CQ WORLD WIDE DX CONTEST -- 1995
Call: AB6FO Country: Los Angeles CA USA
Mode: CW Category: Single Operator High Power
BAND QSO QSO PTS PTS/QSO ZONES COUNTRIES
160 7 13 1.86 5 5
80 100 244 2.44 15 24
40 606 1686 2.78 35 82
20 537 1461 2.72 36 86
15 168 422 2.51 25 48
10 19 22 1.16 7 7
---------------------------------------------------
Totals 1437 3848 2.68 123 252 => 1,443,000
Equipment:
radio 1 - Kenwood 950SD, Alpha 87A, TopTen Decoder tied to Dunestar 600
CQ bandpass filters & stubs, Drake MN2700 Tuner.
radio 2 - Kenwood 950SDX, Kenwood SM230, Alpha 87A, TopTen Decoder tied to
S&P Dunestar 600 bandpass filter & stubs, Dunestar 500 bandpass filter
in receive line, Drake MN2000 tuner.
computer Micron P90, 90 mhz Pentium, CT 9.23, K1EA DVP, Quickpath Systems
MultiPort I/O card
Antenna System:
W0MLY antenna switch to put any antenna on either radio and switch between
selected transmit antenna and receive antenna on radio1.
160 W9INN Sloper, K6STI 21' loop @15' on receive
80 Force 12 180S rotating dipole @72', K6STI 21' loop @15' on receive
40 Mosley Pro96 @ 78'
20 Force 12 420 @ 42'/Pro96 @78'
15 Force 12 415 @ 50'/Pro96 @78'
10 Pro96 @78'
My goals were to beat last year's score and operate 48 straight
hours. I beat last year by about 100,000 and I didn't sleep.
Lowlites:
1. At 23:30 Friday, everything was set up and ready to go. I decided to
check WWV on packet. After running CT's COMTSRs I need to do a cold reboot
on the computer to get my packet program to work. When I turned the computer
back on, I heard a loud grinding, whining noise and got a CMOS error
message. I got a horrible feeling in my stomach as I thought the hard disk
had died. I rebooted again, again got the grinding sound, but this time
the computer booted. Then, when I reloaded CT, it wouldn't read radio 1.
I've had a problem with COM4 before, so I switched to COM6. At 23:55 I
was back in business, but had to deal with the grinding whining noise the
rest of the contest. It turns out it was a floppy drive that had died.
2. I had 6 single digit QSO hours. I don't think I'll do 48 straight
again until the sunspots return.
3. My second and third string headphones went out. Need some new ones.
Suggestions?
Highlites:
1. Making it 48 hours. I went 25 hours straight, took a 15 minute break,
then did 11 hours before another 15 minute break. Towards the end things in
the shack started undulating. Wave patterns appeared in the carpet, the
950's readout took on eerie three dimensional qualities. If I was seeing
things, I got to wondering if I was hearing things also. I needed a repeat
on just about every JA call in the 2200 hour Sunday.
2. Busting virtually every pileup in just a few calls. My callsign in
starting to get recognized in the pileups. Still can't wait for 610V though.
Comments:
160/80 meters - I finished installing a K6STI receiving loop 5' above the
garage roof Friday afternoon. I tuned it by running a long headphone
extension cable through the skylight in the shack. It seemed to work better
on 160 than 80 in terms of noise reduction, but I didn't hear anything on
the loop that I couldn't hear on my 160 sloper. My balloon vertical kit
for 160 didn't arrive until after the contest.
What is the shortest a Beverage can be and still give some benefit? The
house to the rear of my property is vacant and I can surupticiously
run a wire on top of its 6' cinderblock side yard wall, drop coax to the wall
foot and bury it up to my property, bring the coax over our adjoining
wall to my property rear and into the shack, jag the beverage wire 15'
to my cinderblock side party wall and wind up with about 225' of beverage at
6' pointing at 100 degrees, forgetting the jag. There is a lot of vines on
the wall, so no one would ever see it.
