[3830] WPX SSB WX3B M/M HP
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Mon Mar 28 14:32:21 PDT 2011
CQWW WPX Contest, SSB
Call: WX3B
Operator(s): WX3B, KU1T, K1RH, N3WZR, N3AFT, KB3CS, N3YIM, N8IVN, N3VOP, KA3ITJ, NY3A, KC3VO
Station: WX3B
Class: M/M HP
QTH: MD
Operating Time (hrs): 48
Summary:
Band QSOs
------------
160: 158
80: 412
40: 1448
20: 1627
15: 1397
10: 441
------------
Total: 5482 Prefixes = 1472 Total Score = 21,218,880
Club: Potomac Valley Radio Club
Comments:
WX3B 2011 CQ WPX SSB Soapbox
Our 2011 team (including station support) includes:
WX3B, KU1T, K1RH, N3WZR, N3AFT, KB3CS, N3YIM, N8IVN, N3VOP, KA3ITJ, NY3A,
KC3VO, N3SB, N3KS
I finally got an answer to the question: How do I make great improvements to
WX3B’s performance without spending a lot of money and putting up serious
hardware?
Simple answer: MORE SUNSPOTS, and of course a team that is steadily improving
and growing.
This was quite an amazing contest.
We got off to what I thought was a very rough start overnight, and yet somehow
we managed to BEAT our 2010 score within 24 hours.
The night-time runs supported one fun band (20 meters), one rough band (75
meters) and one horrendous band filled with QSO opportunities and splatter that
could sink a battleship (40 meters).
K1RH, Rob certainly enjoyed his return to contesting at WX3B. Rob was a major
reason the 15m station was upgraded at WX3B, he was the assigned “catcherâ€
when we played throw the 15m monobander (i.e. he was at the top of the AB/577
carefully putting it in the rotor). That opportunity was given to Rob for his
goodwill and service earlier in the week drilling holes for rivets in the
antenna and un-crushing a crushed element pipe end.
KC3VO, Bob came up to visit and was preparing for his fun that the Timonium
hamfest. While you might not find Bob behind many microphones, he is a
visible force keeping people’s station on the air and their equipment fixed!
He also knows a thing or two about designing legal limit solid state amplifiers.
I know many, many hams, including myself, who have greatly benefited from
Bob’s hospitality and radio design/repair skills â€" thanks for making the
trip to WX3B, Bob!
NY3A, Steve was also found at WX3B’s last 15m antenna party two weekends ago
cranking up an AB/577 55 feet. He made it look easy, pretty much did it by
himself, with very little guy wire support. Thanks again Steve, we put that
monobander to good use in the contest. Steve also single handedly installed
the new Force 12 6 element 10 meter monobander at WX3B last spring and enjoyed
being one of the first to actually use it. Several VKs, ZLs and pacific
stations were immediately placed into the log.
KU1T, Zbignew (a.k.a. Zibi….or ‘Z’) made his first guest appearance at
WX3B and he diligently worked at 20 meters for most of the day Saturday. This
year, many folks ABANDONED 20 meters during the morning hours and went to
15…..making the job a little lonely. Next time we’ll have to give Z a
taste of 20m during the late afternoon hours…..there’s nothing like it!
Zbignew has been a major contributor at K4VV with his computer networking
skills and is a very enthusiastic contester!
N3WZR, Chuck was handed one of the more difficult primary assignments â€" get
on 75 meters and try to attract attention.
Even the new WX3B vertical array did not seem to gather much of a following on
Friday night. The punch line and sad story about 75 meters is that it actually
got WORSE on Saturday, after I assured Chuck it had to be better the second
night. Fortunately Chuck did get to have some fun on the other bands as a
consolation for listening to static crashes for hours on end.
N3AFT, Mike was visiting WX3B for the first time and survived being thrown into
the fire. We started him off on 160, and by the end of the contest I believe he
had a taste of most bands, including a hot 20 meter band on Saturday afternoon.
Nothing like drinking through a FIRE hose…is there. I enjoyed Mike’s
company over the weekend â€" thanks for coming out and joining our team.
KB3CS , Chris was a welcome late addition to the operating schedule and helped
pull the train for a variety of different bands. Chris has become known for
his enthusiastic propagation forecasts, and for teaching all of us how to enjoy
using “DX Sherlock†to visually see where spots are being sent from/to and
how band coverage by others is being observed. This helps keep us from
missing important band openings….as long as someone else has figured them
out. Chris also took the opportunity to help advertise other team member run
frequencies on his slow run bands.
