CQ Worldwide DX Contest, SSB
Call: YN5Z
Operator(s): K7ZO
Station: YN5Z
Class: SOAB(A) HP
QTH: San Juan del Sur
Operating Time (hrs): 41
Summary:
Band QSOs Zones Countries
------------------------------
160: 3 2 3
80: 100 12 22
40: 294 21 54
20: 755 31 92
15: 1664 32 95
10: 2582 32 108
------------------------------
Total: 5398 130 374 Total Score = 6,495,552
Club:
Comments:
Another successful Field Day contest operation is in the books from here in San
Juan del Sur, Nicaragua. Hard to say much more about conditions that has not
been said already except "Wow -- can we do this every year?" I had
six hours over 250 QSOs and came tantalizing close to breaking that magic 300
QSO/hour barrier with a 296. I might have a 300+ best 60 minutes in there
somewhere but have not had a chance to look.
Unlike most contesters I have no permanent station setup here in YN. My whole
station is stored in three hard sided golf bag cases and I have to set it up
each time - a task that takes about a day and half of hard work in high heat
and high humidity. It is the rainy season right now but luckily we had minimal
rain interfering with the outside setup and the thunderstorms during the
contest passed well off in the distance, never interfering with my operating.
(And the rain seems to have greatly reduced the power line RFI I have
experienced during the dry seasons. I had at worst S1-2 noise levels whereas I
have seen S7-9 on some bands at other times.) Wind was almost non-existant
making the setup much easier than fighting the constant gale force winds I had
during ARRL SSB earlier this year. I was also worried about power as during the
week before the contest power had been out for several hours each day due to
rain and maintenance. So, I rented a backup generator for the weekend and it
served its purpose like a good umbrella when it might rain. By being ready, the
power stayed on the whole weekend except for a couple dozen power bumps which
only knocked my amp offline for a few seconds. So, in total not only did the
sun cooperate this weekend but I got a good break from the whole suite of
mother nature's offerings.
As a result I started the contest relaxed and refreshed instead of frustratred
and exhausted.
My station here is not bad for a Field Day operation. The high bands are
covered by a 5 band Spiderbeam on a push up mast. I can't say enough about the
support from the Spiderbeam team. I had a few issues resulting from the high
winds during ARRL SSB, mostly caused by me skipping a few steps in the setup.
Yet, they jumped in and helped me figure out what was going on and getting me
replacement parts. If you are looking for an antenna supplier with great
customer service take a look at the Spiderbeam team. As far as the antenna
itself it is very lightweight and the whole thing fits in one golf case so it
is ideal for dxpeditions. I have assembled the antenna a half dozen times now
and can get it all done in about two hours. And when done I have 4 elements on
10 and 3 elements on 15 and 20 -- full sized and optimally spaced unlike
classic three element tri-banders. You can see from my results that it worked
great. 2,500+ QSOs on 10! Wow! One thing I am missing though is a rotator. So
when it comes time to rotate the beam I have to get up from the operating
station and go out in the yard, unhook the tie down ropes, losen a clamp on the
push up mast, turn the beam then tighten the clamp, and reset the tie down
ropes. This makes it a bit hard to chase mults but it goes with the territory
for a Field Day operation. For the low bands, like any Field Day operation, I
am more challenged and go the verticals route. I have a dedicated 1/4 wave for
40 and an old HF2V for 80 and 160. Each antenna has thirty 32 foot radials
which is as long as possible in the empty lot I use for them will allow. The 40
works reasonably well and is enhanced by the sometimes amazing 40 propagation
from here into Europe. In some pre-contest testing I received some 59+ reports.
Things were obviously harder during the frenzy that is CQWW but I did have a
couple of short runs on 40 into Europe and worked many mults. The HF2V, and
anything that small on 80 and 160, is obviously going to be challenging. I did
manage a couple of EU contacts on 80 along with a lone JA. On 160 I acutally
made my first contacts on the Top Band from here with my three QSOs. I had
hoped for 6 or 7, but I will take the three for now. The inside part of the
station is made up of a TS-590, Elecraft KPA-500 amp and KAT-500 tuner/switch,
microKeyer II, and an Asus ultrabook. I continue to be totally impressed with
the amp. It gets abused by me doing things I shouldn't from time to time but it
manages to protect itself from my stupidity with flying colors. The KAT allows
me to stretch the operating range on 80 to about 100 khz and automatically
switching antennas as I change bands is really helpful.
