CQWW WPX Contest, SSB
Call: NK7U
Operator(s): NK7U, K7ZO, KL9A, N0AX, N7ZG, KL2A, KQ7W, DARREN
Station: NK7U
Class: M/M HP
QTH: Oregon
Operating Time (hrs): 48
Summary:
Band QSOs
------------
160: 240
80: 669
40: 749
20: 1599
15: 664
10: 27
------------
Total: 3948 Prefixes = 1010 Total Score = 7,817,400
Club:
Comments:
NK7U went M/M this year during WPX SSB. Our usual contest entry class is M/2 but
KL9A thought it would be fun to do a M/M and ?show those NR6O guys who has the
top station and operators on the west coast?. Well, our congrats go out to Ken
and the NR6O team for a great score from the west coast. Our salvation is that
they only beat us by 28%. This is a major improvement over the last time we took
them on in a M/M WPX in 1999 when they beat us by 52%. (The story behind that
battle was published in CQ Contest and can be found on the NK7U web site at
www.nk7u.com.).
Congrats also go out to the W6YI/NX6T team who in a M/2 entry spanked us as
well. In fact based on postings we are in last place among the M/M, in the
middle of the pack of the M/2. It does appear we are ahead of all the M/S scores
though. :)
We were a bit operator challenged this year and almost changed back to M/2 right
at the start of the contest. But in our pre-contest meeting the gang said they
we up for putting in the hours and off we went. We pretty much managed to keep
three stations fully manned for the whole contest. Not that there were three
bands open all the time and at this spot in the solar cycle M/M and M/2 are not
that much different. Looking at the scores only the top M/M score from NQ4I is
in front of the top M/2 scores. (Nice job Rick and your team.) The operators we
assembled were:
* NK7U -- station builder extraordinaire and late night low band operator.
* K7ZO -- the main ?inside guy? at the NK7U station, team manager, scheduler,
and computer network maintainer.
* KL9A -- Chris drove down from Moscow, ID where he is going to school and gave
us the honor of operating with us. Chris is a top top notch operator. We share
Chris with K3LR where he goes for the major CW contests and has helped Tim and
team string together an very impressive set of recent M/M wins.
* N0AX -- Ward came down from Seattle to share with us his whit, wisdom and
ability to put QSO?s in the log. Ward and KL9A are also going to be a team at
WRTC this summer. It is special to think ?hey, they contested with us at
NK7U?.
* N7ZG -- Guy made his first trip to NK7U, coming down from Seattle with N0AX.
Guy navigated the complexities of operating at a large multi-op station very
well and earned his place in NK7U lore by being the first guest operator to cook
a hot breakfast for us all.
* KL2A and KQ7W/LU9AY -- Jon/KL2A is a local and had Matt/KQ7W visiting for the
weekend. Both are great operators but family commitments kept them away except
for some nighttime operating one evening.
* Darren -- no one can remember his call, but Darren a recently licensed local
ham dropped by and listened to us make QSO?s for hours, asking us endless
questions, and soaking up the experience. On Sunday afternoon, K7ZO talked him
through his first ever contest QSO and HF QSO for that matter when he worked
AH6RF for our first 10M QSO of the day.
On a band by band basis the contest highlights were as follows:
10M
====
Our 27 QSO?s were actually 27 more than we thought we were going to make. The
band was open at the start of the contest and K7ZO put 14 QSO?s into the log
during the first 30 minutes before it closed down. We had 1 QSO on Saturday
afternoon, and then another 12 on Sunday afternoon between 20:30 and 21:30 UTC.
All QSO?s were with South and Central America. The lone Caribbean was PJ2T and
then we also had the AH6RF QSO mentioned above. At the end we had 27 QSO?s on
10M to NR6O?s 128. What a difference being 500 miles farther south makes.
15M
===
Based on instant message exchanges with some contesting buddies down south we
knew were in big trouble on 15M. Though it was clear from the spots that no one
was getting great Europe openings on 15M, we weren?t getting great 15M openings
to anywhere. The band was open from the start until 02:00 or so and we put 114
QSO?s into the log -- maybe a dozen or so JA? and other Asians. The rest were
spread across the Americas. On Saturday the band really never opened strong for
us to anywhere with a good run opportunity. Stateside it opened to Florida and
that was about it. For a while we thought we were in the Florida QSO party. From
dawn until 0:00 Sunday we put a grand total of 112 more QSO?s in the log -- talk
about slow. For long periods we had a higher rate on 40M talking non-contesters
into giving us QSO with serial number 001. The band did pop open for us around
00:30 toward JA and we added 57 QSO?s into the log until the band closed around
2:00. So, come dawn Sunday morning we had a total of 281 QSO?s on 15M. However,
things were looking much better on Sunday. The band opened early and was open
all up and down the east coast. We got off to a great start then it really
started to slow down around 16:15. During the next two hours we had a total of
20 QSO?s and then it opened back up again pretty nicely throughout North America
around 18:15. N0AX was at the mic and got a pretty good run going. At 18:55 T96Q
called in out of the blue our first European QSO of the contest. Ward turned a
beam to the north hoping the opening would grow. At 18:59 9A35Y entered the log.
