N6LL Op by WA6CDR
On quite late (0230z) started by S/P - mults/DX, never suspecting the all
time best (for me, at least) EU openings were in store. The DX window was
FULL... fortunately of DX, almost all the time. The window works because
most ops respected it. Please, lets keep it going! Wasted too much time
on HK1KXA (John- he was one of your pileups of w not calling EU in the
window) - Only 4 EU first nite (0245-0315) but got UA2FF.. (Yes, John, ZB
was close - thanks for hearing me thru him). Both nites there was no eu
sunrise peak -sigs dropped by 5z- -- notable strong but could not hear me -
SP5GRM, ON5XX. ZL2JR at 0731 KH8 ZK1 UA0 JA7NI all by 0840 (yes there was
a VK or 2- Missed Mike (HD) but tks VK3QI) ... VR2AX good sig 1330-1530Z
peaked 9+ but heard almost none of the 100 stns calling! (for me must be
payback for XZ1N!) wasted 45 mins twice- no Qso.
Thought the Fri nite EU opening was good - I do not hear EU well at N6LL due
North is a 2000 Ft cliff- no place for North beverages... but Sat -- some
of the standout stations were so loud that several of the locals who have
low dipoles on city lots were hearing on their Tx antennas - OT6T & GM3POI
were beacons.. SM5EDX called me to report hearing me at 14Z sat morning-
I heard VY1JA & KL7Y working lots of EU both mornings but NIL heard. Reminds
me of sitting at N6DX listening to UN2L CQ CQ for 45 mins well after our
sunrise a couple years back.. JA segment was full of very strong signals,
but no third or 4th layer to work (Typical in this test). The locals who
heard EU for the first time ever worked some of the JAs with their 100w and
low dipoles- the west coast 4th layer.. Heard XV7SW for a while but not too
strong and no W qsos noted.
summary- 15 EU for 13 EU countries, 57 JAs (by no means a record), 4 UA9/0
697Q 74/24 = 161896.. Where was VE2 & SFL? (for N6LL, a record country count
in this test- but not a personal record score)
Biggest DX complaint- why did FS/W2QM, KP3W & TI4CF only run for an hour or
so? W6 cannot get thru the east & south KWs in that time.. (guess I can't
really blame them... it probably isn't too much fun to get beat to death by
Ws just for showing up!)
Domestic thoughts- John, you are not alone --- Several times some LID
decided that my CQ freq could be his just by ignoring me. It mostly did not
work, but wasted 10-15 mins sometimes. I don't understand why some ops have
to be forced to realize that they are NOT being part of the "gentlemens
band" when they operate like lids - we all make mistakes, but REAL top band
ops know that and are courteous and admit them.
I suppose things have not really changed much... I remember griping about
the non top banders who showed up for the CQ 160 test - back in 60 or 61 for
the S/N 1 top band contest.
Will have the XZ1N report done in a couple days- if it as smaller than 15 K
or so, I'll post it based on the comments received sofar- if much larger,
I'll excerpt here and post a URL path.
73 robin, wa6cdr/n6ll xz1n et al wb6tza@compuall.net
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