North American QSO Party, CW
Call: VE7FO
Operator(s): VE7FO VE7YBH
Station: VE7FO
Class: M/2 LP
QTH: Vancouver
Operating Time (hrs): 12
Summary:
Band QSOs Mults
-------------------
160: 4 4
80: 82 35
40: 69 36
20: 340 51
15: 26 11
10:
-------------------
Total: 521 137 Total Score = 71,377
Club: British Columbia DX Club
Team:
Comments:
Another fun contest.
For I think the first time, I managed to set up two fully functional
op positions in my 107 sq ft shack so Phil, VE7YBH (ex G3YBH), and I
could do a M/2.
Position 2 consisted of an IC 706 MkIIG radio and an old IBM Thinkpad
laptop because the computer which is supposed to be used at that position
won't boot. The position is pretty funny to look at as the two
analogue monitors for it are still on the op table, along with a flat
screen LCD which doesn't work and I don't know where else to put it.
Also, there's a breadboard socket with the parallel keying interface
components on it lying on the bench along with another one with the
components for the CIV serial interface required by the 706.
Fortunately none of the wires or components came adrift.
Amazingly, I had everything done and was ready for the start at 1800Z.
I was on my own at this point as Phil wasn't going to be here until
about 2130.
This was probably my best ever contest start from this station. After
picking off a few mults on 20 I easily found a spot to run at 1815, I
guess because of the 100W power limit. The run lasted until 2115
(1315 local) and netted 282 Qs which, for my station, is phenomenal.
I didn't get enough sleep last night and was grousing at myself for
all the mistakes I was making. Then I noticed the short term rate at
that point was a bit over 160 and felt somewhat better. The run could
have lasted longer but I thought I'd better move to 15 and harvest
mults while it was still open.
Phil arrived about this time so he took over Position #1 on 15 and I
moved to #2 with the 706.
At my station, I connect the TH3 tribander to the Ant A input of the
MkV and the rest of the antennas through a 5 position rotary switch to
the Ant B input. This made it very easy to share antennas between the
two positions. The TH3 was left connected to the MkV and the output
of the rotary switch was connected to the 706. So the MkV had access
to 10, 15 and 20 via the TH3 and the 706 had access to 10, 15 and 20
via the CC R5 vertical mounted above the beam as well as dipoles on 40
and 80 and a crappy inverted L on 160, all on a 120 x 33 ft city lot.
(Well, I shouldn't knock the inv L too much as it did give me 4 Qs and
4 mults in spite of an S9 noise level.)
So Phil is running on 15 and I'm trying to make Qs on the 706. Tried
20 but the poor old 706 wasn't doing a very good job of keeping out
the 15m RF from Phil. (Time to haul out W2VJN's stub filters book).
So I checked out 40, not expecting to hear much at 2 pm local. Good
heavens, all kinds of signals, 5 or 6 at any particular point on the
dial coming through the 706 which doesn't have a cw filter.
I'm used to the MkV with a full complement of cw filters (except no
250 Hz at the 455 If) plus the ability to get the BW down to 60 Hz
with the DSP if needed. What a shock! Well, I can copy signals in
the presence of others as long as there are significant differences
among them such as speed, pitch, strength and timing but it sure slows
things down. Oddly, the biggest difficulty I had was knowing when I
was tuned close enough to the station I was calling in S&P that I
would be in his filter bandwidth. With the MkV it simply isn't an
issue. If I'm using the 250 Hz filter, which I usually am, if I can
hear him I'm on the right frequency.
Well, it took a long time for me to get to the point where I was
reasonably confident that I was on the right frequency when I called
someone. Lots of fruitless looking through the 706 manual for a means
of zero beating the incoming signal or some other way of getting it
right. When you actually send something, you can try to listen for a
difference in frequency between the monitored tone and the incoming
signal. However, there's a lot of distortion in the monitored tone
which makes it difficult to compare them (well, for me it does).
It didn't help when I discovered the IF shift control and set it to
the middle of the passband instead of one edge or the other. Now,
whenever I tried to match the monitor pitch to that of the incoming
signal, half the time I was on the wrong side of zero beat and got no
response.
OK, next time I'll have stub filters and a cw filter in the 706. (A
K3 would be a better solution. I'll check with the XYL.)
I did finally get to the point where, when I called someone, I'd get a
response.
While all this is going on, VE7YBH is making Qs on 15. Well, he was
until it died at 1415 local and he switched to 20. We're at 314 Qs at
this point and it's obvious that the glory days of long runs are
behind us. Bad precipitation static didn't help while it was doing
its best to snow here in lotus land (where one can often golf on
Xmas day.)
While Phil is making Qs on 20 I'm actually doing not too badly S&Ping
on 40 on the 706 until he notices that I'm making 3 Qs to his 1. We
take that as a signal that 20 is dying and Phil moves to 40 at 1600
local with 403 Qs in the bag.
Given that the 40 and 80 dipoles are only a few feet apart, I didn't
want to risk putting the 706 on 80 and, as all I could hear on 20 was
a VR2 and a couple of UA0's, that was the end of op position 2's
contribution.
Phil had to leave at 1700 local with 425 Qs and left me with the
dregs.
And the dregs they were. Couldn't get any runs going, high noise
level, every Q is a struggle. Five hours for the last 100 Qs! Oh
well, as the soccer folks are prone to say, it builds character. I
sure must have a lot of it by now.
It's actually quite amazing that we're able to communicate anything at
all in these kinds of conditions. A tribute to the great ops out
there.
So, great cndx at the start, crappy at the end, good fun sharing with
Phil, have learned that it's possible to do a M/2 from here and hope
to be on next week with Phil (and stub philters) for the NAQP SSB on
my 74th birthday. However, my family might have other plans.
Hmm.. it's also possible that I might have a bunch of newbies here.
Just imagine, a M/2 operation with a bunch of folks who've never been
on the air! Don't know if I'm ready for this.
How much did the 2nd op position contribute? It was manned during
hours 21 to 00 inclusive, i.e. 4 hours max. How many Qs? 20. Was it
worth it? Sure. I learned a lot. Wait 'til next time!!
Interestingly, the 706 didn't affect the MkV at all even though some
point of every antenna is within 20 ft of some point on every other
antenna. The MkV did bother the 706 quite a bit. Stubs should take
care of most of that. They'll make antenna switching more of a
bother, though.
Thanks for the Qs everyone and your patience in pulling me out of the
mud on the low bands.
73, Jim VE7FO
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