[3830] RTTY WPX AC0C SOAB HP

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                    CQ WW RTTY WPX Contest

Call: AC0C
Operator(s): AC0C
Station: AC0C

Class: SOAB HP
QTH: Kansas
Operating Time (hrs): 30

Summary:
 Band  QSOs
------------
   80:  150
   40:  452
   20:  352
   15:  141
   10:    4
------------
Total: 1099  Prefixes = 438  Total Score = 1,115,586

Club: Kansas City DX Club

Comments:

Equipment:  FT-2000 with the NS filter, Alpha 76pa, home-brew interface with
N1MM/MMTTY.  Antenna is an all attic stealth arrangement that covers 160m-6m
through a series of mostly monoband yagis of various types.  

New to this contest was a change from a parasitic type 40m to a phased drive
reversible.  A month of work on antennas was ongoing right up until a few hours
before contest start but did get completed.  

The 40m phased array was a very good performer and exhibits a better F/B now
with the phase drive vs. the parasitic drive used in the RU last month. 
Especially nice was the 15m beam which has been optimized with the W8WWV RVM
system that facilitates direct phase/magnitude measurement when adjusting a
beam’s trim.  

No equipment failures or other surprises this time matching the experience of
the RU.  

So with all the improvements in the antenna trim, I expected the results to be
much better.  But the conditions were trying at best.  Runs were far better and
signals generally stronger on the RU than this weekend.  
80m was noisy in the evenings although the loop helped.  40m slowed down early
in the evenings.  

I’m not sure if the sunspot was the cause or not...  But on day 2 (Sunday), I
would swear that 20m just shut down at about 11:30 AM local time.  The band just
faded out and was (by comparison) dead for several hours.  As the afternoon
progressed, 20m started up again and was strong.  Even 40m seemed to open an
hour or two later than the prior few days.  I’ve never seen anything like it.
 

I’m really envious of all the guys talking up the great propagation.  We sure
could have used more of that good stuff at this QTH!

The best Q of the contest was working UAE on 40m.  Quite a surprise…

Score summary was an improvement in gross over the prior year â€" but far short
of the target 1500 Q which I had set as a reasonable performance goal.  

73/jeff/ac0c
www.ac0c.com


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