At 19:17 EA5DFV called in with N7ZG now at the mic. At 20:12 OH4R called in
closely followed by I4LCK. Then at 20:18 OE4A spotted us on the cluster in
Europe, though surprisingly they are not in the log. Maybe they called us but we
didn?t hear them. But, the spot didn?t generate any more QSO?s and that was it
for us for as far as European QSO?s went - a grand total of 5. The band stayed
open pretty well until 22:00 when it slowed way down and it never did open to
Japan. At the end we had 664 QSO?s on 15M to NR6O?s 1283.
20M
===
If at times it seemed the whole world was on 20M, they probably were. 20M is
actually a band where the more northerly NK7U has an advantage into Europe over
the southern stations on the west coast. We had a good solid opening into Asia
and Scandinavia at the start of the contest and the band stayed open until 04:15
when it closed and we had 414 QSO?s in the log.
At NK7U over the years we have learned to check the higher bands in the middle
of the night, even though they are not supposed to be open. We have found some
epic 15M openings this way. This year it wouldn?t be 15M, but 20M that should be
checked. Sure enough at 11:30 Saturday morning, 3:30AM local time, K7ZO found
20M open into Europe and worked a half dozen surprised operators at the big gun
multi-op stations -- like LY7Z, RL3A, and DL0WW. So, the band was open, it just
took big stations on each end to make the QSO. We have no idea when the opening
started but signals that were S9 at 11:30 had faded into the noise around 11:45.
The band began its usual sunrise opening pattern for us about an hour later and
the whole set of operators took their turn at running Europe on 20M from the
west coast - a practice that is guaranteed to turn your brain to mush. Most of
us cannot keep it going for more than about 90 minutes until mental exhaustion
sets in and you need to hand the headset to someone else. We powered through the
morning though and by noon local time, 20:00, we had a solid 400 QSO?s in the
log, a high portion of them being 3 pointers. We had only a short period of the
usual afternoon slow down and then things picked back up again. At 20:45 we
settled in at 14311, a frequency we would be on for the next 7 hours and just
kept running and running. The band opened nicely to Japan and Asia around 22:00.
We had may good stations call in during this period though in this contest they
are all just another mult and 3 points -- 5X1GS, TU2CI, TF3AM, EL2AR, E21EIC,
AP2IA, etc.
As the evening wore on we fell into what is becoming a common sub contest at
NK7U, predicting when some of the usual big gun stations would call in. We
started this a couple years ago when one afternoon during a 15M JA run K7ZO
mentioned to KL9A, who was at the mic, ?About time for OH6NIO to call in?. Sure
enough about 5 QSO?s later guess who called in. This year it was Chris who
offered up to K7ZO who was on 20M, ?About time from 9K2HN to call in?. As Scott
waited for 9K2HN Chris also offered up, ?Just heard that W6YI worked a VU
station?. The band was open to that part of the world for us at that time around
02:30 and we were working many deep Asia stations. Sure enough about 2 QSO?s
later a clear and loud ?VU2? came into the headset and VU2SWS was in the log.
K7ZO turned the controls over to N0AX at 02:45 and 9K2HN still had not called
in. Eventually though at 03:19, 9K2HN did call in. Chris has called it, but just
one hour too early.
The band closed for us again right around 04:00 and we had a satisfying total of
845 Q?s for the day. Importantly this opening all put many good prefixes in the
log. We actually beat NR6O on prefixes -- probably because of this nice day on
20M.
Over the night KL9A found another short opening at 11:00 UTC though this time
only big gun RU1A was worked.
Sunday found the band open though the opening was not a good and/or we had
worked many of the stations with big enough signals for us to hear. Things were
pretty well closed to Europe by 18:00 with only a half dozen European station
worked after then. There were plenty of stations in the Americas to work and the
band did open nicely to Asia beginning around 22:00. We ended the contest with
1599 QSO;?s on 20M compared to NR6O?s 1504.
Special mention has to be made of W7WA. We thought we worked 20M as hard as we
could and ended up with our well earned 1,599 QSO?s. W7WA who is up near Seattle
and a mere 300 miles to the northwest of us managed to put 2,604 Q?s into the
log in a 20M Single Op effort. This is truly a world class effort, well done
Dan.
