I post to these reflectors even less often than Terry, if that's
possible. But, the whole issue of how the ARRL VHF contests are
conceived is a long time question for me.
Before anyone or everyone gets hot over my position, please read this
disclaimer:
I essentially retired from VHF (and HF) contests more than 10 years
ago. As a result, my views may be somewhat out of date. On the
other hand, I don't have an axe to grind, either.
In my opinion, the VHF contests should have been revamped in the mid
to late 1980's.
In the early 80's, grid square scoring replaced using ARRL sections
as multipliers. This essentially equally distributed the multiplier
availability for everyone in the country. Prior to that, the more
densely populated areas were divided up into a number of ARRL
sections, very roughly based on the ham population. So, places like
the Northeast had a whole bunch of sections within easy VHF range,
while places like Texas had very few. Since the scoring is based on
contact points (a function of QSO numbers) multiplied by, well, the
multiplier (number of sections) , competitors in places like the
Northeast had an exponential scoring advantage over their competitors
in other less dense places. If you look back at scores for the
January VHF SS from the 60's and 70's, you find that most of the top
scores came from what is now FN20. There were notable exceptions,
but exceptions they were.
Grid squares changed that. Guys in Kansas had equal access to
multipliers as did guys in New Jersey. In one practical sense they
had more access since almost all the grid squares to the east of NJ
are in the Atlantic or beyond. Indeed, activity both during and
outside of contests increased dramatically when the grid square
system was put into use. The availability of SSB transceivers for
VHF as well as the high interest in the OSCAR satellites added more
to the mix as well.
Scoring equality still didn't exist because of the distribution of
the ham population and the availability of active people to work.
This is still true today.
But, I guess everyone knows all this.
There are two questions about the foundation of the contests that
come to my mind.
The first is: What can be done to make the contest more equitable
for people outside of the heavily populated areas of the country?
Second: What is the point of the contest?
Personally, I think addressing the second will help with the first.
To me, the point of VHF contests is to push the state of the art in
terms of making long distance contacts on VHF and above. That was
the original point, and probably is more the case today than when the
contests started. How much can hams contribute to the state of the
art in equipment these days, compared to 40 years ago? But, how much
can hams with their better equipped stations (compared to 40 years
ago) contribute to understanding of various propagation modes and the
natural phenomena that might cause them? Probably a lot more than we
even want to take on.
Once upon a time, just getting a station on the air so that you could
work the next state over on 420 MHz was a big accomplishment. Now,
it's not. In fact, if you have the inclination, you can get on just
about all the bands with commercial equipment. In fact, this
equipment has been around for so long now that you can buy used first
and second generation equipment pretty cheaply if you try. Being an
electrical engineer isn't a requirement at all to have effective
stations on just about every band that you want these days. In fact,
I'd bet that most hams have more trouble keeping their computers from
crashing from Windows than they do in making a microwave station work.
So, why keep giving extra points for microwave contacts? In a lot of
contests it's easier making contacts on 1296 than it is on 222, or
even 6 meters if the band isn't open. Just how does that make sense?
This approach rewards people exponentially for getting on the higher
bands - not only do they get QSO's and the extra multipliers, they
get bonus points as well.
So, my idea for restructuring would be this:
1. Every contact is worth three points, regardless of band. Why
three? The only reason is to emulate the DX contest scoring. Two,
one, or 17 would be just as good.
2. You get multipliers on each band for grids worked.
3. The value of each grid square multiplier is based on the distance
of the center of that grid to the center of your grid. To make
things easy, your own grid would count as one. The next grid over
would as two. Two grids over would count as three. And so on.
Yeah, guys in the northwest corner of a grid might work a guy in the
southeast corner of a somewhat distant grid, and get a break. But,
going the other direction he or she is at a disadvantage, so it works
out in the end. The exact formula used to figure out what counts for
what (working FN31 from FN31 counts as one, FN32 from FN31 counts as
two, FN34 from FN31 counts as four, FN54 from FN31 counts as five?)
isn't that important, since it's kind of arbitrary anyway. The point
is that everyone usues the same rules, and the scoring structure isn't
fundamentally based on population density, although density certainly
is a prime factor.
4. Either limit the number of bands allowed in the June contest to
those below 1296, or make distinct classes for that. The September
contest could still be an all band affair. January is already
limited by crappy propagation and weather, which limits hilltop
operations. The reasoning is that it is just too much to expect an
individual or small group to set-up and operate on all the bands when
most of the attention will be on 6 meters. Sure, everyone can come
up with exceptions to that, but you shouldn't build contest rules
around that.
5. Come to grips with whatever the various K1JT weak signal modes
will bring. Is this a good thing or not? In one sense, it does give
everyone a chance to make QSOs at a much greater distance. That is
the main point of the contest, and it is fun, which is the main
reason why people get on in the first place. (You didn't think it
was because of the great rewards, admiration, and respect you get
when you win, did you?) But, am I the only one who gets a much
bigger thrill out of actually hearing the DX station?
6. Finally, do everything that can be done to get people to set up
on hilltops, even if only with their FT-817 for a few hours. Face
it, even small stations on hill tops work a lot more and a lot cooler
stuff than large stations in typical residential neighborhoods.
Neighborhoods have learned to hate ham radio, and antennas are hard
to put up these days. (Does anybody see hope of this getting any
better? Please?) Putting a rig in the back seat along with some
small antennas is a good thing. So is putting a battery powered rig
into a back pack. You can work a lot, and it's a load of fun.
Getting this kind of activity would raise the numbers in VHF contests
dramatically. At least that's my opinion. Somebody bring back a
modern version of the IC-202. (BTW, would anybody buy a modern
version of the IC-202? If so, how much would you pay?)
Now you see why I don't post that often.
73,
Clarke K1JX
--
|