[3830] CQWW SSB N1LN M/2 HP

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                    CQ Worldwide DX Contest, SSB

Call: N1LN
Operator(s): N4YDU, W4KAZ, AD4L, WW4M, KA1ARB, W4DTB, N1LN
Station: N1LN

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

Summary:
 Band  QSOs  Zones  Countries
------------------------------
  160:   75    12       23
   80:  364    18       69
   40:  508    27       97
   20: 1092    39      126
   15: 1104    36      131
   10: 1593    37      146
------------------------------
Total: 4736   169      592  Total Score = 9,560,443

Club: Potomac Valley Radio Club

Comments:

With every week prior to a Contest Weekend, whoever is part of the team, has an
email discussion about goal setting. CQWW-SSB was no exception. The only
difference this weekend was that we reached our goals long before the end of
the contest.  So, we quickly reset our goals higher and changed our
conversation to forecasting what scores some of the big stations would turn in.
Based on some of the early postings to 3830 we were not only low on our initial
goal setting, but also on what a big score would look like.  Records were
broken this weekend. The short story, 10 meters was OPEN and it was fun.

In total, our team had seven operators, and I thank them all for their
flexibility with the operating schedule. It was great to have both Nate, N4YDU,
and Kaz, W4KAZ, back for another contest weekend. Another frequent team member
is Rob. KA1ARB. He was supposed to arrive Saturday night, but got stranded in
New York City because of the snow and did not arrive until almost 1800 UTC on
Sunday. When his plane landed at RDU, his next stop was here. Even though he
was quite tired from a stressful weekend, he stayed to the end and closed out
the contest with me. We were also able to get a couple PVRC members out of
semi-contest retirement. Pete, AD4L, was able to stay for the entire contest
and Jim, WW4M, was able to rearrange a family commitment so he could help out
Friday night to mid-day Saturday.  We also had a relatively new ham, Derek,
W4DTB, stop by on Saturday afternoon for a couple of hours.  This was the first
time Derek participated in one of the WW majors. We think he may be hooked. I
was number seven.  

We just can’t have a 48 hour contest weekend without a visit from Mr. Murphy.
  Early Friday afternoon I just got in the house from my usual beverage walk and
tower, coax, antenna inspection. The next step was to test the software,
networking and antennas. All was well except for the top 20 meter antenna. The
SWR was over 4 to 1. Panic set in. I had replaced the coax about 2 months ago
after a similar issue.  Now what?  The good news here is that the problem went
away.  The better news was that it stayed away. This Saturday, before ARRL SS I
will be up the tower with tools. The next issue was computer related. I had just
rebuilt XP on my left computer due to a virus.  It was working fine. About 8
hours into the contest a WriteLog started to run very slow and then hung. It
was time for a CTRL ALT DEL and reboot. From then on it was fine. That was our
last visit from Mr. Murphy.

Now on to the fun, and we had lots of it. The bands were in great shape,
FINALLY.  10 and 15 meters were very busy with strong signals and fortunately
the K3s were always able to find run frequencies. 20 meters was open almost all
night, closing only for about 1.5 hours. The dead time was weird. It was early
into my 0900 to 1200 UTC Sunday shift. I was moving between 20, 80 and 160
while Pete worked the busier 40 meters. One minute 20 was crowded with a good
Europe opening. The next minute I could only hear about 5 signals on the band. 
I thought the top antenna failed again, but no.  Strange.  The highlight of the
weekend was listening to Nate and Kaz on their 1200 to 1500 UTC Sunday shift.  
Kaz was on 10 and Nate was on 15.  They had the best 3 hour shift of the weekend
with a combined Q count of 569 and the best one hour rate of 260. It was during
their run that both of our original goals were surpassed and new goals were
set. 80 and 160 were quite noisy which impacted both our Q and mult counts.
Both bands were under our 2010 results.    

Congratulations to everyone that participated this weekend and had the
opportunity to experience one of the best, if not THE BEST, propagation
weekends in recent history. I know we all had a fun weekend and hope to have a
few more during this cycle. Now it is time for the counting and error checking.
 

73, 
Bruce â€" N1LN


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