CQ Worldwide DX Contest, SSB
Call: VE2IM
Operator(s): VE3DZ
Station: VE2CSI
Class: SOAB HP
QTH: Zone 2
Operating Time (hrs): 42
Radios: SO2R
Summary:
Band QSOs Zones Countries
------------------------------
160: 186 8 24
80: 646 17 60
40: 428 21 78
20: 1934 31 115
15: 1614 25 99
10: 51 7 22
------------------------------
Total: 4859 109 398 Total Score = 6,436,365
Club: Contest Club Ontario
Comments:
VE2IM Zone 2 (really long)
This is my 7th year of doing semi-Field Day style operation from Sept-Iles (Zone
2). 4 CQ WWs SSB, 4 CQ WWs CW and 1 CQ 160 m CW so far.
Usually I operate from the house of local radio club, paying modest price for
the use of the place (no station provided), old Mosley 7 element tribander at
about 50? and Alpha Delta dipole for 40, 75 and 160 meters. Each time I have to
bring my own equipment and some additional antennas. Unfortunately (like at a
real Field Day) there is always not enough time to put everything together
properly and Mr. Murphy is pretty frequent visitor up here. Tight work schedule
and family commitments do not help either.
There were few happy years however, when I could come for both SSB and CW
contests and managed to fix everything before or during SSB part (like in 2003)
so everything was in order for the CW contest.
This time I was scheduled to arrive at about lunch time on Thursday, so I had no
other choice than to make it really easy on myself ? the plan was to put an
additional 40 m antenna which would resonate in the upper portion of the band
(for cross-band operation) and R7 vertical for the second radio. The gear
consisted of FT1000MP and IC746 radios, a home brew amplifier (~1200 watts
output) and old SB220 and DX Doubler by Top Ten Devices for SO2R with home made
cables. The software was CTWin by K1EA and Voice Keyer 1.6 by SM3WMV with home
made Audio and PTT interfaces.
The installation of antennas was accomplished pretty quickly with the help of
VE2XAA and on Friday morning I had almost everything up and running. At that
time a group of U.S. HAMs (KD3TB, KD3RF and K3FMQ) paid me a visit and we
chatted for about a half of an hour. These guys are amazing. They drive here all
the way from Pennsylvania just to set up a modest M/2 station using Butternut
multiband verticals almost every year (well, at least for the last three years
as far as I remember). Considering that there are already two big contest
stations in VY2 owned by U.S. operators I believe that Canada is becoming more
and more popular among the contesters from the south of the border. Probably the
main reasons are the proximity to the States (easy 2-point contacts on all
bands) and easy access from the U.S. In addition to that being a VE is much more
fun in the contest and even if conditions suck you may always have a pretty
decent run working your south neighbors for points?
Anyway, these guys are always staying at the opposite end of the city in the
motel with verticals right on the shore of St. Lawrence river so we are far
enough to bother each other with the QRM, but close enough to give each other an
easy Zone 2 multiplier on all bands. And according to Erwin, KD3TB, the HF6V and
HF2V works pretty well for them. All equipment and antennas (along with 3 ops)
fit into a single SUV. J
After doing some grocery shopping and taking a short nap I decided to check the
bands. To my deep disappointed there was a constant noise on all high bands
peaking on 28 MHz with the beam headings from approx. 30 to 180 degrees. With EU
heading at about 45 degrees it gave about S6 to S7 noise on 20 an 15 meters.
This is something new? There is a huge electric power station in that direction
just about 2 or 3 km away, so I assume the noise is coming from there. The best
I could do was to try to adjust NB, it helped a bit on 20 and 15, but not on 10.
Luckily, looks like it does not affect Low Bands.
There are very few stations on 20 m at 23:50 Z so I decided to start on 40 with
second radio on 20. Rate is pretty slow so I manage to make 2nd radio QSO every
3-4 minutes. However with split operation (mostly with the U.S.) the rate
increases and I finish my 1st hour with decent 138 QSOs. The rate on the second
radio dropped to about 3-4 Q?s/hr.
