[3830] RTTY WPX AC0C SOAB HP

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Sun Feb 9 22:31:36 EST 2014


                    CQ WW RTTY WPX Contest

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

Class: SOAB HP
QTH: 
Operating Time (hrs): 
Radios: SO2R

Summary:
 Band  QSOs
------------
   80:  334
   40:  393
   20:  220
   15:  695
   10:  545
------------
Total: 2187  Prefixes = 724  Total Score = 3,672,852

Club: Kansas City Contest Club

Comments:

Congratulations to KI1G - 8 million; now THATS a score!  With the SFI up, had
the A/K numbers been better behaved, I wonder if there may have been a 10M
score?  

Here I saw an increase of 10% total over my 2013 number.  The plan was to work
more DX on the lower bands but the gods of propagation were not kind to us here
in the Midwest.  Stayed up high and ran 10/15 most of the daylight hours and
found quite a bit of DX there although signals here were definitely weaker on
Sunday than Saturday.  

With the K spiking on Saturday evening, I planned to stay on 40/80 a bit longer
- just in case the bands would be in bad shape on Sunday and to catch the EU
sunrise DX.  The bands were not bad on Sunday AM and so I split the remaining 6
hours of op time into a Sunday AM session, an afternoon rest break and then
resumed to catch the JA sunrise.  Unfortunately the XYL redefined the afternoon
"rest" break into an "exercise opportunity" featuring the
shoveling of driveway snow.    

Having moved to a new QTH in late 2012, it's been a constant build & debug
cycle but this contest found things working very nicely with no big surprises. 
The rotor for the 10/15/20m beams had locked up in the RU but I've not had a
problem since even with temps dropping below 0 this weekend.  Had a bit of
trouble with the low band RX antenna switching; something thought I had fixed -
but should have clearly tested more.  And also gone is an occasional loss of
communication with the USB side of the MK2R+ that showed up from time to time
and was resistant to the usual application of magical ferrites - a new USB
cable that arrived last week and seems to have done the trick.

And the luck continued into the software.  this is the first contest with a
properly functioning PTT control out of the logger since starting So2r a few
years back!  Under certain circumstances, the PTT would drop and the message on
the last keyed rig would be incompletely sent.  That bug has followed me through
a lot of logger iterations, 3 shack PC OS, all new PC hardware, a QTH relocation
and through two So2r controllers.  Part of the hassle nailing it down was that
it was hard to reproduce and only seemed to be worse later in the contest.  Got
luck this year and **finally** found a keystroke combo in the RTTY RU last 
month that would recreate the problem every time.  That sequence eventually led
to a work-around thanks to the efforts of a couple of the N1MM guys and Joe
W4TV. Big thanks!!!  2Tone continues to amaze and was rock solid all weekend.

The FT2K ran anchor on 15/40m all weekend and used the FT5K roamed and ran the
other bands.  QSO counts were split about evenly between the two rigs.  These
two boxes are RTTY workhorses.

Thanks to everyone for the Qs - and see you in the next one!

73/jeff/ac0c


Gear
----------------------------------
Yaesu FTdx-5000MP with DMU-2000
Yaesu FT-2000 with NS roofing filter
Alpha 76pa - 900W
Heathkit SB-200 with Gi7b and other modifications - 900W
N1MM and Microham MK2R+
5B4AGN W3NQN-type BPF

Antennas
---------------------------
10m 4 ele OWA 10m @ 82 feet
15m 4 ele OWA 10m @ 77 feet
20m 4 ele OWA 10m @ 71 feet
40m elevated radial 4-square
80m full-size elevated radial vertical
80m inverted-V at 60 feet
Hi-Z pro4-8 RX circle
660' NE beverage
Stationmaster for control


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