ARRL Sweepstakes Contest, CW
Call: W6YX
Operator(s): KB0VVT N7MH
Station: W6YX
Class: School Club HP
QTH: Stanford
Operating Time (hrs): 24
Summary:
Band QSOs
------------
160:
80: 61
40: 418
20: 216
15: 329
10: 242
------------
Total: 1266 Sections = 83 Total Score = 210,156
Club: Northern California Contest Club
Comments:
The W6YX station hosted 4 simultaneous high-power SS CW operations this weekend
- W6YX (School Club), K6SU (Multi - KZ2V/K2YY/K2TJ), W6LD (SO) and K6SF (SO
Unlimited).
Near the W6YX shack are low HyGain 5-element monoband Yagis for 10/15/20 fixed
pointing toward the eastern US plus inverted vees for 40 and 80. On the
ridgeline about 400 yards from the shack are a couple of towers with 6 elements
on 20/15/10, plus an M2 4-el 40 and an inverted vee cut for 80 phone.
We rotated the ridgeline antennas to minimize interference with the fixed
antennas on each band. This enabled us to run two high-power stations on any
band with varying amounts of interference. On 20 and 40 we could get to within
a few kHz of each other, on 10 we had some audible hash within 15 kHz but mostly
quiet beyond that, and on 15 we could still hear weak noise from the other
station when widely separated in frequency. We never had 2 stations on 80 at
the same time even though our testing showed minimal interference and that the
amps could handle the 2:1 SWR of the phone antenna.
John/W6LD mostly used a recently refurbished Pro67A that is situated behind the
low monobanders relative to their beam heading. This antenna did not play well
with some of the others so we spread out to other bands instead of trying to
have 3 transmitters on the same band in close proximity.
The W6YX equipment was an FT1000MP and Alpha 9500 plus a barefoot FT1000MP Mark
V second radio connected to a MicroHam SO2R box. I used the second radio as
much as possible but found that sometimes the antennas for the other open bands
were being used by someone else. The second radio was probably in use for about
15 of the 24 hours.
Clayton/NF1R scheduled his wedding for SS CW Saturday so he wasn't available to
operate. Note to Clayton and others contemplating such action - this means your
anniversary weekend will always be on SS CW weekend, possibly limiting future SS
CW participation also.
Rebecca/KB0VVT was available and operated Sunday afternoon. Rebecca opted not
to do SO2R and to just deal with one radio. She took full advantage of the
"Sunday doldrums", setting up Auto-CQ and between responses reviewing
a practice midterm exam for the Introductory Electronics course for which she is
the course assistant.
We weren't always on the best band because it's often simpler for everyone to
just stay where they are instead of coordinating band moves between several
operators. I'm happy with the score but I know we could have done a little
better if the second radio had been usable for more of the contest. I'm
especially pleased with the overall effort from the 4 operations at the station
as we made over 3500 Q's.
In the last hour of the contest I was pleased to meet Andy/K2TJ who was in town
for Clayton's wedding and who was able to close out the K6SU operation to get
them over the 1000 Q threshold.
As always, thanks to everyone for the Q's.
73,
-Mike, N7MH
Posted using 3830 Score Submittal Forms at: http://www.3830scores.com/
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