ARRL September VHF Contest
Call: K1TEO
Operator(s): K1TEO
Station: K1TEO
Class: Single Op HP
QTH: FN31/CT
Operating Time (hrs): 20
Summary:
Band QSOs Mults
-------------------
6: 186 46
2: 116 31
222: 74 27
432: 50 15
903: 24 16
1.2:
2.3: 14 11
3.4: 10 9
5.7:
10G:
24G:
-------------------
Total: 474 155 Total Score = 111,290
Club: North East Weak Signal Group
Comments:
Having been off of 144 and 432 since a microburst toppled my largest tower and
destroyed most of the antennas on other towers in Mid May, I decided to try
something temporary for this contest. I put up a 2M ant on the side mount I have
off my 6 meter tower. The antenna was just above the rotor about 18 ft off the
ground. For 432 I put up a mast on my backyard deck, with a rotor on the deck.
That antenna was about 20 ft up.
It was nice to be back on both bands, albeit in a very limited fashion. Both
bands were looking into heavy foliage, and in fact the 432 ant was actually
touching oak leaves - and wet ones at that with rain both days. Usually my side
mounted 6M antenna can turn about 75 degrees. Adding the 2M antenna limited
rotation to about 240 degs to 280 degs as with the closer element spacing on 2M
vs 6M the elements touched the tower at that point. As it turned out there was
s7- s9 noise all day on Saturday and most of Sunday. I had been hoping to work
stations off the back of the antenna but with the noise that was not possible
except for very strong stations. So essentially it was an exercise in torture
with the heavy foliage attenuation, inability to turn the antenna and
debilitating noise. You've got to be a gluten to operate with this scenario and
I guess I qualify!
While 432 could turn it was looking into my house from N to SSE. I thought it
would still be ok but as it turned out the house was a very effective block on
all signals. The lack of much on 2M hindered the rest of the operation as I find
that many Q's are found on 2M with a QSY to other bands. Even 6M is hurt as I
work many tropo grids on that band by finding distant stations on 2M and moving
them over to 6. Despite all the challenges it was still nice to get back on 2
and 432. Hopefully I will be back on normally soon with a replacement tower on
its way.
Activity seemed down quite a bit but of course it's hard to know for sure given
the limitations I had this contest. One thing that was definitely noticeable was
the lack of rovers. Condx were not very good with rainy condx both days and it
was unusually windy Sunday for this time of year with a steady breeze blowing.
Tnx for the Q's.
Jeff K1TEO
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