Texas QSO Party
Call: W0BH
Operator(s): W0BH AD0DX
Station: W0BH
Class: Multi-Op Mobile LP
QTH: 36 TX counties
Operating Time (hrs): 17
Summary:
Band CW Qs Ph Qs Dig Qs
----------------------------
160:
80: 4 0
40: 212 35
20: 1005 389
15: 281 21
10: 4 4
6:
2:
UHF:
----------------------------
Total: 1506 449 0 Mults = 116 Total Score = 664,756
Club:
Comments:
Score includes 36,000 county bonus points and 500 mobile bonus points.
"Retired" in Texas by Bob/w0bh
Friday
After seriously fun Kansas QSO Party runs, Ron/ad0dx and I decided to team up
once again for a Mobile Multi-Op effort through the Texas panhandle. Last year
we had to cut the run short by about 20 minutes to get Ron back to the Wichita
airport on time. This year we added an extra county and could take our time
going home. We were apparently the only CW station in the panhandle, so getting
to all our counties was a priority.
The weekend weather forecast was for a line of storms on Friday as we headed to
southwest Kansas, but clearing in the panhandle on Saturday and Sunday. The
forecasters were right. About an hour out of our Friday night stop in Liberal,
we ran right into the line of storms. It wasn't bad as Kansas storms go, but
the rain was pouring down and I didn't see the dead deer in the road. The deer
caused quite a pair of bumps as the '91 Chevy Astro with 289,000 miles on it
rolled over its back end at about 55 mph. Nothing seemed to be damaged, and we
continued on to Liberal without further incident. A check of the underside and
tires after we arrived came up negative. We attached the Hustler antenna
arrays, guyed them, and called it a night.
Saturday
Because of the excessive rains last month (and our almost getting stuck
experiences last year), I'd planned Saturday to be on all paved roads. We left
early and drove to the far end of our first county to start on a two-county
line, arriving with five minutes to spare. We also had a county line sign photo
project assigned to us by N4CD, so I snapped the Hansford county sign before
settling in for the 9:00 am start. K5OT was there on 40m, followed by N5NA/m
and we were off! After just 18 minutes, OM2VL checked in on 40m with the first
and second of his 78 contacts. Amazing job, Laci!
I'm writing this almost two weeks after the fact so the memories are starting
to dim, but a few observations stick. We had good pileups, but band conditions
weren't as good as a year ago. East coast stations were strong, but the usually
loud west coast was unusually weak. The first several hours was also along a
road with major powerlines, so I'm sorry if we couldn't copy your signal at
first. We could hear ops calling, but just couldn't get past the noise. Once we
turned south, conditions improved and 15m opened, so it started to feel more
"normal" again.
I ran the first three counties, then turned the Icom 706MkIIG over to Ron. With
a year of practice and a previous TQP under his belt, Ron was ready to go. He
didn't even turn down the code speed! It was fun picking out calls for him, but
he was often already sending the same call I heard. We both had keys, so it was
also fun tag-teaming at times. As things slowed down on CW, I would take the
mic and let Ron enter the Qs. It's particularly fun to touch base with the CW
ops on SSB when I get the chance, and we tried to put at least a few SSB
contacts in the log from each county (often many more than a few in the longer
counties).
We didn't miss turns this year and all our roads were open, but we fell behind
the schedule at times. Once we heard a loud bang and thought we'd lost an
antenna, but a stop and check of antennas and tires once again found nothing
wrong. Later, the van did start to vibrate some, so we speculated that the deer
must have done some damage after all. As we hit Floyd county, the plan called
for us to take a quick trip north to Briscoe county before going back through
Floyd. Ron was driving about 65 mph and I was letting everyone know we were
five minutes from Briscoe when I heard Ron say something which even made it
past the noise cancelling headphones. Then the van came to a rather sudden
halt. Our right rear tire had blown out and Ron did a terrific job of driving
to keep us going straight.
Wow, I haven't had a blowout like that in 30 years, but here we were - on a
lonely road in Texas with a shredded tire down on the rim. As we waded through
the grass on the side of the road to look at the tire, we found out it wasn't
so lonely after all as we were suddenly surrounded by mosquitos! My backpack
always has DEET packets, unused for many QSO parties, but gold on this one.
They did their job and we got on with the work at hand. The road had almost no
shoulder, and what shoulder there was appeared to be too soft to support a
jack, so I drove the van back on the road. I always carry a "real"
spare tire, a big commercial jack and a breaker bar lug wrench, so changing the
tire turned out to be work but a non-issue. A check of the log shows a 35
minute break, so not Indy-car pit stop quality, but we were mobile once again.
Many ops thought they'd missed us in Briscoe and were pleasantly surprised to
find us there after all. So were we!
Now well behind schedule, we decided to continue our published route anyway.
We'd miss our last county, but we could start there in the morning. We arrived
at the mortuary turned motel named Hunter's Lodge in Paducah, tired but happy.
A big group of Texans in big hats with big pickups were also staying there
overnight, so Ron and I enjoyed listening to real Texas drawls as they tried to
figure out what we were up to. The owners of the motel even remembered us from
last year! I spent awhile with the GPS trying to fit one more county on the
Sunday route.
Sunday
Sunday morning was clear and cool. Since we were leaving from the motel, we had
some extra time to enjoy a breakfast at the cafe next door, complete with quite
an assortment of locals. I also remembered what not to order from last time. As
we packed up the van, I noticed that the spare tire was low on air, so I got out
the portable electric air pump and put in about 15 pounds. We checked the tire
every few hours and had to air it up several times during the day.
