In light of CT1BOH's recent proposal to revamp CQ WW scoring, I thought the
assembled brethren might be interested in some history that just resurfaced
when I cleaned out my desk for a recent office move.
In the Jan/Feb 1984 issue of NCJ, Jim Neiger N6TJ made arguments nearly
identical to BOH's to get rid of two pointers. Jim's argument was in the
form of a really nasty letter to Frank Anzalone, and also proposed
alternating the CW and SSB weekends. However, his main point was the same.
Also in that issue was the tail end of a short-lived guest op controversy,
briefly brought back to life a few years ago by W3BGN: can a guest op really
enter as a single op, especially if the station owner fixes antennas or
amplifiers *during* the contest?
Seems like contesting controversies are on roughly an 11 year cycle as well!
John Pescatore WB2EKK
pescatore_jt@ncsd.gte.com
>From ken.silverman@atlas.ccmail.PacTel.COM (ken silverman) Tue Feb 1
>18:47:26 1994
From: ken.silverman@atlas.ccmail.PacTel.COM (ken silverman) (ken silverman)
Subject: Contest/Expedition Radios
Message-ID: <9401017601.AA760128446@atlas.ccmail.pactel.com>
Hi Gang, I need your advice (kinda like "Dear Abby" of contesting)!
My contest/expedition radio is broken again (10 yr old FT757 w/ IRC filters),
and I can't seem to fix the problem, nor am I willing to put more money into
the radio. I figure it's time to upgrade the radio with new technology. The
main use for the radio is for contest/expeditions, and portable operations from
overseas.
My needs in a contest/expedition radio are fairly basic: 1) Small enough to
transport in a suitcase; 2) Be capable of serious contesting from the DX end;
3) Be rugged enough to handle years of abuse 4) Computer control interface, and
support by CT/NA/N6TR software; 5) Internal AC power supply (desirable but not
critical); 6) Built in Keyer (desirable but not critical); 7) Excels in CW
performance, for SSB operations are far and few between; 8) Price is less
critical than meeting the above requirements
I have not been able to test drive any of the new models during a contest, so I
wonder if you can help me gather some information. (I tend to use IC 765's,
751's, FT1000s, TS 940's etc, none of which I feel meet my needs for an
expedition radio)
My question to you is this:
What new radios have you used that fit this category, and what comments +/- do
you have? Also, I am open to modifying any radio that's out there to increase
it's performance to fit my needs.
Many thanks for your comments!
Ken WM2C
Note: internet addr has changed: ken.silverman@atlas.ccmail.pactel.com
>From Mark E. Bailey" <mebly@Glue.umd.edu Tue Feb 1 19:42:15 1994
From: Mark E. Bailey" <mebly@Glue.umd.edu (Mark E. Bailey)
Subject: New Hams/Contesting
Message-ID: <199402011942.OAA03130@nand.eng.umd.edu>
From: "Daniel R. Violette"
<Daniel_R._Violette@ccmail.anatcp.rockwell.com>
> About four years back we were getting a multi-single club effort going
> for the ARRL DX SSB Contest. Since we were going to have fun and not
> be a great contender and that we couldn't get a lot of SSB ops,
> thought it would be nice to indoctrinate a couple Technicians who were
> studying the code and interested in contest operating. Then one of
> the seasoned ops said 'Look at the rules under miscellaneous rules'.
> Sure enough there was a rule prohibiting operators from exceeding
> there class of operator license in the contest. So it fell apart.
>[...]
Isn't the problem here really the "international third party traffic" issue?
The Technicians can't be the control operators except (possibly) in the
ten meter Novice/Technician subband. Outside that subband, they would be
considered third parties and could only communicate with countries having
a third party agreement with the US.
It has been a while since I looked this one up. However, when I did, I
came to the conclusion that we couldn't do the same thing (let non-hams
or Novice/Technician class hams) operate in a DX contest...except, again,
in the appropriate section of ten meters.
Mark Bailey KD4D Motto: Life's too short to drink cheap beer.
mebly@glue.umd.edu Disclaimer: I didn't really say this.
>From Smith, Pete" <PSmith@codei.hq.nasa.gov Tue Feb 1 23:47:00 1994
From: Smith, Pete" <PSmith@codei.hq.nasa.gov (Smith, Pete)
Subject: FW: CT vs. ???
Message-ID: <2D4EEA12@ms.hq.nasa.gov>
----------
From: Smith, Pete
To: CQ-Contest-Relay
Subject: Re: CT vs. ???
Ward, N0AX wrote:
>CT's upgrades tend to have more bugs than would be allowable in
>commercial software. However, given the limited resources available to
>the programmers (repeat after me...it IS a hobby...) a less-than-complete
>testing program is to be expected. That said, I'm surprised that 8.52
>went out with busted "check-partial", if true as reported...it's kind of a
>major function.
>My personal preference would be to have fewer upgrades with better testing
>of each version. ...