N3YIM, Joe had 15m and 20m with a little 10m thrown in and I know he was
enthusiastic even though he was recovering from his week long illness. Joe is
an expert pouncer that has been encouraged (forced) to run during certain
contests â€" and this was one of them. At the end of the contest he said it
was fun and he might even learn to LIKE running stations!
N8IVN, (Steel ears) Dennis has become a regular face at WX3B events. The
entire team took their hat off to him for choosing to operate 40 meters â€"
both nights. His comments on the high bands and the splatter associated with
the 15 meter signals were “after 40 meters, this is easy!†Fortunately
Dennis did get some prime time runs on the high bands as an alternative to his
40m assignment. Great job Dennis, your iron man command of “the chair†is
growing with each contest, and your ability to fish signals out of the noise
gets better with every contest!
KA3ITJ, Eric gets a big round of applause for passing his Extra exam this
month! He is also building up his own station and was doing a LOT of work
before the WPX SSB contest. Eric joined us at the very end Sunday night to
celebrate with us and make a few QSOs.
N3VOP, Mike sailed into town just in time for the hottest Sunday run time of
Europeans on 20 meters. I enjoyed hearing Mike’s enthusiastic response to
the pileup and watching our score click away as he stuffed one multiplier after
another into the log….and this was AFTER he had had very little sleep because
of working at the Timonium hamfest. Everyone was happy to see Mike arrive as
we had all had plenty of radio time by then.
N3SB, Steve has been a station builder, equipment loan officer and occasional
operator at WX3B since 1998. He may have not made it to my house for this
event, however he DID make it and participate in the chore of installing the
new 15m monobander two weekends ago. Steve always rises to the occasion of
helping me out with station building and team WX3B has greatly benefited from
his friendship and generosity over the years! Some of you might remember that
there is a Kenwood TS-950SDX and Drake L4B at WX3B….those are both on long
term loan from N3SB.
N3KS, Kamal also deserves special recognition for encouraging me to build the
80m vertical array this year. Some of that encouragement was in the form of
consulting, coaching, prodding, motivating, and even handing me the most
important materials (radial spools…..and a phasing box) to construct the
array.
There were some HUGE signals noticed this weekend, and some of them were at
interesting (non-traditional) times:
1. 9A1A, 35db/9 at 8:47pm local time. Nice work Emil. (15m)
Then there was the Sunday morning DX fest I inherited on 20m:
2. E2E (op: Charly, HS0ZCW) â€" 15db/9 Sunday morning
3. VR2HF â€" with his American accent and 59+ signal â€" thought he was a
stateside caller (W2HF) at first.
4. B7P, so strong, and very polite operators (ask if you’re interested in
this one).
I want to congratulate my two friends Ray W2RE and Lee WW2DX for piloting
Ray’s new super-station to an INCREDIBLE score!!! I am going to use your
technique of listening down on 40 when the going gets tough….and perhaps
install a 40m RX antenna before this contest next year.
There were some great stories during this contest too. There are more
parallels between amateur radio contesting and golf that I would have imagined
years ago…..at least the psychology of operations.
On Saturday evening, during a particularly productive and “clean†run I was
having on 40 myself, a certain DX station comes up about 500hz away from my run
frequency and the following exchange was heard:
DX: “again? Your Number again???†(Jim’s note: remember this was out
of thin air)
WX3B: “Ahhhhhh the frequency is actually in use, â€" can you please move
about 2khz down, this frequency is in use?
DX: {works a fake pileup â€" always pretending to be finishing the QSO when
I let up}
The story has happy ending, the station finally QSYed and I had a better run
frequency that we started with.
I was impressed with his psychological creativity on trying to poach the
frequency.
There was the N3WZR 75 meter jammer story.
Nothing’s happening on 75 meters, at least nothing quickly. All the sudden
Chuck notices his transmit frequency is being jammed with a carrier. Next his
receive frequency is being jammed. One of the jamming signals just stopped,
and the second jamming signal started sizzling and arcing and it stopped. It
was as if the second jammer’s amplifier blew up. Wouldn’t that be
GREAT???
I also made some team observations that I found rather interesting and for
those of you that have enjoyed (or suffered) through this long writeup â€" I
would love to hear your answer to the following operational questions:
1. When somebody gets close or on YOUR run frequency, what is your first
reaction?
2. When you are running a good pileup (multiple callers) â€" what is the best
way to handle someone when you only hear a /QRP in the pileup?
3. If someone calls in that is an obvious duplicate, how do you handle them ?
4. What is the best way to get a jammer to stop jamming your frequency? How
should you react?
