[3830] RTTY WPX VE7FO SOAB LP

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                    CQ WW RTTY WPX Contest

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

Class: SOAB LP
QTH: BC
Operating Time (hrs): 30

Summary:
 Band  QSOs  Pts
-----------------
   80:   67   262
   40:   25   100
   20:  165   376
   15:  253   579
   10:  118   245
-----------------
Total:  628  1562  Prefixes = 259  Total Score = 404,558

Club: British Columbia DX Club

Comments:

STATION STUFF

I'm in the process of putting up an inverted L for 160.  Got as far as putting
up 30 ft of very skinny, self-supported tower at the end of the back yard.  The
160 flat top is attached but not yet run to the 30 ft mast in the front yard. 
However, the 40 and 80 dipoles which used to terminate at a 16 ft high mast are
now attached to the new 30 ft tower, starting about 5 ft from the top.

Severe rectification problems showed up recently which put 2 or 3 BC stations
every 10 kHz on 80 m with signal levels ranging from S7 to S9 +20.  When I moved
the dipoles to the tower the problem vanished!!  Don't know what the cause was
but sure glad I don't have to try to track it down.

I seem to be getting better at the mechanics of this RTTY stuff.  I'm using WL
with K6STI RITTY and a PK-232.  By means of a little 4 chan mixer I can feed any
of the following outputs to the PK-232, each with separate level control on the
mixer:  MkV Main Rx, MkV Sub Rx, or old 75A4 Rx on a separate antenna.  In the
ARRL RTTY in Jan I had troubles getting RITTY and the PK-232 both printing
properly off the Main Rx.  Turns out that one was offset from the other by about
60 Hz.  Since then I changed RITTY's centre freq to match that of the PK-232. 
This resulted in a different CF for RITTY than what I arrived at when following
the RITTY setup instructions.  Don't know if that made any real difference to
RITTY.  Didn't seem to.

Ever since I got the PK-232 a couple of years ago I've had difficulty using the
LED display for tuning signals in.  I'm better with the RITTY display but, in
the WL version, that isn't that easy either.  I made some changes to the station
layout which have resulted in the PK-232 being placed on end.  i.e. the long
dimension is now vertical rather than horizontal.  For some unknown reason I now
find it much, much easier to tune in signals using the LED display and, with
strong signals I can do it quite rapidly.  So, when I'm S&Ping with both RITTY
and PK-232, I now get a rapid rough tuning on the PK-232 display and then make
whatever slight adjustment is needed using the RITTY display.  This has provided
a great improvement in the speed with which I can acquire a signal.

When I first started with this RTTY stuff I had troubles getting S7 signals to
print properly.  I have since found, to my amazement, that if the audio levels
are set right then both RITTY and PK-232 will print signals which are barely
audible.  To my further amazement, the PK-232 beat RITTY when there was no QRM. 
Don't remember how it fared under QRM cndx.


CONDITIONS

Not much DX

Fri night - 20 died around 2030 local time.  40 died 40 minutes later
Sat night - 20 died around 1930 local time.  40 died an hour later

However, 40 did yield a rather surprising contact.  While the distance wasn't
great it seemed like a Long Delayed Echo except in reverse.  The log shows that
at 0410Z on 40, my Q #391, I worked VE7FO and he gave me #1087.  I can only
conclude that I worked, across time, a future version of myself, given that I
have yet to make 1087 Qs in this contest.  While the contest manager may have
difficulties accepting my explanation of this anomaly, I'm really happy to see
that such good results lie in my future; a testament to all the work I'm doing
to get better at this stuff.  ZF2NT had better watch out!


OPERATION

Got a couple of "Sri, wrkd B4 CQ WPX".  I just got back into Ham Radio in late
2000 after several decades' absence.  It only took me a few contests to figure
out that, even though contest software makes it easy to say this, it's a pretty
dumb thing to do.  However, when I did it myself, before having recognized the
folly of my ways, I confess to having got a bit of an ego rush when I sent it. 
"See how clever I am.  I know more than you do about what's happening, you poor
boob."  Maybe others get off on this too.  

Practised SO1.5R using the MkV 2nd VFO and SO1.75R using the 75A4.  I know I
made some Qs and mults this way that I wouldn't have otherwise made.  I wish WL
had some way of flagging these so I could get a better idea of how many extra
Qs/mults I'm getting this way.

Overall result was 10 more Qs than last year and 19 mults less for an 8% drop in
score.  Oh well, there's always next year.

Thanks for the Qs everyone.

Jim	VE7FO


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