[3830] ARRL 10 YN5ZO(K7ZO) SO SSB HP
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Mon Dec 10 09:40:47 EST 2012
ARRL 10-Meter Contest
Call: YN5ZO
Operator(s): K7ZO
Station: YN5ZO
Class: SO SSB HP
QTH: San Juan del Sur
Operating Time (hrs): 22
Summary:
Band QSOs Mults
-------------------
CW:
SSB:
-------------------
Total: 1721 96 Total Score = 330,432
Club:
Comments:
That was as fun as it could be given the conditions. I feel relatively good
about the QSO total but know I am going to get creamed on mults by the LU, PY,
CX, and CE stations. Time will tell if I reach my goal and make it into the Top
10 box.
Full story follows.
This was my second ever DX operation. Planning started immediately after my
first operation here in Nicaragua during the 2012 ARRL DX SSB contest. When I
put down the headphones I told myself: “That was fun but next time I need a
real radio, an amp, a bigger antenna, and a DVP.†With that goal started a
half year long journey leading up to the ARRL 10 Meter contest.
Before getting to the contest story let me step back to early 2012. My wife and
I were planning a trip to Nicaragua to see our son, who lives in San Juan del
Sur. I decided it would be fun to take a radio along and get on the air during
the ARRL DX SSB contest. I had never operated on the DX side of things and YN,
though not rare, is uncommon enough to add a bit of spice to the game. I was
able to put together essentially a one briefcase station from my existing ham
pieces and parts: an old FT-100, switching power supply, a 10-20M dipole, 50
feet of coax, a headset, and footswitch. Getting the license was about as easy
as could be. With a little assistance from Octavio/YN2A, I was able to e-mail
all the required documents to YN’s licensing authority, Telcor, and then a
short time later received the license back as a JPG file. And at no cost! This
is how licensing should work everywhere. So off we went and during ARRL DX SSB
weekend I got on the air with the dipole strung from our 2nd floor hotel
balcony out to a tree and with me hunched over the radio and PC carefully
balanced on a little side table. It was a kick. I made just under 1,000 QSOs
and had little mini runs when someone spotted me. But I knew it could be
better. Having operated at NK7U I know what it is like to be loud. To have that
stopping power signal strength that makes everyone tuning by on the band stop to
give you a call. That was what I wanted next time. (And to have a DVP to save my
poor vocal cords from more abuse along with a radio with better selectivity to
save my ears. )
So, the journey started. How to take a major step up the loudness scale and
still be essentially a, setup out of your luggage, field day, DXpedition? I
knew the keys to loudness would a bigger antenna, up higher, and with more
power behind the signal.
The journey started with scouting out potential QTH’s to rent. The area
around San Juan del Sur is pretty hilly which can be great if you can find a
house in the right location and with enough yard to put up antennas. An
afternoon of driving around found a great QTH that was in the final stages of
construction. Luckily most homes in the area are for rent and we tracked down
the rental agency in charge and made arrangements. (See photo in QRZ.COM
profile of YN5ZO) In hindsight it might have been better to get a home a bit
higher up the hillside for a better takeoff to Europe, but I don’t think that
would have made much difference. At least this time.
The next step was getting an antenna. A SpiderBeam seemed like a good route to
go. It is light weight, breaks down into a small size, and has good gain on the
high bands. Many DXpeditions are using them. I found a partially assembled 5
band SpiderBeam on the QTH.COM classifieds and purchased it. The original owner
had done a lot of the tedious detail work in putting it together which was
appreciated. Still, getting one of these antennas completed and tuned is not a
single afternoon project. I also then bought a used hard sided golf case off
Craigslist and adapted it to carry the Spiderbeam with straps to secure the
boom sections and attached zipper bags to hold all the other parts, some coax,
etc. If anyone is interested let me know and I will send photos. Be aware
though that in the eyes of the airlines, even though you are still using a
standard golf bag, because you don’t have golf clubs in it, it is just a
giant oversized bag and they will hit you up for an excess baggage charge.
To complement the SpiderBeam I also bought from them their 10 meter push up
mast and tripod. They really have a great system designed and all the parts
work well together. The push up mast though would not fit into a hard sided
golf bag. The two or three longest sections are longer than the 48 inch maximum
size for a golf bag. At one point I was considering cutting back the offending
sections to 48 inches until NK7U suggested going with a hard sided ski carrier.
I tracked one of these down, luckily on sale at REI, and had that problem fixed.
Both the push up mast and tripod fit nicely in the case. Of course, like the
golf bag, the airlines are going to consider this an oversized bag.
