ARRL 160-Meter Contest
Call: K1LT
Operator(s): K1LT
Station: K1LT
Class: Single Op HP
QTH: Ohio EM89ps
Operating Time (hrs): 32
Radios: SO2R
Summary:
Total: QSOs = 1528 Sections = 83 Countries = 44 Total Score = 423,545
Club: Mad River Radio Club
Comments:
I made no particular effort to prepare for this ARRL 160 contest. All
of the short verticals were working as was the transmitting vertical.
Last fall I did have to tweak the splice in the cable TV hardline
feeding the transmit vertical. Even though cable TV splice connectors
are designed to work outdoors, they are probably not specified for
lying on the ground for 10 years.
A couple of hours before the contest I tried to make the "transmit
nulling" 2-element end-fire array produce a 60 db null, but I could
not get the matching network to work correctly. I did discover that
the present arrangement of junk-box parts prefers to null at the
bottom of the band. The best I could do was about 30 db, which I
decide was good enough. That allows me to receive down to about 6-8
kHz from my transmit signal.
Conditions at the start seemed very good. Noise was low. Big-gun
Europeans called sporadically amongst the scores of W/VE signals for
the first 6 hours. The initial rate seemed excellent but comparison
with previous years shows the rate to be typical. The European
sunrise period did not produce many additional contacts. The
conditions seemed to be good but the participants were lacking. They
got their fill of W/VE stations during the CQ WW test. Other the
other hand, western North American stations very loud and plentiful.
Also, the selection of South American stations was outstanding. No
PY!
K8MR/4 supplied the only WCF section the first nigth. I did not hear
him calling initially but there was a blip on the P3 (K3 listening on
the SE Beverage) with no corresponding audio from the SDR receivers.
The blip was my cue to turn the phased array towards the south. The
visual method of searching for signals has some merit for further
development as one can visually scan a bunch of waterfalls faster and
easier than turning an antenna and listening.
The first night I worked all ARRL sections except AK, NL, NT, and WTX.
Saturday afternoon I hacked on the transmit nulling matching network a
bit more. I wound a "big" inductor to replace the molded inductor
and
added a tap for better impedance matching. The tap didn't do any good
but the bigger inductor seemed to provide a few more db of null depth.
The extra few db lets me receive within 2-3 kHz of my transmit signal.
This scheme needs more study.
The second evening conditions seemed very nearly as good as the first
night. The noise was somewhat higher and got worse as the evening
progressed. There seemed to be slightly more Europeans, especially UA
and UR, and slightly fewer W6 and W7. Again the European sunrise did
not produce many extra contacts.
K5OAI called around 0346Z to supply WTX and VO2AC called very shortly
thereafter to supply NL. WL7E called around 0419Z filling the AK slot
rather early in the evening. VY1AAA called around 0514Z to finish my
one and only 'clean sweep' of ARRL sections during an ARRL 160 test.
LA2XPA called around 0900Z for a surprise additional multiplier. At
1225Z I struggled to copy JH1HDT's call through the noise crackle. I
eventually copied his call as his signal strength grew by a couple of
db. I appreciate his patience. On a typically quiet morning he would
have come through with only a couple of tries. JH2FXK was my other JA
QSO. I heard JA3YBK running stations as he quickly faded 20 minutes
after my sunrise.
VY1AAA wins the surprise multiplier award. The award is a mention
here. I worked KH2N who quicked my heartbeat for just a moment until
he said his section was "VA". Maybe I miscopied his call in my
morning stupor.
Writelog locked up twice while I was switching between radios (VFOs,
actually) while doing the SO2R thing. When Writelog is locked this
way, the K3 is unable to transmit a signal, although it produces full
power RF noise that kicks the amplifier offline. Obviously a software
problem, but since all of the involved software is proprietary, I
cannot lend my professional expertise to solving this problem. Take
that, closed-source software mavens.
Every year I always have to derive the formula to compute the number
of 5 point contacts. So to save my future self some effort, here is
the process:
2 * K-QSOs + 5 * DX-QSOs = QSO-points
K-QSOs + DX-QSOs = total-QSOs
Solving by system of equations gives:
DX-QSOs = (QSO-points - 2 * total-QSOs) / 3
DX worked: 9H, CT (2), CX, DL, EA (2), EA6 (2), EI (3), F (8),
FM, FS, G (7), GM (2), GW, HA (3), HB, HC, HI, HK (2), HP, I (2),
JA (2), LA, OA, OH (4), OH0, OK (3), OM, ON, PA (2), PJ2, PJ4,
SM (4), SP (2), SV, TI, UA (3), UR (4), V3, VP5, XE (2), YL, YO,
YV, and ZF for a total of 44 entities and 93 5-point QSOs.
The following report of stations by US call district from 'cbs' seems
interesting. Note the almost 4-way tie among call districts 0, 1, 8,
and 9.
Area QSOs Percent
0 145 9.5
1 143 9.4
2 121 7.9
3 137 9.0
4 200 13.1
5 106 6.9
6 82 5.4
7 105 6.9
8 144 9.4
9 143 9.4
Total 1326 86.8
Equipment: K3/100, P3, acoustically subdued Alpha 8410, K3/10; 65-foot
"Tee" with 70 or so 125-foot radials, 16 23-foot verticals each with
16 23-foot radials, 2 miles of RG6, and 6 2-wire Beverages; and too
many computers and SDR pieces-parts. Also audio routing piece-parts,
homebrew SO2R box, more software, Writelog version 11 and all of its
warts.
Some history of K1LT raw scores:
Year DX K/VE Total K/VE DX Total
QSOs QSOs QSOs Mult Mult Score
2007 101 1452 1553 78 48 429534
2008 119 1350 1469 77 42 392105
2009 238 1447 1685 78 51 526836
2010 185 1419 1604 77 51 481664
2011 65 1288 1353 77 30 310407
2012 87 1388 1475 81 36 375687
2013 117 1378 1495 82 32 380874
2014 67 1359 1417 79 23 309570
2015 94 1394 1488 80 33 368154
2016 93 1435 1528 83 44 423545
Notice that the number of K/VE stations stays about the same while the
DX compliment varies. So this year my score is improved because I
worked more W/VE stations and the same number of DX stations spread
out in more entities.
Posted using 3830 Score Submittal Forms at: http://www.3830scores.com/
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