[3830] FlQP NO5W M/SCW LP
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Thu May 1 00:45:41 EDT 2014
Florida QSO Party
Call: NO5W
Operator(s): NO5W KN5O
Station: NO5W
Class: M/SCW LP
QTH: MANY
Operating Time (hrs): 19.75
Summary:
Band CW Qs Ph Qs
--------------------
40: 146
20: 2109
15: 1
10:
--------------------
Total: 2256 0 CW Mults = 67 Ph Mults = 0 Total Score = 604,608
Club: Louisiana Contest Club
Comments:
Equipment: K3/100, HiQ 4/80, Dell D610-XP-CQ/X (logging), Sony Vaio-Win7-CQ/X
(navigation), 2002 Pathfinder
Ah, the last weekend of April and time again for the annual FQP where mobile
ops
can go to test their skills against the biggest pileups found inside the CONUS.
Sowith new RainX blades in the wipers, new oil in the 145K mile crankcase, many
new gallons of regular of various prices (ouch!) waiting to be converted to
forward motion, a new operator position, a new common mode choke on the antenna
feedline, new guest op/driver, Ted-KN5O and I set out on the same old route
Dallas-K1DW and I used in 2013 to try our hand with the FQP pileups, to
determine where we fit in the spectrum between total lids and competent
operators, and most of all just to have some radio fun in one of the finest
state QSO parties existing.
When we entered the panhandle on the drive over Friday afternoon from KN5O's
QTH near Covington, LA, I remarked that on Sunday afternoon we would probably
experience some good pileups on our return home through the western set of
panhandle counties including Washington, Holmes, Walton, etc. Boy was that an
understatement! Pileups all day Saturday and during most of the day on Sunday
were good but manageable. But the monster pileup in Holmes on Sunday afternoon
took us to the brink of chaos where discerning even a single letter from the
roaring din seemed impossible. It was not even possible to determine whether
the din tolled for us or for some other station several hundred Hz to the side
as there was very little relation between what I sent and the response of the
pile. As KN5O pulled out of the area where we had stopped to run Holmes and
headed on west to the next one, I was toast and feeling more than a little
defeated. However, on review of the log it looks like about 67 Qs were pulled
through the din so it was at least not a total washout. Apologies if you were
in the din but did not make it into our log.
For the most part Murphy stayed away from our adventure but there was that
instance in Duval around noon on Sunday when the D610 logging computer shut
totally down with no prior indication of a problem. Fortunately we were able to
get it going again and it behaved during the rest of the party. Saturday startup
was also a bit of a problem. Normally we prefer an earlier start than the 1600z
used in the FQP on Saturday but the late start turned out to be a good thing
since the Win7 machine we were using for the driver navigation insisted on
detecting the serial GPS as a mouse rendering the machine unuseable until we
could recall how to disable thatWin7 feature.
It was somewhat disappointing that we missed Lake during the Saturday session
and Santa Rosa and Escambia on Sunday. There's always a tradeoff between
leaving QSOson the table in a county where you have a choice about how long to
stay and meeting the overall schedule. This time we erred on the side of
staying with a county until the pileup was essentially worked through -- Holmes
being a notable exception. That was particularly true in Lafayette and Gilchrist
on Saturday. On Sunday we spent an excessive amount of time in Columbia due to
the driver getting in line at a Subway behind a group of school kids who were
undecided about the ingredients they wanted on their sub -- we kept operating
during that lunch break but by that time Columbia had essentially been worked
out. Apologies if you were needing us in those missed
counties for a sweep. Perhaps a review of the route is in order for next year.
But one thing for sure Sunday afternoon will find us headed back to Louisiana
through the western panhandle counties looking to test mettle against some
demanding pileups.
It was also disappointing that we could not get anything going on 15m or 10m
although we tried several times and after multiple CQs checked the band and
heard no signals. So 20m was our primary band plus a small number of Qs on 40.
We've seen numerous scores with some 15m component but it just was not there
when we tried to get something going.
Here's some results on a county basis. Some dupes are included here and the
total operating minutes is shy by about 16 minutes due to the time spent
coaxing the D610 back to life in Duval.
County Q-Total Minutes Average Initial First
In County Hourly Rate 10 Min Rate In Log
Marion 117 50 140 180 W8WVU
Levy 112 55 122 180 N5NA
Jefferson 101 44 138 180 N8VW
Franklin 95 60 95 198 W8WVU
Taylor 94 57 99 174 AC5K
Gilchrist 91 35 156 192 G3XVR
Citrus 87 50 104 174 W8WVU
Calhoun 86 49 105 126 K8MFO
Jackson 84 37 136 96 VE3KZ
Wakulla 84 59 85 186 K0PC
Columbia 78 66 71 186 W8WVU
Dixie 70 32 131 210 W8WVU
Holmes 67 22 183 168 N4TZ
Gadsden 65 27 144 192 VE3DZ
Duval 61 21 174 198 W1TO
Alachua 61 27 136 192 W8WVU
Gulf 61 48 76 162 K2DFC
Walton 60 22 164 228 K5WA
Putnam 60 43 84 186 K9PG
Lafayette 59 29 122 204 VE3DZ
Madison 58 32 109 174 K3WW
Bradford 58 24 145 198 W8WVU
Union 56 31 108 180 W5MF
Suwannee 55 20 165 66 W8WVU
Nassau 52 18 173 144 W8WVU
Leon 46 17 162 216 N9CK
Liberty 46 15 184 204 W5MF
Sumter 45 16 169 180 K0FX
St.Johns 44 21 126 156 W8WVU
Flagler 43 16 161 192 KE5LQ
Baker 40 16 150 150 W4EE
Clay 36 14 154 144 KI0I
Hamilton 36 13 166 186 K9CT
Washington 35 12 175 132 W5MF
Volusia 34 24 85 60 K7SV
Okaloosa 19 5 228 114 W8WVU
Bay 18 17 64 102 K3WW
Averages 63 31 135 168
The initial ten minute rate is the number of QSOs in the first ten minutes
after crossing into the county converted to an hourly basis and indicates that
on average we had a good pileup supporting a little less than 3 QSOs per minute
at the beginning of each county.