The rest of the station came together pretty easily. A Kenwood TS-590 and
Elecraft KPA-500 were ordered along with a MicroHAM microKEYER II for voice
keyer and RTTY work. I also ordered some LMR-240 coax. This is the size and
weight of RG-8X but has higher power handling and lower loss. Pretty good
stuff! And to carry the radio and amp I ordered cases from Rose Kopp/N7HKW who
seems to have made a pretty good business out of making cases for the Elecraft
line. They are well made and well worth the cost.
I had all of this equipment on hand by early November and ran a beta test of
sorts at home during the weekend of JIDX SSB and WAE RTTY. I gained approval
from my next door neighbor for this temporary setup as they are always
concerned when I play around with things radioish. The antenna went up in my
back yard on the push up mast and tripod using the TS-590, KPA-500, microKEYER,
etc. It seemed to play well, so time to pack things up and head south.
Like I said this was essentially a field day operation with the whole station
travelling in checked and carry on luggage. I ended up with the hard sided golf
and ski cases with the antenna, mast, tripod, coax, and other assorted stuff.
Both cases came in at 49.5 pounds! In carry on luggage I had the radio in Roses
case, inside a standard black rolling suitcase which my wife hauled around. The
amp went inside a smaller rolling briefcase along with the radio power supply
and microKEYER. This bag was hefty to be sure. I could barely lift it into the
overhead luggage compartment. What a sight. We were not quite the normal couple
going through security on check in or through customs on arrival. But, in the
end everything made it to Nicaragua as planned.
Setup at the rental home here went more or less as planned. The caretakers
wondered what in the world I was setting up, but I managed an explanation.
There was the perfect space out on the pool patio for the tripod and the
terrain sloped off from 240 degrees through north to 90 degrees. The one hiccup
was that winds were higher here than I had experienced at home and I had trouble
getting the mast up to its full height and to keep the wind from turning the
beam. The first problem was solved by waiting for a lull in the wind and the
last problem was solved by attaching a rope to the back end of the beam to keep
it in place. You can never have too much rope!
So, this brings up back to the ARRL 10 Meter contest. My goal was a Top 10 box
in the SO HP SSB only category. From the 2011 results and propagation forecasts
leading up to the contest I figured a 2,000 QSO effort should do it along with a
reasonable number of mults. That should do it. I also hoped to set and all time
record for YN in this category.
The contest starts in Nicaragua at 6:00 PM local time, about 45 minutes after
sunset. From experiences leading up to the contest I was not even sure I would
make any contacts the first night. The band shut tight as the sun touched the
horizon. But, contests have a habit of stretching propagation out a bit. And,
sure enough as the contest started there were many of the PY/LU/CE/CX contest
stations on the air and quite workable. CQing did not generate much so it was
mostly S&P. I only worked one station north of me when I caught a XE working
someone and asked him to go up five for a mult. In total I managed a
respectable 34 QSOs before the band shut tight around 0400 UTC.
I was up at dawn on Saturday â€" 6:00 AM local time, 12:00 UTC. I really did
not expect the band to be open for another hour and a half, but I didn’t want
to miss anything in case it did open. And, it didn’t do anything surprising.
I could just make out some signals around 13:00, an hour after sunrise. The
first audible station was LV5V at 13:30. The first station to the north I could
copy was AA1JD at 13:50 and my first QSO of the morning was OA4TT at 13:53,
which at the time was my third OA QSO in a row. I am positive I have never had
that in any of my logs before. Nothing happened then until 14:11 when I made
my first stateside QSO with WA8EUG. Then 4 minutes later the band literally
turned on. Just like someone threw a switch it was that quick. I settled in at
28369, and ran off a 210 hour followed by a 100+ hour. Most of the weekend I
operated in the range of 28370 as this was where the local noise was at a
minimum. This initial run was pretty much focused in the Northeast US, east and
north from Ohio. A few of the VE1 sections called in for mults. At one point I
asked “Any Europe out there†and was pleased to have EI9E come back weakly
for the only EU of the day. He was followed immediately by D4C and then it was
back to North America for more or less the rest of the day. I asked several
times if there was any Europe out there until well after their sunset to no
avail. Propagation just was not there. I did have an EA8 call in later in the
day but signals were just not going to make it across the Atlantic. I am just
too far north and west and the stations in PY, LU, CE etc have a huge advantage
over me in this respect as I competed with them for a Top 10 box finish.
After the opening pileups propagation quickly moved west across the US and the
northeast disappeared until later again in the afternoon. About this time I
also noticed that I was missing all the states in the Southeast: SC, GA, FL,
AL, MS, LA, AR. For whatever reason, propagation or effects of my local terrain
on my takeoff pattern, I was skipping right over these states. Propagation
predictions sort of suggested this and that W4 would start coming in stronger
later in the day. I finally worked my first FL, K4XS, at 17:30. Bill likewise
said they had not really had any opening to South and Central America. I
eventually worked plenty of FL stations and a couple of the other missing
states but I still ended up the first day lacking AR, AL, and SC in the log.
