ARRL DX Contest, CW
Call: P40L
Operator(s): W6LD, W0YK
Station: P40L/P49Y
Class: M/S HP
QTH: Aruba
Operating Time (hrs): 48.0
Summary:
Band QSOs Mults
-------------------
160: 463 58
80: 729 58
40: 1281 58
20: 1473 59
15: 1526 59
10: 1151 50
-------------------
Total: 6577 342 Total Score = 6,748,002
Club: Northern California Contest Club
Comments:
Comments:
Ed, W0YK, and I had a lot of fun doing ARRL DX CW as a multi-single last year,
so we decided to try it again to see if we could improve on our results.
Ed had operated the station in the WPX RTTY contest the previous weekend. The
original plan had been for me to join him right after he completed the contest,
but I unfortunately was delayed due to work conflicts. By the time I arrived
around mid-night on Thursday, Ed had the station fully reconfigured for ARRL DX
CW and all that remained was to tweak our messages and to develop a band plan
and operating schedule. He had logged 500 QSOs during the week on 160 and 10,
so we felt confident in our setup, especially since the station had just come
off WPX RTTY weekend with 3600 QSOs across 80-10.
We ran the station through its paces overnight on 160 (with a very nice opening
to Europe) and periodically throughout the course of the day Friday (with very
strong 10 meter openings into both the U.S. and Europe). With an additional
500 practice/test QSOs in the log by the time 0000z rolled around, everything
was looking very promising: the station seemed to be working great and band
conditions were the best they had been in years.
But, despite all the preparation and testing, annoying problems cropped up from
the very beginning and persisted throughout the contest. None of the problems
were disasters, but they were just enough to distract and throw us off a bit.
They included erratic keying by WriteLog using Winkeyers, an 80 meter antenna
that seemed not to work right when we needed it (after working great just hours
earlier) and some intermittent issues with one amplifier.
Ed spent much of the first six hours or so methodically troubleshooting while I
tried to maintain some semblance of rate. Iâ??d like to say that we eventually
got the problems under control, but that would suggest that we were able to
clearly identify the causes. Instead, we found fixes that worked for most
problems and others eventually just subsided or disappeared on their own accord
with the causes remaining a mystery in all cases.
Conditions proved to be excellent throughout the weekend with solar flux
peaking at 125. 160 meters was excellent, especially Friday night, and we had
good, long openings on 10 meters both days. In the end, we were able to improve
on last year results by about five percent. We felt good about our multiplier
totals on all bands except 10 meters where despite high QSO totals we think we
missed out on four or five multipliers by operating on 15 meters instead of 10
meters during a critical hour or so Sunday afternoon. VE5 was noticeably
absent on the low bands.
The day after the contest was spent on various station projects with much of
the time spent out in the Cunucu working on the beverages. We greatly enjoyed
getting together for a lovely post-contest dinner organized by Andy,
P40LE/K2LE, with other hams on the island, including Truce and Martin
(P43MRS/VE3MRS and P49MR/VE3MR), Jean-Pierre and Chris (P43A and P43C), Carl
(P49V/AI6V), Andy (P40LE/K2LE) and Ed (P49X/W0YK).
Congratulations to the many fine efforts put on by others, especially the TI5N
team for a new record in the multi-single category, the P49V team (AI6V and
K2LE) for their excellent results in the new lower power multi-single category
and PJ4Aâ??s and ZF2AMâ??s very impressive SOHP results.
As always, thanks for all the QSOs.
