[3830] CQWW CW WC1M SOAB HP

[webform at b4h.net]

                    CQ Worldwide DX Contest, CW

Call: WC1M
Operator(s): WC1M
Station: WC1M

Class: SOAB HP
QTH: NH
Operating Time (hrs): 46
Radios: SO2R

Summary:
 Band  QSOs  Zones  Countries
------------------------------
  160:   16     8       13
   80:  278    16       65
   40:  922    28       86
   20:  662    31       95
   15:  925    25       79
   10:  263    26       73
------------------------------
Total: 3066   134      411  Total Score = 4,823,795

Club: Yankee Clipper Contest Club

Comments:

Antennas:

160M  -  trapped vee @65'
 80M  -  delta loop @75', trapped vee @65'
 40M  -  40-2CD @75', 4-square
 20M  -  4-el @72', C3E @50'
 15M  -  5-el @50', C3E @50'
 10M  -  C3E @50'
 
 580' NE beverage

 All yagis on separate tubular towers (no vertical stacks)

Equipment:

Orion + Alpha 87A, FT-1000D + Acom 2000A, Writelog, TopTen band decoders 
and switches.

Wow -- best conditions for this contest since 2000. We finally got two solid
days of decent flux and low geomagnetic activity. The propagation gods truly
shined down upon us. This contest is always the best of the year because
everyone gets on and there are so many Dxpeditions. The fun increases
exponentially when great propagation brings in exotic calls from all over the
world every single hour of the contest. Every year I struggle to make it through
the pain and fatigue, then a couple of days later I want nothing more than to do
it all over again! Maybe it's like that thing that causes women think about
having another kid soon after a difficult labor (or... maybe not. :-)

There were too many great moments to list them all, but highlights included
9K2HN calling in on 40 for my first contact, a nice opening hour on 40 (122 Qs),
6 100+ hours Saturday AM, working JA on 80-10, working T32WW on 80 and 40,
hearing a VK on 80 for the first time ever, working B4RF on 40, finding and
working JT1DA late in the contest, working TO4WW under a massive pileup on the
first call, etc, etc, etc.

Perhaps the biggest achievement was making it through 48 hours without sleeping.
In previous contests, I've either felt terrible after sleeping or have overslept
and missed an important opening. Not sleeping was a major goal of this contest:
I had to see if I could do it. I took no more than a few quick bathroom breaks
the first 24 hours. I took a shower at the halfway point to clear my head (30
minutes), and took off the very slow 10Z hour on Sunday for some breakfast and
to get away from the radio. Another 30 minutes was spent taking a walk to look
for wind damage on the wires and towers. Writelog says 45.75 hours, but I think
the extra time was spent not making a contact for 15 minutes when I returned
from my one-hour break at 11z Sunday! Anyhow, I consider this an
accomplishment.

The downside of the contest, as you can see, was my performance. The Qs are a
little low and the mults are very low. There were two main reasons for this:
First, I came down with a nasty cold or flu on Monday and it persisted through
the weekend. I was battling a very sore throat and coughing up thick green stuff
throughout the contest. Of course, this wasn't helped by not sleeping, but I
knew that if I slept at all the chances were that I would be out for many hours.
As a result, I was unable to hit the second radio very hard and did not move a
single mult all weekend. I just didn't have the energy to do either one. Also,
my CW copy was very ragged Sunday morning as I struggled not to pass out during
the big runs. Several times I blanked out between working a station and sending
TU. I don't think I was gone for more than a few seconds, but sometimes I
wondered if it had been longer.

The second major problem was 10m. I made a bad gamble on antennas this year. I
only have the four low tubular towers, each of which carried a single monobander
last year. I really missed having a second antenna on the high bands for South
and splitting the beams to EU/JA. Trouble was I had to lose one of the
monobanders to get a tribander in the system. So, I did an analysis of CQ WW CW
band breakdowns for W1 top stations over the last 20 years for CQ WW CW and ARRL
DX CW. This showed a remarkable correlation between percentage of Qs worked on
each band and the SSN number. Of course, conditions tend to repeat every 10
years: for example, the 10m QSO percentages in 1983 and 1993 are quite close.
Anyway, the odds were high that 10m would be a minor band this year, so I
swapped the 6-el 10m monobander for the tribander. Also put the tribander on the
longest coax run (450 feet of bury flex!) so 15m could be on a shorter run (350
feet of same.) The only tribander that would fit between the trees was my old
C3E, which is *maybe* as good as a short-boom 3-el. This setup put me in 2nd for
WPX and 3rd for IARU this summer, when 10m was no factor at all. But the recent
solar activity nailed my assumption to the wall, and 10m was actually a good
band in CQ WW CW this year. Unfortunately, I was unable to get a 10m run going
either day, especially the first day. Had to spend most of the first morning on
15m, which is why I did over 900 Qs on that band. Even so, the 15m mults were
low because I couldn't SO2R enough. Only 263 Qs on 10m and low mults -- so much
for statistical analysis. Mark my words: 10m will be lousy NEXT year!
 
