ARRL 10-Meter Contest - 2019
Call: K7XC
Operator(s): K7XC
Station: K7XC
Class: SO Mixed Unlimited HP
QTH: N NV -DM09jh
Operating Time (hrs): 20
Summary:
Band QSOs Mults
-------------------
CW: 119 23
SSB: 23 11
-------------------
Total: 142 34 Total Score = 17,748
Club: Northern California Contest Club
Comments:
Monday and Tuesday before the contest I reconfigured the VHF Tower trailer to
end up with the 4ele 10M yagi up top at 30ft and the 6ele 6M yagi below it at
26ft. Everything tested great at 100W so called it good. For 3 days I have had
that nagging feeling I forgot something. Friday morning I Configured N1MM+ for
the 10M contest, loaded up the AL-80B Amp so it would be ready to go and BLAMMO!
The SWR is through the roof, shifting all over the place. So with 2 hrs of light
left Rosie and I Get dressed for the cold and 25MPH winds, lower the tower, tip
it over, and loosen the boom to mounting plate clamps and swivel the ant over so
the elements are parallel to the mast. Now we can lower it till the 6M Reflector
hits the ground. On a Ladder I remove the Scotch 88 tape sealing the coax
connector, remove it and use a brass bristled brush on the PL259 center
conductor till its shiny, and use a brass bore brush on the inside of the SO-239
till clean. Replacing the Coax and raising the
tower trailer back to vertical and the 7 to 1 SWR remains. Lowering it back
down, up the ladder in what little light is now left, I swap it out for a 20 ft
test cable & raise it back up... 1.03 to 1 at 28.200 MHz. Damn, the feedline
is BAD! Why? I will figure it out later. Since I removed the 144, 222, and 432
MHz yagis to make room for 10M, I now have my choice of low loss feed-lines to
swap over too. The 2M run of 1/2 Heliax terminates to a short run of CQ-106 low
loss coax with a PL-259 on the end, so it will not need any adapters. I remove
the temp run of 3 sections of RG-8 that used to go to the 4WL 222MHz yagi and
use the 2M feedline, Secure and weatherproof it as daylight fades, aided by a
high power LED flashlight. Rosie steadies me on the ladder as I am getting cold
and tired. It takes 10 minutes to cut out the bad coax and redo the rotor loop
harness with Scotch 88, as its all I have that will work in the freezing cold.
Once done We raise the tower a bit, Secure the antenna so its horizontal again,
and raise the tower back to vertical. Running Inside I run a quick check and
everything is perfect again. Back out & fully raise the tower trailer,
gather up all the tools, secure the unused feedline and stagger back indoors
where a roaring fire in the pellet stove is waiting to thaw out my frozen
fingers! 3 minutes later I am in front of the radio and the band is filled with
Plenty of loud signals, with rapid QSB, typical of Sporadic E (Es) propagation.
So I start an hour late but as I write this report at 06:30Z the band is still
open to VE7/WA/OR on CW. Time to call it a night! So... I thought I had it all
covered 4 days early and Murphy shows up saying, " NO YOU DON'T!" with
barely enough time to fix it before the contest starts! HI HI Off to bed I get
up at Sunrise planning to play on the rocks. 28MHz MS with a KW and long yagi is
usually a lot of fun! Unfortunately that's all she wrote as both Sat and Sun are
very disappointing with horrid conditions and hardly any new stations to work.
Still, what a blast to see 10M open like it was Friday night, reminded me of
times past when the sunspots were not so stingy! 73s de Tim - K7XC - DM09jh...
sk
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