Good points Jim and Ted. When operating in or promoting a State QSO Party,
there are many things to consider. I believe foremost is participation,
from within and external to the home State/Area. Within the State, working
other counties and other multipliers are as important, sometimes more so,
than making QSO's. Thus, operating on 80m/75m and 40m can make a huge
difference in scores.
I worked portable for this past Saturday's Colorado QSO Party at the
intersection of three "rare" counties. Much to my surprise, there was no
80m/75m (that I could copy) at the beginning or end of the event. My
strategy was to work and stations I could find, move up to 40m, and then
20m. I did the opposite at the end of the event.
Using W6SX's advice, thanks Hank, I ran stations all the time excluding my
pointless forays below 40m and above 20m. I only changed bands/modes when
runs dried up. I operated both 40m and 20m, alternating between the two.
Thus, I made my counties available to both "locals" and out-of-State
stations.
I made 828 QSO's on 40m and 695 on 20m. That led to 52 and 59 mults
respectively. From that, I conclude working both 40m and 20m was critical
to my score. Looking at N1MM+'s graph of QSO's/hour by band shows I should
still have operated 40m more during the middle four hours and probably lost
some multipliers by staying exclusively on 20m then. Another lesson
learned!
It's difficult to achieve the "perfect" balance, but it's obvious that
in-State competitors need to balance local and distant contacts to achieve
the best possible scores. Additionally, if we don't try to run up
out-of-state QSO's, those participants, as Jim points out, will become fewer
and fewer. We need guys like John, N6MU, who follows me from band-to-band.
Thanks John! Too bad we couldn't make contact on 80m.
One more point. It was obvious that the great majority of my COQP QSO's
were with non-contesters, especially on SSB. Treating them well is a big
part, IMHO, of every contest. I often used a voice recording "begging" for
contacts--it worked, even better than my short SSB CQ, one designed to
attract fellow contesters.
I believe the more contacts we make, the more fun everyone has in these (and
other events). That's why I'm a big fan of mobiles running APRS, allowing
self-spots for mobiles and portable stations without changing their
categories to assisted. And not "charging" them for another operator when
someone else drives and doesn't make contact is both safer and seems fair to
me. However, convincing sponsors to change QSO Party rules if often a
challenge.
All-in-all, it was a fun event in spite of the previous day's solar event
and resulting decline in propagation. We only traveled a little over 200
miles to that alfalfa field. Coincidentally, a deputy sheriff dropped by to
check us out as we finished setup Friday. His call is KD0SAU--small world!
73, Bill, K8TE
Faith, Family, Radio-Life is Good!
------------------------------
Message: 2
Date: Tue, 5 Sep 2017 09:29:49 -0700
From: Jim Brown <k9yc@audiosystemsgroup.com>
To: cq-contest <cq-contest@contesting.com>
Subject: Re: [CQ-Contest] Tennessee QSO Party 2017 - Sunday September
3
Message-ID:
<b1b61dbe-15ba-d3cb-6870-6bc92133d33c@audiosystemsgroup.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8; format=flowed
Hi Ted,
If this is to be the attitude, I think QSO parties are going to lose a lot
of support out here. That may not matter to you, but it is a major
disappointment for those of us who enjoy it.? Here's what an OT posted on
the NCCC reflector reporting his TNQP score:
> Other than MIQP, I'm about to give up on eastern QSO parties.?
> In-state turnout is really poor, and they QSY to 40 to run up their
> own scores with the east coast stations while the sun is still high in
> the sky out here on the western frontier.? Throw a party and then
> abandon a bunch of your guests ... seems a bit rude.
This is from a guy who, like me, has been part of at least a dozen
expeditions to light up rare counties for CQP and 7QP. Out here, these
expeditions require major efforts equal to or greater than the serious /M
efforts by teams led by guys like W0BH and K4BAI. We typically drive
200 miles or more each way to a a site where we set up antennas good enough
to put decent signals into the east coast on all the contest bands except
160. And these locations must be scouted. N6RNO spent an entire weekend
finding what turned out to be a great site in Tehama Co.
W6GJB, W6JTI, and I spent four days making three round trips across NV to
light up 7 counties in 7QP.? We spent five days doing it in UT. Note that
the NV border is 6 hours away, and UT is more like 14 hours.? We're thinking
about ID and eastern OR for next year.
73, Jim K9YC
On 9/4/2017 1:06 PM, Ted Bryant wrote:
> In the afternoon we always try spend some time on 40 and 20m from
> each county. But it's a numbers game, Jim. And I know you're aware of
this.
> Around 23z, 80m begins to come alive for the mobiles here, especially in
> Eastern TN. Also around that time the skip on 20m gets very long. There
> are a lot of unanswered CQ's and it just cannot support the activity
> to compare with 40 or 80m. And in a short contest like this, rate is key.
>
> Thank you for the many QSO's yesterday, wish it could have been even more.
>
> 73, Ted W4NZ
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: CQ-Contest [mailto:cq-contest-bounces@contesting.com] On Behalf
> Of Jim Brown
> Sent: Sunday, September 03, 2017 7:47 PM
> To: cq-contest
> Subject: Re: [CQ-Contest] Tennessee QSO Party 2017 - Sunday September
> 3
>
> It's not much fun when one of the two mobiles abandons 20M hours
> before the band closes and doesn't show up on 20 in several counties
> before that. I gave up around 23Z, and won't bother to submit a log.
>
> 73, Jim K9YC
>
> On 9/1/2017 10:27 AM, Ted Bryant wrote:
>> With all the contest activity this weekend and being a holiday
>> weekend as well, don't forget that we're having a party in Tennessee,
>> the Tennessee QSO Party - on Sunday after things have calmed down a bit.
>> Don't shut your radio off, come join us. Chase the mobiles across
>> the Tennessee hillsides through our 95 counties. The party is only
>> 540 minutes (9 hrs) long so it should be fast-paced, non-stop action.
>> Awards for those who make 100 QSO's or more.
> _______________________________________________
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