In a very few words, I had a blast! I had not been at the home QTH for
many contests in the past couple years because of contract work
assignments, but I am now retired, since the contract market has been
looking very flat, so I will be here for future contests, God willing.
In late August I put up a Butternut HF9-V vertical on the peak of the
house with about 500 feet of raised radials. Since forty and eighty
meters were where I needed to expend some RF, I decided on Single
Operator Low Power Single Band on forty meters for this contest.
Here is an excerpt from the log-file, with 125 QSO's:
ARRL-SECTION: ME
CALLSIGN: NT1V
CATEGORY: SINGLE-OP 40M LOW RTTY
CLAIMED-SCORE: 20400
CLUB:
CONTEST: CQ-WW-RTTY
CREATED-BY: WriteLog V10.33C
NAME: Robert C. Boyd
ADDRESS: 16 Woodlawn Avenue
ADDRESS: Kennebunkport, ME 04046
OPERATORS: NT1V
I worked into 4X, ZL2, KL7, KH6, and throughout Europe. Heard several
JA but they weren't hearing the US. No complaints! I gained ten new
countries and my last state (toward 5B-RTTY WAS) in about ten hours of
operation on 40M. The antenna surpassed my wishes for 40M so I am very
pleased. It's a real "pisser" on 15 and 20 meters; the near future will
tell what it can do on eighty.
This antenna replaces a 3-element beam at fifty feet and another 40
meter vertical that was only so-so. To anyone considering this antenna:
read the installation notes until you can recite them with your eyes
closed! You need to install the radials as they suggest. Here, the
vertical is at about 25 feet and the radials are tied to trees no higher
than that.
Best regards to all,
Bob - NT1V (ex W1VXV
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