ARRL RTTY Roundup
Call: P49X
Operator(s): W0YK
Station: P49Y/P40L
Class: Single Op HP
QTH: FM52al
Operating Time (hrs): 24
Radios: SO2R
Summary:
Band QSOs
------------
80: 170
40: 568
20: 675
15: 1260
10: 876
------------
Total: 3549 State/Prov = 57 Countries = 75 Total Score = 468,468
Club: Northern California Contest Club
Comments:
Fun contest! Thanks to everyone who showed up, even for a short while. Each of
our individual results are really not “individual”, but rather the combined
efforts of many, on both sides of each QSO. It was great to contact so many
familiar stations around the world. Thank you for working me! Extra thanks go
to those many who responded to my QRV message and went to my other band to give
another QSO. This was especially gratifying on Sunday when I was fighting to
catch up to my 2013 Round-Up results. There was even one station who
interleaved QSOs on the two bands at the same time. That gave me a double-take
for a second as I thought I’d somehow got the two radios mixed up!
Despite an impressive sunspot number over the weekend, conditions didn't live
up to my optimistic expectation. Saturday was mostly pretty good where my peak
full-hour QSO rate hit 252, about 20% higher than my prior best. Then, all of a
sudden there would be no one calling, although there were still signals on the
bandscope with reasonable signal strength. Strange.
At the end of my first 12 hours, the net of these ups and downs was about 100
QSOs ahead of my best in this contest (2013). I hoped that solar conditions
would settle down and actually improve on Sunday, so it was hard to take a
sleep break … I was excited to see how high the rate might go!
Well, it was not to be. Sunday was also up and down, just like Saturday, but
was never really great. As the day wore on, I watched my QSO total drop
comparatively with Sunday last year, until I was 100 QSOs behind. Very
discouraging to be tempted by such seemingly promising conditions, only to be
let down. Not to be deterred, I dug in and pushed hard. At the end of my 24
hours, I ended up 54 QSOs ahead of 2013. But with one less mult, it’s not
certain that this will hold up as a new personal best after the ARRL completes
log checking.
Speaking of mults, once again I fell short. I only got 8 VE mults and already
several stations are reporting 9-10 with additional ones heard but not worked.
And, I’d expect the country total from here to be much higher than 75.
However, it is a challenge to search for (and, work) mults on the second
receiver in each radio (while averaging 150/hour for 24 hours (at least for
this operator!). Most of the mults I did find were not able to hear me and
just kept CQing back to my calls. With the weak signal levels and any amount
of local noise, it is not surprising to find “alligators” on the bands.
This station worked well with only two scary moments and one miraculous
positive occurrence. Late on Thursday before the contest, while running on 10
and 15 meters, the 15 meter SWR started rising, until it got above 3:1 and the
amp couldn't be used. Checking the home-run to the 15 meter Yagi with an
antenna analyzer showed there was basically no antenna at the end of the coax.
We've be replacing some defective PL259s throughout the antenna system this past
year and the 10/15 tower has yet to be refurbished. So, I figured that was the
problem and I prepared to climb up there early Friday and replace coax jumpers
as well as the PL259 at the end of the home run coax.
Working my way toward the antenna feed-point with my analyzer, I ultimately
found a fried Balun. Replacing that and one of the coax jumpers fixed the
problem. The antenna has been solid since then, and it got a heavy workout
during RU. It’s both a good thing and a bad thing that RTTY stress-tests the
hardware in your station.
The next key moment came late Saturday afternoon when I noticed the power out
of the Alpha 86 on 10 meters was gradually dropping. I kept lowering the grid
current to keep it tuned properly, but eventually it was at about 150 watts.
Not my preference for a high power entry. My guess was that the (very old)
tubes were beginning to give up the ghost. There is a spare 86 here, but I
never like equipment problems. I resigned myself to take one of my two break
periods to swap out the amp. Before doing so, though, I moved that radio from
10 to 20 while continuing to run on 15. The power out was just what it has
always been. All parameters looked good. So I kept going.
The next morning after a 5-hour break (saving another hour as a contingency for
the rest of the contest), I checked that errant 86 on 10 meters and all was good
again. Hmmm. Well, don’t push fate. I decided to only use that amp on 15
meters and see how it would hold up. I could always take my last one-hour
break to swap in another amp. But, the amp held steady at 1200 watts all day.
Second problem skirted and I finished my 24 hours before the end of the contest
period.
