CQWW WPX Contest, CW - 2021
Call: WC1M
Operator(s): WC1M
Station: WC1M
Class: SOAB HP
Class Overlay: Unassisted
QTH: NH
Operating Time (hrs): 35:32
Radios: SO2R
Summary:
Band QSOs
------------
160: 0
80: 291
40: 1017
20: 1712
15: 281
10: 0
------------
Total: 3301 Prefixes = 10128 Total Score = 10,826,832
Club: Yankee Clipper Contest Club
Comments:
Unassisted. I have mixed feelings about the official elimination of this
category. I have nothing against Assisted, and use it all the time in multis of
course, but it's not the way I like to play the SO game -- for me, clicking on
spots is boring. What's the thrill in putting a fish in your basket that someone
else caught and handed to you? I'm very glad that 3830 has the Unassisted
overlay, and even happier that the Unassisted Challenge exists. I tried to find
a way to sponsor a plaque for that, but couldn't find any info on the website.
Congrats to N1UR (AC1U) for a fine Unassisted performance, and to AA3B, W1UE and
K1ZZ for great Assisted performances. Too early to call the Unassisted standings
-- KQ2M is out there, and possibly others.
2BSIQ for the first time, other than half an hour in CWT for practice last week.
But lots of practice on the simulator in March and April. When I first learned
about 2BSIQ, after getting hammered by KL9A and N5DX in the 2018 CW WPX CW, I
didn't think an old dog like me could learn a major new trick like that. But it
turned out to be more feasible than I thought, though I need lots more practice
to get good at it. In some ways I like 2BSIQ better than SO2R because I don't
have to listen in both ears at the same time, which causes somewhat more fatigue
for me than trying to keep the radios in sync.
Near as I can tell from my rate sheet, I spent about 2/3 of the contest doing
2BSIQ. The rest of the time only one band was open or I was trying to focus on
working as many 6 pointers as possible (e.g., EU on 40 is worth twice as much as
EU on 20.) 2BSIQ maximizes overall rate, but not necessarily on each of the two
bands. I deliberately minimized SO2R S&P, doing only about 45 2nd radio
contacts, to see if 2BSIQ can make up the Qs and mults. It sure can, but that's
only true for WPX, where about 1/3 of the Qs are new mults and you don't have to
hunt for countries, zones, etc. Seems like 2BSIQ was made for WPX.
Great conditions on day 1, except for 15. 40 was packed at the start. Seemed
like it took forever to find a run frequency, but it only took about 3 minutes.
Pretty sure I left a bunch of Qs on the table by trying to do 2BSIQ on 40 and 20
right away -- it took some time to get my sea legs. Just ran 40 in the second
hour, then resumed 2BSIQ on 40 and 80, which worked out better. As happens all
too often these days, I got tired early and took a 3-hour break at 0600z, an
hour more and an hour earlier than I'd planned. 20 opened at 0900z and was
rocking all morning. No 2BSIQ because 15 didn't open, at least not that I could
tell. I probably should have done more SO2R S&P, though I don't think it
would have moved the needle on my score all that much. Took a couple of hours
off from 1500z-1700z, then got back on for the afternoon high rate on 20. Around
2000z I started interleaving EU on 20 with USA on 15, trying to up the prefix
count. It's hard to say if that sacrificed some rate on 20, but I definitely
needed the prefixes. 40 opened up at 2300z, allowing some 2BSIQ with 20, then
opened to EU at 0100z 80 and I was able to interleave 6-pointers on 40 and 80
for five hours. That's the holy grail in WPX. Too bad I only have a delta loop
at 90' and a Beverage on 80. Might have really rocked with a 4-square!
Day 2 conditions were good, too, except for some nasty QRN Sunday afternoon
local time. After the 40/80 runs, I took another three hour break from
0600z-0900z. 20 was open, but a little sluggish. Got a few Pacific mults
S&Ping on 40 while running 20, but not a lot of Qs. Worked some JAs on 20 in
the 1000z hour, then had a nice JA run in the 1100z hour for a bunch of new
prefixes. 15 opened to EU at about 1300z allowing interleaving of EU on 20 and
15. Can't wait until we have enough sunspots to make that last longer -- not to
mention interleaving EU on 15 and 10! Speaking of 10, I never even checked it.
Might have picked up a prefix or two, but it wasn't worth the distraction. Took
my last break from 1500z-1800z, then interleaved EU on 20 with USA on 15 for a
couple of hours. Definitely higher rate than if I'd I just run 20 and S&Ped
15. I switched from 15 to 40 at 2000z, hoping for an early opening to EU, but
only picked up a few USA stations. The QRN on 40 was really bad, and 15 was
getting very weak, so I ran 20 for an hour. 40 settled down at about 2200z and I
was able to interleave 40 and 20 for the last two hours of the contest.
Had quite a few stations plop down on my run frequency, but most of them moved
when I asked. Had two instances of very loud stations rudely ignoring my pleas.
Some people must think that's part of the game. I think it's bad sportsmanship.
All in all, pretty happy with this one, my 22nd CQ WPX CW in a row. Set personal
records for Qs and mults, and it's my second highest score and third highest QSO
points. Only broke 10 million twice before, and that was when we had a lot more
sunspots! I'm sure 2BSIQ had something to do with that, but most of the score
increases we've seen in recent years comes from the ever-growing participation
in this great contest.
Thanks for all the Qs and putting up with my lid moves while learning 2BSIQ.
