[3830] MnQP N8II Single Op HP

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                    Minnesota QSO Party

Call: N8II
Operator(s): N8II
Station: N8II

Class: Single Op HP
QTH: WV
Operating Time (hrs): 9

Summary:
 Band  CW-RTTY Qs  Ph Qs
-------------------------
  160:                 
   80:      22        5
   40:      91        9
   20:      89       69
   15:                 
   10:                 
    6:                 
    2:                 
  UHF:                 
-------------------------
Total:     202       83  Mults = 79  Total Score = 45,030

Club: Potomac Valley Radio Club

Comments:

MNQP was a welcome break from a really boring January month in the ham radio
world. 20 was my bread and butter band, 40 very frustrating. For about half of
the contest, 16Z-2045Z, the mobiles were mostly inaudible on 40. N9AUG was
almost always in there when I was calling a mobile on 40. Towards MN, I only
have an inverted vee at 50 ft, just not enough and the disturbed condx probably
increased absorbtion as well. Some of the mobiles spent a lot more time on 40
than 20 which put me at a disadvantage, so I wasn't too optimistic about the
outcome. Also, at times prop was marginal to SE MN; some of the mobiles were
right at the noise level while the guys farther away were loud. In general, 20
was open from 15-22Z. I tried to limit SSB runs to no more than 10 minutes in
order to keep up with the mobiles; this wasn't too much of a problem as when I
was able to run a few, it dried up pretty quickly. Around 18Z was the peak of
20M activity with MN phone stations spread out from 14240-14300 in between the
other activity on the band; it was a bit crowded anywhere around 14270. The
darned XE RTTY (RTTY contest du jour) hurt any causual acitivty in the evening
as 40 CW really opened up for me and the foreign BC above 7200 was pretty much
blanketing the band. Suggest either moving the 40M phone frequency to 7170 or
have 2 frequencies, the old one + one below 7200. If the CW activity slid down
a bit, it would avoid the RTTY mess.

Many thanks to the mobiles! I'm sure the roads were not perfectly clear; I was
glad to hear the WX warmed up to near normal for MN. I think I worked N0PI 3
times on 20 phone and SSB mobiles KC0DMF (3 Q's) and WG0C + KC0MKS (2 Q's each)
were active. On CW John, N0IJ led the pack with 23 Q's in 18 counties; in order
of Q's others gratefully worked were Pat K0PC - 19, Dan N0PI - 19, Dick N0IM -
18, Jon W0ZQ - 12, Doug N0EO - 9, Mark  W0AA - 8, and Jim N0UR - 7. 

Counties missed were CLA, COT, HOU, KIT, MRS, NOR, PIP, and STV. K9DOG cost me
a few Q's and probably a mult or two; that dawg never made it more than 400 ft
from the house and still sniffed around for at least 20 minutes. I kept BIC
pretty well, but got started 7 minutes late and didn't eat in front of the
radio
(dinner was after 24Z).

Thanks to MWA and the other sponsors. A little promo of the QP amongst the
contesting communtiy would help activity, but it was OK. I looked back to see
how I'd done compared to past years and discovered this was my first serious
effort. Hope to see you again next year with sunny skies and warm temps; this
winter has been a bear, but thankfully my area has largely escaped the costal
and midwest snows.


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