I used my new Ten-Tec Orion in its first major CW contest. I have to say that
this radio truly lives up to its advanced billing in terms of RX performance.
There was no evidence of desensing or IMD from the very crowded bands. The
narrow roofing filters really work, even when 40m is wall-to-wall. Those awful
clicks from loud stations up and down the band were entirely gone, proving to me
that most of the clicks we hear come from the RX end, not the TX end. The few
cases of real clicks I heard could be entirely eliminated with the Orion's noise
blanker without detectable loss of RX performance! Truly amazing. The DSP
filtering is so good that I could squeeze in between loud stations with 300 Hz
or so of bandwidth and not hear them at all. If they got closer, a little less
bandwidth or shifting the passband made them disappear. Even at 100 Hz bandwidth
there's no appreciable ringing, so you can really copy the weak ones.

That was the good stuff. The bad stuff: 1) The QSK, which sounds great under
normal conditions, sounded awful on very crowded bands, like IMD -- something
strange is going on there; 2) the radio would sometimes go into a no-RF tune
mode when certain keys were hit in Writelog and would have to be power cycled;
3) It's very awkward to get in and out of split mode. I should add that the
design of this radio is so different, and it has so many capabilities, that you
should not attempt to use it for the first time in a major contest. It takes a
lot of practice and careful consideration to become proficient with this
marvelous radio. It's not for the technically-challenged, either. I'm still
trying to learn all the things I can do with the infinitely adjustable AGC
parameters.

Bottom line: the Orion is a winner (W4PA used one, too.) Being able to get rid
of the 1000MP and use the 1000D for the second radio was truly pleasant as well.
The Orion and FT-1000D, along with the Icom 781, are far and away the best
radios I've used for contesting.

I was reasonably prepared this time and got a good amount of sleep the week
before. Still working on getting at least four hours of nap in on Friday
afternoon -- only managed 2.5 hours this time. Had some tense weeks after my 80m
delta loop and 160/80 vee came down in this fall's high wind storms, requiring
that I hire a tree climber to install new mount points (pulleys this time.) The
replacement delta loop failed within a week, requiring a change in design to use
springs and weights to put tension on the corners, and replacement of the #12
THHN with insulated wire consisting of 13 strands of copper-clad steel (you can
get this great wire through Craig at Radioware.) Put a spring at the top of the
vee, too. Both antennas did well in winds up to 40 MPH during the contest.

Lastly, I've been learning terrain analysis in order to help optimize the new
NT1Y M/2 station in Topsham, VT, which is less than 40 minutes from my QTH.
Judging from W4PA's performance in this contest, Bill doesn't have to do
anything on the low bands! Scott held his own on the high bands, but agreed with
our assessment from CQ WW SSB that the station needs more punch on 20-10. We've
been working with N6BV's fabulous new version of his terrain analysis software
-- HFTA, which comes with the 20th edition of the ARRL Antenna Book. The new
package includes a program called MicroDEM which makes downloading and
formatting USGS terrain data from the Internet a breeze. No more maps and
rulers! I can't imagine designing a serious contest station without this amazing
tool. Wait 'till you see what Bill has in mind!

The bad news for me was seeing in graphic form how my low single monobanders
give up 5-10 dB or more to the big guns. The good news is that my terrain is
decent to EU. I can get in the running with the big dogs just by adding a
100-footer with a 3-stack of tribanders at 90/60/30 and a 40-2CD at 105'. Been
eyeing the 4-el SteppIRs, which really impressed me at NT1Y, but have some
concerns about the motors here in the frozen Northeast. With the cycle heading
way down now, a 4-square on 80m seems a necessity. Looks like this will be the
year I finally do the major improvements (didn't I say that last year?)

Thanks for all the QSOs and can't wait to do this one again next year -- it's
the best!

73, Dick WC1M


Posted using 3830 Score Submittal Forms at: http://www.hornucopia.com/3830score/