CQWW WPX Contest, SSB
Call: WX3B
Operator(s):
AG4RZ,K3LP,K3MM,KG4NEP,N3FX,N3SB,N3ST,N3VOP,N3YIM,N5WNB,NY3A,W3ADC,W3ADX,WB4MSG,WX3B
Station: WX3B
Class: M/M HP
QTH: MD
Operating Time (hrs): 47
Summary:
Band QSOs
------------
160: 343
80: 801
40: 805
20: 1419
15: 445
10: 139
------------
Total: 3952 Prefixes = 1059 Total Score = 8,363,982
Club: Potomac Valley Radio Club
Comments:
What a great Adventure at Team WX3B!
First - a heart thank you to all of you that have helped build this station over
the past year. It's great to see it being put to good use.
I reached Goal #1 this year - to BEAT our 2004 high score of 7.1 Million. I
almost reached Goal #2 to break the 4,000 QSO Mark.
It was a fun weekend. Thanks to all the operators that made this such an
enjoyable event; this was the first 48 hours contest where I was actually at my
house for (almost) all 48 hours of the contest!
Our lineup this year was stellar - at one point I was overloaded with offers to
help. KG4NEP organized the North Carolina group - Team PVRC (W4WS) from Winston
Salem, N.C.
Traveling with Robert were Gene (driver and veteran WX3B Operator, WB4MSG), Tim,
AG4RZ (a very young 31 years old), and Dave, N5WNB, who had experienced pileups
from KC4 in the past. All 4 of these men did a tremendous job staffing the
radios for all 48 hours of the contest.
We also had tremendous support from regular team members, including a 48 hour
appearance by Tony, N3FX. John and Nathan King (father and son, W3ADC and
W3ADX) operated the graveyard shift 1:00am to 6:00am Sunday morning and came
back to finish off the contest.
N3VOP helped us out on Saturday, N3ST assisted Friday night, K3LP was the first
one in the 20 meter chair and he graciously gave it up to our secret weapon, Ty,
K3MM.
N3YIM was seen running 20 meters Saturday morning...and doing a good job. Keep
up the good work, Joe!
N3SB was the official group photographer on Sunday and he ran on 15 meters
working Europe, Africa and stateside contacts. It was good to see Steve on 15
meters, since the entire operating position (TS-950SDX, Drake L4B, Computer) is
on 'loan' from him.
NY3A did something incredibly brave, he brough his YL Mary-Jo to the contest and
we have the photos to prove it. The definition of true love is sitting next to
your sweetheart while she wears headphones plugged into the same radio you're
contesting on. We'll undoubtedly hear Mary-Jo CQing any day now.
Although W3ARS didn't make it to operate, he was doing his duty for the team by
purchasing yet another AB/577 for me. Now we have a support for that 40
Monobander (to be purchased) that must go up. Mike, N3VOP delivered the new
AB/577 right to my garage door. Thanks Mike & Clint, you can make the first few
40 meter DX contacts when the new antenna is up.
Band conditions were interesting. We missed some of the European/African run
potential on 15 meters. 20 meters was hit or miss. Saturday morning we had our
head served to us for showing up late on the band and NOT finding a good run
frequency. Until 11:00am local time, I felt like I was using 100 watts and a
dipole. After 11:00am things got better/louder. I guess you really DO need
that 'other' antenna at 100 feet.
40 meters turned into a good band for us - and Robert expressed joy in running
some VKs and ZLs VERY early in the morning. 80 meters was fun - we had a new
beverage and put it to the test. Thanks to W3LPL for the personal beverage
lessons before the contest.
Although we didn't work much DX on 160, we heard quite a few stations in there
calling. Lots of stateside folks were good sports and called in.
John King, W3ADC loaned us his brand new loaded Yaesu Mark V field. It was put
on the 20 meter position as radio #2 and shared with an N3OC two radio sharing
box (so only one could transmit). We were actually able to tell there was a
performance advantage with John's Mark V since it had the INRAD roofing filter
in it. It was a great time having two operators on 20 at a time...and when the
runs got slow one or both stations would go on pouncing sprees.
I re-learned an important software lesson - always test your networked log
BEFORE the contest. I didn't, and had the wrong version of logging software on
one computer. Because of my mistake, I ended up running 6 single user mode
computers all weekend long. I had to wait until the contest was over to learn
how to repair the log. It cost us about an hour during the contest to keep
things moving forward. Thanks to Ty, K3MM for master-minding the recovery
process.
All hardware worked GREAT - some limited inter-station interference generated by
80 and 160 that needs to be fixed. The only failure we had was a wafer in a
very old footswitch.
Well...only one more year until we do it again!
73,
Jim Nitzberg WX3B
Posted using 3830 Score Submittal Forms at: http://www.hornucopia.com/3830score/
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