North American QSO Party, CW
Call: VA7ST
Operator(s): VA7ST
Station: VA7ST
Class: Single Op LP
QTH: BC
Operating Time (hrs): 9
Summary:
Band QSOs Mults
-------------------
160: 3 3
80: 48 20
40: 138 42
20: 161 38
15: 35 12
10: 1 1
-------------------
Total: 386 116 Total Score = 44,776
Club:
Team: TCG #3
Comments:
SO1R Gear:
* FT-2000 + N1MM Logger
* Tribander at 40'
* 40M twin half-square array
* 80M 2-element wire vertical array
* Inv-L 160M (70' high, 60' horizontal)
Flux: 66 | Ap: 2 | Kp: 2 -- no sunspots
Had hoped for a great day, but this was not a very good showing from southern
B.C. High-band conditions were not good here.
20M was very noisy, with both QRN and power line noise. Qs and mults were down
dramatically from 2007: 239/48 > 161/38. Didn't have many good runs at all.
15M was quiet with good signal strength but not many stations heard (more
worked than last year, but mults down -- 18 > 12).
Nice to see folks down south raking in the contacts on 10M, but up here just
one station heard, one worked. Perhaps we're a few months behind for high-band
improvement. Not sure how the band can improve if the solar indices haven't
improved over the past two years. Definitely no change up here.
40M was OK but not great. Managed to equal last year's 42 mults, but Qs were
down a lot -- 161 > 138. And that's with a 3dB improvement in antenna
performance.
80M felt really bad, but I managed to beat last year's mults by 2, though the
QSO count was down 70 > 48. QRN was big, and signals beyond CO were pretty
rough.
Was difficult to stay in the chair during the daylight hours with rates so low.
Stayed in there to help TCG #3 team, though it felt like a lost cause from here.
I truly felt like I was in an RF black hole -- with few states looking my way.
When propagation is good, it's not so bad being off the side of someone's beam,
but when signals are weak anyway, there's far less hope of being heard. Sure
could tell who was aiming at me and who wasn't. The BC mult is easy to get, but
it requires rotator movement.
Had a lot of fun at times, though. Highlight was that first move to 40M in
early evening, searching and pouncing on fresh mult after mult. What a blast!
The rapid rise in points helped soothe the pain of seeing my low score all day
on livescores.org (I was the lone Zone 3 station posting, and most guys posting
yesterday moved to 40M much -- hours -- earlier so their mult totals went up
quickly, leaving me in the dust).
Was happy with the phased 80M verticals and 40M half-square twin phased array.
Not happy at all with the old Moseley Classic-33's performance -- it used to be
far better even at 45' but score trends tell me something's not right. Gotta
figure out why I was down 80 Qs and 10 mults on 20M this year.
Thanks for the Qs, and special thanks to NCJ for the contest!
Year-over-year for August NAQP:
2008 386 116 44,776
2007: 481 131 63,011
2006: 457 129 58,953
2005: 419 129 54,051 <- added tower and beam
2004: 175 72 12,600 <- wires only
2003: 261 86 22,446
2002: 191 72 13,752
-- Bud VA7ST
http://www3.telus.net/va7st
Posted using 3830 Score Submittal Forms at: http://www.hornucopia.com/3830score/
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