The miraculous happening was that Saturday night there was virtually no RFI
from the 40 meter station into the 20 meter side. This has always been a huge
obstacle in this station for years now, and for some mysterious reason it was
gone. Even the day before, the RFI was huge, just as it has been for a long
time. But Saturday night, I could run unimpeded on 40 and 20. I was stunned,
but not at all ashamed to take advantage of the good luck!
I started the contest on 15 and 20, but in retrospect I should have started on
10 and 15. After struggling on 20 meters for the first 28 minutes of the
contest, I moved that radio to 10. I then experienced my highest-ever rate.
There were 252 QSOs in the following 60 minutes, evenly split between 10 and 15
meters. What a rush! Makes a case for not being shy to change bands if things
aren't working well. Of course, it can go the other way, as it did on Sunday.
At that time, when I hit a slow period on 10 meters, I moved that radio to 20
for a while but wasn’t able to do any better, so moved back to 10.
This time I setup 6 decoders on each radio, 4 on the main receiver and 2 on the
sub-receiver. On the main, I used 2Tone Normal, 2Tone Flutter, MMTTY Standard
and the Hal DXP38 hardware modem. On the sub, I used 2Tone Normal and MMTTY
Standard. Later, I may elucidate the gory details on how each decoder
performed throughout the weekend, but the short story is that this complement
of decoders was absolutely crucial to minimizing requests for repeats. There
were many times when only one of the 4 main decoders copied clearly and I was
so thankful I hadn't bet on only one of them. There also is not a clear winner
among the 4. They each have their strengths and weaknesses.
I’m continually grateful to John (W6LD/P40L) and Andy (AE6Y/P40Y) for sharing
their quaint station here with me. It’s amazing what a few modest antennas on
a city lot can do … if it’s located off the coast of Venezuela! Thanks to
the hundreds of stations who worked P49X this weekend. Together we made for a
fun weekend, at least on this end.
Ed
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Cabrillo Statistics (Version 10g) by K5KA & N6TV
http://bit.ly/cabstat
CALLSIGN: P49X
CATEGORY-OPERATOR: SINGLE-OP
CATEGORY-TRANSMITTER: ONE
CONTEST: ARRL-RTTY
OPERATORS: W0YK
-------------- Q S O R a t e S u m m a r y ---------------------
Hour 160 80 40 20 15 10 Rate Total Pct
--------------------------------------------------------------------
1800 0 0 0 35 102 74 211 211 5.9
1900 0 0 0 0 105 114 219 430 12.1
2000 0 0 0 57 88 3 148 578 16.3
2100 0 0 0 74 98 0 172 750 21.1
2200 0 0 0 68 82 0 150 900 25.4
2300 0 0 15 87 44 0 146 1046 29.5
0000 0 0 98 96 0 0 194 1240 34.9
0100 0 0 105 95 0 0 200 1440 40.6
0200 0 0 99 62 0 0 161 1601 45.1
0300 0 52 103 5 0 0 160 1761 49.6
0400 0 72 90 0 0 0 162 1923 54.2
0500 0 46 57 0 0 0 103 2026 57.1
0600 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 2027 57.1
0700 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2027 57.1
0800 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2027 57.1
0900 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2027 57.1
1000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2027 57.1
1100 0 0 0 21 78 0 99 2126 59.9
1200 0 0 0 24 72 42 138 2264 63.8
1300 0 0 0 0 63 87 150 2414 68.0
1400 0 0 0 0 47 78 125 2539 71.5
1500 0 0 0 0 63 98 161 2700 76.1
1600 0 0 0 0 67 76 143 2843 80.1
1700 0 0 0 17 54 23 94 2937 82.8
1800 0 0 0 10 38 53 101 3038 85.6
1900 0 0 0 0 51 62 113 3151 88.8
2000 0 0 0 0 55 77 132 3283 92.5
2100 0 0 0 0 83 61 144 3427 96.6
2200 0 0 0 12 65 28 105 3532 99.5
2300 0 0 0 12 5 0 17 3549 100.0
------------------------------------------------------
Total 0 170 568 675 1260 876 3549
Gross QSOs=3595 Dupes=46 Net QSOs=3549
Unique callsigns worked = 2043
The best 60 minute rate was 252/hour from 1831 to 1930
The best 30 minute rate was 260/hour from 1829 to 1858
The best 10 minute rate was 288/hour from 1848 to 1857
The best 1 minute rates were:
7 QSOs/minute 1 times.
6 QSOs/minute 6 times.
5 QSOs/minute 73 times.
4 QSOs/minute 228 times.
3 QSOs/minute 376 times.
2 QSOs/minute 422 times.
1 QSOs/minute 257 times.
There were 2294 bandchanges and 1578 (44.5%) probable 2nd radio QSOs.