My opinion on the best way to answer these questions was surprisingly opposite
of most of my team members! Any new and valuable information will be shared
with the entire team WX3B crew.
I want to congratulate my entire team on a stellar performance! The old WX3B
record (17.5m claimed) was SMASHED, along with the previous prefix count record
for the W3 region.
Very 73,
Jim WX3B
WX3B Station description
160m
Inverted L, 4 receive beverages shared with 80m, Yaesu FT-1000mp, Ameritron
AL-1200
75m
Dipole at 55 feet, 2 element phased vertical array, 4 receive beverages shared
with 160m….Yaesu FT-1000mp Mark 5 and Ameritron AL-1200, WX0B stack match box
used to select transmit antennas or split power. K9AY beverage box used for
sharing beverage resources, KD9SV reversible beverages provide 4 directions.
40m
Force 12 EF-240(x) â€" 2 elements on a 24 foot boom on an AB/577 at 55 feet,
Yaesu FT-1000mp, Ameritron AL-1200
20m
Force 12 EF-420 â€" 4 elements on a 30 foot boom on an AB/577 at 50 feet, Yaesu
FT-1000mp Mark V, Ameritron AL-1200
15m
Force 12 MAG-615 â€" 6 element monobander on a 36 foot boom on an AB/577 at 55
feet, Yaesu FT-1000mp, Drake L4B (loaned by Steve N3SB)
10m
Force 12 EF-610 â€" 6 element monobander on a 24 foot boom on an AB/577 at 55
feet, Yaesu FT-1000mp, Drake L4B
QSO by hour and band (No Prefix totals)
160M 80M 40M 20M 15M 10M Total Cumm
OffTime
D1-0000Z 14 16 48 17 10 8 113 113
D1-0100Z 21 19 38 31 23 - 132 245
D1-0200Z 19 26 43 32 1 1 122 367
D1-0300Z 19 26 50 29 - - 124 491
D1-0400Z 11 32 41 7 - - 91 582
D1-0500Z 24 39 85 - - - 148 730
D1-0600Z 5 28 40 - - - 73 803
D1-0700Z 8 11 46 - - - 65 868
D1-0800Z ---+- 2 30 ---+- ---+- ---+- 32 900
D1-0900Z - 17 26 2 - - 45 945
D1-1000Z - 5 37 17 1 - 60 1005
D1-1100Z - 10 54 39 19 - 122 1127
D1-1200Z - - 29 42 66 5 142 1269
D1-1300Z - - 50 39 56 - 145 1414
D1-1400Z - - - 40 51 21 112 1526
D1-1500Z - - - 25 72 14 111 1637
D1-1600Z ---+- ---+- ---+- 23 97 35 155 1792
D1-1700Z - - - 42 65 46 153 1945
D1-1800Z - - - 86 48 66 200 2145
D1-1900Z - - - 74 50 25 149 2294
D1-2000Z - 3 23 131 55 18 230 2524
D1-2100Z - - 51 78 55 25 209 2733
D1-2200Z - 1 52 70 36 3 162 2895
D1-2300Z - - 57 56 26 23 162 3057
D2-0000Z ---+- 7 59 37 17 18 138 3195
D2-0100Z - 24 38 46 4 - 112 3307
D2-0200Z 1 18 34 16 - - 69 3376
D2-0300Z - 31 61 11 - - 103 3479
D2-0400Z 2 27 35 - - - 64 3543
D2-0500Z 2 20 44 - - - 66 3609
D2-0600Z 14 10 35 - - - 59 3668
D2-0700Z - 5 22 - - - 27 3695
D2-0800Z ---+- 2 25 ---+- ---+- ---+- 27 3722
D2-0900Z - 1 4 - - - 5 3727
34
D2-1000Z - - 23 1 - - 24 3751
D2-1100Z - - 44 70 16 - 130 3881
D2-1200Z - - 9 53 45 - 107 3988
D2-1300Z - - 3 67 57 - 127 4115
D2-1400Z - - - 53 63 6 122 4237
D2-1500Z - - - 22 101 3 126 4363
D2-1600Z ---+- ---+- ---+- 27 64 15 106 4469
D2-1700Z - - - 40 62 15 117 4586
D2-1800Z - - - 66 45 14 125 4711
D2-1900Z - - - 65 31 22 118 4829
D2-2000Z - 1 39 41 37 14 132 4961
D2-2100Z - - 50 45 43 20 158 5119
D2-2200Z 1 9 56 57 42 17 182 5301
D2-2300Z 17 22 67 29 39 7 181 5482
Total: 158 412 1448 1626 1397 441
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