CQ 160-Meter Contest, CW
Call: N7GP
Operator(s): N5IA
Station: N5IA
Class: Single Op HP
QTH: AZ -- DM52
Operating Time (hrs): 25:30
Remote Operation
Summary:
Total: QSOs = 915 State/Prov = 58 Countries = 37 Total Score = 336,015
Club: Arizona Outlaws Contest Club
Comments:
I have operated 160 Meter contests for nearly a quarter century and this report
is made in the context of the many ups and downs over that period of time.
This report will be fairly long, and it is not for the quick reader. I am just
trying to put into perspective the results vs my personal history from this part
of the world; the desert southwest of the USA.
This should never have been a contest weekend. But, as I tell others; it is
what it is. My schedule for the last 72 hours has played out in the following
manner.
After making final changes and preparations for the first true test of my new
TX array, and assuring myself the remote operation was fully ready to rock and
roll, I had a couple of days to relax and get the body into a 160 M contest
cycle.
I made an equipment check Thursday evening with the intent of seeing what the
propagation might be towards EU. Hmmm. I could not access the PC at the
remote site which allows controlling of the direction selection for the RX and
TX antennas, and turning ON/OFF plus viewing the status of the amplifier.
I loaded up my pickup truck and headed to the remote site 55 road miles away.
What did I find? The BLUE SCREEN of DEATH!!. I had recently changed out an
old XP machine for a later model Win 7 machine. Bummer. I reinstalled the XP
machine and everything came up working FB. Just a bit slower; but at least it
would be dependable through the contest weekend.
I got up early Friday morning to check band conditions to the Pacific, and
exercise the remote operation. Conditions were fair and I worked a couple
dozen JA stations, a couple of Russians, and HL5IVY in about 30 minutes of
casual CQing. OK. Everything is ready for the afternoon start of CQ 160 CW;
the most important contest of the year for me.
The sun is more than two hours high in the afternoon sky when the contest
begins. Hour 1 was decent with 16 call signs in the log. N0TT in MO was the
best 'DX'.
Hour 2 the conditions are steadily improving and 32 more Qs are logged. The
best 'DX' contact was with VA2EW. The St/P count was rising rapidly with a
total of 22 before Zero hours Zulu rolled around.
Hour 3 added three more St/P and the Q count was at 56 as the sun set behind
the 10,720' high mountain range to the west of the station location. With
darkness the conditions improved very rapidly and the hour ended with a total
of 104 logged contacts. The St/P rose to 32 with a few eastern seaboard states
worked. However, overall conditions seemed rather soft and the snow storm
system to the east was producing some QRN.
My normal strategy is to RUN until the rate slows a bit, and then do a complete
S & P of the band. The rate for this period of the contest was slower than
usual so I started my S & P of the band at 0130.
After 30 minutes of working through only 15 kHz of the band I found CS2C and
OM0M CQing. Both immediately answered my calls. Well, perhaps the band was
better than I thought. I went back to running and stayed put until 0300
putting a number of St/P (VE5 and VE9 called in)in the log as well as being
called by UA3UCD. The 0200 hour yielded the 2nd highest quantity of contacts
with a total of 80.
I started my 2nd S & P operation at 0300Z. The rate was slow, down to 30
for the hour, but I added 6 mults including ME, ZF, PJ2, KP2 and EA8,
I went back to running at 0400 and the hour produced my highest hourly rate for
the entire contest. 84 Qs were logged which among others included calls from
RI, VT, and OZ.
At 0500 I started my third search of the band which lasted for a full 2 hours.
I made multiplier contacts with XE, IT9, DL, OK, KP4, KL, HI, ON, and EA. The Q
count at the end of the 0600 hour was at 445 and the mult count was at 66. All
states had been worked with the exception of MT and KH6. Hmmm. Everyone
snowed in up north in Montana? Everyone on the beach in Hawaii?
I started running again shortly after 0700 and enjoyed a mini-opening to EU.
The signals were never strong and many contacts required multiple exchanges to
get the complete call sign of the caller. There were only 38 contacts in the
hour but I added mults of G, GU, GW, CU, and PA.
At this time of the year sunrise in EU corresponds to sunset at the north
island of ZL and northern JA. I specifically paid attention to the possibility
of getting calls from these two areas. I bounced back and forth with TXing and
RXing between ZL, JA and to the east. No one checked in from ZL but JA7ACM was
the first JA at 0830. KH6CC called at 0840 and left only MT for WAS. PY was
the only other mult added during the 32 Q 0800 hour.
The balance of night one was rather mundane with a rather high noise level to
the west and apparently very poor propagation to the South and Western Pacific
areas. Direction calls at VK sunset resulted in VK3IO being added to the log.
Old Faithful, VE1ZZ called in with the NS mult. RT0F put the UA9 mult in the
books.
WAS was completed at 1137 when N7LT called in from Montana. A mini-run of JAs
from 1230 to 1245 helped the JA total for the night to reach 23. The first
night ended with 672 Qs, 56 St/P, and 27 DX.
I went to bed for 3 hours, got up, showered, shaved, and put on the suit and
tie to start the Saturday activities. These included two funerals and four
hours of church meetings.
The first funeral was for an elderly rancher lady who was a good friend and
long time resident of the area.
The 2nd funeral was for my ham mentor. K5IWA, 55 years ago this spring, asked
a teenage boy if he might be interested in Ham Radio. Well, the rest of the
story is history and I paid my last respects to a great man who lived life to
the fullest for family, the nation, his friends and his religion.