[NB: DXLog reports four more QSOs and two more mults than CBS reports for the
Cabrillo file and Writelog reports for the ADIF file. So either there's an error
in the DXLog totals or export function. It's only a couple thousand points, so
I'm posting the lower numbers until I can track down the source of the
discrepancy.]
73, Dick WC1M
-------------- Q S O R a t e S u m m a r y ---------------------
Hour 160 80 40 20 15 10 Rate Total Pct
--------------------------------------------------------------------
0000 0 0 78 40 0 0 118 118 3.6
0100 0 0 131 1 0 0 132 250 7.6
0200 0 18 119 4 0 0 141 391 11.8
0300 0 40 41 0 0 0 81 472 14.3
0400 0 44 68 0 0 0 112 584 17.7
0500 0 37 75 0 0 0 112 696 21.1
0600 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 696 21.1
0700 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 696 21.1
0800 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 696 21.1
0900 0 0 3 70 0 0 73 769 23.3
1000 0 0 1 142 0 0 143 912 27.6
1100 0 0 0 114 0 0 114 1026 31.1
1200 0 0 4 93 0 0 97 1123 34.0
1300 0 0 0 107 3 0 110 1233 37.4
1400 0 0 0 86 8 0 94 1327 40.2
1500 0 0 0 4 2 0 6 1333 40.4
1600 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1333 40.4
1700 0 0 0 80 1 0 81 1414 42.8
1800 0 0 0 114 4 0 118 1532 46.4
1900 0 0 0 84 5 0 89 1621 49.1
2000 0 0 0 59 22 0 81 1702 51.6
2100 0 0 2 64 28 0 94 1796 54.4
2200 0 0 8 45 25 0 78 1874 56.8
2300 0 0 86 14 0 0 100 1974 59.8
0000 0 0 73 31 0 0 104 2078 63.0
0100 0 21 81 2 0 0 104 2182 66.1
0200 0 50 31 0 0 0 81 2263 68.6
0300 0 41 38 0 0 0 79 2342 70.9
0400 0 30 61 0 0 0 91 2433 73.7
0500 0 10 34 0 0 0 44 2477 75.0
0600 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2477 75.0
0700 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2477 75.0
0800 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2477 75.0
0900 0 0 8 45 0 0 53 2530 76.6
1000 0 0 3 68 0 0 71 2601 78.8
1100 0 0 4 81 0 0 85 2686 81.4
1200 0 0 0 53 6 0 59 2745 83.2
1300 0 0 0 14 57 0 71 2816 85.3
1400 0 0 0 9 55 0 64 2880 87.2
1500 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 2881 87.3
1600 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2881 87.3
1700 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2881 87.3
1800 0 0 0 69 26 0 95 2976 90.2
1900 0 0 0 58 39 0 97 3073 93.1
2000 0 0 10 37 0 0 47 3120 94.5
2100 0 0 0 60 0 0 60 3180 96.3
2200 0 0 25 36 0 0 61 3241 98.2
2300 0 0 33 27 0 0 60 3301 100.0
------------------------------------------------------
Total 0 291 1017 1712 281 0 3301
Gross QSOs=3354 Dupes=53 Net QSOs=3301
Unique callsigns worked = 2504
The best 60 minute rate was 150/hour from 0939 to 1038
The best 30 minute rate was 162/hour from 0939 to 1008
The best 10 minute rate was 186/hour from 0036 to 0045
The best 1 minute rates were:
5 QSOs/minute 1 times.
4 QSOs/minute 51 times.
3 QSOs/minute 340 times.
2 QSOs/minute 717 times.
1 QSOs/minute 638 times.
There were 794 bandchanges and 436 (13.2%) probable 2nd radio QSOs.
Number of letters in callsigns
Letters # worked
-----------------
3 34
4 1396
5 1170
6 668
7 11
8 16
9 6
Multi-band QSOs
---------------
1 bands 1887
2 bands 461
3 bands 132
4 bands 24
5 bands 0
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 0 106 491 1172 118 0
Antennas:
160M - inverted vee @90'
80M - delta loop @75'
40M - Cal-Av 2D-40A @110', 4-square (used together for Diversity RX) 20M -
4/4/4 SteppIRs @96'/64'/34' on TICs, C3E @50', 4-el @72'
15M - 4/4/4 SteppIRs @96'/64'/34' on TICs, C3E @50', 5-el @50'
10M - 4/4/4 SteppIRs @96'/64'/34' on TICs, C3E @50'. 6-el @115'
Tower#1: Force 12 EF-610, Cal-AV 2D-40A, 4-el SteppIRs, 160 inverted vee
770-MDP: Force-12 EF-420
AB-577 #1: Force-12 EF-515
AB-577 #2: Force-12 C3E
Delta loop hung from a tree
15m monobander got stuck by a tree branch at 270-degrees early on day 2 and
couldn't be rotated.
dual 580' beverage aimed 20/220 degrees
Equipment:
Elecraft K3/P3 + Alpha 87A, DXLog.net, YCCC SO2R Box, homebrew Windows antenna
switching/tuning software ("AntennaMaster"), 8" Windows tablet
Pro running AntennaMaster station software for wireless touch-screen
"button box", K1XM MOAS II USB Switch, TopTen and KK1L SO2R switches,
Green Heron and Hy-Gain rotor controllers, microHam Stack Switch and StackMax
Posted using 3830 Score Submittal Forms at: http://www.3830scores.com/
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