ARRL Sweepstakes Contest, CW - 2019
Call: K1LT
Operator(s): K1LT
Station: K1LT
Class: SO Unlimited HP
QTH: Ohio EM89ps
Operating Time (hrs): 18
Radios: SO2R
Summary:
Band QSOs
------------
160: 0
80: 485
40: 190
20: 149
15: 98
10: 0
------------
Total: 872 Sections = 83 Total Score = 144,752
Club: Mad River Radio Club
Comments:
Since I couldn't operate full time and to maximize my score for the
club score I operated assisted. Since my time at the start was
limited, I elected to go multiplier hunting right off the bat. I was
able to work all of the traditional 'hard' multipliers in the first
hour on 15 meters. Of course, every year has a new collection of
'hard' multipliers.
I had to be a parent for more hours than usual this year. The kid's
marching band earned a visit to the state marching band competition so
I had to drive up to Columbus to show my support. That consumed most
of the productive hours Saturday evening.
By the time I got back to the radio, 80 was already long although I
did work a number of close-in stations and I didn't even look at 40.
Going to bed with only 360 QSOs in the log was a bit demoralizing.
Since I was only goofing off this year, I went to sleep at the usual
time around 0600Z and planned to get up when I woke up on my own. I
woke up at 1100Z which worked out well to catch more stations on 80
while there was some darkness left. After a couple of hours I took a
90 minute nap.
It was nice to get a normal amount of sleep. I was really dragging on
Saturday. More SS. By noon I found that this year's 'hard'
multipliers were VE4, ND, NE, and WTX.
The rest of Sunday played out like a typical Sweepstakes Sunday. I
kept an eye on DX Summit for the missing multipliers and eventually a
VE4 spot went by. So I changed bands and joined the pileup.
Thankfully, almost everyone fails to use the 'tune to the side' trick
and I had VE4VT after just a few calls. The next station I worked was
VE4GV who had a smaller pileup.
N7IV answered my CQ on 20 and gave me ND.
Since I was unlimited, I had a packet cluster node connected via the
logging program. So much noise (broken calls) and 'phantom' spots. I
call them phantom spots because the same calls appeared on numerous
frequencies that apparently belong to some other station. So the
click and pounce strategy was extremely tedious.
Turns out that one of the phantoms was KV0I in NE. He was on 20 when
the band was going long and it took a few exchanges to complete the
QSO. Thanks! Another phantom was N5NA in WTX. It is nice when all
the multipliers are worked so one can concentrate on finding new
stations.
>From then on I did the usual rotation of CQing and then pouncing and
then changing bands and then repeat. DX Summit indicated a new
station to work almost as often as the packet cluster. There was a
big difference in signal to noise ratio.
Around 0100Z DX Summit said FR4NT was on 160. That's a new 160
country for me and I've been chasing him off and on for a couple of
years. So I went to 160 and worked him as his signal was fairly
decent. I didn't notice any SS activity on the waterfalls, so I went
back to the rotation.
My observation is that there were enough people doing the 'fresh meat'
thing that no one received a huge pileup and the rate remained merely
'tediously slow' instead of 'agonizingly boring' as in previous years.
Nice to make 2 QSOs in the last 2 minutes!
The amplifier started doing its weird and exceedingly annoying fan
cycling thing in the last hour. The last time, blowing all the dust
out of the tube fins seemed to cure that problem for a few months.
Must be time to take out the 37 screws and either break my back or
fill the shack with dust.
Equipment: Elecraft K3S/P3 and Alpha 8410; K3/P3; tribander at 100
feet, tribander at 60 feet, full sized verticals on 40 and 80.
I left out the story about trying to raise the high tribander 7 feet
so I can put a 40 meter antenna under it because that process hasn't
been successful yet. But I've been getting my exercise.
Posted using 3830 Score Submittal Forms at: http://www.3830scores.com/
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