ARRL DX Contest, CW
Call: KT8K
Operator(s): KT8K
Station: KT8K
Class: SOAB QRP
QTH: EN82ch SE Michigan
Operating Time (hrs): 19:39
Summary:
Band QSOs Mults
-------------------
160: 0 0
80: 21 17
40: 80 41
20: 147 66
15: 80 43
10: 10 6
-------------------
Total: 338 173 Total Score = 175,422
Club: Mad River Radio Club
Comments:
The contest started with a high noise level here, but it subsided in the first
hour, leaving great conditions, especially for this part of the sunspot cycle!
I was often working some of the weakest stations beneath the hubbub of big guns
with my 5 Watts and wires in the trees, which always amazes me. It took some
repeats, but I was often able to work a station reporting "KW", who
sounded like a whisper to me, fairly quickly.
I wished there were more stations on, but maybe the propagation was more spotty
and point-to-point than when the solar flux is higher, so I was hearing less
stations at any given time. There was some QSB but it was rarely bad, and 15
thru 40m worked as well or better than I expected most of the time. 20m was
opening up to Eu before 1300Z, and though signals were quite weak the QRN level
was low enough to make contacts a good bit earlier than usual. Fun!
The propagation the second day started out poor to average, but improved as the
sun rose higher. There were periods when nobody could hear me, as sometimes
happens, but I just took an hour off when that happened and, when I came back,
people were hearing me again.
I hope to put you all in the log in the phone version. Good reception to all
until then, and thanks to all who listened hard for my tiny signal. 73 - Tim
station equipment:
- Tentec Orion, MFJ Grandmaster Memory Keyer with Bencher BY-1 paddle
- XP laptop running N1MM+ (and nothing else!)
- homebrew RS-232 to keying interface (thanks Dan KB6NU - catch his blog!)
Antennas:
- 20/40/80m multi-wire dipole at 30 feet, fed with RG8x
- 10/15/20m vertical trap dipole fed at 35 feet with RG8x
- 40/80m wire vertical fed with TV twin lead and LDG Z-11 autotuner, feed point
at 12 feet above ground, 2 radials per band
Thanks for enjoying my ham radio (and other) songs:
"I Want a Big Tower" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uNWZjzrzgwA
"If You Ain't Runnin', You Ain't Winnin'"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uNWZjzrzgwA
www.youtube.com/themandolinmaniac
Posted using 3830 Score Submittal Forms at: http://www.3830scores.com/
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