EU was pretty loud on 80 even on my modest antenna. Added another 110 Q?s in the
2nd hour and about 150 in the 3rd, while operating 80 and 160 m. Tried to run on
40 several times, but with no success.
For the next few hours the rate is dropping to 70, 60 and 50 Q/hr. The night
hours are traditionally hard here up North with no beam antennas for low bands.
However I managed to catch a good but short opening to EU on 160 around 06:00 Z
which brought me at least 5 unexpected EU multipliers.
Unfortunately around that time my 40 m antenna started to give intermittent high
SWR on the frequencies above 7050, which made impossible to transmit in the U.S.
portion of the band. All attempts to find and fix a problem resulted only in
time loss with no success - I made only about 15 QSO between 09:30 and 10:30
UTC. So at around 10 UTC I was basically left with 40 m dipole resonating in the
CW portion and a R7 vertical which I was still using for the second radio.
Europe started to come at around 10:30 UTC so I quit all repairs activity and
concentrated on the run. 204 Qs in the 12th hour, 211 in the 13th, 248 in the
14th, 233 in the 15th and 192 in the 17th made me feel a bit better about my
score. However, noise is really annoying so I had to turn my beam a bit away
from EU and I was trying not to think about 2nd night (with no 40 m antenna).
Managed to make very few second radio QSOs in the morning because of high CQ
rate. It seems like SSb is not my mode for SO2R since it is much easier for me
to do SO2R on CW? In the next few hours rate dropped slowly from about 180 to
60/hr at around 20:00 when I tried to work some lonely SA multipliers on 10
meters. Tried all possible combinations of Noise Blanker on MP to fight that
noise, but it helped very little.
At around 21:30 UTC, right in the middle of short JA pile-up I heard loud
?Bang!? and my main amplifier went South. I quickly disconnected it and
continued with 100 watts for about 30 minutes until Alex VE2XAA came and we
together removeded it and connected old trusty SB220 to my main radio. With
about 800 to 900 watts it became much better again, however I had no 2nd radio
amp from that moment on. Also at some point in the evening I noticed that R7 has
high SWR on 40 too so Alex went outside trying to find a problem while I was
trying to survive between 20 an 40 (below 7050). The 40 m trap on R7 was
appeared to be fried however it could be still used on higher bands. All these
problems forced me to go on 80 earlier and I finished my 1st day with humble
2730 QSO in the LOG.
Night hours were a real nigh mare. I was trying to run on 40 transmitting below
7040 with almost zero success, and since I worked almost everyone I could on 80
and 160, I had to do a lot of S/P which caused me to fall asleep. I was taking
short naps, waking up, worked few station and then again taking nap? From 04:30
to 07:15 I barely made 10 contacts. The 80m started to pick up and I made a
decent 50 Q?s hour. Then again I tried to work people on 40, but could barely
work 20 stations in one hour. All Europeans I heard were listening above 7150
where I could not transmit? L
At about 10:50 UTC I started on 20 again with changing to 15 an hour later. Was
using IC746 barefoot into fried R7 for 2nd radio and sometimes was even making
some contacts!
Nothing else broke since then and I finished a contest with a good run on 20 and
40 with final 4958 QSO (dupes included). Had to pack everything quickly since I
was leaving 5:30 A.M. Monday morning. (Back to work on Tuesday morning).
Congratulations to VY2PA on a decent score. The VY2ZM is a ?hard-to-beat?
station and I just dream that Jim will allow me to do some contest from his
station one day.
Thanks to everyone who called me and especially to those who moved for me.
Special thanks to VE2XAA, VE2NN, VE3EY, VE3UKR and VE3TA who helped me a lot in
preparation to this contest.
At this point I feel like it could be my last trip to Sept-Iles? Have to move
on and try something else.
73 Yuri VE3DZ / VE2IM
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