NA Sprint SSB Contest
Call: W6YX
Operator(s): N6DE
Station: W6YX
Class: Single Op HP
QTH: CA
Operating Time (hrs): 4
Summary:
Band QSOs Op Time
---------------------
80: 62 0:50
40: 101 1:20
20: 128 1:50
---------------------
Total: 291 Mults = 46 Total Score = 13,386
Club: Northern California Contest Club
Team: NCCC #1
Comments:
I was hoping to surpass 300 QSOs in this one and sneak into the Top 10, but no
such luck. There are a bunch of great scores out there. Congrats to K9PG and
VA7RR, whose operating abilities are beyond human.
I set up a crude form of SO2R for this contest, hoping to be able to CQ on a
high band while searching for new stations on the active lower band. It didn't
work, for two reasons:
a) the Writelog voice keyer locked up on the second radio due to RF. It would
have required a system reboot and network reconnect. I wasn't willing to waste
time on that. We had the same problem in a previous contest, and found that it
was most likely RF getting in through the LPT port from the CW keying cable. I
forgot to disconnect that cable before the contest.
b) Before the keyer locked up, I found that CQing on the second rig slowed me
down in hunting for new stations on the main rig because my concentration was
divided. I learned that I need A LOT of SO2R practice before attempting this
again in a future Sprint.
I also wanted to see if having a low 40m antenna would be of value in this
contest. Thanks to K6ENT, I borrowed his 40m dipole and temporarily installed
it at 20'. It proved to be useful. The main thing it did was attenuate all the
broadcast noise so that I could actually hear the station's exchange.
It's too bad 40m and 80m were not like they were during the Thu and Fri practice
Sprints. Local stations that were 59+20dB on Friday were barely copyable 24
hours later. I got beat out a lot on 80m by other CA stations. W6TK and W7EJ
had extremely loud 80m signals.
I heard AR and AB, and actually called them, but got beat in the pileups, and
never heard them again. I heard people having a hard time with K8MR's name...
doesn't anyone watch the NBA? :) I tried calling him a few times but he always
had a large pile of midwest stations.
After the Sprint, I went home and wound down to a local rock station that plays
2 hours of 80's hair band rock on Saturday nights... it's good for a blast from
the good old junior high and high school daze. Sam Kinnison's rendition of
"Wild Thing" always makes me laugh hard! I need to get that CD one of these
days. I went to bed before hearing the station's hour of "Hard Core Hell" which
apparently was going to be led off by a 13 minute song by Iron Maiden. I never
was into Iron Maiden... probably because I'm not into the really hard stuff, and
also because when I was a kid, there was some punk who lived down the street who
was a diehard Iron Maiden fan... dude was really annoying. What's even scarier:
Iron Maiden is *still* touring! Now that's insane, but I digress...
73...
-Dean - N6DE
Posted using 3830 Score Submittal Forms at: http://www.hornucopia.com/3830score/
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