Thanks to all who replied to my "kerchunk" of the Internet. I must have heard
from 50 guys who I had not seen or talked with for 20 years. Wow.
Anyway, I was disappointed to see the thread about gas disappear without
any real interesting and meaty discussions. We almost got there, but
we chickened out at the last minute. I liked the suggestion that W5WMU
(whom I do not know at all) tell us what his final tubes are and we can guess
the rest. We got a real good description of the antennas but there was a very
awkward silence about final tubes . . .
I know what happens here when you bring up something like this. You get
flamed unless you are willing to answer the same question about your own
final tubes. So, you ask, what does W7NI run? A pair of 4-1000A's in
parallel on 80 thru 10 and a single 4-1000A on 160. Seriously, I doubt
that you even care what I run since I haven't been in a serious constest
effort for at least 10 years. By the way, N7T?? N6TR has operated from my
shack but he refuses to use any of my radio equipment, especially the final.
He has always brought his own rig and used only my antennas.
It will be interesting to see what this note brings.
Stan Griffiths "W7NI@delphi.com"
>From Peter G. Smith" <n4zr@netcom.com Thu Aug 11 12:20:26 1994
From: Peter G. Smith" <n4zr@netcom.com (Peter G. Smith)
Subject: Stuff
Message-ID: <Pine.3.89.9408110449.A23277-0100000@netcom16>
Being among those who suggested the FINAL TUBES = ? test, Thank you for
your support :}
73, Pete
N4ZR@netcom.com
On Thu, 11 Aug 1994 W7NI@delphi.com wrote:
> Thanks to all who replied to my "kerchunk" of the Internet. I must have
> heard from 50 guys who I had not seen or talked with for 20 years. Wow.
>
> Anyway, I was disappointed to see the thread about gas disappear without
> any real interesting and meaty discussions. We almost got there, but
> we chickened out at the last minute. I liked the suggestion that W5WMU
> (whom I do not know at all) tell us what his final tubes are and we can guess
> the rest. We got a real good description of the antennas but there was a very
> awkward silence about final tubes . . .
>
> I know what happens here when you bring up something like this. You get
> flamed unless you are willing to answer the same question about your own
> final tubes. So, you ask, what does W7NI run? A pair of 4-1000A's in
> parallel on 80 thru 10 and a single 4-1000A on 160. Seriously, I doubt
> that you even care what I run since I haven't been in a serious constest
> effort for at least 10 years. By the way, N7T?? N6TR has operated from my
> shack but he refuses to use any of my radio equipment, especially the final.
> He has always brought his own rig and used only my antennas.
>
> It will be interesting to see what this note brings.
>
> Stan Griffiths "W7NI@delphi.com"
>
>From DAVID ROBBINS KY1H W-413-494-6955 H-413-655-2714
>ROBBINS@GUID2.DNET.GE.COM <robbins@guid2.dnet.ge.com> Thu Aug 11 12:26:30 1994
From: DAVID ROBBINS KY1H W-413-494-6955 H-413-655-2714
ROBBINS@GUID2.DNET.GE.COM <robbins@guid2.dnet.ge.com> (DAVID ROBBINS KY1H
W-413-494-6955 H-413-655-2714 ROBBINS@GUID2.DNET.GE.COM
<robbins@guid2.dnet.ge.com>)
Subject: score challenge
Message-ID: <9408111048.AA22063@thomas.ge.com>
Ever since getting in to contesting almost 10 years ago I have been bugged
by one aspect of our sport. That is the long delay between the event and
the rewards. In almost every other sport the final results are known within
minutes and awards are presented quickly. Maybe I am just too much of a
modern person and want my instant gratification, but there has to be a
better system than waiting 6 to 9 months for final results and over a year
in some cases for certificates. Granted, it takes time for mail to arrive
from around the world, and there is a couple month lead time on magazine
printings, but in this age of electronic mail we have the technology to
make it better!
Another part of this is the mixed up way that the contest sponsors accept
logs. The ARRL has done the best job of coming into the modern age by
accepting logs directly and without paper. CQ is really backwards by
requiring paper logs, but then also requiring electronic logs insome cases.
At one point there was an advantage to sending electronic logs by getting
a lower penalty for bad calls, but I think that went away.