I heard Europe on 80 for the first time with the Force 12 rotating
dipole, but wasn't able to bust the pileups. The dipole at 72' sure beat
my old Vee with the apex at 70'.
40 meters - It is unusual for me to hear Europe on 40 in the evening. There
were plenty of Europeans both evenings. In fact on Sunday Europe was coming
through on 40 hours before sunset here. I should have checked 40 earlier.
20 meters - The Europe switch got turned on at sunrise and lasted about 2
hours. It was amazing to hear nothing and then, out of nowhere, the band
was wall to wall signals. I couldn't find a run frequency except amid the
RTTY crowd, one of which hunted me up and down 15 or 20 Khz in order to
jam me.
15 meters - Not as good as last year. No Europe heard. Not as many South
Americans as I had hoped for. No zone 12. JA runs much slower. The Force 12
415 at 50' doesn't show the benefit over the Pro96 at 72' on 15 that the
Force 12 420 at 42' shows on 20 meters over the much higher Pro96. I'm
coming to the conclusion that the Pro96 is poor on 20 but OK on the other
bands.
10 meters - NL7G was the only station I worked on all 6 bands. His was the
loudest signal I heard on 10. Ironically, when I worked him on 80 I sent
"only need u on 10 no chance HI HI." Despite checking often, 10, though
marginally open, yielded few QSOs & mults.
It is hard for me to understand how I missed a number of DXpeditions. I
only heard AH0A on 40 and KH0AM, XY1A, 9Q9WW, among others, not at all.
Heard 3B8 twice and it was one of the very few pileups I couldn't bust.
73. Ken, AB6FO, KWIDELITZ@DELPHI.COM
>From George Cook <george@epix.net> Wed Nov 29 01:26:42 1995
From: George Cook <george@epix.net> (George Cook)
Subject: K3ANS score CQWW/CW
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.91.951128202428.16950A-100000@peach.epix.net>
The following is being posted for K3ANS by AA3JU
Please forward any questions on this operation to K3ANS via
packet radio to K3ANS@WB3DTG
Unedited CQ WORLD WIDE DX CONTEST -- 1995
Call: K3ANS Country: United States
Mode: CW Category: Multi Multi
BAND QSO QSO PTS PTS/QSO ZONES COUNTRIES
160 274 637 2.32 20 72
80 265 700 2.64 21 82
40 588 1690 2.87 37 120
20 726 2081 2.87 35 125
15 796 2298 2.89 28 119
10 50 107 2.14 10 24
---------------------------------------------------
Totals 2699 7513 2.78 151 542 => 5,206,509
All reports sent were 59(9), unless otherwise noted.
Operator List:
Frankford Radio Club members: K3ANS, N2BIM, WF3H, N3RCA, N2MZH, N2KJM,
AA3JA/JH7PKU, K3YD.
Potential members: N3JGX, N3IYX
Club Affiliation: Frankford Radio Club, Inc.
Equipment Description: 5 independent stations set up.
160 Meters: Icom IC-765, Commander amplfier, full size ground plane
antenna,
inverted V antenna, 5 receiving beverage antennas: NE, NW,
W, S, E.
80 Meters: Icom IC-761, Ameritron AL-1200 amplifier,
3 element
wire yagi aimed northeast (to Europe), center fed zepp, south
sloping dipole antennas, 5 receiving beverage antennas: NE, NW,
W, S, E.
40 Meters: Yaesu FT-1000D, Drake L-4B amplifier,
3 element Telrex yagi at 108', wire yagi aimed north east (to
Europe).
20 Meters: Icom IC-761, Drake L-4B amplifier,
Hygain 205CA yagi at 117'
Sterba curtain 6 element wire antenna aimed
NE/SW.
15 Meters: Icom IC-765, Commander amplifier, Hygain 155CA yagi at 90',
(with
Telex Tailtwister rotator which kept jamming and sticking in one
position).
10 Meters: Icom IC-761, Drake L-4B amplifier
Collins 30L-1 amplifier, 6
element yagi at 80' (using same bad Telex Tailtwister rotator)
F.R.C. Paving the road to the top!
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