Crazy.
Similarly I had troubles getting into the Pacific Northwest, notably WA and VE7
which likewise I ended up missing on Day 1 along with UT. (And only with 2 OR, 3
ID, and 1 MT in the log) I did have 3 AK stations in the log, but totally missed
VE7 and WA. Not sure if this was propagation or my antenna pattern.
Most of Saturday was spent following the spotlight band openings. I am not that
experienced in 6 meter contests but it felt much like that. I would have 4
straight QSOs in AZ, followed by 3 in MI, a couple in NY, then back out to CO,
etc. There was not a general widespread opening, just little pockets of
propagation that moved back and forth across the US. The band was never totally
closed but rates would drop down under 50 an hour interspersed with pleasant
mini runs of 10-15 minutes when the rate would climb back up over 100.
In the late afternoon signals from the north disappeared as the MUF over the
path dropped below 28 MHz. My last QSO north of me was fully 30 minutes before
sunset. Since there was nothing to work I went outside, and took advantage in a
temporary lull in the trade breezes to extend the push up mast another 8 feet.
My hope was that this would change the takeoff angles and fill in the skip
zones Sunday I experienced to the Southeast US in particular.
With this change made I turned the antenna west and was rewarded with a nice
opening to VK/ZL â€" something that either was not there or I missed on Friday
night. My last QSO of the day was at 0106 UTC. I checked the band a few times
after that but there was nothing new to work and CQing did not get any
responses. K4XS was still pounding in as late as 02:30 as the only signal from
up north.
Another conspicuous absence in the log was Japan. I had thought that even if I
didn’t work Europe I could at least work Japan. From the QTH here the path to
JA is just about perfect. I am 150 feet above the ocean and from the antenna the
terrain slopes down the ocean and then off to Japan. At one point I thought I
heard a JA working a VK but this was true ESP stuff. Actually, probably a
hallucination.
I ended Day 1 with 801 QSOs and 77 mults. Certainly well below what I had hoped
for. But from the feel of things I thought I still might have a chance for a Top
10 box as the conditions were clearly bad for everyone.
I figured I didn’t need to get in front of the radio quite as early on Sunday
morning. So I gave myself another hour of sleep and slipped in front of the
radio at 1300 UTC. Surprisingly I could hear stations already and I worked my
first station of the day, K1WHS at 13:20 UTC on Sunday. So, at least from that
standpoint the band seemed better than Saturday. It was open 30 minutes earlier
than on Saturday. Interestingly, TM6M called K1WHS right after me and I could
almost believe I could hear him. That also gave me a ray of hope and would also
be a portent to the QSO of the contest later in the day.
As things happen though, I was not able to work anyone else for another 20
minutes when the band clicked open around 13:40 UTC and I was off the races.
Rates were not as high as on Saturday but I still managed a 120 then a 150 hour
for the first couple hours.
Soon after the run started I was pleased to have a ZS call in. A bit
unexpected, but appreciated. A couple QSO’s later I heard a very excited and
insistent “Romeo†call in over the top of the station I was working. Turned
out to be TM0R for my first mainland Europe QSO. I then made a point of CQing
for Europe and was rewarded with another F and a MW. I got so excited I even
tried to turn several calls starting with KK into DK. But, it just didnt happen
and that was most of Europe for the day. So back to W/VE. At least the opening
seemed more widespread and consistent on Sunday and rates stayed up with the
2000 and 2100 hours being some of the best of the contest. During the day I
also filled in the missing states in the Southeast US. Then just when
predictions said the band should start opening to W7 a VE7 and WA called in
within 10 minutes of each other. Whether snagging these missing mults was just
normal contesting or facilitated by my late Saturday change in antenna
configuration I will never know. Interestingly I worked many WA and VE7
stations on Sunday while I worked relatively few stations in FL and they were
much weaker than on Saturday. A reversal of conditions on Saturday.
The QSO of the contest came around 1800 UTC when a loud but somewhat distorted
French voice came back to my CQ. All could make out clearly was “M6M†with
the leading letter garbled. At one point I thought it was FM6M which made
sense, sort of. There could be propagation from the Caribbean and FM is a
French island, but the call didn’t make sense. I struggled with it for a
while until I finally heard a clear “Texas†in the earphones. What do you
know, it was TM6M calling in somewhere around 2 hours after their sunset. And
that was it, just a single QSO. No magic late Europe opening. Just a
fascinating QSO. It would be interesting to know how it occurred propagation
wise.
Rates dropped off a cliff again around 2200 as the path north shut down.
