[3830] K4NO NAQP SSB MULTI OP

[k4no@ix.netcom.com]

Hope everyone had as much fun as we did.

The Operators   Roger  KA9EKJ
                Mike   K4GU
                Greg   K4NO

The Equipment   Station 1  

               FT-102 maily used on 20/40/75
               20 meters  4l West at 95'
                          4l NE at  40'     
               
               40 meters  dipole at 85'
               75 meters  full wave loop apex at 90'

               Station 2

               FT-990 (THANKS KU4J) mainly used on 10/15/160
               Wilson SY-1 Tribander at 55'    40 meter loop  
               75/160 1/4 wave verticals with common feedline and ground system


The results   1451 x 278  = 403,378

              160  170 x 42
               75  286 x 52
               40  281 x 53
               20  401 x 61
               15  120 x 44
               10  193 x 26

           
I set everything up early Saturday morning and began to work on a
water problem in the house.  When KA9EKJ got here at 1700z, I told him
all he needed to do was load the DVK memories.  I neglected to tell
him to tune the FT-102 up on 20 meters.  I got finished working on the
water line with about 10 minutes to spare. I walked into the basement
shack with 5 minutes to go before the contest started.  I had station
2 and was on 10 meters. Roger was on 20. We had the computers
networked and wanted to break 300k which was our goal.  About 3
minutes into the contest, I noticed that he hadn't worked too many
folks on 20 (the money band).  I looked at the watt meter and found
out why.  After tuning the radio up, he was off and running.  I think
Roger left the chair for about 3 minutes in the first 6 hours, both of
us took a 20 minute dinner break (Mike was riding around trying to
find the house...) and that was it.  Even with a relief op available,
he was in THE ZONE and we just let him run..and run and move mults to
the other station.

I ended up taking several small breaks as I had to watch my 4 year old
son Jackson while mom and daughter went to music class.  I also had to
take my wife's grandmother to the emergency room and lost about 30
minutes of op time.  this was before K4GU got here.  I guess if we
could have kept folks in the chair the full time, we might have make
another 100 q's.

We tried to move mults via the ALT P command on NA but it seemed like
too much typing so we ended up pointing at the callsign on the
computer monitor and using a form of sign language.  It might be
easier if we had computer controlled radios but there's always room
for improvement.  We didn;t have any inter station interference as the
towers are about 300' apart.  There was a bit of a problem on the
first harmonic between 20 and 10 meters.  On tower 1, I also have a 5L
10 and 5L 15 that we didn't use because i was concerned about the
screwing up a front end.  The FT-990 is on loan from KU4J (Thanks TIM)

K4GU filled in on the low bands and did a great job for a Phone lid.
Mike prefers CW and is getting back into contesting on SSB.  He did
get the opportunity to tour the country side here in Maysville.
Thanks to my wife who went to the end of the driveway and flagged him
down to get him here.  Those cell phones come in handy at times.

We had a blast and hope to do it again in August with bigger and
better stuff..

73 

Greg K4NO


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