----------------- C o n t i n e n t S u m m a r y -----------------
160 80 40 20 15 10 Total Pct
---------------------------------------------------------------------
North America 0 140 477 491 811 627 2546 71.7
South America 0 1 3 9 14 22 49 1.4
Europe 0 29 82 70 357 214 752 21.2
Asia 0 0 2 93 67 5 167 4.7
Africa 0 0 1 7 8 6 22 0.6
Oceania 0 0 3 5 3 2 13 0.4
--------------------------------------------------------------
Total 0 170 568 675 1260 876 3549
Number of letters in callsigns
Letters # worked
-----------------
3 1
4 1303
5 1335
6 881
7 15
8 9
9 3
10 2
------------------ C o u n t r y S u m m a r y ------------------
Country 160 80 40 20 15 10 Total Pct
-------------------------------------------------------------------
9A 0 0 0 2 3 1 6 0.2
9K 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0.0
9M2 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0.0
CE 0 0 0 0 2 3 5 0.1
CM 0 0 4 1 9 2 16 0.5
CN 0 0 0 1 0 1 2 0.1
CT 0 0 0 2 1 1 4 0.1
CU 0 0 0 0 1 1 2 0.1
CX 0 0 0 0 0 2 2 0.1
DL 0 2 9 3 61 26 101 2.8
E7 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 0.0
EA 0 2 4 1 7 10 24 0.7
EA8 0 0 0 5 7 4 16 0.5
EI 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0.0
ES 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 0.0
EU 0 1 0 0 2 0 3 0.1
F 0 0 3 5 14 18 40 1.1
FM 0 0 0 0 2 2 4 0.1
G 0 0 1 3 24 20 48 1.4
GI 0 0 0 2 2 2 6 0.2
GM 0 0 0 2 1 1 4 0.1
GU 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0.0
GW 0 0 1 0 3 2 6 0.2
HA 0 1 4 2 6 5 18 0.5
HB 0 0 0 0 3 0 3 0.1
HC 0 0 0 1 1 1 3 0.1
HI 0 0 1 1 0 0 2 0.1
HK 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0.0
HL 0 0 0 2 0 0 2 0.1
HS 0 0 0 1 1 0 2 0.1
HZ 0 0 0 0 1 1 2 0.1
I 0 1 10 10 55 27 103 2.9
IS 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 0.0
*IT9 0 0 3 1 3 2 9 0.3
JA 0 0 0 83 59 4 146 4.1
K 0 130 442 456 747 582 2357 66.4
KG4 0 0 0 1 1 1 3 0.1
KH6 0 0 3 1 1 0 5 0.1
KL 0 1 2 3 4 2 12 0.3
KP2 0 0 2 1 0 1 4 0.1
KP4 0 0 2 0 1 1 4 0.1
LA 0 0 0 1 5 2 8 0.2
LU 0 0 1 1 2 6 10 0.3
LY 0 1 2 1 6 4 14 0.4
LZ 0 0 1 0 4 1 6 0.2
OE 0 0 0 1 5 1 7 0.2
OH 0 2 2 5 7 3 19 0.5
OK 0 2 3 2 13 9 29 0.8
OM 0 0 0 0 4 1 5 0.1
ON 0 0 1 2 7 3 13 0.4
OZ 0 0 1 0 3 4 8 0.2
P4 0 1 1 2 2 2 8 0.2
PA 0 1 0 6 12 17 36 1.0
PY 0 0 0 4 6 8 18 0.5
S5 0 0 3 3 4 2 12 0.3
SM 0 1 0 2 11 2 16 0.5
SP 0 4 6 4 19 7 40 1.1
SV 0 0 1 0 5 3 9 0.3
SV5 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0.0
TF 0 0 0 0 1 1 2 0.1
TK 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0.0
UA 0 2 4 2 16 9 33 0.9
UA2 0 0 0 0 2 0 2 0.1
UA9 0 0 0 5 3 0 8 0.2
UN 0 0 1 0 3 0 4 0.1
UR 0 4 19 2 26 18 69 1.9
VE 0 8 23 27 46 35 139 3.9
VK 0 0 0 2 1 1 4 0.1
VP9 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0.0
