CQ WW RTTY WPX Contest
Call: K3FIV
Operator(s): K3FIV
Station: K3FIV
Class: SOAB LP
QTH: CA
Operating Time (hrs):
Summary:
Band QSOs
------------
80: 38
40: 51
20: 15
15: 40
10: 14
------------
Total: 158 Prefixes = 120 Total Score = 47,040
Club: Northern California Contest Club
Comments:
RTTY contests are especially interesting to me, since they involve a lot of
technology. I knew that I wouldn't be operating anywhere near "full time".
These marathon contests are simply too long for me. After a while it just stops
being fun.
So I didn't pay any attention to the scoring, or what bands and stations I
should target for the most points. It seemed like almost every contact was a
multiplier anyway (in fact 75% of mine were), and from my QTH on the western
edge of North America, the point-rich stations on other continents are pretty
far away behind walls of QRM.
But, since there were lots of RTTY signals around, I used the opportunity to
hunt out a few new DXCC band/mode contacts, and also to retrain myself in how
to operate RTTY.
My RTTY setup involves a Flex-3000 radio, running 100W to a 80-meter Carolina
Windom at 35'. With an antenna tuner below the feedpoint, I can use it on all
the bands, with the obvious limitations of performance. For some perverse
reason I enjoy seeing what can be done with 100W and a wire. The software for
RTTY makes things interesting. With two large monitors connected to the
computer, and a bazillion windows open to the Flex PowerSDR programs, N1MM
contest controls, and several MMTTY windows decoding two RTTY signals at once,
I get the feeling that my operating console could compete with the cockpit of a
jumbojet for complexity. So many simulated knobs, buttons, sliders, meters,
displays, and menus that it's hard to count all the controls and
instrumentation. Of course the radio does have one real knob - the power
button. But I leave that "on" all the time, and let the computer turn it off
and on.
Of course I always forget how precisely set everything up so that all the
signals go to the right places inside the software, and the programs don't seem
to be able to remember it all. So there's always an hour or so of setup time,
ending with the first contact. Hey! I can hear him and he can hear me. Let's
see, that's COM6 here, and COM17 there. Don't forget to set that slider full
right, and this one full left. TX gain at +2 so I don't overdrive and distort.
Yes, I'll write this all down again, and maybe not lose the paper this time,
With lots of RTTY signals, there's plenty of material for experimenting with
all the controls to see what works best in different situations. That kept me
occupied for hours, mostly S&Ping, selecting different stations depending on
what I was trying to learn, e.g., what filter setup works best for a weak
station near a strong one. It was interesting to "eavesdrop" on the
superstations running contacts, and see how well I could hear all the different
stations calling them. The Flex setup is pretty nice for that, especially the
'brick wall' software filters that I could set way tight to pull a station out
of a crowd.
All in all, it was very enjoyable. N1MM tells me that I even made some
contacts.
I sure wish the WPX, and other contest, organizers would realize that there are
many people who might try to compete if there was some kind of scoring that
could allow contesters to compete amongst their own kind, with less than a
full-bore sleepless multi-day marathon commitment. A
contest-within-the-contest, for example scoring based on the first 8 hours of
your log, might bring more contestants into the fray to actually compete.
73,
/Jack de K3FIV
Posted using 3830 Score Submittal Forms at: http://www.hornucopia.com/3830score/
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