About the time that the profits from CT stopped going to YCCC, and the price
charged for the software started to get on up there, I think the user should
have been able to expect something more nearly approaching "commercial"
quality control. Both CT7 and CT8 have had to be fixed many times, to fix
things that were broken in prior revisions, and not caught before those
revisions went on the street.
While I'm not familiar with the source code, my impression is that there
must be a fair bit of "spaghetti" in there, given that things often get
broken when another (seemingly unrelated) function is fixed. I also
question whether it makes sense to integrate all the code required to
support multi-single and multi-multi operation, instead of making it a
separate module for those who want and need it.
I don't suppose this situation is likely to change , and so will continue to
use CT versions that are at least three or four revs earlier than the
current one, so that bugs -- at least bugs I care about -- are discovered by
someone else. Meanwhile, I have just begun experimenting with N6TR's
software, which is commendably compact and easy to use on the air, though
painfully lacking in post-contest creature comforts.
73, Pete N4ZR
>From dcurtis@mipos2.intel.com (Dave Curtis) Tue Feb 1 19:57:58 1994
From: dcurtis@mipos2.intel.com (Dave Curtis) (Dave Curtis)
Subject: attracting contest newbies
Message-ID: <9402011957.AA12596@climax.intel.com>
Isn't Novice Roundup in progress right now? If memory serves, this
upcoming weekend is the second weekend. Let's provide some Q's and
maybe spread the contest bug.
73, Dave NG0X
dcurtis@mipos2.intel.com
>From rking@sescva.esc.edu (RICHARD KING - K5NA) Tue Feb 1 18:56:03 1994
From: rking@sescva.esc.edu (RICHARD KING - K5NA) (RICHARD KING - K5NA)
Subject: CQ 160 CW Contest
This is the first time in 10 years that this station didn't have a serious
effort in the CQ 160 Meter CW Contest. I was just too busy playing student
to put in the time. So Susan, KU2Q, and I played around in the contest
during the peak hours to Europe.
Susan used the TS940 with a Dentron DTR2000L amp to the full-wave 160 meter
loop (top at 120 feet and bottom at 20 feet). I used the IC765 with a Henry
3K amp (Premier prototype) to switchable (NE & SW) half-wave slopers hanging
from 190 feet. The first night was almost all S/P with Susan and I taking
turns calling people. I was listening mainly for DX while she looked for
stateside QSOs. The second night we did a little running, especially when
the band was open to Europe. It was casual and it was a lot of fun. Susan
and I had:
375 QSOs - 1285 QSO Points - 51 W/VE - 36 Countries = 111,785 Final Score
CT said we put in 8.8 hours, worked 49 Europe, 6 South America (all P4s?),
2 Asia, 1 Oceania, and 1 Africa. Best DX was probably HZ1AB and 4L0M. We
missed La, ND, SD, VY2, VO2, VE5, VE6, VE7, VE8, & VY1.
73, Richard
>From Steven.M.London@att.com (Steven M London +1 303 538 4763) Tue Feb 1
>21:20:00 1994
From: Steven.M.London@att.com (Steven M London +1 303 538 4763) (Steven M
London +1 303 538 4763)
Subject: CT vs. others
Message-ID: <9402012121.AA26486@bighorn.dr.att.com>
I don't want to waste a lot of bandwidth on this ...
As mentioned by others, CT supports a bewildering array of options:
- Lots of contests
- Lots of modes (single, M/S, M/M, M/2, DXpedition, ... )
- Lots of radios
- Multi-computer networking
- PacketCluster support
- Post-contest stats, QSL's, logs ,...
Here's one not mentioned - For the inexperienced op, it has an easy-to-learn
human interface (the same can be said for NA). When you run
small-time multi's, with operators who don't do CT with every contest,
every weekend, it is important that your ops get up to speed quickly.
Yes, it requires a lot of keystrokes for simple operations, but that's a
small price to pay for simplicity.
I too, get frustrated at the little bugs that are introduced in each
release (and subsequently get fixed). When I am doing single-op, no packet,
and don't care about the radio interface, I long for good old
CT 5.08 - It worked great on my dog 8088 computer, and was relatively bug-free.
Steve, N2IC/0
>From jds@bncic01.den.bnr.com (James D. Spaulding) Tue Feb 1 23:25:46 1994
From: jds@bncic01.den.bnr.com (James D. Spaulding) (James D. Spaulding)
Subject: No subject
Message-ID: <9402012325.AA03447@bncic01.den.bnr.com>
I think N2IC has it right... The last 25 years has seen some dramatic changes
for children....Much of the free time they had is gone. I made a quick
survey of my 14 year old's week .. his work day is often as long as mine and
he has extracurricular activities six of seven nights. He's a general class
ham and really does like to contest. Two years running we've tried to get
a multi-single up for NAQP, but each time he's had something going or has
been out of town. This activity creates another problem for youngsters.
For the most part they haven't had to structure their own time. Most of
their activities structure time for them. As a result, I believe they are
less able to plan and carry out their own activities then kids were a
generation ago. I also agree with Steve, the kids I know are very sharp
and pick up contesting fast.
Jim
W0UO
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