73,
John, W6LD/P40L
Station:
Rigs: Elecraft K3s (2); Icom 756 Pro II
Amps: Alpha 86, Ten-Tec Titan 425
Antennas:
C31XR at 43 feet
2 elements 10 meter at 55 feet
5 elements 15 meter at 55 feet
4 elements 20 meter at 68 feet
2 elements 40 meter at 76 feet
1 element 80 meter Sigma 80 at 64 feet
160 meter â??double Lâ?? vertical at 67 feet
Four 500 foot beverages using K9AY switching box/preamp
Logging software: WriteLog on three networked computers
DSL Internet for Packet/Reverse Beacon
QSO/Sec by hour and band
Hour 160M 80M 40M 20M 15M 10M Total Cumm
D1-0000Z --+-- --+-- --+-- 210/49 --+-- --+-- 210/49 210/49
D1-0100Z 77/27 - 42/22 26/0 - - 145/49 355/98
D1-0200Z 31/5 8/8 111/21 - - - 150/34 505/132
D1-0300Z - - 211/9 - - - 211/9 716/141
D1-0400Z 89/11 29/15 15/0 - - - 133/26 849/167
D1-0500Z 13/0 59/14 70/1 - - - 142/15 991/182
D1-0600Z 33/5 129/8 - - - - 162/13 1153/195
D1-0700Z 26/2 88/3 - - - - 114/5 1267/200
D1-0800Z 6/1 44/4 42/0 --+-- --+-- --+-- 92/5 1359/205
D1-0900Z 7/0 32/0 16/1 - - - 55/1 1414/206
D1-1000Z - 39/0 55/1 - - - 94/1 1508/207
D1-1100Z - 33/2 73/2 - - - 106/4 1614/211
D1-1200Z - - 60/0 26/2 11/9 - 97/11 1711/222
D1-1300Z - - - 3/0 151/24 - 154/24 1865/246
D1-1400Z - - - 113/4 - 31/15 144/19 2009/265
D1-1500Z - - - - - 229/26 229/26 2238/291
D1-1600Z --+-- --+-- --+-- --+-- 3/3 190/4 193/7 2431/298
D1-1700Z - - - - - 173/1 173/1 2604/299
D1-1800Z - - - - 200/12 28/0 228/12 2832/311
D1-1900Z - - - 1/1 228/7 2/2 231/10 3063/321
D1-2000Z - - - 23/0 124/1 42/0 189/1 3252/322
D1-2100Z - - - 207/1 - - 207/1 3459/323
D1-2200Z - - - 187/1 - - 187/1 3646/324
D1-2300Z - - 2/0 146/0 - - 148/0 3794/324
D2-0000Z --+-- 1/1 --+-- 144/0 --+-- --+-- 145/1 3939/325
D2-0100Z 53/1 - 43/0 21/0 - - 117/1 4056/326
D2-0200Z - - 166/1 - - - 166/1 4222/327
D2-0300Z - 51/0 102/0 - - - 153/0 4375/327
D2-0400Z 49/1 54/1 - - - - 103/2 4478/329
D2-0500Z 1/1 35/1 85/0 - - - 121/2 4599/331
D2-0600Z 27/3 28/0 11/0 - - - 66/3 4665/334
D2-0700Z - 27/0 27/0 - - - 54/0 4719/334
D2-0800Z 15/1 10/1 23/0 --+-- --+-- --+-- 48/2 4767/336
D2-0900Z 13/0 23/0 16/0 - - - 52/0 4819/336
D2-1000Z 23/0 25/0 15/0 - - - 63/0 4882/336
D2-1100Z - 14/0 67/0 - - - 81/0 4963/336
D2-1200Z - - 14/0 30/0 26/0 - 70/0 5033/336
D2-1300Z - - - - 87/2 - 87/2 5120/338
D2-1400Z - - - 1/0 102/0 1/0 104/0 5224/338
D2-1500Z - - - - 67/1 88/1 155/2 5379/340
D2-1600Z --+-- --+-- --+-- --+-- 7/0 139/0 146/0 5525/340
D2-1700Z - - - 1/1 166/0 - 167/1 5692/341
D2-1800Z - - - - 41/0 133/0 174/0 5866/341
D2-1900Z - - - - 103/0 49/1 152/1 6018/342
D2-2000Z - - - 111/0 59/0 - 170/0 6188/342
D2-2100Z - - - 92/0 66/0 - 158/0 6346/342
D2-2200Z - - - 49/0 85/0 - 134/0 6480/342
D2-2300Z - - 15/0 82/0 - - 97/0 6577/342
Total: 463/58 729/58 1281/58 1473/59 1526/59 1105/50
Posted using 3830 Score Submittal Forms at: http://www.hornucopia.com/3830score/
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