There has also been some talk about post-contest processing of logs. I have
always taken time after a contest to go back and check for bad calls, obvious
typos, and things the computer may miss. I even have a program that checks
logs against a set of rules to spot possible bad calls. In the days of paper
logs when you had to check dupe sheets and mult sheets by hand this could
take a couple of weeks in between getting ready for other contests and just
living, these days I can do it in an hour or two for a bigger log. I know
I should do it immediately after the contest when it is all fresh in my mind,
but because I know that the mailing deadline is weeks away I put it off and
then forget something, or rush and miss a dumb typo and then loose extra
qso's for the penalty.
So, now that I have done my complaining, what is the solution??? Well there
isn't any perfect solution yet, it will still take a while for those using
paper logs, and those in some countries with slow mail service a long time
to get in their results. But as has been noted in some of the magazines
that have done statistics on the submitted logs, a good percentage of the
tops scores arrive electronically. This statistic could be used to help
improve itself if it is handled correctly. My idea is this:
For electronic logs that are post-marked within 24(48?) hrs of the end of the
contest either by e-mail or on floppy reduce the penalty for busted QSOs and
Mults by 50%(or more?). Within 2 weeks of the end of the contest publish a
high claimed list electronically on this reflector, on a BBS for download, and
send printed copies to those who send an SASE. It would be nice if this
list gave the band breakdown on at least the top 10(all?) scores in each class
since that info is something I find important to know where we need
improvement.
Now I know that the log handlers may not like this at first, but I think in
the long run it may provide more incentive for others to send in electronic
logs. And it should help get some logs in earlier so the real checking can
get started in a more timely manner. Of course this won't fix the long
delay for publication and certificates, but it could help get the information
out that I know that I would like to see earlier. Maybe this could be
expanded to get paper logs in sooner also by giving them a smaller incentive
if they are post-marked within a week of the end of the contest.
Who will be the first to take this step toward reduced cycle time for contest
results?
73, Dave KY1H Robbins@guid2.dnet.ge.com
>From jtp1@gte.com (John Pescatore) Thu Aug 11 12:23:20 1994
From: jtp1@gte.com (John Pescatore) (John Pescatore)
Subject: KH2F meteor grid-pedition
Message-ID: <199408111123.HAA15708@bunny.gte.com>
Look for KH2F (+W3LPL) today and tonight from FM27 during the Perseids
meteor shower. They are enconced in a camper on the eastern shore of the
Chesapeake Bay, just north of the Bay Bridge/Tunnel. They will be on 2 and
6, and making skeds on the 75/80M freqs.
John
John Pescatore
GTE Government Systems
Rockville, MD
jtp1@gte.com
>From Trey Garlough <GARLOUGH@TGV.COM> Thu Aug 11 16:07:01 1994
From: Trey Garlough <GARLOUGH@TGV.COM> (Trey Garlough)
Subject: score challenge
Message-ID: <776617621.531498.GARLOUGH@TGV.COM>
> For electronic logs that are post-marked within 24(48?) hrs of the end of the
> contest either by e-mail or on floppy reduce the penalty for busted QSOs and
> Mults by 50%(or more?).
I don't mean to take one small piece of Dave's suggestion and nit-pick,
but this is the type of thing you bump into when you look at real time
submission of logs, or submitting them within 24 hours of the contest:
I takes a day to get from California to Quito. There is a telephone system
in Ecuador, but it's not great. You wouldn't want to try to upload your
log to the ARRL via modem from there. I sat in HC5K's office in Cuenca
quite a bit when I was there, and the #1 thing the office help does is
call people on the phone *over and over* until they get a connection.
Once you are in Quito, you spend another day getting to San Cristobal (HC8)
becuase there is one flight per day and it's at midday. You can pretty
much forget about telephones on HC8. They do all of their communication
to the mainland via HF. They don't do satellites in Ecuador -- there
are some kind of politcal and financial issues involved.
People in Ecuador (and really any other place I have been) give you letters
targeted for the states to carry back on the airplane and ask you to post
them from Miami (or wherever) because it's faster and more reliable than
posting them from the DX spot. (And please no flames telling me this is
illegal -- I'm not interested in hearing about it.)
The earliest I could get back to the states after operating a contest
at HC8 would be more than 48 hours after the contest, and I don't think
I would put my body through that.
Oops, didn't mean to ramble on, but I just wanted to raise the point
that global communication is not quite what we imagine it to be.
--Trey, WN4KKN/6
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