Hi everyone,
Here's my second contest report to this reflector. Thanks to those of you
who wrote after my first report.
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K3WWP's Contest Station
I operate 'pure' QRP (and CW only) with an actual radiated power
around 5 W using the following:
Transmitter: Homebrew tube rig with a 6Y6 final amplifier
Transmitter Power Output: 5 W on all bands
Antennas: 160/80/40/15 - Random wire with apex 30 ft high
20 - Ground mounted vertical dipole
10 - Sloping dipole with center 20 ft high
Receiver: ICOM R71A Transmatch: Homebrew
Keyer: CMOS Super Keyer II with a homebrew paddle
QTH: On a small lot in a town in a river valley.
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This one was a lot of fun with all the bands open from 160-10. I think this
is the first contest since I started operating 'pure' QRP 4 years ago that
I had at least 10 QSO's on each band in a contest. Everyone was copying my
sigs very well - few repeats necessary on my part, and even stations that
were weak here copied me well.
Had a real pipeline into AL/MS thanks mostly to the sporadic E propagation.
15 AL QSO's and 8 MS QSO's. All last year I had only 45 AL QSO's and 15 MS
QSO's.
Thanks to the following for working me on 5 bands: KS9K, K0RX, N0NI.
The only disappointment on my part came from not being able to work the
HR3/ stations. Heard them fairly well on 15 and 40, but couldn't work the
one on 15 even though his CQ's were going unanswered at times. The one on
40 was S&Ping when I heard him. HR is the only mainstream DX country I need
in this hemisphere.
Jeff, W9MSE, made up for my disappointment somewhat by offering to QSY to
12 to give me a new band-state there. Thanks, Jeff.
A few stations along the way asked me to QSY to another band, but I had to
turn them down for a couple of reasons. #1, I was sure my 'pure' QRP
signals wouldn't make it to them on that particular band at that time even
though I may have been strong on the band we were on at the time. #2, It is
not easy for me to change bands quickly. I don't have a station with all
the bells and whistles of most contesters, i.e. transceivers, automatic
antenna tuners, etc. I must change 12-14 controls to change bands on this
old homebrew equipment.
I enjoyed some of the names in the contest like Dogbert, Sluggo, Zip, Frog,
Sharp, Shane, etc. It was interesting at times hearing stations trying to
copy some of these. Those with the unusual names got asked for repeats many
times. How about having a contest some time where instead of a name,
everyone sends a random 5 letter group - xqgfd, ghioa, naimy, for example.
That should prove interesting.
This remains one of my favorite contests. I like the time frame, the
somewhat different exchange, and the fact that it seems to be more of a fun
contest than the SS, ARRL DX, CQWW, etc. contests. It reminds me of the old
CD Parties that I used to enjoy so much. Do you remember them?
If you read my letter about the NAQP's a few issues ago in the NCJ, you
will know that Bruce promised that they would start noting QRP stations in
the results. So if you entered with QRP as I did, be sure to mention that
when you report your results.
I used CT v6.26 in this contest. I used the WPX contest and entered the
state/province/country in the number field (the program accepts anything 4
characters or less here) and noted the names down on paper as I went along.
I know that a newer/different contest program would be better, but CT 6.26
has the best price for me, and also works on the old Tandy 1000SX computer
I use in the shack. There is more work to do after the contest, but by
importing the CT .all file into Quattro Pro and doing some juggling, I can
then export it as a .dbf file, import that into my master Foxbase file, and
do the final processing as I do with all my contests. It sound much harder
than it actually is.
Here are my results:
I operated the full 10 hours. SO.
QSO's Mults
160 39 16
80 67 25
40 67 29
20 41 18
15 34 15
10 10 6
tot 258 109 = 28,122 points
That's my best ever QSO's, mults, and score in a NAQP which means that I
won, since I really only enter contests to compete against myself.
If you want to learn more about my ham adventures with 'pure' QRP, come
visit K3WWP's Ham Radio Activities on the web at:
http://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/3852
73, John, K3WWP
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