[3830] WPX CW PW7T(@PT7CB) M/2 HP

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                    CQWW WPX Contest, CW

Call: PW7T
Operator(s): PT7CG, PT7WA, PY1NB, PY1NX, PY7RP, PY7XC, PY8AZT
Station: PT7CB

Class: M/2 HP
QTH: 
Operating Time (hrs): 48

Summary:
 Band  QSOs
------------
  160:   29
   80:  218
   40:  953
   20: 1954
   15: 1670
   10:  382
------------
Total: 5206  Prefixes = 1220  Total Score = 22,861,580

Club: Fortaleza DX Group

Comments:

This year, our team for the WPX CW was formed by CW Ops PT7CG Raimundo, PT7WA
Mr. Luke, PY1NB Philip PY1NX Soni, PY7RP Renner, and Jim PY7XC PY8AZT Luc. The
Soni was returning to ours is the second time, after the operator with us on
WPX SSB. Jim is an old friend and has come to operate in contest with us many
times. The only one who was the first time here was Felipe PY1NB. 

For the first time do not use traditional DXCluster. Felipe, PY1NB brought in
his luggage an SDR ro run a local Skimmer.

Our goal was, as always, very ambitious. With great Op team available to
operate, local Skimmer, good antennas, set a goal to make 6000 QSOs, 1300
Prefixes and finish the contest with about 30 million. 

On the Friday before the contest, the bands have already indicated that the
weekend would be long, noisy and weak signals. We started at 40m and 20m
prepared to make 150Qs on the first hour, but only 61 did. The same frustration
is repeated all night. At 8z, we had only 425Qs, 50% below the planned target.
The team was down and discouraged with our own performance.

Nothing could be worse ... huge mistake ... 
In a rage of Mr. Murphy, we started having problems with one of the computers.
Throughout the morning it showed signs that it might stop at any time. Finally
at 18Z, the computer burned and we had no spare around. The station just came
back to operation at 23z, when a new computer was provided. Still, do not give
up. 

On Sunday, burned a monitor! Over this time there was a display of booking and
we were quickly in the air again. 

We were informed that our signal was not clear in several bands throughout the
contest. We found that one station had a problem in the power supply and only
fixed the problem on Sunday.

Our persistence was rewarded. 
Even with everything going wrong, the team stood firm and strong. On Saturday
9z, we had our first quick hour when 20m opened to Europe. Since then, we had
good openings to Europe and USA for several hours with rate around 200Q/h. 
At 14z, we overcome our GOAL. Log continued to grow driven by the bands 20, 15
and 10m. In the middle of Saturday morning, we enjoyed our first opening in 10m
(12z) and soon after noon the band opened again for three hours for Europe. We
ended up the first day with 2967Qs. 

The second day was slower than the first, except for the significant
improvement of conditions in the lower bands. The second night was much better
than the first - we did in 3 hours what we did 8 hours on the previous night. 

The Skimmer was fantastic! This type of technology is far superior to
DXCluster. Nearly 100% of the spots generated by it are effectively converted
into QSOs. With the Skimmer, we didn't lose a single opening on 10m, critical
band. 

Thanks to the visitors PY1NX, PY1NB, PY7RP and PY7XC for the help, persistence
and focus on results. 

To Barreto, PT7CB, despite not operate (yet) CW, our thanks for hospitality and
generosity in giving us one more fantastic operation.

Thank you all for each QSO on the contest.

PW7T Team
Fortaleza DX Group (ForDX)


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