40M
====
Most of the time during the day we were on 15, 20, and 40M. Being on 40M during
the day meant making a lot of CQ calls trying to attract non-contesters to give
you a contact. K7ZO spent most of Saturday afternoon doing this and it does work
if you are willing to put the time and effort into it. Over the course of the
contest we had 66 QSO?s on 40M with QSO #1 and another 70 where the QSO # was
2-5. As a percentage this is 9% with #1 and 18% with 5 and under. By comparison
on 20M we had 2% of the QSO?s with #1 and 10% with 5 and under. So, we really
did ?get out the vote? on 40M so to speak. During the 18:00-22:00 hours on
Saturday our QSO rate on 40M was higher than 15M. Pressing his luck, K7ZO even
tried to pass some of these stations to 80M during the daytime. But, this was
much less successful and it required a station to be with a couple hundred miles
to complete the contact.
Other than this 40M was very poor for us. We managed only 44 Europeans and a
measly 47 JA?s over the weekend. Doing some modeling with HFTA we have pretty
much convinced ourselves we need to move Joe?s 4 element beam. In it?s current
location it has a major null in the arrival angles that are most common for
signals from Japan. We know we can and need to do much better. This will be a
summer project on the list.
Our final QSO total was 749 and NR6O beat us handily with 932.
80M
===
In some respects 80m was better for us than 40M. Even with that $*%&#@
Over-the-Horizon radar we managed 74 JA Q?s. However when operating it
essentially shut us down as the radar, from wherever it is, was S9+ for us
completely covering up DX. We had some good rates into North America early in
evening and ended up with 669 QSO?s as compared to NR6O?s 771.
160M
====
With three stations going, 20M closing down a couple hours after sunset, it
meant we spent a lot of time on 160M. During the course of the weekend we
managed to put 240 160M Q?s in the log, which I believe is a NK7U record for any
contest that is not dedicated to that band. NR6O edged us out with 277, but they
have a full 4-square system to our single ground plane.
73? see you in the next contest and visit us at www.nk7u.com
de K7ZO
Now all the numbers fit to print
=================================
160M 80M 40M 20M 15M 10M Total %
NA 238 573 616 872 487 3 2789 70.6
SA 1 11 14 26 70 23 145 3.7
AS 0 73 52 296 67 0 488 12.4
EU 0 0 44 379 5 0 428 10.8
OC 1 9 18 12 30 1 71 1.8
AF 0 3 5 11 4 0 23 0.6
QSO/Pref by hour and band
Hour 160M 80M 40M 20M 15M 10M Total Cumm
D1-0000Z --+-- --+-- 8/5 114/74 63/41 14/12 199/132 199/132
D1-0100Z - - 9/7 134/67 40/27 - 183/101 382/233
D1-0200Z - 24/10 19/15 54/24 11/8 - 108/57 490/290
D1-0300Z - 74/22 153/22 100/27 - - 327/71 817/361
D1-0400Z 9/1 76/10 82/13 10/3 - - 177/27 994/388
D1-0500Z 33/8 73/15 52/12 - - - 158/35 1152/423
D1-0600Z 43/3 59/9 24/4 - - - 126/16 1278/439
D1-0700Z 32/1 38/8 13/0 - - - 83/9 1361/448
D1-0800Z 13/2 40/8 25/3 --+-- --+-- --+-- 78/13 1439/461
D1-0900Z 11/0 41/8 12/5 - - - 64/13 1503/474
D1-1000Z 17/3 26/4 9/1 - - - 52/8 1555/482