Sunday went all too quickly and the rates were much better than Saturday. In
order to add the extra county we missed from yesterday and still make it to
Lipscomb, we reduced time at our favorite four-county line, working it only on
20CW for half an hour and leaving with many still calling. That hurt.
But we did make Lipscomb and the pileup there was amazing. Ron had the honors
and I still remember the look on his face when he put out the first Lipscomb
CQ. The avalanche began with N4PN. Those last 15 minutes were memorable.
Usually, one of us can quickly pick out a call in a pileup after a cQ, but at
times it was next to impossible. The silence was deafening at the closing bell
when so many realized they wouldn't get through in time. But many did,
including K3TW/qrp, OM2VL with contact 78, and N6MU for his "sweep"
of all 36 of our Texas counties! We ended the TQP on the Texas/Oklahoma
border. Sandwiches and pictures afterwards were a much needed break before
starting our five hour trip back to Hesston. Would we do it again? Count on
it!
Stats
2013: We operated 17.0 hours, 1955 Qs, 421 unique calls, 12 dupes, 1375 miles.
2012: We operated 17.7 hours, 2270 Qs, 417 unique calls, 32 dupes, 1423 miles.
-------------- 13 12
US/VE Worked - 52 46 states/provinces
TX worked ---- 46 59 counties
DX worked ---- 18 17 countries
---------- 2013 2012
Day 1 Qs : 1195 1433
Rates (includes dupes)
---------------- 2013 - 2012
Sat 1400 - 2000 : 105 - 121 / hr
Sat 2000 - 0200 : 109 - 119 / hr
Sun 1400 - 0200 : 131 - 143 / hr
Total 2013 W0BH/m : 1955 Qs, 116 mults, 36,500 bonus = 664,756 points
Total 2012 W0BH/m : 2270 Qs, 112 mults, 35,000 bonus = 743,176 points
County Breakdown (in visited order)
Saturday (534 miles during the QSO party)
01 OCHI 28
02 HANS 46
03 HUTC 44
04 MOOR 48
05 SHMN 47
06 DALM 33
07 HART 63
08 OLDH 63
09 POTT 61
10 CARS 47
11 ARMS 46
12 RAND 65
13 DSMI 40
14 CAST 58
15 PARM 53
16 BAIL 42
17 LAMB 56
18 SWIS 68
19 HALE 56
20 FLOY 82
21 BRIS 24
22 MOTL 43
23 DICK 47
24 KING 19
Sunday (251 miles during the QSO party)
25 COTT 41
26 FOAR 33
27 HDMN 45
28 CHIL 93
29 HALL 103
30 DONL 58
31 COLW 60
32 WHEE 95
33 HEMP 96
34 GRAY 50
35 ROBE 63
36 LIPS 39
Special thanks to the following ops for 8 or (way) more contacts:
78: OM2VL
62: N4PN
43: N6MU
37: N8II
34: VE3KZ W4UT WA6KHK
32: VE7CV
28: K3TW
27: N3RJ
26: N1LN W0GXQ
25: N4JF
22: W7GF
21: K1TN N3KR
19: DK2OY KS4X VE3OM
18: ND3R
17: K4AMC KN4Y N3UM
16: K4BAI
15: KQ3F LA8OM N4CD
14: K9CW N4VA N9AUG W2CVW WB0PYF
13: N2CQ W1DWA WW7D
12: K4ZGB K5LH K6KQV N4UF SM6VR W1END
11: DL6KVA DL8MLD K1ZO K9GDF KC3X N6ENO NR5M
10: DL5ME K2SX K7INA K8MFO N4BP N5LZ W8POF
09: AA8VG N3RM N7XU NO5W SP5SA VA3GKO WA4G
08: DL5MU K5OT K8JQ NA2NY WA4WKL
07: 18 ops
06: 14 ops
05: 22 ops
04: 15 ops
03: 28 ops
02: 78 ops
01: 179 ops
Texas mobiles worked (9):
W5CT/6 N5NA/3 NM5G/2 K5AX/2 K5CM K5YAA KK5LO N5TM NS5J
W0BH Award Winners - First Place --- Very Honorable Mention
-----------------------------------------------------------
Most overall Qs ---- OM2VL/74 ------ N4PN/62 ---- N6MU/43
Most CW Qs --------- OM2VL/51 ------ N6MU/43 ---- N4PN/35
Most PH Qs --------- N4PN/27 ------- OM2VL/25 --- W4UT/12
Most counties ------ N6MU/36 ------- OM2VL/34 --- N4PN/33
Afterwards
The spare tire held up for the trip home, the van now has new tires, the spare
no longer leaks, and the batteries are recharged for the next mobile
adventure.
Thanks as always to Chuck/NO5W for his excellent mobile coordination (and the
Louisiana contacts)! Chuck and Alan/N5NA just won the Kansas Mobile Multi-Op
plaque in the Kansas QSO Party. While they were here, I enjoyed meeting both of
them for the first time as Lorna and I hosted them overnight at W0BH/K0WHY. Next
year, we'd like to invite even more Texas mobiles to the Kansas QSO Party!
Thanks to NARS for sponsoring the event and as always, thank you all for
another great Texas weekend!
73, Bob/w0bh and Ron/ad0dx
Posted using 3830 Score Submittal Forms at: http://www.3830scores.com/
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