So ive been trying to get Winlink Express set up for a few weeks now and im pretty close i think but still running into weirdness. Background: im running a Kenwood TS-590SG into a SignaLink USB, antenna is a fan dipole up about 35 feet, all pretty standard stuff. I can hear the gateway beaconing, i can even see it in the RMS list in the software, but when i try to actually connect and pull mail it just sits there doing the handshake thing and then drops. Sometimes it completes a session but no messages come through even though i know there are messages waiting because i sent myself a test from the web interface.

Ive been using VARA HF mode because everyone says its better than Winmor at this point which, yeah i get that. But im wondering if this is a timing issue with my audio levels or something on the gateway side. The gateway is only about 40 miles away line of sight more or less, 160w on my end. Shouldnt be a propagation problem on 40m in the afternoon.

Also not totally clear on how the RMS relay stuff works - like if the gateway cant reach the CMS directly does it store the message and forward later or does it just fail? been trying to read the documentation but its a lot

The store and forward question - yeah RMS gateways are supposed to hold messages if they lose their CMS connection and push them through when they reconnect, but in practice ive seen some gateway sysops have their nodes configured in weird ways so its not always reliable. Worth checking the gateway status on winlink.org to see if that particular node has been having upstream issues lately.

As for your actual connection problem, the first thing id look at is VARA tuning. If your audio is even slightly off it'll do exactly what you're describing - start the handshake, maybe even get through part of it, then bail. The VARA soundcard setup screen has that calibration tool, have you run through that? Also check that you dont have any other audio apps grabbing the device in the background, that'll kill you. Windows is notorious for this.

40 miles on 40m in the afternoon with 160w should be totally workable, i wouldnt blame propagation for this one. more likely something in the audio chain or PTT timing.

yeah what he said about VARA calibration. also one thing that got me early on was the PTT delay setting in Winlink Express - if its too short the first burst of your transmission is getting clipped before the radio is actually keyed up all the way. i had a SignaLink too and had to bump the PTT delay to like 300ms before things started working consistently. theres a setting somewhere in the station settings, think its called TX delay or key-up delay something like that.