[VHFcontesting] Re:ERP-based Entry Classes

[N1OFZ <n1ofz@arrl.net>]

I have been rereading and rethinking Ev's proposal for many days now.  
It got me to thinking about why these changes were suggested in the 
first place.  Increased participation in the higher bands.  I'm pretty 
sure the changing the scoring to ERP is not going to do that.

17 of 445 class A ops used bands over 1296 in the June 2003 contest.  
Out of the top 10 class A ops only 1 had bands over 1296.  Further, 
that op only had 2304 and made 2Q's.  So it is pretty clear that you 
don't need a lot of bands to win SOLP.  On the other hand, 29 of 157 
class B ops used bands over 1296.  6 out of the top 10 ops had bands 
over 1296.  Looks like to be competitive in SOHP you have to have more 
bands.  Dare I say that there is almost a self imposed (natural) 5 band 
limit in SOLP?

The focus of increasing participation on the higher bands needs to be 
on finding an inexpensive, plug and play way of getting the large 
number of guys with IC-706's, FT-100's and all the other HF-VHF/UHF 
rigs on SHF+.  The guys who can build transverters themselves and the 
scrounger/modifier are probably already on these bands.  What is left 
is a big pool of people who need a way.  Telling them to shell out 
$400+ for a transverter and then a few more hundred for feed line, 
relays, etc,  doesn't make sense to them.  They probably only spent 
$500-1000 for a rig that does HF-UHF.  Why does it cost almost as much 
to add one SHF band?  Why bother?  The stats show it is not even going 
to help their score much.  Where does ERP classes provide an incentive 
to add more bands?  If anything it might move some of the existing SOLP 
into SOHP which may not make them too happy.

In general guys who want to get on other bands do it because they want 
to.  Curiosity, the challenge and I'm sure many other reasons.  The 
only way to get the 'general population' to do it is to make it easy 
and cheap to do.  No contest rules change is going to do it...

Dana
N1OFZ

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