ARRL Sweepstakes Contest, CW
Call: K0EU
Operator(s): K0EU
Station: K0EU
Class: SO Unlimited HP
QTH: CO
Operating Time (hrs): 24
Radios: SO2R
Summary:
Band QSOs
------------
160: 2
80: 149
40: 434
20: 462
15: 349
10: 56
------------
Total: 1452 Sections = 83 Total Score = 241,032
Club: Grand Mesa Contesters of Colorado
Comments:
Thanks again to all who participate and make this a fun contest, at least for
the first 10 or 12 hours. Congrats to N6TV at W7RN for the best score so far.
I've been doing some contract work at the Comstock mine, just over the hill
from that station. It is very impressive when seen in person. Still waiting to
see what score N9RV posts as he quite a bit ahead of me when we worked.
Congrats to K7BG, who appears to have taken number one in A power again with
his plethora of antennas. Nice going, Matt.
After decades of doing the A category in SS, I thought I'd try something new
this year and entered the high power assisted class. I chose assisted because
there appeared to be a reasonable chance of making the top five based on prior
score comparisons. Things didn't start out well. I sat down to find a run
frequency to begin the contest, found a clear spot, sent QRL? and the main amp
started arcing. Crap! I had manually placed the run radio on the same band as
the second radio and was transmitting with no antenna. Switched bands on the
other radio...still had arcing even with antenna. Decided Murphy had dealt me a
nasty last minute blow, and had less than ten minutes to swap out the HF2500DX
for spare Alpha 76PA. Luckily, teenage son was available to help swap amps
since I can't move the HF2500DX on my own. Managed to poke hole in thumb while
moving the amp and began bleeding like a stuck pig. Sat down in chair with
bandaged thumb and replacement amp at 20:59:50. Sent some V's..no arcs!..,
pressed F1 key at 21:00:00 and began best first four hours ever (401 QSO's).
After the rate dropped to where the second radio became more useful, I found
that something had taken over my contest computer! Little effort was required
in listening on the second radio because every signal I tuned had a matching
grey or blue popup callsign above the call entry window in N1MM. Only once
during the weekend did I find a nice catch (N7IV, North Dakota) on the second
radio whose signal had somehow evaded the collective's receiving outposts.
Getting a sweep by finding a watery VY1JA signal on 10 or 15 meters was no
longer a special moment to cherish. I simply kept an eye on the band map, and
when VY1JA showed up, I clicked, worked, and moved on. OK, every so often the
callsign listed on the band map was not correct so you had to be careful.
Apologies to KH7XX who I tried working later in the contest because he was
spotted as KH6XX. I doubt I was the only one. Once I found the way to reduce
clutter and delete the bad spots from the band map in N1MM, I was able to focus
on knocking off second radio Q's during lulls in run radio responders.
73
Randy
K0EU
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