[3830] CQ WW RTTY W4AAA(KK9A) SOSB20 HP

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CQ Worldwide DX Contest, RTTY

Call: W4AAA
Operator(s): KK9A
Station: KK9A

Class: SOSB20 HP
QTH: North Carolina
Operating Time (hrs): 34
Radios: SO2R

Summary:
 Band  QSOs  State/Prov  DX   Zones
------------------------------------
   80:                            
   40:                            
   20: 1600      58      100    33
   15:                            
   10:                            
------------------------------------
Total: 1600      58      101    33  Total Score = 756,000

Club: 

Comments:

I recently replaced one of my shack computers and I still needed to set it up
for contesting. Also, I have been wanting to upgrade my second computer’s
operating system to Windows 7 so I decided to make that change and reload the
software just days before the contest. The installation went perfectly. I could
not imagine setting up RTTY's 2Tone and MTTY without AA5AU's excellent website
http://www.rttycontesting.com/. Thank you Don for all of your hard work on the
site! I connected the antennas, turned on the equipment and suddenly the
amplifier started smoking and then it tripped the circuit breaker. This
occurred before I even made a test transmission. I had not used the station
since March so I guess it is not surprising that something failed. Contesting
seems conducive to equipment and antenna failures, luckily this was my only
issue and I had a working backup amplifier. I operated 20m single band which
had the most activity during this part of the sun spot cycle.  Conditions were
reasonably good, especially on the first day. More than half of my QSOs were
with Europe. The band was open to this region for most of the daytime hours and
the rates were very high during my sunrise and their sunset. The CQWW RTTY rules
are unique compared to other WW modes as they allow some points and multipliers
for working other US stations. About 1/4 of my QSOs were with US stations. The
path from North Carolina to Asia is a difficult one. The signals are usually
weaker, sometimes difficult to decode and rates are slower but that makes this
even more challenging. Not knowing what station in which country you will work
next or what path the signal will arrive on really makes this exciting. About
10% of my contacts were with Asia. During slower times, I used the Elecraft K3S
sub-receiver to look for new stations and multipliers. I set the SO2V up as a
second radio in Writelog using N6EE's instructions. This worked very well and
switching between the two receivers or listening on both simultaneously could
not be easier. Unfortunately, being a single transceiver meant that both
receivers were muted during transmissions. Depending on the timing of the QSOs
in progress, this was sometimes frustrating to use while running on the main
transceiver. However, it was still quite useful for finding new stations and it
kept me from being bored. There was no shortage of activity in this contest and
I am happy with my score. This is definitely a fun RTTY contest!

73 and thanks for the QSOs,

John KK9A  aka W4AAA, WP2AA, P40A etc

Please QSL via WD9DZV


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