[3830] ARRL 160 AA4LR Single Op LP

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                    ARRL 160-Meter Contest

Call: AA4LR
Operator(s): AA4LR
Station: AA4LR

Class: Single Op LP
QTH: GA
Operating Time (hrs): 17.7

Summary:
Total:  QSOs = 625  Sections = 73  Countries = 7  Total Score = 101,680

Club: South East Contest Club

Comments:

Antennas:
15m shunt-fed tower with 30 ground-mounted radials (most 60' four are 100+')
125 doublet fed with open wire at 10m
Half-size K9AY receiving loops

Equipment:
Elecraft K2/100 w/ KAT100 running 80-100 watts
Kenwood AT-250 (for doublet)

Comments:

Wow.

After looking over the results from the ARRL 160m last summer, I had decided I
needed to put in a greater effort this year. I figured I couldn't compete with
W8JI in the High-Power category in Georgia (I can't use the amp with the
shunt-fed tower anyway), but the Low-Power category was one with scores in the
70K range the last couple of years. Also, given this is the sunspot low, 160m
ought to be really great as well.

The last couple of years, my efforts were limited due to equipment failures.
The shunt matching network had failed abruptly in 2005 on the second night. The
revised network had failed at the start of the contest in 2006, costing me 4
hours of prime-time operating.

I'd done a good job repairing the matching network in 2006. It had worked all
year. A bit of maintenance the week before gave me confidence that I wasn't
going to have any antenna failures. The rest of it was a matter of spending
hours in the chair operating.

With some pre-contest analysis, I found that my efforts from the previous two
years had lots of Qs, but fewer multipliers (just under 60) compared with other
stations in Georgia. This likely due to the fact that I mostly ran stations and
did very little S & P. Both of the last two efforts were right about 7 hours of
operating time. I figured if I could double the amount of time, that 500 Qs
should be possible, and 75 multipliers seemed reasonable as well, with a target
score of 75K.

I also wanted to get some confirmations for my 160m CW WAS. I have all but six
states confirmed, only lacking AK, HI, NV, ND, UT, WY. I figured that AK and HI
would be the hardest, and would require me to get up before dawn. 

Contest started out well, I quickly found a spot to CQ, and the rate meter read
over 240/hr briefly at the start. I'd have a series of good runs, interspersed
with some S & P. The first night, I focused mostly on rate, figuring I'd get a
second shot at multipliers the second night. After staying up late, getting up
an hour before dawn was really tough. But 20 minutes after sunrise, I'd
finished with 392 Qs and 74 mults. I had already significantly bested last
years effort, and was more than on track to make my goal.

Second night was tougher, since I'd has a busy Saturday, little sleep the night
before, and was at it again. The excitement of the contest kept me going. By the
time I threw in the towel at 0600z, I had 590 Qs, 79 mults. I'd more than met my
goal. When I got up early in the morning, I figured I might be able to break 600
Qs. But could I make it to 100 K points? I S & P'd furiously, skipping over
stations I had worked previously. I broke 100 K just before dawn, and finished
up with a few more stations.

On the multiplier front, I worked all sections missing only ND, SF, AK, AB, MB,
NL & NT. Of these, I never heard any stations in any of these sections, with the
exception of AB, as I heard a VE6 calling someone the second night. DX was C6A,
HI (HI3A called me while I was CQing), CO, G, PJ2, 9A (9A2DQ was extremely
loud) and XE. As it was, I worked 48 states on 160m in a weekend (All but ND
and AK). That's amazing. 

A couple of equipment notes. The doublet was basically useless -- only a couple
of Qs made on that antenna. The Shunt ruled. Not bad for an antenna barely 1/10
wavelength tall. The K9AY loops were marginally helpful in a few cases. I tried
to put up some full-sized loops, but the wire I was trying to loft into a tree
got caught and broke, so I wasn't able to complete thats. 

In the last month, I started hearing some broad S3 noise starting around 1825
kHz up to about 1840 kHz. It's not stable and tends to drift around. The rest
of the band is about S1 atmospheric noise. Since this is the "sweet" part of
the band, including the DX window, that was really frustrating. 

Had one other weird thing with the K2/100. The amount of current it needs to
produce 100 watts output seems to vary with temperature. As the unit gets
warmer, the current demands get higher. Aftering CQing for a long time the
second night, the power supply started to protest by producing a loud hum in
time with my code. It only happened couple of times off an on, but it was very
disconcerting. I was afraid my power supply would fail, and then I would be off
the air. 

I'm hoping this score might be good enough for a certificate. The Southeast
Division leader for low power had 104K last year, so maybe I've got a shot
there, too. In any case, I've established a new personal best as well as worked
4 of the six missing states for 160m WAS.


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