North American QSO Party, CW
Call: VA7ST
Operator(s): VA7ST
Station: VA7ST
Class: Single Op LP
QTH: BC
Operating Time (hrs): 10
Summary:
Band QSOs Mults
-------------------
160: 56 27
80: 150 44
40: 120 33
20: 257 43
15: 104 24
10:
-------------------
Total: 687 171 Total Score = 117,447
Club: British Columbia DX Club
Team:
Comments:
This year: Flux: 71 | Ap: 2 | Kp: 0
Last year: Flux: 76 | Ap: 4 | Kp: 2
SO1R Gear:
* FT-2000 + N1MM Logger
* Tribander at 30'
* 40M half-squares - phased
* 80M phased verticals
* Inv-L 160M (70' high, 65' horizontal)
Went into this one with just one goal: beat last year's 96,000 score. Managed
to break 100,000 for only the second time in NAQP and came within 1 mult of
tying my best-ever mult total, though still a bit shy of my best-ever score of
126,700 points. More Qs on 15 would have put me there.
Glued myself to the chair for almost 10 hours -- ended up with 9:49 on-time.
Took all my off-time at once -- from 1:41 to 3:50 p.m. Pacific. 20M was losing
its sea legs by 1:30 p.m. and I was already tired, so lunch and a nap filled
the off hours. Took 9 extra minutes before getting back on for a walkabout to
make sure all the low-band wires were still in the air, as the wind kicked up
all day.
Due to the wind, all 20M and 15M Qs were conducted with a three-element yagi at
30' with the tower cranked down -- fortunately, terrain analysis at this
steep-slope ridge-line QTH indicates that for domestic contests the low
tribander doesn't really hurt much. (
http://www3.telus.net/va7st/terrain_analysis.htm )
Was disappointed with 15M -- band was definitely open to all of NA but just not
many heard or worked. I did run 90 stations from 1937z to 2041z. QSO count was
down by 55 on this band vs. 2008.
Must congratulate Yaesu on the FT-2000 PEP (performance enhancement project)
firmware update released on Jan. 1. This upgrade turns an already good radio
into something beyond great. They didn't give CW operators the Curtis Mode B
keying we NEED in all built-in keyers, but the newly designed and outstanding
DSP tools made NAQP CW and RTTY RU an exceptional operating experience.
http://www3.telus.net/va7st/ft2000.htm
20M was pretty good but I couldn't land the close-in mults I needed -- ID, WA,
MT, OR, etc. Best runs there were 148 Qs (1807z to 1920z) and 107 stations
(2048z to 2137z).
During solarmin -- I think we're in year 3 of it now -- running just one radio
after about 1 p.m. Pacific (2100z) can be a real challenge. Around that time:
* 15M is dead.
* 20M gets punky, and stations are already sparse as those out east head to the
40M happy hunting grounds.
* From up here in the northwest, 40M doesn't play well to the east until
closer
to dark at 4 p.m. (there's a knife-edge somewhere there, between not playing
to the east and working like gang-busters to the east)
* 80M isn't rolling, and won't offer much until well after dark.
The only logical choices are to be an early adopter on 40M and suffer abyssmal
rate for a while, or take a break and hit 40M hard once it is open. That was
the thinking behind taking 2 hours off from 2140z to 2340z. Yep, it hurt to
walk away from 20M when rates were still around 100/hr, but had to do it to
give myself any chance of raking in low-band mults later. I perennially make
the mistake of going to 40M too late to cash in on the action. I reminded
myself 40M has a useful lifespan of about two hours (from 0000z to 0200z), and
it's a ghost town after that, so it was important to get my off-time finished
and get on 40M just as it got perking up here, then ride the low bands through
till 0600z.
Had fun on 40M for a change -- lately it has been my worst band but this time I
had no trouble running, even as early as 4 p.m. local. I suspected my 40M phased
verticals hanging in the bush, about 45' from the nearest half-square, were
killing my 40M twin half-square array into the US and VE. I took down the
verticals for this test, and all of a sudden stateside stations heard me. Had a
nice run of 93 stations from 0000z to 0100z. Quite steady 40M performance by
year says more about 40M in January than about antenna experiments:
* 120 for 33 mults in 2009 with twin phased half-squares
* 112 for 30 mults in 2008 with E-W and N-S half-squares
* 137 for 34 mults in 2007 with 18AVQ/WB vertical and phased delta loops East
* 91 for 31 mults in 2006 with twin delta loops to East
Also think the 40M bush verticals (situated mid-way between the 80M wire
verticals) may have been affecting the nearby 80M vertical array, as I did
better on 80M than I have in previous years:
* 150 for 44 mults in 2009 with phased elevated verticals
* 76 for 27 mults in 2008 with a full-size delta loop
* 143 for 43 mults in 2007 with 80M inverted-V at 60'
* 146 for 39 mults in 2006 with twin delta loops to East
Surprised myself with the 160M mults -- figured on maybe 10 or so with the
inverted-L connected only to the chainlink fence, but ended up with 27 mults
from 56 Qs (last year it was 15 mults, 48 Qs).
Entirely missed ND, SD, WV and HI but still fell just one short of my best-ever
mult count of 172.
All in all, this was a good outing for me. All the antennas played well -- and
my off-time worked out perfectly. Although the final four hours were much
slower than 20M had been, there were multipliers aplenty to be found on the low
bands. Special tough-mult thanks to Ed VE7EAR (40M and 160M) and Kelly VE4XT
(20M) for MB, and Paul VE1DX (20M) and Al VA1MM (80M) for NS!
Year Qs Mults Score January NAQP CW
========================
2009: 687 171 117,477
2008: 646 149 96,254
2007: 587 143 83,941
2006: 737 172 126,764
2005: -- -- --
2004: 206 62 12,772
2003: 412 147 60,564
73 es tnx fer all the fun. No Triple Play CW sweep from this one, but it's a
great start!
-- Bud VA7ST
http://www3.telus.net/va7st
Posted using 3830 Score Submittal Forms at: http://www.hornucopia.com/3830score/
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