The actual contest was an incredible experience. When the QSOs start pouring in
it makes all the work getting the station on the air worthwhile. Before the
contest I had decided to enter Assisted for a couple of reasons. N6GQ was going
to be at YN2N operating as SOAB (HP) from a superior station so I just wanted to
stay out of the way of Jeff. Also, I knew that I would be challenged on the
lower bands and operating Assisted would keep things interesting without the
drudgery of tuning for mults and unworked stations. I also felt I had an
outside chance to make it into the Top 10 as assisted but at best would only
break into the top 50 in the big boys SOAB (HP) category. After all I am
essentially a Field Day station with a Tri-bander & Single Elements and
only putting out 500 watts. My pre contest goals were 6M points and 5,000 QSOs
both of which I achieved. I did end up being relatively multiplier challenged,
which is not a good thing for an Assisted station. I just didn't have enough
firepower to break pileups and many many mults were heard and not worked. In
particular I had a hard time working the Carribean on the high bands as from my
QTH I was off the back of their beams when they were beaming to EU and off the
side of their beam when they were beaming US. I had an easier time working them
on the low bands. Overall though my low band mults were to be expected with
verticals. I can only look at envy at the low band mult numbers from the
Carribean and Europe stations. But, I certainly had an advantage making Qs with
the US a short hop due north of me and great high band paths into Europe and
Asia. 10 opened into Europe about 30 minutes after sunrise and I had hours of
fun working them. I had no idea there were so many hams in Zone 16 and wow does
Poland (SP) seem to be a center of contesters. My overall best memory will be
from Saturday night from about 0130 to 0500 UTC when 20 was open to the whole
northern hemisphere at the same time. I was just about to sit down for dinner
with my family when I took what was meant to be a quick look at 20 and somehow
found 14259 open. I settled in, got the a run going, and all thoughts of dinner
dissappeared. For the next couple of hours I had stations calling in from all
over the world. There would be K, followed by a 9A, then a JA, a UA9, a VU, a
DL, back to the US, etc over and over. It is now one of my top memories from my
20+ years of contesting. Another experience was my finishing the contest on 10
beaming to Asia, which I forgot to do on Saturday and I knew I missing many
multipliers and three point JA qsos. So, off I went at 2230 UTC giving up 250+
rates on 15M telling myself I was doing the right thing -- "Give up the
known rate, you need mults on 10 and there are three point qsos waiting".
As many have said 10 was packed to well about 29000 but I squeezed in at 28443
and soon had the biggest pileup of JAs I have ever heard. It was essentially
unmanageable as there were probably 50+ stations calling and they were all the
same signal strength. The pileups from Europe were probably similar depth but
there always was a station either through their location and a temporary
propagation enhancement or their antenna and power, could rise above the rest.
This just was not happening out of Japan and my rates dropped. I thought about
"going by the numbers" and maybe should have but didn't. So I just
struggled along working what I could and taking quick QSY's to grab mults off
the bandmap. At one point I realized I was missing the HL mult which would be
silly. So, I asked the pileup "Any HL stations out there".
Immediately a ZL appeared above the noise and I gave him a break and put him in
the log. Then after a long struggle to get the JA's to standby an HL2 was in the
log. I worked a few more then thought to see if there were any other missing
mults in the screaming masses. So I asked "Any BV, 3W, 9V" out there.
Again after a struggle to get the pileup to calm down a wonderful surprise came
in loud in clear with JT1BV finding his was into the log as my last mult and a
double mult at that!
Enough story for now. Thanks everyone for the QSOs. QSL via K7ZO or LOTW. QSL
and other information is on QRZ.COM for YN5Z.
Look for me again in the 10 Meter contest.
Scott/YN5Z/K7ZO
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