[3830] ARRL 10 KB0VVT M/S HP

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                    ARRL 10-Meter Contest

Call: KB0VVT
Operator(s): KB0VVT, KG0US
Station: KB0VVT

Class: M/S HP
QTH: MO
Operating Time (hrs): 21

Summary:
 Band  QSOs  Mults
-------------------
   CW:  567    78
  SSB:  539    75
-------------------
Total: 1106   153  Total Score = 511,938

Club: Kansas City DX Club

Comments:

My 15 year old daughter Rebecca did the majority of operating.  I operated when
she needed to take some short breaks during the day, late in the evening after
she went to bed, and in the morning before she got up.  This was the first time
anyone from our station operated high power during this contest.  It was a lot
of fun but it would have been better had we been able to work much more Europe
and our friends in Japan.  

We did not put in the serious effort as I had by myself in years past.  Partly
because we were not getting the major DX openings.  On Saturday, we took off
about 2 hours during the middle of the afternoon to eat dinner at Bo Lings our
favorite Chinese restaurant about 30 minutes away.  At first we had planned to
work only CW.  However I was reading the rules again on Saturday and discovered
that since I had helped Rebecca and we had used packet a couple of times we
should now be in the multi-op class.  This being the case, we decided that we
should dedicate the vast majority of Sunday to phone.  This could work out well
since we would be considered "fresh meat" by contesting standards.  The plan was
to work phone with the beam pointed East until noon when we would probably need
to take a 3 hour break.  The break would be so that the neighbors could watch
the Kansas City Chiefs.  After the Chiefs game, the plan was to work the last 3
hours of the contest with the beam pointed west.  It would be like a miniature
California QSO party for the last 3 hours of the contest.

I started operating first on Sunday morning about 13:00z and was surprised that
there was already activity.  I operated CW until Rebecca came downstairs to go
to phone with the antenna pointing 45 degrees in case Europe would open.  For
the next 3 or 4 hours, we were rewarded with some very high rates, for our
station, on phone since we were "fresh meat".  It did not hurt that we were
running full legal power although our KT34A antenna is only up 40 feet.  It was
somewhere during this time that the neighbor came knocking on the door to
complain about us getting into the sound of his cable TV.  I let my wife Barbara
KG0UT answer the door.  She assured him that we would cut back when the Chiefs
game started.  We did stop during the game except a few times during commercial
breaks.  After the game, we where poised to implement the final stage of our
plan that was to gain many phone QSOs from target rich California and other
stations out west.  It started to unfold quite well but unfortunately the band
decided to nose-dive.  Perhaps next year!

Rebecca will be working on catching up on the QSL cards during the holiday break
from school.  We both have many DX cards that are ready to send through the
outgoing QSL service. 

Happy Holidays,

Dave KG0US
Barbara KG0UT (Did not operate this time but took care of neighborhood
relations)
Rebecca KB0VVT


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