Activity seemed very poor. Maybe my antenna was shorted out, except that it was
picking up the rain static exceedingly well at 58 to 59. When that was going on
I could not hear anything. Between the heavy rain and the static, it was not a
pleasant night. I hung around until a few minutes after nine PM. The rain was
falling so hard that there was running water everywhere. The rain static was
coming and going, so I finally bagged it. Maybe if I did not have to brave the
outdoors to get to the ham shack and fire up the generator, I might have stayed
at the rig a bit longer.
Not sure of the score, My handwriting is a mess, but it looks like 15 grids
and 28 QSOs. Some good contacts were W4TJ and K8TQK while the rain static was
off. I heard W9RM very well and gave a couple of calls but no luck. When the
rain static was in, I could not hear anything. It drowned out almost everyone.
Quite a frustrating night. The antenna needs work. I discovered that my uptilt
position has infinite VSWR and one of the antennas is stuck with a broken
rotor.
This was the first 50 MHz Sprint I have managed to operate. Happy to work a
few of the locals W1ZC, W1OUN, and KO1U were keeping northern New England
hopping despite the adverse conditions. I also got to try out my new K3 on six
for the first time. After a few hiccups, it was working pretty well.I found
that 8 watts was good enough for full power out of the big amp. It has a second
receiver, which is nice for monitoring video subcarriers or 50.125 while
operating elsewhere. The built in voice and CW keyers were nice for saving the
lungs. I keep forgetting the voice keyer is there! I spent much of the time
during the sprint fiddling with settings on the radio. It filled in the time
when the rain static was awful and contacts were few.
Thanks to the SE VHF Society for sponsoring an activity builder on VHF!!
73
Dave K1WHS
_______________________________________________
VHFcontesting mailing list
VHFcontesting@contesting.com
http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/vhfcontesting
|