He was a WWII vet, a master welder, served 5 missions for his church and leaves
a legacy of 6 children, 28 grandchildren, 71 great grandchildren, and 2
great-great grandchildren. He and his wife celebrated their 70th wedding
anniversary this past year.
>From 4 PM to 9 PM local time I attended church meetings. I arrived at home in
time to get the station fired up and make my first contact of the 2nd night at
0443.
I started out S & P to see what was left on the band. I knew that I had
already missed the 4 hours of 'Prime Time' and the casual operators from the
midwest and east coast USA had already gone off to bed.
An hour plus of work yielded mults of J7, I, OA, PEI, and E7. One of the
highlights of the night was busting with just a couple of calls the giant
pileup on E7. The total Q count was now at 697.
I started running shortly after 0600 and was immediately rewarded with calls
from S5, HB, and EI. I moved to S & P at 0730 to see if I could find any
other EU mults before the EU sunrise. I did find F6GOX for the last EU Mult.
I went back to running and had G3UJE and G4AMT call in for the last of 26 EU
contacts for the night.
Directional calls to ZL at both islands' sunset, and to VK at the east, middle
and western sunsets yielded zero contacts. No stations were heard or worked
from the South or Western Pacific.
Until the JA path opens it is a combination of making short calls on a CQ
frequency and in between CQs checking to see if there are any new stations
showing up on the band. At 0825 I enjoyed the 2nd highlight of the night. I
found VE4GV with a HUGE pileup. The real advantage of a phased TX array really
showed up. A couple of well placed calls resulted in the elusive MB multiplier
being added to my log.
JA8EVL called in at 0902 for the first JA of night two. Until nearly 1100Z the
rate was VERY SLOW with an occasional JA among various local 2 pointers. The
0800 hour added 18 Qs; the 0900 hour added 23 Qs; and the 1000 hour jumped up
to 35 Qs. One mult was found during this period; a lone HK.
At 1041 JA2ETQ literally opened the gate to JA land. The band was up and down.
Sometimes the path would totally go away for 5-10 minutes and then come back.
I had runs of 4 and 5 JAs interspersed with calls from eastern and midwestern
US stations who were just getting out of bed. One run during the period up to
1245Z had 11 straight JA calls.
>From 1246 to 1325 only one JA was logged. During this period I noticed a weak
station CQing underneath my CQs. Careful listening revealed it was BA7IO about
100 Hz off my frequency. I listened to his CQs and gave him a call. The 2nd
call he was in my log for the BY mult. I moved up 250 Hz and resumed my
running. Again many low level signals from JA interspersed with the Sunday
morning US operators as the terminator moved across the US.
I got a magnificent gray line lift which lasted exactly 12 minutes from 1402Z
to 1414Z. During these 12 minutes I logged an additional 12 JA calls who all
had the best JA signals by far of both nights of operation. Most all these
contacts were made with one call exchanges whereas the majority of the previous
100+ contacts required 3, 4, or sometimes 5 or more exchanges to get the
complete call. Isn't it strange that out of a 6 character JA call sign on
every repeat you get the JA at the front and the last letter of the call? It
happened dozens of times.
Some additional statistics.
The states with the highest contribution of contacts in my log
are.............
TOP TEN
CA = 51
TX = 39
OH = 32
VA = 32
PA = 31
IL = 29
AZ = 28
NY = 27
MN = 26
MI = 23
Least amount, the RARE ONES.
DC = 2
MS = 2
VT = 2
DE = 3
ME = 3
NE = 3
RI = 3
KH6 = 3
ND = 4
SD = 4
KL7 = 4
AR = 5
OK = 5
WY = 5
Our good Canadian Friends to the north provided a total of 46 - 5 Pointers.
Our good Mexican Friends to the south provided a total of 4 - 5 pointers.
Zone 14 = 31
Zone 15 = 12
Zone 19 = 4
And the final, total Q count for JA was 136. Thanks guys for making the score
what it is.
Upon shutting down the station this morning, I went to bed for 2 hours. The
wife and I then attended church until 12 Noon.
When we returned home we changed our clothes and went to our 3 year old
granddaughters birthday lunch and party. Well, to tell the truth, after the
meal I crashed on the couch for 3 hours.
I then made it home and have been reading 3830 reports for other reporting
stations and writing this report of my operation.
The summary is........Conditions were generally poor from this location with
the exception of the tiny spotlight windows to portions of EU and the last
couple of hours to JA land.
I know I left some mults on the table. I worked all I heard with the exception
of some EU stations. I have read some other reports which mention Carib and SA
stations which I did not hear. So, there is room for improvement for this
single operator.
I can report that the TX array works as advertised. It is absolutely fantastic
to be able to point the array at a needed mult and with reasonable expectation
get results with one, or two, or at the most 3 calls. It is also great to be
able to hold a run frequency for as long as I want. I will always yield to
BA7IO :-). Thanks to those that took time to comment about the signal level.
I apologize to those who I could not hear well, or at all. I do have a fairly
high level (for me) ambient man made noise level (read power line noise) to
contend with in most directions. This is a priority to get corrected, but will
take time to work with the local power company.
If you have read this far, thank you for indulging me the time. Thanks for all
the contacts, and I look forward to more activity in the remaining winter
contests where I will always be operating 160 M single band.
73 for now, and have a great week.
Milt, N5IA, operator of N7GP
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