ARRL DX Contest, CW
Call: N4TZ/9
Operator(s): N4TZ/9
Station: N4TZ/9
Class: SOAB HP
QTH: IN
Operating Time (hrs): 42
Radios: SO2R
Summary:
Band QSOs Mults
-------------------
160: 63 40
80: 150 65
40: 457 80
20: 725 92
15: 469 81
10: 144 52
-------------------
Total: 2008 410 Total Score = 2,466,150
Club: Society of Midwest Contesters
Comments:
Woulda, coulda, shoulda.
I just got whupped. Lots of reasons, no excuses.
Just the facts, ma'am.
Because of the expected decline of high frequency propagation,
I decided to run high power. Friday afternoon I roll out the
125 foot long extension cord to the family clothes dryer, with
strict orders from the boss to leave the dryer running until
30 minutes before the contest. Further complicating the setup
was the arrival of the UPS truck with the new TenTec Orion
that same afternoon. Fortunately, despite frequent hand-wringing
on various reflectors on how hard the Orion is to interface
with amplifiers and SO2R boxes, it took me less than one minute
to make all necessary connections.
I started the contest trolling the bands with the OMNI VI+ and
Hercules II 500w autoswitching amp while getting the feel of the
Orion and the Titan amp. The latest verion of the Orion firmware
certainly fixed the distracting tuning step stutter while S&P
tuning. An hour into the contest I decide to try to find a hole
on 40m to try CQing. This has always been a real problem for
me with low power. Another 12dB of power certainly helps here,
but even a pair of Cushcraft 40m antennas on a 120' tower is not
competitive. Nearly nine hours of operating time during the
weekend netted only 457 QSOs on 40.
Like most operators, I was delighted by the great 80 and 160
conditions. I made most of my 160 Qs using the 500w OMNI setup
because I found that 1500 watts made the TopTen band decoder
lights blink. Since my entire station and antenna switching
is controlled by these boxes, I decided discretion was the
better part of valor. No problem was noted on any other band.
Since I had to roll up the extension cord immediately after
the contest, I still haven't been able to trouble shoot this.
I compared my rate sheets for the 2002 contest, when I ran low
power and made 552 more contacts. I paid particular attention
to the "footings" on the OH2MM reports which I have included
below:
160 80 40 20 15 10 Total
Hours/hourly rate
2004
D1 1.8/22 3.0/32 5.5/50 4.7/60 6.1/63 1.9/68 22.9/53
D2 1.3/19 2.5/21 3.4/53 9.5/46 1.8/48 0.5/31 19.1/42
TO 3.0/21 5.5/27 8.9/51 14.3/51 7.9/59 2.4/60 42.0/48
2002
D1 1.0/23 2.6/37 2.3/60 3.8/91 5.9/64 8.4/67 24.0/64
D2 0.1/23 0.9/18 2.0/38 8.0/55 3.8/50 5.8/51 20.6/50
TO 1.1/23 3.4/32 4.2/50 11.8/66 9.8/59 14.2/60 44.5/57
QSO/MULT
2004
D1 39/30 96/54 276/76 286/69 381/76 128/46 1206/351
D2 24/10 54/11 181/4 439/23 88/5 16/6 802/59
TO 63/40 150/65 457/80 725/92 469/81 144/52 2008/410
2002
D1 22/17 95/48 136/49 343/52 382/67 562/67 1540/300
D2 3/2 16/4 74/8 439/26 192/11 296/20 1020/71
TO 25/19 111/52 210/57 782/78 574/78 858/87 2560/371
A basic economic principle for optimizing output is that the
marginal rates should be equal for substitues. For bands that
are likely to be open at the same time (substitutes), the rates
should be equal. If one band has a higher rate, that means that
I did not operate it enough, becuase that band's higher rate
could have been substituted for the adjacent band's lower rate.
Rate should be modified to include the impact of multipliers.
The average tradeoff over the contest was 1 new multiplier for
every 5 QSOs. So, I recalculated the above data to show
effective QSOs = QSO + 5*mult. Average rate was calculated by
dividing the effective QSOs by the number of operating hours.
2004
Band 160 80 40 20 15 10
Q 63 150 457 725 469 144
M 40 65 80 92 81 52
Hours 3 5.5 8.9 14.3 7.9 2.4
EffQ 263 475 857 1185 874 404
EffRate 88 86 96 83 111 168
2002
Q 25 111 210 782 574 858
M 19 52 57 78 78 87
Hours 1.1 3.4 4.2 11.8 9.8 14.2
EffQ 120 371 495 1172 964 1293
EffRate 109 109 118 99 98 91
>From these data I conclude that in 2004 I seriously
neglected 10m, and also 15m. I spent way too much
time on 20m during the day Sunday. Looking at the
results for K9NW and N9CK shows that both had a lot
more QSOs on 15 than I did, and Mike had more to show
on 10m. I didn't have much luck finding stations on
10 and 15 on Sunday using the second radio. Apparently
I should have tried to CQ there anyway.
A couple of minor problems with using a newer version
of TRLog. First, EXCHANGERADIOS did not copy the
correct frequency from either radio. I verified this
after the contest. Second, I would sometimes find that
my run frequency had suddenly shifted down a few hundred
hertz even with the VFO lock on. KE5C pointed out that
the default for TRLog is that the shift keys tune the
VFO! So, next time I'll set that option off. It wasn't
a problem with the older OMNI VI rigs because this TRLog
option doesn't affect them.
Although disappointed with my score, I had a great time.
Posted using 3830 Score Submittal Forms at: http://www.hornucopia.com/3830score/
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