[3830] SS CW VE7FO Single Op LP

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                    ARRL Sweepstakes Contest, CW

Call: VE7FO
Operator(s): VE7FO
Station: VE7FO

Class: Single Op LP
QTH: BC
Operating Time (hrs): 21

Summary:
 Band  QSOs
------------
  160:     
   80:   14
   40:   39
   20:  185
   15:  140
   10:  217
------------
Total:  595  Sections = 75  Total Score = 89,250

Club: British Columbia DX Club

Comments:

Another emotional roller-coaster ride.  Started preparing for this one a week
early.  Made sure all the gear was functioning, checked latest version of TR
using simulator and got some much needed cw practice as well, plotted
propagation charts to VY1JA, VE1OP, VO1MP, VE2AWR, VE4, 5 and 6 as well as
various difficult US Sections.  Read and took to heart Tree's contesting hints
on the CQ Contest reflector.  I think this is the first contest I have ever felt
actually ready for.

I now have a 2nd monitor hooked up to the computer.  As conditions looked like
there might be a lot of activity from the sun I had the GOES satellite 5 minute
X-Ray Flux monitor running on it as well as a Kp graph updating periodically.

Wanted to start listening around an hour or so ahead of the start but got to the
rig only 15 minutes before start time.  Listened around a bit then, just before
the start heard a carib station working people like crazy so thought I'd call to
sensitize him to my call for when things got going.  What the.... rig doesn't
key.  Frantic fiddling with my breadboarded keying interface.  Hmm...  computer
output not keying.  Reboot computer.  Now it works.  First 20 minutes of contest
lost.


2120  Start running on 10.  Wow, this is great.  That cw practice is paying
off.

2212  53 Qs  27 mults.  A 53 hour on cw with the long SS exchange is pretty good
for me but switch to 15 as charts say no prop to VY1JA on 10.  Somewhere along
the way I realize that sending leading zeroes with a long dah and 9 with an N is
messing people up so dispensed with both.

2337  92 Qs  46 mults.  Hmm.. no J and rate not as good on 15 so switch back to
10.  Conditions are great - look at all those mults.

0013  117 Qs  50 mults.  Spent too much time S&P.  When am I going to learn?  In
SS if I make 800 QS and a sweep (good luck on either of them) then 1 mult is
1600 pts while 1 Q is 160 pts.  i.e. a mult is worth only 10 Qs (even if it is
J), fewer if I make less than 800 Qs.  Still, an average of 40 Qs/hr x the 20
hours I'll probably put in is 800 Qs.  While things do slow down, they don't
slow down as much for me as for the big stations as there are still lots of guys
on Sunday needing a VE7.  So, maybe 600 Qs is do-able.  Switched to 15.  Lord
knows why - made 17 Qs in the previous 20 min on 10.

0115  147 Qs  56 mults.  Whoopee-ding  30 Qs in an hour.  Good mult production
though (code for too much S&P).  Switch to 20.  Now that I look at the log I
realize that of those 30 Qs, 12 of them were in the last 15 minutes.  Why did I
switch?

0159  186 Qs  59 mults.  Hey, that was a 51 hour.  Pretty good for me in SS.

0347	232 Qs  61 mults.  85 Qs in 2.5 hrs.  Too much S&P again.  Starting to get
depressed and feel like quitting.  Berating myself for not running on 10 'til it
died.  To make myself feel worse I check my 2001 log to see how I was doing at
this time.  Well... 175 Qs and 64 mults so I'm 60 Qs ahead.  Yah but wait 'til
you look at 2002.  Hmm... 133 Qs and 53 mults - I'm 100 Qs ahead.  Say - I'm
doing really well!  This is fun!  Let's go beat up on 40.

0424  244 Qs  62 mults.  Not loud on 40 - all S&P.  Switch to 80.

0538  262 Qs  64 mults.  Not loud on 80 either.  Switched back and forth between
40 and 80 until I went to bed (much later).  Had a 3/4 hr break in here too.

0800	284 Qs  67 mults including Mt.  22 Qs in 2.5 hours.  Should have gone to
bed 2 hrs ago.  284 Qs in 10 hours of operation is 28/hr.  At that rate, if I
get in another 11 hours I'll just about make 600 Qs.  Well, that would beat my
previous 2 attempts of 471 and 524 Qs (not counting my last incarnation in the
50s and 60s where 184 Qs and 220 Qs were enough for me to win Section awards). 
So, set a target of 30/hr.  That'll give me 614 Qs which gives enough headroom
for dupes but probably not enough for busted calls, etc.  I'll work on busted
calls next year.  For now, if I can report a net 600 Qs I'll be real happy.

1602  Back at it on 15.  

1643  299 Qs  70 mults.  Was glad to pick up NNy, Me and Vt.  I find them
somewhat difficult from here.  Worked Don, AA5AU.  I thought he'd be out duck
hunting.  Funny sig though.  The dits seemed to be on a different frequency than
the dahs.  Sounded like about 170 Hz apart.  Looks like 10 is happening.  Go
there.

1648  302 Qs  70 mults.  It wasn't.  Try 20.