D1-1100Z 2/0 30/6 8/2 6/5 - - 46/13 1601/495
D1-1200Z 3/1 6/0 - 11/8 - - 20/9 1621/504
D1-1300Z - - 1/0 49/17 2/2 - 52/19 1673/523
D1-1400Z - - 1/0 97/64 8/3 - 106/67 1779/590
D1-1500Z - - - 77/42 1/0 - 78/42 1857/632
D1-1600Z --+-- --+-- --+-- 48/25 13/5 --+-- 61/30 1918/662
D1-1700Z - - - 39/15 25/8 - 64/23 1982/685
D1-1800Z - - 10/2 33/10 9/0 - 52/12 2034/697
D1-1900Z - 1/0 14/2 36/17 1/1 - 52/20 2086/717
D1-2000Z - 1/0 17/1 30/8 14/2 1/0 63/11 2149/728
D1-2100Z - - 8/0 62/17 10/4 - 80/21 2229/749
D1-2200Z - 1/0 10/1 63/13 17/6 - 91/20 2320/769
D1-2300Z - - 5/1 65/18 10/3 1/0 81/22 2401/791
D2-0000Z --+-- --+-- 23/2 54/10 27/2 --+-- 104/14 2505/805
D2-0100Z - - 54/7 69/8 24/8 - 147/23 2652/828
D2-0200Z 2/0 2/1 34/3 43/10 6/2 - 87/16 2739/844
D2-0300Z - 3/1 28/4 38/7 - - 69/12 2808/856
D2-0400Z 4/0 13/2 33/7 4/0 - - 54/9 2862/865
D2-0500Z 25/0 26/3 26/5 - - - 77/8 2939/873
D2-0600Z 8/0 24/3 11/1 - - - 43/4 2982/877
D2-0700Z 12/1 26/2 19/3 - - - 57/6 3039/883
D2-0800Z 10/1 25/1 19/4 --+-- --+-- --+-- 54/6 3093/889
D2-0900Z 7/0 20/2 6/0 - - - 33/2 3126/891
D2-1000Z 4/2 19/0 2/0 - - - 25/2 3151/893
D2-1100Z 5/0 7/2 - 1/0 - - 13/2 3164/895
D2-1200Z - 10/1 - - - - 10/1 3174/896
D2-1300Z - 2/0 - 12/1 - - 14/1 3188/897
D2-1400Z - 2/0 - 65/24 1/0 - 68/24 3256/921
D2-1500Z - - - 27/6 24/4 - 51/10 3307/931
D2-1600Z --+-- --+-- 3/1 28/3 26/3 --+-- 57/7 3364/938
D2-1700Z - - 4/0 31/6 11/1 - 46/7 3410/945
D2-1800Z - - - 35/3 52/10 - 87/13 3497/958
D2-1900Z - - - 20/5 82/8 - 102/13 3599/971
D2-2000Z - - - 19/2 105/8 1/1 125/11 3724/982
D2-2100Z - - - 24/5 61/3 10/3 95/11 3819/993
D2-2200Z - - - 59/6 9/1 - 68/7 3887/1000
D2-2300Z - - 7/0 42/8 12/2 - 61/10 3948/1010
Total: 240/23 669/118 749/1331599/558 664/162 27/16
160M 80M 40M 20M 15M 10M Total
3V 1 1
3W 1 1
4J 2 2
4L 1 1
5B 1 1 2
5X 1 1
6W 1 1 2 2 6
6Y 1 1
8P 1 1 2 2 6
9A 2 5 1 8
9K 1 1
9M2 1 1 2
9M6 1 1 1 3
9V 1 1
9Y 1 1
A3 1 1
AP 1 1
BV 1 2 1 4
BY 17 1 18
CE 4 4
CM 2 1 3
CN 1 1 2
CT 1 1
CT3 1 1 2
CU 1 1
CX 1 2 2 5
DL 2 44 46
DU 5 3 8
EA 1 11 1 13
EA6 1 1
EA8 1 1 2
EA9 1 1
EI 3 3
EK 1 1
EL 1 1
ER 1 1
ES 7 7
EU 3 3
EX 4 4
F 3 14 17
FM 1 1 2
FP 1 1
G 24 24
GM 3 3
GW 2 2
HA 1 8 9
HB 3 3
HC8 1 1 1 1 1 1 6
HH 1 1 2
HI 1 1 1 2 1 6
HK 2 1 3 6
HL 1 9 2 12
HP 1 1 2
HR 1 1
HS 1 1
I 4 17 1 22
IS 1 1
IT9 3 3
J3 1 1
J6 1 1 1 1 4
J7 1 2 3
JA 71 47 150 62 330
JT 1 1
JW 1 1
K 205 474 548 761 411 1 2400
KH2 1 1 1 1 4
KH6 1 3 3 2 7 1 17
KL 1 6 6 22 12 47
KP2 1 1 3 5
KP4 1 2 1 3 7
LU 1 7 24 6 38
LX 1 1
LY 2 7 9
LZ 1 3 4
OA 1 1 2
OE 1 5 6
OH 3 18 1 22
OH0 3 3
OK 2 20 22
OM 1 4 5
ON 1 12 13
OZ 5 5
P2 1 1
P4 1 1 1 2 5
PA 6 6
PJ2 1 1 2 1 5
PJ7 1 1 2
PY 4 6 11 22 13 56
S5 4 14 18
SM 16 16
SP 2 13 15
SV 2 2
T9 1 2 1 4
TA 1 1
TF 2 2
TG 1 2 3
TI 2 1 1 3 2 9
TU 1 1
UA 4 57 61
UA9 1 3 85 89
UK 1 1
UN 10 10
UR 3 18 21
V3 1 1 1 1 1 5
V4 1 1 2
V7 1 1 2
VE 27 79 51 71 30 258
VK 4 8 1 4 17
VK9N 1 1
VP2E 1 1 1 3
VP5 1 1
VP8 1 1
VR 4 4
VU 1 1
XE 1 2 1 6 4 14
YB 2 7 9
YL 4 4
YO 2 2
YU 4 10 14
YV 2 4 2 6 14
Z3 1 3 4
ZD8 1 1 1 3
ZF 1 1
ZK1/s 1 1
ZL 4 3 7
ZP 2 2
ZS 1 1 1 3
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