CQWW WPX Contest, CW
Call: WW4M
Operator(s): W4ZV
Station: W4ZV
Class: SOSB10 HP
QTH: NC
Operating Time (hrs): 6
Summary:
Band QSOs
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160:
80:
40:
20:
15:
10: 222
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Total: 222 Prefixes = 177 Total Score = 81,774
Club: Potomac Valley Radio Club
Comments:
Ugh! I don't think this one was really meant to be for me. It started out with
my trusty FT-1000MP losing an amplifier stage (driver?) Friday morning which
gave me a maximim of 25 watts output, so I boxed it up and dug out my
TS-930S...at least nobody should complain about clicks!
The week before the contest, I was optimistic about beating my SOSB/10
record from last year since the WWV numbers were forecasted to be 175/10 and
175/8 versus last year's 147/10 and 147/5...well the geomagnetic field might be
a little more unstable but not bad. Wednesday's very high velocity CME at 0034
UTC failed to have much impact when it arrived much sooner than expected
Thursday just after 10 UTC...plenty of time for things to settle down by the
weekend.
The contest started out poorly and went down hill from there! This year
I had 124/91 when I quit Friday night versus 213/138 last year. I was hopeful
conditions would improve by Saturday morning but unfortunately they didn't!
Last year my first EU QSO was at 0949...this year at 1018...oh well the band
will still open but just a little later...WRONG! I kept rotating the antennas
and the band never seemed to open to the north. Last year I was running direct
path by 11 UTC and had a 73 hour which was the best for Saturday (and Sunday was
much better)..this year it was only 25 (almost all S&P via scatter). I heard
only a couple of very weak JA's via long path both of whom I had already worked
by SW scatter the previous night. At ~12 UTC Charlanne brought me a cup a
coffee, looked at the screen and said "Pretty slow huh...why don't you just go
to the mountains with me?" Hmmm...the weather IS awfully nice outside!
I kept at it and began to wonder if there was something wrong with the
TS-930. Occasionally I would get excited when the S-meter would move off zero
but it was usually a South American. OC4WW really gave me a thrill when I first
thought he was Belguim...until I realized it was Peru! Nevertheless I
had managed to snag several goodies like OD5, HZ1, A61, ZD9, TA3 and JY9...but
most signals were so weak I thought I was on 160 at times.
Finally I came to my senses and said "Why am I doing this? It's not fun
and there is NO WAY I am going to beat last year." I was at about half last
year's QSO total when I finally decided to quit and headed for the mountains
with Charlanne. In retrospect, it's interesting to see that the actual WWV
numbers for the weekend were reported as 183/3 for Saturday and 183/9 for
Sunday. Normally this would equate to excellent conditions on 10 but my guess
is that there were some other effects going on which did not show up in the WWV
numbers...perhaps due to a recurring coronal hole.
Thanks to all who I struggled with many repeats to get your numbers and
I hope you had more fun in the contest than I did! We had a great time in the
mountains and really enjoyed seeing Mountain Laurel and Rhododendron in bloom
along the Blue Ridge Parkway...there's always next year for the contest!
73, Bill W4ZV
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