1700  307 Qs  70 mults.  Half way to my 600 goal with 10 hours to go and it's
Sunday.  Well, maybe I got a chance.  After all, it's only 30 Qs/hr.  Oh, oh. 
X-Ray Flux rising rapidly.  It's been bouncing around between C2 to M1 with a
couple of stronger blips but now it's rocketing up past M8.  This doesn't look
good.

1719  314 Qs  70 mults.  Last 2 Qs were locals.  Gosh it's quiet.  The only cw I
hear is from the ringing in my ears.  Flux is 10X higher now at X8.  D-Region
Absorption Prediction site says estimated time of recovery something like 2-3
hours.  Goodbye 600 Qs (sniffle).  If I understand this stuff correctly, 10
should recover first so watch the flux graph (mercifully dropping) and run the
CQ enerator on 10.

1733  Whaddya know!  A Q on 10 with W0PI.  Great call under the circumstances. 
On phone I would have called him "Whoopee".  Hey, I'm running and making Qs. 
Wow, we're back.  What a relief.  I thought I was going to have to put Beaconsee
up on the 2nd monitor on 10, 15 and 20 and read a book or something while I
watched it and the flux.  Maybe I can still hit 600.

1945  398 Qs  72 mults.  Well, that was really good considering that we had a
major, major X-Class flare.  Flux is now down to about M1.5.  Ran the whole
time.  Had a 52 hour which is good for me in SS.  Finally, a VE3 showed up.

2113	440 Qs  72 mults.  On track.  At 30 Qs/hr to hit my 600 target I should
have 441.  Flux is down to C6.  Thank goodness that's over.  Switched briefly to
15 during this time and then back to 10.  Some S&P but mostly running.  No bites
on my CQ for 4 minutes.  SOUND THE ALARMS... CHANGE BANDS.... NOW!  I have to
learn to be more patient. I had 8 Qs in the period 2100 - 2109.  That's 48/hr. 
It wasn't that far back in the story when I was crowing about a 52 hour. 
Anyway, I went to 15.  Maybe I'll do better on the East coast mults.

2200  457 Qs  73 mults.  Flux is down to C5.  Falling behind here.  I should
have at least 464 Qs to hit the 600+.  Did pick up NNj however.  I have a
problem with the MkV on 15 which I haven't got around to fixing which cuts the
output back to about 65W.  No, it's not a high SWR foldback problem.  (Maybe I
should spend less time on these stories and more on the rubber/road interface.) 
6 Qs in the last 15 min.  Switch to 20.

2300  485 Qs  73 mults.  Flux is behaving itself.  Now down to C4.  Should be at
494 Qs.  Maybe I'll find rate on 10 so go there.

2338  501 Qs  74 mults.  Flux is about C3.  Didn't find any better rate but did
find my only Mar.  That's worth about 7 Qs.  Should be at 514 Qs.  Slipping -
try 15.

0020  515 Qs  74 mults.  Flux is nice and steady at C3.  Should be at 534 Qs. 
40 minutes behind schedule.  Switch to 20.

0100	539 Qs  75 mults.  Flux is up a bit at C5.  Should be at 554 so now 30
minutes behind.  Did pick up NLi so that's worth another 7 Qs in total score. 
Been running 20 the whole time.

0105  543 Qs but flux is now at C8.  Rate of rise is quite worrisome.

0110  548 Qs.  Great rate but flux is now about M1.2.  Rate of rise looks
steeper than the X8 flare.  Don't like this at all.

0115  550 Qs.  Flux is M5.  At this rate it'll hit X10 at 0120.  Looks like I'm
toast.

0120	552 Qs.  "But wait, what do I see?"  Flux is about X1.1

0130  557 Qs.  Flux has levelled off at X3.  "She's walkin' back to me."

0200  569 Qs.  Flux is M6.  "Pretty woman."  Should be at 584.  30 min behind
schedule.  Maybe, like Roy Orbison, I'll get lucky.

0259  600 Qs  75 mults.  No dupe headroom.

I tried to do more of the listening on the MkV A VFO while CQing on the B.  Some
of those reading this may have heard me CQing endlessly on the B VFO for
something like 20 minutes while I tuned around on the A.  It took me quite a
while to realize that the reason I wasn't hearing any answers to my CQs was that
I had the B Rx turned off.  Oh well, there were at least 7 other VE7s on that I
heard so maybe I didn't cause anyone to miss VE7 through my carelessness.

One major problem I had which caused me to request many fills is due to the
combination of the length of the SS exchange and my somewhat advanced age. 
While listening to TR sending my exchange I seemed to often fall into a trance
where I wasn't actually listening to what was being sent.  This, in itself,
isn't that bad a thing.  Unfortunately, the trance extended to not listening to
the exchange being sent back to me.  This led to a lot of frantic keyboard
punching and fill requests.  I hate to think what I'll be like in ten years.

I was going to say, "73 and see you in the phone SS," but as phone SS was last
weekend (another roller coaster ride), the best I can do is a weak, "Hope I saw
you."

73, Jim	VE7FO


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