[3830] CQWW SSB K1VR SOAB LP

[hopengarten at post.harvard.edu]

                     CQ Worldwide DX Contest, SSB
                    
Call: K1VR
Operator(s): K1VR
Station: K1VR

Class: SOAB LP
QTH: EMA
Operating Time (hrs): 33.6
Radios: SO2R

Summary:
 Band     QSOs  Zones  Countries
-------------------------------
  160:      5      3      2
   80:     36     10     23
   40:    111     16     62
   20:    236     26     86
   15:    338     27    100
   10:    572     28    103
-------------------------------
Total:   1298    110    376  =  1,801,602

Club/Team: YCCC

Comments:

I know, you want to know what went wrong!

Though K1EP has been working on the project for months, he is in CA now
and was unable to do the installation of a circuit to make my new W3NQN
(from WX0B) filters do automatic bandswitching. WK1O, who was just too
busy to do everything necessary -- though he came over two evenings in a
row  -- says he'll have it working by CQ WW CW. Right, Sasha? God bless
K1EP for trying though. It wasn't his fault that I'm a lawyer and not an
engineer. He's still welcome to come and operate Sweepstakes.

Luigi, AA1AA, came over on Wednesday to help me find out why my middle
TH6 in the stack would not rotate. We discovered that it was a tree
branch that I had cut a few years ago -- but it had grown back with a
vengeance. It was now just as fat (four inches in diameter) and it had
grown in the direction of the middle TH6. He pointed out that I probably
couldn't do the job myself as safely as an arborist -- so I spent
Thursday trying to find a tree cutting crew to come that day or Friday. I
found a crew with a 60' bucket and they came Friday at 9 AM. By 10 AM
they were gone. My TH6 was rotating freely (some cutting was necessary in
two adjacent trees too), and I was $200 poorer. But they had a crew of
three: foreman, lead cutter in the bucket, and Brazilian apprentice who
feeds the branches into the chopper. No one has ever left the place quite
as neat.

While I was outdoors with the tree crew, W1NA called from Pantelleria
Island (IH9A) to make a schedule on 3752-3755 at 30 minutes before the
contest started.

I did not get a nap on Friday afternoon, and then I discovered that my DVP
was not starting for the RUN radio. I spent three hours getting
progressively more and more frantic, when it finally occurred to me to
call K1EP on the phone. He apparently looked at his caller ID and
answered the phone: "Two hours to go."

Bless his heart, as I read him my k1vrct.bat file, line by line, he
spotted that there was a REM in front of the DVPTSR, and that's why my
DVP wouldn't start. 

So tried to record my CQ and other F1-F4 entries. But nothing would
record. I tried substituting the D-104 for my Beyer headset (which has
a Heil HC-4 microphone cartridge). This recorded, but sounded horrible --
much too "bright." That meant the problem was in the Beyer headset. I
took apart the Beyer headset and found that the glue holding the
cartridge in place had broken, allowing the cartridge to float around
inside the microphone case. Thus, a wire had broken and was no longer
making contact with the microphone element. Yet that same microphone had
worked earlier in the day!  I soldered a new lead on, broke the second
lead in the process, resoldered that one, and used "Shoe Goo" (a rubber
silicone product used to repair sneakers) to set the element in place --
reasoning that it would absorb shock and not crack. That used up all my
remaining time. I never got a nap.

Friday night I felt as though something was wrong on 80. But when I heard
IH9A (W1NA operating) at S4-S5, I knew the band was punk -- really soft.
Pier Luigi had asked me to compare two antennas. After telling him on the
air that there was no difference, he called me again on the phone (he
loves that NexTel phone!) to make sure that he heard me correctly. I told
him that the band didn't sound very good, and that IG9A was no louder.

So I started. About 10 am Saturday morning I couldn't stand the Beyer
headset anymore, and went to try on the Heil headset -- only to discover
that I had failed to wire on a stereo plug after ripping it out too
brusquely last Spring, without ever repairing it. So I stopped for about
one hour to make the repair and replace the two headphone pads -- which
were no longer cushioning the earpieces. Luckily I had purchased some
replacement pads at Dayton.

At mid-day Saturday, I realized that when I put my WH7 wattmeter on the
20 watt maximum range, I was still NOT pinning the meter. Thereafter I
started pushing the antenna tuner button more often. This occasionally
seemed to increase my output to 70-75 watts or so, and results improved.
I guess I should read the FT-1000MP manual on how to use the antenna
tuner.

Saturday afternoon came and I realized that my European Beverage was not
working because, after taking it down for the tree crew, I had failed to
put it back up. I did that and then realized that, for lack of a nap, I
was just too tired to continue. So I took a nap Saturday afternoon.

The rest of the weekend was normal. I never did get a run of any sort
going. But Sunday morning I ran into Ann, WA1S, who won the CQWW SOLP
category three times. She was at N4RV. She told me to forget trying to
run on low power phone and just S&P all weekend. I immediately started
taking her advice and I think I had a pretty good Sunday. She casually
mentioned that SOLP CW is a very different experience than phone, and
that SOLP phone is just not fun.



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