W8WVU seemed to show up first in the log in about 30% of our counties -- always
there and always recognizable. Was he tracking us on APRS? Was anyone? Well we
do know from his report that K5WA was putting APRS to some good sleuthing use
monitoring our cruise control while we pulled away from Holmes and headed west
on I-10 in the direction of Walton, his last one for the sweep. KN5O, who was
driving during that Holmes to Walton segment reports that Bob was on target,
perhaps a few miles per hour low, with his speed estimate. Hopefully the QRQ
police do not review APRS records but who knows in today's world.
Here's some rate information (this data includes some dupes) in terms of peak
rates over periods of various lengths. Note that all of these peaks occurred on
Sunday afternoon.
PEAK RATES:
Period QSO/ Hourly UTC (4/27)
Mins QSOs Min QSOs OP Start End Counties
10 36 3.6 216 NO5W 20:09 20:19 LIB-CAH
20 64 3.2 192 NO5W 20:29 20:48 JAC
30 90 3.0 180 NO5W 19:54 20:23 LIB-CAH
60 170 2.8 170 NO5W 19:54 20:53 LIB-CAH-JAC-WAG
120 326 2.7 163 NO5W 19:25 21:25 LEO-GAD-LIB-CAH-JAC-WAG-HOL
We were running behind as early as LEO and the thought occurred that we should
skip the detour off of I-10 required to pick up LIB, returning us through CAH
which we had already activated on Saturday at the start. That would have
eliminated only one county from the plan and would have probably put us back on
schedule allowing us to reach Santa Rosa and Escambia. But it's a good thing we
stayed with the plan, otherwise we would have missed some good rates. In
LIB-CAH-JAC and the beginning of WAG the callers were frequent and steady but
the pileups had not yet grown to the supernova size of the ones at the end of
WAG and during most of HOL where the rate meter rarely got above the 130
level.
Here's a clock-hour view of the QSOs with noticeable puny results from 40m
although we tried in all but the shortest counties. We'd go to 40m make a half
dozen Qs and that would be it, back to good old 20m.
Hour 40M 20M 15M ALL Accum. OP
1600 68 68 68 NO5W
1700 97 97 165 NO5W
1800 5 71 76 241 NO5W
1900 3 83 86 327 NO5W/KN5O
2000 122 122 449 KN5O
2100 12 90 102 551 KN5O
2200 137 137 688 KN5O
2300 34 79 113 801 KN5O/NO5W
0000 14 88 102 903 NO5W
0100 68 80 148 1051 NO5W
1200 10 107 117 1168 KN5O
1300 1 104 1 106 1274 KN5O
1400 136 136 1410 KN5O
1500 117 117 1527 KN5O
1600 113 113 1640 KN5O
1700 74 74 1714 NO5W
1800 1 126 127 1841 NO5W
1900 151 151 1992 NO5W
2000 163 163 2155 NO5W
2100 159 159 2314 NO5W
During all those Qs we managed to work 347 different calls. Thanks to all
callers but especially to the following top-twenty who stayed with us the
entire party:VE3DZ(41), K9CT(39), W8WVU(39), VE3KZ(37), K8IR(36), K9NW(36),
K7SV(36), K3WW(34), N9CK(32), K0HC(32), WA3HAE(32), WA8CDU(29), K9PG(29),
WI9WI(28), N5ZK(28), K5WA(27), K8MFO(26), N1CC(25), K9UIY(24), K8GT(24).
Many thanks to the FQP organizers for keeping the FQP running and making it one
of the best state QSO parties. And finally congratulations to W4AN (K4BAI &
KU8E) as well as K1XX (K1XX & W1MD) and N4GI (N4GI & WF3C) for putting
up some outstanding numbers in the Mobile/Multi-Single CW category. Prospects
are not looking good for a top three finish for NO5W in what is turning out to
be a very competitive category. Looks in fact like NO5W should lobby for a
Mobile-Multi-Single-Single-Band-20m-CW-Only category. Whaddya say Dan? At any
rate we need to tune up our 15m capability and come back in 2015 ready to add
some 15m to the mix.
KN5O remarked on the drive back to LA that, although he was not sure beforehand
what it would be like seeing as this was his first time at a state QSO party,
he was ready to spend some time in the FQP as part of the NO5W mobile again in
future years. That alone made our adventure a success as far as I was
concerned. I assured Ted that year after year FQP rises to the occasion with
fun-fun-fun and pileups-pileups-pileups that you won't experience without being
DX. Many thanks to Ted for coming along with me to the FQP, doing some excellent
driving and operating and also to Ted, Lorraine, and Connie for inviting me to
crash at their place on Sunday night.
73 es OJ
Chuck-NO5W
Ted-KN5O
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