[3830] CQ WW RTTY KE4UW SOSB/40 HP

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                    CQ Worldwide DX Contest, RTTY

Call: KE4UW
Operator(s): KE4UW
Station: KE4UW

Class: SOSB/40 HP
QTH: Marietta, GA
Operating Time (hrs): 18

Summary:
 Band  QSOs  Pts   State/Prov  DX  Zones
-----------------------------------------
   80:                                 
   40:  534  1013      44      66    22
   20:                                 
   15:                                 
   10:                                 
-----------------------------------------
Total:  534  1013      44      66    22  Total Score = 133,716

Club: South East Contest Club

Comments:

Setup was the TS-950SDX, 700 watts, wire antennas.  We had a lot of family
activities during the day on Saturday and Sunday, so since most of my
participation would be at night I opted for single band 40 meters.  I built a
bobtail curtain and got it put up on Thursday, and it seemed to play well,
oriented for Europe.  I was able to work about everything I heard, but missed
some mults (C31, LA, SM, OH0) that I just couldn’t copy well enough through
the QRM to copy an exchange.  Most operation was with the bobtail, although I
switched to a north-south loop or G5RV at times for working US/VE.   

As many of you know, I and computers do not seem to get along well, and I could
not get the Microkeyer working with RTTY—I suspect one of the MMTTY settings
is incorrect.  After working on it a couple evenings last week I gave up on it
and went back to the PK232DSP for RTTY and the IF232 for the rig interface.  I
had to re-learn a few software settings to get that right, but it was up and
running and tested an hour or so before the start of the contest.  There is
something to be said for trial and error, and when all else fails, pulling out
the manuals.  

Propagation seemed very good to Europe on Friday evening.  I managed to stay
awake until about 3 am Saturday morning before crashing for a couple of hours,
then back up at for a couple hours until after sunrise.  When I had to head off
to other things during the day I had logged 300 contacts, 60 DXCC mults, 30
state mults, and about 20 zones.  Q’s were split about evenly between run and
S&P—it seemed like after 15 or 20 minutes of running the rate dropped off to
near zero, so I’d switch to S&P for 30 minutes, then run a bit more, etc.
etc.   

Got back on the air about Saturday evening and managed to keep going until
about 1am.  By then I was running out of gas and needed some sleep as we had a
full day of activities planned for Sunday (including a celebration for my
oldest son turning 30).  I did catch an hour or so of operating just
before/after sunrise, but we had company all afternoon, so only got on for
another hour or so in the evening.

Overall I had a lot of fun.  The band was in pretty good shape, the new bobtail
curtain worked well, and the radio/computer/TNC/Writelog combo worked
flawlessly.  The score seems a bit disappointing, as I just can’t gather in
nearly as many mults on single band.


Posted using 3830 Score Submittal Forms at: http://www.hornucopia.com/3830score/