CQWW WPX Contest, CW
Call: NX5M
Operator(s): NX5M, N5XJ, AB5K, KU5B, K5GQ, N5DUW, KE5C
Station: NX5M
Class: M/M HP
QTH: TEXAS
Operating Time (hrs): 42
Summary:
Band QSOs
------------
160: 3
80: 89
40: 883
20: 1506
15: 1063
10: 602
------------
Total: 4146 Prefixes = 1012 Total Score = 8,876,252
Club: Central Texas DX and Contest Club
Comments:
The evening before the contest I discovered that the top 20m yagi had an
intermittent swr spike. Luckily it was repaired an hour before the start. Of
course the fix was a compromise��one side of the hairpin match was loose
where it fits inside the shorting bar. A vice-grip was used to clamp the
shorting strap tighter to the rodâ?¦..but it worked!
Next problem was finding that the dedicated South America 20m antenna was
totally dead. No time to fix so we ended up using another antenna fixed in the
same direction but at only about 30 feet.
We had about 20 computer crashes. 15 of them were on the 20m station and the
rest were on the 10m station. Must be something I did when I built a new
network hub and changed out all of the cables. It did cost us quite a bit of
operating time while trying to figure out the problem but that just the way it
goes. So if you were one of the people that wondered why we did not answer
you, or were delayed in answering, we were just waiting for the computer to
come back up.
With a shortage of operators for this one, and a couple of them being first
time ops here, I almost decided to just do a multi-single or multi-two. One
of the greatest obstacles is having someone use logging software that they have
never used before and trying to give them a crash course 30 minutes before the
starting time. The second problem is the lack familiarity with the station
hardware. In the last 3 hours I decided to go ahead with the multi-multi plan
and just let people operate as much or as little as they wanted to. Several
times throughout the weekend we were on with just one station. Several hours
were spent with only two stations operating. I told the operators that if they
needed a break, food, drink or sleep��just do it. If the chair is left
empty, so be it!
Only three of the five operators we going to be here the whole time (NX5M,
N5XJ, AB5K). KE5C arrived an hour before the contest but could only stay until
the next morning. K5GQ walked through the door a couple of hours after the
start. This was all we had to work with and we all knew that this could not be
done seriously because none of us was going to operate the whole time. KU5B
graduated from high school Friday night so he was not able to get here until
the wee hours of the morning. His plans made me laughâ?¦â?¦â??Once I am
finished visiting with my relatives and they have gone to bed I am leaving for
your placeâ??. It was about 0800 when he arrived but needed a bit of rest
before getting on the air. A couple of the guys got some good quality sleep
during the night as well as some sitting in the operating chair (yes boys, I
noticed). Normally I would get upset if someone got out of the operating chair
and decided to go to sleep for the rest of the night, leaving an operating
position vacant. Not this time��.my approach for this one was that people
get to operate as much or as little as they want and if a chair is left empty,
the chair is just left empty. One of the operators (N5DUW) had planned to make
this one but had to drop out at the last minute for good reason. Was I ever
surprised (happier more than surprised) when N5DUW walked into the building at
about midnight Saturday. The guy managed to operate for a good 10 hours
straight before having to get some sleep. Both he and K5GQ made their
departures with 4 to 5 hours left in the contest. Meâ?¦..well, I managed to
stay awake all night and finally hit the bunk bed a little after local sunrise
Saturday morning only to wake up 4 hours later. I could not make it all the
way through the second night. About 430am I had nothing left so I again hit
the bunk bed for 4 ½ hours of good quality sleep.
Newly installed tower with 40m yagis seemed to play well. No failures during
the contest other than some computer issues. Nice to hear some signals from JA
on 10m both days. Too noisy down here in Texas for 80 and 160 this time of
year. Did not spend much time on 80 the first night, well, the station was set
up for 80 but the chair was empty. Never even tried 160 the second night. If I
ever do multi-multi in this contest again it will be done on 10 through 40 and I
will just give up the low numbers on 80m and 160m.
We had a good time. We had our serious moments but for the most part the
operation was pretty casual. Casual is the only way to go when there are not
enough operators to do the job right. Everyone walked away happy with the
effort and no one was exhausted from a lack of rest.
Last time KU5B operated here he fell out of a bunk bed (from the top). It just
hit me that he never got up there this weekend. Perhaps the gravity of that
past situation was resting heavy on his mind.
Thanks to all for the Qâ??s and more importantly for the patience. QSB was
pretty high at times and of course QRM on 20 and 40 made things even tougher.
Posted using 3830 Score Submittal Forms at: http://www.hornucopia.com/3830score/
______________________________________________
3830 mailing list
3830@contesting.com
http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/3830
|