In arguing for a real M/S category, N4KG says:
> 2 - No Increase in Categories - Just expand the scope of
> Single Operator Assisted to allow a replacement operator.
> Restrict the category to ONE signal at ALL times with no
> restrictions on band changes (no ten minute rule).
Sadly, this just won't work. I have seen valid M/S entries in the
California QSO Party where I'm certain there was never more than one signal
on the air at any time and yet it was obvious that the station in question
was running on at least 4 bands simultaneously (concurrently?). How?
Simple--with an octopus. Such an arrangement is a M/S only in the narrowest
legal sense, but it did meet the rules in CQP as they were then defined. It
was in order to move that category to what Tom described--a bunch of guys
taking turn operating one radio--that we had to add a 10 minute rule. The
alternative would have been the CAC's current thinking about a fixed number
of band changes being allowed per hour, but that wasn't the route we chose.
Anyway, my point is that you have to have something like this in order to
eliminate the octopus approach. Yet for every rule I've seen used to try to
lock it down to one active radio, there are howls of indignation about the
artificial constraints imposed.
The more I watch this stuff, the more convinced I become that N6TJ had the
right idea in a panel discussion a few years ago when he said "There's
single-op, there's unlimited, and everything else in between is just BS."
Bruce, N6NT
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