Well, a week ago today I found out my schedule had changed and I
could make it to the W7RM M/M after all. What a great contest! I
have some observations about the rules, the condx, and the
operators.
-1 pt for domestic QSOs: Finally!!! This contest did NOT become
the USA QSO party like a certain SM has/is saying. Why do you
think I spent 5 minutes on Sunday digging out just *one* UT5?
Why did we keep a beam on EU almost the entire day Saturday?
Why did we run lots and lots of EU on 20 and 15? Because 3
point QSO's help MUCH more then 1 point! And 6 point JA's on
40/80 are MUCH better then 1 point stateside!
Yes, we called stateside when we wouldn't have in the past. But
we worked all the Euros we could find.
-condx: 20 was open almost round the clock, but the QRM was
ferocious. Had my own pileup of VK's around 0900z or so once the
band got quiet. Europe was booming in, but it was HARD to copy
the 3rd tier guys through the QRM.
Did battle with the SSTV'ers and the county hunter net guys...I was
2 kc from the county hunters and had them complain that I was so
loud that the mobile guys couldn't hear anything but me with the
noise blanker on.
Great condx on 15, I spent some time running after 0400z, had lots
of JA's call, and some Indian ocean stuff to boot, including VQ9 at
almost 0500z!
Sunday was slooow on 20, couldn't get a stateside run going until
20 minutes to the end, and then I was 2 kc down from a 50 over
N0NI, which made it hard to really run guys, but managed 20 guys
or so in the last 20 minutes. I know W7RM is super loud, sorry
guys, we just had a super hard time hearing when every time the
guy 2 kc above me talks, the noise goes to 20 over.
-ops: Come on guys, USE FULL CALLS!!!! It drove me crazy to
get called with last 2 or last 3. Especially on 15, I was getting
called almost every time with people using last 2...the YB/YC guys
seemed to be the worst at this, but even JA's are doing it now! Not
only does it slow down the rate for both of us, but it requires an
extra round of overs that give QRM, QRN, or QSB a chance to
enter into the equation.
More stuff probably once I catch up on sleep, but that's what I
remember off the top of my head.
73
David Jones, KK7GW
kk7gw@wa.freei.net
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