[3830] CoQP N4CD M/SMixed LP

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                    Colorado QSO Party

Call: N4CD
Operator(s): N4CD
Station: N4CD

Class: M/SMixed LP
QTH: CO
Operating Time (hrs): 

Summary:
 Band  CW Qs  Ph Qs  Dig Qs
----------------------------
  160:                   
   80:                   
   40:                   
   20:                   
   15:                   
   10:                   
    6:                   
    2:                   
  222:                   
  432:                   
----------------------------
Total:  234     4       0  CW Mults = 38  Ph Mults = 3  Dig Mults = 0  Total Score = 36,176

Club: 

Comments:

It seems many of the regular state QSO party folks were off chasing other
contests and not around.   Conditions were challenging.  I spent the night in
Silverton (San Juan county - 9300 ft elev) , and in the morning headed south -
the only place to be to run the county.   Jeff, N8II, was listening for CO
mobiles.  He was disappointed as there didn't seem to be too many mobiles out. 
 It was nice and cool for this Texas boy.   Near 50 degrees as I sat up at
10,000 feet putting out San Juan.

If was then south to Durango (La Plata) and then east to Archuleta, Mineral,
Rio Grande, Sagauche, Alamosa, COnejos...... 


I ran 8 counties mobile starting in San Juan - then south to La Plata, then
east.  The best run was 49Q in a county.

Jeff, N8II, was the only station heard on 20 SSB.  He let me use the frequency
that he had been calling to CO on...but very little action on SSB, so I
basically forgot about it.  Conditions not great.  N6MU was barely in there on
40M or 20M most of the day, and usually he is loud.    

The weather was good - in the afternoon a few storms moved in- strange to watch
thunder and lightning at 7000 and 8000 feet - isolated storms you can see 10-15
miles away - a lot different than in TX and OK and east at lower altitudes.  
It's hard to get clouds to form that high up!

Went over a few 10,000-11000  foot mountain passes and checked out the new
Malibu in the mountains - six speed automatic.  The radio (IC706)  runs fairly
hot at 10,000 feet - not much air at that altitude for cooling !  Half of that
at sea level.   If you run a lot calling CO QP out that way, an auxiliary fan
would help.  Late afternoon the RTTY QRM moved in on 40M.  20M died fairly
early.   

I figured it wasn't then worth burning the gas to run much more as the contacts
fell off quickly, and people were out doing things on the holiday weekend.  I
sort of figured it was mostly over at that point, other than fixed stations. 

 I headed back up the mountains and stopped by dinner time in Chaffee County in
Salida.  Shut down the radio and ended the contesting early.   

I only heard about 6 Colorado stations - worked three of them, the others
couldn't hear me.  Only worked one other mobile, W0ETT, and he was way up on
the high mountains in Summit could have been near line of sight between us at
150-200 miles.     

It was a challenge to find a frequency on 20M CW that worked. I don't know if
there were dozens of high power stations clogging up the band, or conditions
were just rotten, but it took a few tries to find a frequency where folks
responded.  Time wasted.  A 'mobile only ' window would be nice.   

I think the rule on spotting nets is not good.  Many county hunters watch the
spots on W6RK spotting network http://ch.w6rk.com/   .  Of course, many don't
bother to read the rules, and don't send in logs anyway, but the idea shoudl be
to encourage the most activity.  Mobiles are out burning gas, and want to be
spotted, and not have that count against those who submit logs.  Using spotting
networks gets you into the 'multi op' category.  County hunters now, with all
the new phones, can spot themselves if they have cellphone coverage by text
message (or being logged on to W6RK if they have broadband access).   Not many
do it, but it is the coming thing.   

I usually don't bother to submit logs - work the stations, log them, and I'm
all 100% paper logs so it is pain to submit logs.  Only reason I'm doing it
this year is because it is Year of the QSO Party, and if I don't do it, I can't
put the sticker on my certificate.    

I always spot mobiles I hear, and watch the spots for other mobiles.   Likely
50-60 county hunters do that - and the idea should be to get the maximum number
of folks involved in the state QSO party contests.  Some only are looking for a
few counties in the state, and they have 'alarm programs' that go off when
those counties are spotted.    

I worked 2 DX stations - for 4 points instead of 2.  The usual crowd of DX
county hunters was no where to be heard. (DL5AWI, DL5MC, OK1VD, OH3JF, LY5A,
etc)   Either too much QRM from the Asian DX contest (which I never heard), or
the band was just not there , or the interest. 

Had fun, but the COLO folks need to get some more mobiles out there if they
think this event is going to survive.  It looks like most mobiles ran a handful
of counties (the 3 or 4 of the others who were mobile or portable - W0ETT,
W0HXB, N0KM. )

The rig - IC706   Six foot mast on grounded mag mount on rear trunk deck with
20/30/40M resonators horizontal (plus I had 17M hamstick and 40M hamstick on
rooftop but didn't use.  Never heard anything on 40SSB and didn't try too hard
there.  Band was yuk and no one around.   I made a handful of contacts on 20M
SSB - and half of them with N8II.   99% CW effort. Stopped to run most of the
counties.   No hurry - just poking along headed eventually back toward TX
during the contest.


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