Continued CQing brought in a few XE mults, a couple KH6s and an AH0. But,
again, no JAs. At one point V31NO rose up out of the noise just long enough
for a QSO and then faded away again even as we tried to compare notes on the
contest. That was a perfect snippet of the whole contest in one QSO.
Day 2 ended with 1,721 QSOs meaning I worked 920 on Day 2, more than Day 1,
which was unexpected and a measure of the band being better on Sunday than on
Saturday. I felt pretty good about the QSO total though falling short of my
2,000 goal. However, the log checkers are still going to have a fun time as I
must have had 75 or more stations say I was their contact #1. 96 Mults was also
well under my hopes though to be expected with essentially no Europe and Asia in
the log. In some respects I was in a little black hole of sorts and missed
openings to both areas that stations south and east of me had. And, of course
I ended up missing North Dakota. I worked dozens and dozens of W0s on Sunday
expecting at least one of them to say “ND†but it never happened. Where
were they all? I also missed a few of the more sparse Canada mults.
All in all â€" it was fun. It could have been better for sure. And I am sure
glad I was in YN for the contest and not parts north of here.
I might make a return trip for ARRL SSB. We will see.
Thanks for the QSOs. Log will be uploaded to LOTW before the end of the year.
Scott/YN5ZO (K7ZO)
QSO/Sec+Dx by hour and band
Hour 10M CW 10M PHO Total Cumm OffTime
D1-0000Z --+-- 23/4 23/4 23/4
D1-0100Z - 7/1 7/1 30/5 37
D1-0200Z - 3/1 3/1 33/6 12
D1-0300Z - - 0/0 33/6 60
D1-0400Z - 1/0 1/0 34/6 59
D1-0500Z - - 0/0 34/6 60
D1-0600Z - - 0/0 34/6 60
D1-0700Z - - 0/0 34/6 60
D1-0800Z --+-- --+-- 0/0 34/6 60
D1-0900Z - - 0/0 34/6 60
D1-1000Z - - 0/0 34/6 60
D1-1100Z - - 0/0 34/6 60
D1-1200Z - - 0/0 34/6 60
D1-1300Z - 1/0 1/0 35/6 53
D1-1400Z - 163/31 163/31 198/37
D1-1500Z - 129/10 129/10 327/47
D1-1600Z --+-- 41/1 41/1 368/48
D1-1700Z - 65/6 65/6 433/54
D1-1800Z - 66/7 66/7 499/61
D1-1900Z - 79/7 79/7 578/68
D1-2000Z - 72/3 72/3 650/71
D1-2100Z - 97/3 97/3 747/74
D1-2200Z - 32/1 32/1 779/75
D1-2300Z - 9/2 9/2 788/77 48
D2-0000Z --+-- 10/0 10/0 798/77 43
D2-0100Z - 3/0 3/0 801/77 53
D2-0200Z - - 0/0 801/77 60
D2-0300Z - - 0/0 801/77 60
D2-0400Z - - 0/0 801/77 60
D2-0500Z - - 0/0 801/77 60
D2-0600Z - - 0/0 801/77 60
D2-0700Z - - 0/0 801/77 60
D2-0800Z --+-- --+-- 0/0 801/77 60
D2-0900Z - - 0/0 801/77 60
D2-1000Z - - 0/0 801/77 60
D2-1100Z - - 0/0 801/77 60
D2-1200Z - - 0/0 801/77 60
D2-1300Z - 27/4 27/4 828/81 20
D2-1400Z - 118/1 118/1 946/82
D2-1500Z - 171/2 171/2 1117/84
D2-1600Z --+-- 69/0 69/0 1186/84
D2-1700Z - 27/1 27/1 1213/85
D2-1800Z - 90/2 90/2 1303/87
D2-1900Z - 79/2 79/2 1382/89
D2-2000Z - 139/2 139/2 1521/91
D2-2100Z - 162/0 162/0 1683/91
D2-2200Z - 29/4 29/4 1712/95
D2-2300Z - 9/1 9/1 1721/96
Total: 0/0 1721/96
10M CW 10M PHO Total
6Y 1 1
C6 1 1
CE 4 4
CM 6 6
CX 6 6
D4 1 1
EA8 3 3
EI 1 1
F 3 3
FY 1 1
GW 1 1
HI 1 1
HK 1 1
HR 1 1
K 1521 1521
KH0 1 1
KH6 4 4
KL 5 5
KP4 3 3
LU 23 23
OA 3 3
P4 1 1
PJ2 1 1
PJ4 1 1
PY 20 20
V3 1 1
VE 70 70
VK 15 15
VP8 1 1
XE 11 11
ZF 2 2
ZL 6 6
ZS 1 1
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