As someone who has spent the past 10 years competitively low power
contesting at 100 and 150W depending on the contest, I can tell you that it
does make a difference. I have routinely experimented in contests that I am
not competing in or DXing. Its that marginal time of the station saying
"the N1 station?" and then sometimes the next time says "the W1?" and you
think "oh no - he was getting it". Right there, at that instant, I have
found that about 1/3 of the time, the 1.7dB can complete the still marginal
Q, pretty much immediately when its going to work.
So as I layout thousands of feet of radial wire for 160 even though the text
book says that the last 50% of the work might only add 2dB, you know why you
are doing it. Or countless other projects that add 1db or 0.5dB at a time.
For the record, I have 2 x FT1000MP Mk Vs and one of the reasons was to have
the 150W capability for the ARRL contests.
73
Ed N1UR
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