WAE DX Contest, CW
Call: KL9A
Operator(s): KL9A
Station: KL7Y
Class: SOAB HP
QTH:
Operating Time (hrs): 28
Summary:
Band QSOs QTCs Mults
-------------------------------
80:
40:
20: 474 413 84
15: 1223 1116 90
10: 1 0 2
-------------------------------
Total: 1698 1529 176 = 567,424
Club/Team:
Comments:
Hey, that was pretty fun. I had planned quite a bit for this contest, trying
to figure out off times. As usual it all went downhill pretty fast. I took
the first 3 hours off, which was good. The rate from 0000z-0300z is pretty
poor up here. About 1700z on Saturday I slept for 6-7 hours, which hurt me. I
had been awake since 5:30am on Friday and worked all day, and I just couldn't
do it anymore. I fell asleep at the key a few times while sending QTC's. I'd
wake up to hear, "KL9A? KL9A QTC? KL9A DE (enter your favorite EU station
here) PSE QTC" Then I would snap awake and hit the + key. I guess 20m was open
pretty well when I was sleeping, so that hurt a lot. 15m was a bottomless
pit... it was open the entire contest. 10m was very very marginal, being
slightly less sucky the 2nd night when I had my only qso with UW5Q. Everyone
in Europe asked me for 10m or 40m or both. The persistence award goes to UU7J,
who asked me what seemed like every 15 minutes to QSY to 10m. :) Dan place was
set up fro M/M and I had to run from rig to rig to go to another band. 15m is
a separate room from 20 and 10, so I was reluctant to lose my run freq at
times. I tried to QSY as much as possible though. Several EU were heard on
10m: HA1AG, IQ2A, UU7J, UW5Q, YT9X, YO8WW, YO2BEH, and JY8TE (was in the most
of anyone), C4A, ZS6something, HS0AC, K5KG (loud!), ZW5B and N4BP are the ones
that come to mind outside of EU. It sure was spotty... and very frustrating.
40m: This time of year 40m isn't really worth much to EU. There isn't any
mutual darkness, with the best shots being far west like G, TF, etc. I did
hear a few stations: DL2NDU, HA1AG vy vy vy weak, M5X, all s0.
20m: Seemed like it was always open, but all the action was on 15m. Missing a
few hours while sleeping hurt for sure. My best hour (110) was on Saturday.
15m: Bottomless pit. I was getting 40 and 50 over 9 reports at times. The
rate wasn't huge, but steady. The piles were huge at first, then about half an
hour into it I had worked everyone calling.
10m: Sucky.
I saw that there was going to be poor condx on sunday, so I tried to plan
around it. At 1700z the bands shut down. The big guns went from 599+ to s2 or
3 on 15m. 20m was empty, so I went to sleep for an hour. I woke up an hour
later to the phone, and decided to call it quits. 20m sounded like it was
coming back, but it wasn't worth it to stick around. Signals were stronger,
but extremely fluttery. Salvaged the rest of the beautiful sunday by going
sailing with my friends who picked me up.
2000+ qso's was definitely doable this time with only 2 bands. 10m was in
better shape in 1999. Dan owns 15m with his 5/5/5/5. I should have sent more
QTC's, but I had planned on dumping a ton of them on Sunday... that was before
I quit early. :) I don't like the way CT handles QTC's either. 1) I can't
send them by hand and still have the program log it. Or can I? I couldn't
figure it out. 2) I can't change the speed while sending a QTC.
As always, lots of things I could have done better. Every contest is a
learning experience. :) My main problem seems to be staying awake... anyone
have any ideas? Working all day Friday didn't help I guess. Nice to work so
many WWYCers... we're taking over! :) Thanks to Dan for letting me use his
great station, I had fun.
This was my last contest from KL7 until November, so hope to see everyone from
W7UQ!
73,
Chris KL9A (Yeah I know, I wrote a lot.)
http://www.qsl.net/kl9a
kl9a@qsl.net
10m: 5/5/5/5, only 5/5 to EU
15m: 5/5/5/5, all to EU :)
20m: 5 el
40m: 3 el
QTC?
QRU TU KL9A
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