VU 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0.0
XE 0 0 1 1 1 1 4 0.1
YB 0 0 0 2 1 0 3 0.1
YL 0 2 0 2 4 2 10 0.3
YO 0 3 3 0 10 8 24 0.7
YU 0 0 0 1 3 1 5 0.1
YV 0 0 0 1 1 0 2 0.1
Z3 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 0.0
ZL 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 0.0
ZS 0 0 1 1 1 1 4 0.1
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Total 0 170 568 675 1260 876 3549
------------ M u l t i p l i e r S u m m a r y ------------
Mult 160 80 40 20 15 10 Total Pct
-------------------------------------------------------------
-DX- 0 32 103 191 466 258 1050 29.6
CA 0 8 54 34 57 50 203 5.7
NY 0 7 23 28 43 36 137 3.9
VA 0 5 20 26 38 35 124 3.5
PA 0 6 19 19 42 35 121 3.4
TX 0 9 22 21 31 31 114 3.2
MN 0 11 24 22 32 23 112 3.2
OH 0 4 15 21 40 28 108 3.0
FL 0 3 11 26 32 19 91 2.6
NC 0 5 10 18 26 22 81 2.3
NJ 0 4 12 17 20 25 78 2.2
ON 0 4 14 15 24 17 74 2.1
WA 0 0 19 10 29 16 74 2.1
IL 0 3 16 14 27 12 72 2.0
TN 0 4 14 15 22 16 71 2.0
MD 0 6 12 15 22 16 71 2.0
CO 0 4 15 12 20 16 67 1.9
MI 0 2 11 15 22 13 63 1.8
AZ 0 2 12 13 25 8 60 1.7
MA 0 3 6 9 18 17 53 1.5
OR 0 3 10 13 13 11 50 1.4
MO 0 4 5 6 19 11 45 1.3
IN 0 2 8 6 14 14 44 1.2
AL 0 3 10 10 11 8 42 1.2
WI 0 1 11 6 16 7 41 1.2
CT 0 2 6 6 9 16 39 1.1
LA 0 1 7 9 7 11 35 1.0
SC 0 1 3 10 12 7 33 0.9
NH 0 3 6 7 11 6 33 0.9
IA 0 2 6 4 13 5 30 0.8
GA 0 1 10 6 5 7 29 0.8
OK 0 3 6 3 9 3 24 0.7
NV 0 3 5 4 5 6 23 0.6
BC 0 0 3 6 8 5 22 0.6
KS 0 1 2 5 8 4 20 0.6
QC 0 3 3 3 6 4 19 0.5
KY 0 2 2 3 3 9 19 0.5
ID 0 1 5 4 4 3 17 0.5
DE 0 1 4 1 5 5 16 0.5
NE 0 1 3 1 3 6 14 0.4
AR 0 1 1 3 4 4 13 0.4
WV 0 0 5 2 5 1 13 0.4
ME 0 2 1 4 3 3 13 0.4
UT 0 0 2 1 4 6 13 0.4
NM 0 2 2 2 4 1 11 0.3
MS 0 0 2 1 4 2 9 0.3
MT 0 2 2 1 2 1 8 0.2
RI 0 1 0 1 3 2 7 0.2
VT 0 0 1 2 2 2 7 0.2
SK 0 0 0 1 3 3 7 0.2
AB 0 0 1 1 2 3 7 0.2
SD 0 0 1 0 2 3 6 0.2
NB 0 0 0 1 1 2 4 0.1
DC 0 0 1 0 2 1 4 0.1
NS 0 0 0 0 2 1 3 0.1
MB 0 1 2 0 0 0 3 0.1
WY 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0.0
ND 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0.0
------------------------------------------------------
Total 0 170 568 675 1260 876 3549
U.S. Call Areas Worked
Area QSOs Pct
--------------------
0 296 8.3
1 181 5.1
2 271 7.6
3 232 6.5
4 356 10.0
5 198 5.6
6 221 6.2
7 211 5.9
8 216 6.1
9 175 4.9
--------------------
Total 2357 66.4
Multi-band QSOs
---------------
1 bands 1115
2 bands 543
3 bands 231
4 bands 115
5 bands 39
6 bands 0
------- S i n g l e B a n d Q S O s ------
Band 160 80 40 20 15 10
----------------------------------------------
QSOs 0 28 132 217 483 255
Posted using 3830 Score Submittal Forms at: http://www.3830scores.com/
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