[3830] ARRL June VHF W9ZRX Single Op LP

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                    ARRL June VHF QSO Party

Call: W9ZRX
Operator(s): W9ZRX
Station: W9ZRX

Class: Single Op LP
QTH: Westfield, IN
Operating Time (hrs): 15.1

Summary:
 Band  QSOs  Mults
-------------------
    6:  487   158
    2:           
  222:           
  432:           
  903:           
  1.2:           
  2.3:           
  3.4:           
  5.7:           
  10G:           
  24G:           
-------------------
Total:  487   158  Total Score = 76,946

Club: 

Comments:

This is the first time I’ve operated this Contest from the home QTH.  The past
couple of years I’ve been in either EM85 or EM87.  We stayed home this year
because of the lousy economy.  The 6M “antenna farm” used consists of a
40-ft aluminum pole supporting a pair of stacked PAR Loops.  The rig was a
Elecraft K3 w/PR6 Preamp running 100W.

Propagation was pretty good on Saturday but seemed to slowly decline after
0130z.  Sunday was slow until 1900 when there was a good opening to the NE. 
Propagation to anywhere significantly declined here after 2300z and not a
single QSO was made after 0130Z.  There were no essentially signals to be heard
after 0130 on Sunday.  We had significant storms and high winds move through
around 2200-2300z on Sunday.

I figured with the pitiful antennas I’d spend the weekend tuning.  I was
surprised at being able to hold a frequency.  I’m not sure there is any
advantage to be gained operating from a rare Grid Square.  Given typical
propagation patterns, every Grid Square is rare to someone somewhere.  It’s
better to be located in an area that typically has good openings to high
population areas.

The only real problem was with the Sound Card setup.  I was using Win-Test with
a Lenovo Laptop running under Windows-7.  I “thought” I’d figured out how
to pass Mike Audio through the internal Conexant sound chip.  Internet posts on
the Conexant Chip said this wasn’t possible, but I thought a driver update had
added that capability.  At the start of the Contest I discovered my setup
resulted in audio with a huge, unacceptable echo.  I spent the first day
calling CQ “live”.  Overnight I’d dug out a Turtle Beach “Amigo
Advantage” USB Sound “Card” and got it playing.  Sunday I was able to
save my voice.

Unfortunately there was no easy way to get a rotor under the 2M yagi, so the
XV144 and 2M Amp sat unused.


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