January 1998 NA QSO Party SSB
N2GA (@N2FF)
606 QSO's 151 multipliers = 91,506 points (10 hours)
Station used: Frank Fallon's QTH in East Williston (Long Island), New York
Team Affiliation: Long Island Mobile Amateur Radio Club (LIMARC)
Equipment: Yaesu FT1000MP, 100W, 10/15/20 Quad@50 feet, 40 and 80 dipoles
Hope everyone had fun! I had a VERY interesting experience this year! Many
obstacles had to be overcome in order to even participate. Let me tell you my
story first and then the results.
First, I was in Dallas all week on business. My plane didn't arrive at
LaGuardia until 9pm Friday! Diane K2DO picked me up and by the time we got
home it was 11pm. I was all wound up, still on central time and could not go
to bed. Had a bite to eat and then snoozed off about 1:30am.
Woke up about 8am Saturday morning. After the normal morning activities, I
helped Diane get set up for the contest as she was using our station for the
contest. We went over the tuner, antenna switch settings, computer, voice
keyer, etc. She was going to crank the tower up, so I didn't have to worry
about that. By the time we were done it was 11am! Contest was to start at
1pm EST so didn't have much time to waste!
Into the car went my headset, but I had no footswitch. Off to Radio Shack and
I purchased a footswitch and adapter. Thinking the rig used a 1/8 inch plug,
I bought an adapter that went from 3/32 inch (footswitch output) to 1/8 inch
(radio input). Made it to Frank's house at 12:30pm, 1/2 hour to go, plenty of
time right?
First, I tried to plug in the foot switch, but the rig took a RCA plug!
Looked around the room where Frank keeps his adapters. Could not find any 1/8
to RCA adapter. I figured then I'd use VOX. I know I had done it before on
the FT1000MP but didn't know how to set the VOX delay and VOX gain controls!
Couldn't get them working. Besides that, my headset mike wasn't sending audio
to the MP!
The only other microphone was the handmike attached to Frank's MP. It off
course had a PTT on it, but the prospect of using a handmike for 10 hours was
not appealing! So, back to the footswitch I went! I finally found a cable
with an RCA plug on one end that was stripped to bare wire on the other. I
had luckily brought electrical tape with me and used it to tape the bare wire
to the connector of the foot switch! Luckily it worked! One problem solved.
Next, I still had ONLY the hand mike. Now I could key it by foot, but how to
position it to the correct place for good ergonomics? I looked around and
Frank had a "fish immobilizer" laying in the corner. This was basically a
large bat type object about 2 feet long! I taped the hand mike to the end of
it and used two unused computer switch boxes to lean it on with the end stuck
under the computer monitor! Instant boom mike! It was crude but effective!
Second problem solved.
It was now getting VERY late! It was 12:55pm and I still hadn't set up the
computer! I figured this would be fast and easy! Wrong again! I turned on
the computer and Frank had put Windows 95 on it! So, knowing the program
would only work in DOS mode, I immediately tried to shut down and restart in
DOS mode. It tried but then hung up! I thought "Oh great - no computer". I
then made my first big mistake - I pressed RESET on the computer! Windows 95
doesn't like that! It restarted in SAFE mode and then wouldn't let me
shutdown and restart in DOS! I had to shutdown normally, restart and try
again. Luckily the second time, it did restart in DOS mode! Third problem
solved.
By now it was 1pm. I heard the contest start on the radio and I was still not
ready! If you know me, you know that I MUST be on the air right at the start
and better yet - have a run frequency going before the contest! Oh well - not
to be today. I looked through the subdirectories and found NA. Great I
thought, I'll start it right up. I typed in NA and the program was something
like version 6.0! Oh no. I exited knowing I had version 9 somewhere on
disk. Finally found it in the NA9 directory! Loaded it up and then saw it
did not have FT1000MP support! I would have to change bands manually (ALT
F1/ALT F2). I then realized I hadn't started the voice keyer TSR. Exited
again, typed DVPTSR and got that going. Restarted NA, keyed in the pertinent
information and got to the logging screen finally! It was now about 1:10 pm
- - I had "lost" 10 minutes! Fourth problem solved!
Then I tried to use the voice keyer - it would record but wouldn't key the
radio! I tried everything - using a second memory position, OPON, PTT - but
it just wouldn't work. So I resolved I would have to work the whole contest
without it. Oh well.
I started on 15 and then immediately switched to 20! Spent the first few
hours switching back and fourth between them. I checked 10 every now and
then, but no activity there so back to 15 and 20. Eventually I did work 17
QSO's on 10 for 6 mults but could really sustain any rate. As night fell, I
switched down to 40 and had my best run there for an hour - using only Frank's
dipole! Wow! I can only imagine how good it could have been with a two
element 40 meter beam! Wound up the contest down on 75 meters with two real
good hours which both exceeded my contest average! All in all, I called CQ
for about 9 1/2 of the 10 hours - searching pouncing only occasionally to see
what the band was like! I got into a great rhythm and found a very effective
method to calling CQ. I used VERY short calls and called continuously. CQ
Contest Norway Two Germany America. Period. Got LOTS of responses!
Obviously, I owe a lot to Frank's GREAT antenna setup. His QUAD at 50 feet
worked real well on 10/15/20. The 40 meter dipole was impressive and his 80
meter dipole was more than adequate! Thanks Frank!
I finished about 11:05pm, no major breaks except minor "pit" stops! I was
amazed how well my voice held up without the voice keyer! Getting lots of
response really does get the adrenaline going! To date it was my best
"phone" effort! I realized an "average" rate per hour of over 60 per! Final
totals were 606 QSO's! There were times when I was making more than 5 QSO's
per minute and the rate meter topped 200! Wow! All this with LOW power! I
can only invision what it would have been like with the amplifier ON and with
a 40 meter beam! It was without a doubt the most exhilarating time I've had
in phone contesting!
Thanks again to N2FF and his wife Kathleen for their gracious hospitality and
for use of his station. Thanks to Diane K2DO for allowing me the opportunity
to work the contest away from home, thanks to all of you who worked me and
congratulations to all of the LIMARC fine on another fine team effort!
Breakdown and score follows.
73, George
NAQP (SSB) Score for N2GA (@N2FF) January 1998
Band QSOs Mults
80 174 44
40 124 33
20 171 42
15 120 26
10 17 6
----- ------- ------
ALL 606 151 = 91,506 points
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