W5YR wrote:
Perhaps a more appropriate question is how many of the major contesters and
big multi-multi stations use Ten Tec equipment?
Hush George, we don't want them to learn about Orion! In the 2003
CQ WW SSB, here were my results versus the top multi-multi scores on
10 meters. All of these stations have much larger antennas, two
complete stations/operators per band, packet-spotting, etc. KC1XX has
about 75 elements (at last count) on 10 meters compared to my measly 18
elements. I've listed the radios they use on 10 meters.
Call QSO's/Z/C Radio
K9NS 1940/34/153 Yaesu?...hard to tell from picture
KC1XX 1894/32/145 IC-781
W3LPL 1717/35/147 FT-1000MP
NQ4I 1452/33/141 FT-1000MP
W4ZV 1937/35/138
The major difference I noticed with Orion when 10 meters was
wide open with strong EU signals was how easily I could copy the really
weak guys usually on the first call with few requests for repeats. This
is the 5th year I've done the CQ WW SSB as SOSB10 so I have a good basis
for comparison. I attribute the difference to two factors:
1. Passband noise seemed to be much less. I believe this is because I
was not getting SSB IMD products which I suspect raises the passband
noise floor. I know what IMD products sound like on CW (bleeps and
bloops), but I suspect IMD products for wideband signals simply sounds
like more noise. Whatever the reason, Orion seemed to sound much
quieter in the passband. BTW, I used the 1800 Hz roofing filter at all
times and adjusted the DSP between 2000 and 1700 Hz depending on QRM.
I found fixing PBT at +150 and RX EQ at -10 improves the readability
even down to bandwidths as low as 1600 Hz, which I almost never needed.
2. The digital AGC works well and seems to help bring up the really
weak signals that were fading in and out of the noise level. It also
reduced operator fatigue since I just set RF Gain to 100% and seldom
adjusted AF Gain, simply letting the AGC do it's work for me. Much less
tiring than continuing to ride both RF and AF Gain controls as I had
to do for the previous 4 years with my MP.
The next test will be to see how Orion does under very crowded
CW contest conditions, and I'll soon know that after the CQ WW CW!
73, Bill W4ZV
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