i keep getting confused. ive seen guys running 4x4 yagi arrays and also seen single yagi setups doing JT65 contacts so im not really sure what the minimum viable setup looks like in. i have about 75 feet of yard space i can work with in the direction of moon rise which isnt ideal i know but its what i have. running a TS-2000 which i know has a decent 2m section, and i can probably squeeze out 150w to the feedline. preamp wise i have an SSB Electronics unit that ive used for weak signal work before.

is the single yagi thing actually realistic or am i going to spend a year calling and never hear anything back? the digital modes changed things a lot i think but i dont know enough to say how much. any pointers from people who have actually done this would be great

yeah JT65 really did change the calculus on this pretty significantly. back when it was all CW you basically needed a massive array to even hear yourself let alone someone else. these days a single long yagi - and i mean something in the 12 to 18 element range - with a good low noise preamp right at the feedpoint is enough to make contacts with the big stations at least. the key word being big stations, they have to be running serious power and a real array on their end to close the link with you.

your SSB Electronics preamp should be fine depending on which model it is, you want the noise figure down as low as you can get it, ideally under 0.5dB at the antenna. that matters way more than people think. losing a half dB in coax before the preamp can kill you on EME.

the TS-2000 should work, a lot of people run that radio for this. main thing is making sure your computer interface is tight and youre using WSJT-X properly configured for EME mode, theres some settings that are different from regular FT8 stuff. sequencing especially. honestly just get on and listen during a contest weekend first, the EME contest in october is a good one, youll hear a lot of activity and get a feel for signal levels before you start calling yourself.

i did my first EME contact last winter with a single 17el yagi and 200w, worked a few of the big EU stations during a contest. took me about 3 hours of trying but it happened. dont let anyone tell you its impossible with a small setup, just gotta be patient and pick your times. moon at perigee makes a noticeable difference btw, worth tracking that.