[3830] WPX CW A73A(@A71BX) M/S HP

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                    CQWW WPX Contest, CW

Call: A73A
Operator(s): A71BX, K5GN
Station: A71BX

Class: M/S HP
QTH: Qatar
Operating Time (hrs): 48

Summary:
 Band  QSOs
------------
  160:     
   80:  199
   40: 1234
   20: 1611
   15:  603
   10:  191
------------
Total: 3838  Prefixes = 977  Total Score = 14,561,208

Club: 

Comments:

Last year the QARS contesters went to the beach for WPX CW to do a feasibility
test of setting up tents and verticals by the salt water of the Arabian Gulf. 
We learned a lot of technical things and that it was certainly possible, but
the key thing we learned was that it was too hot for such an adventure without
an air conditioned space in which to cool off.  We decided that this year we
would not brave the beach but would set up at the home QTH of Ali, A71BX.  Last
year it was windy and 40C.  This year the week before WPX CW saw high
temperatures of 50-51C, a heat wave for this desert location.  So we were very
happy to be in cool comfort at Ali's QTH.

Last year Ali renovated his antenna system before CQ WW DX SSB:

80 half-wave sloper from 25m
40-10 OB12-4 at 26m
40-10 OB9-5 at 20m on second tower

He now also has a 160 Cushcraft vertical on the roof, but this band was not
used in WPX CW.

This year Ali upgraded to FT-2000 rigs and added a new ACOM amplifier which is
his first auto-tune amp.  His Emtron amplifier is still doing a great job. 
Both were operated at 1500W and worked superbly on all bands.

He is moving toward an SO2R setup, but the station was set up for multi-single,
CQ-style, with two complete stations sharing the antennas via a WX0B SiXPak
switch.  FilterMax filters and home-brew stub filters kept the interstation RFI
low.  Band changes are not yet automated except for radio-computer.  Win-Test
was used again with great success.  

Ali's internet service is interrupted frequently by RFI.  Even 100W on 40m
seems to nail it.  We haven't yet figured this out.  It seems more work is
needed to solve it.  This meant that packet spots were rarely available, as the
connection to servers was so often lost.

Without the packet cluster, we chose to add a Skimmer.  Unfortunately,
connector adapters are hard to find here in Qatar, so the Skimmer was connected
to only one radio.  Skimmer finds a lot of bogus callsigns.  Eventually you
figure out how to recognize the callsigns with short first dits - Skimmer
misses a lot of first dits in the noise.

Most of the final setup was completed Friday afternoon and evening.  

The operators were to be A71BX (Ali), A71EM (Juma), A71AN (Rashed), and K5GN
(Dave).  However, Juma was unable to be in country, and Rashed was similarly
detained, so it ended up being just BX and GN.  The work week is Sunday through
Thursday here, so we had both requested leave of absence for Sunday.  All was
set but BX's manager called in Saturday afternoon to say he was needed at work
on Sunday!  This meant that we both would end up operating as though we were
doing single-operator efforts.

As the contest started, Ali realized that the OB12-4 was stuck north.  We never
figured out what was wrong during the contest, but will go up the tower the
following weekend to sort it out.  During the weekend a big Shamal wind came in
at gusts up to 65km/hr.  The OB9-5 came loose on the mast and was variably
pointing somewhere between northeast and north west for most of the second
day.

COnditions were quiet on 40 and there were signals all night on 20.  15 opened
up during the day fairly solidly to Europe, but 10 was only spotty -- mainly
the big guns with high antennas were coming through.

Some people say that it seems silly in WPX to worry with a mult station.  While
there is merit to this argument -- the best way to increase mults in WPX is to
increase rate -- it is clear that, especially early on, the multiplier station
can be quite busy adding QSOs to the bottom line.  Later on, there are still
more mults to be found on the off bands while running on the best band for
rate.  

We started with one station running on 40 and the mult station pouncing on 80. 
Lots of big guns to work on 80, several frequency battles and a very crowded
40.

Sunrise here was at 0145z, but 40 remained productive enough to keep us from
20m until almost 0400z, and we worked mults there until 0455.  20 was the
workhorse during the day.

With a real low JA participation and being unable to turn the 40m yagi to the
east, we were slow to return to 40m in the evening.  But it was a very good
band at night, all night long.  20 was open somewhere all night to provide some
mults and a break from 40 when a run frequency was lost.  80 was tough, as usual
from here, with only one good run.  Most attempts at running end up wasting
time.

Sunday was better on 15 and provided a few short runs on 10.  However, overall
rates were lower, as usual, and we were both pretty tired.  We didn't break
4000 QSOs nor 1000 mults as we had hoped.

The great thing, though, was a significant improvement over last year, with our
best ever score.

CU on the air again in the rest of the summertime contests!

73,

Ali and Dave


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