[3830] CQWW CW VE9AA SOAB Classic HP

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                    CQ Worldwide DX Contest, CW

Call: VE9AA
Operator(s): VE9AA
Station: VE9AA

Class: SOAB HP
Class Overlay: Classic 
QTH: NB
Operating Time (hrs): 24

Summary:
 Band  QSOs  Zones  Countries
------------------------------
  160:   16     3        4
   80:  405    14       65
   40:  412    19       62
   20: 1070    23       87
   15:  121    18       65
   10:    1     1        1
------------------------------
Total: 2025    78      284  Total Score = 1,889,278

Club: Maritime Contest Club

Comments:

I made lemonade !
Essentially down 3 antennas,so I knew going in that this couldn't be a full bore
iron pants Herculean effort.  So, that in mind, I chose the 24hr "boy and
his radio" Classic category once again. (I notice the good folks @ CQWW
still don't have the records quite right with conflicts/omissions on the pages
depending on which screen/page you look at or search that you do).  
 That aside, I strode forward, missing practical antennas* for 10, 15 & 160.
 << more about that later.

Antenna description at the bottom.

DA BANDS:

I heard condx on 160m were good.  I did well to work 3 zones and a massive 16
Q's...the WHY when you read about the antenna.  No signals above 559 here (even
VY2ZM was only 559 - but I never called him of course, hi)  Missed hearing Jack,
VE1ZZ.   He usually called me in most contests. RIP LowBand Jack.

80m.  Condx the first night were average, but low noise (quiet) . I was up all
day Friday, so missed most of the EU sunrise.  Couldn't hold the eyelids open
past 3am local.

40m.  Same as 80m. ZZZzzz.....no JA's heard. (but slept thru Sunrise on Sat
morning.)

20m.  No Q's the first night.  Saturday I took some weird off times the first
afternoon, so did miss a bit of 20m to EU, and later, to the USA.

15m.  Ha ! What a flop...Last year with barely an excuse for an antenna I made
410 Q's.  This year I scrounged for every last Q of the whopping 121 that I
made.  Oh bother, I miss sunspots.

10m.  I made just one lonely QSO with local and avid band-mover Dave,
VE9CB....thanks Dave.  I just KNEW you'd move me from 15m to 10m and you did not
dissapoint.  Last year I was blessed to work Dave from 6W1SU. Not quite as
rewarding, but I'll sure take it ! (hi hi)
The only other stn I heard on 10m was from New England on Scatter.  Didn't get a
full call.  Probably my first CQWW event with zero Ionospheric Q's on 10m. 
Goodbye TEN, we knew you well. Sniff.

...Finally, some RANDOM comments jotted down over the weekend and at the end,
I'll describe in gorey details the excuse I have for antennas here @ my
near-ridgetop QTH....aprox 660' ASL.

A certain KL7 was just below me on 20m and sounded like 53A (that's Aurora to
you non-VHF types)  Never could get him to hear me.  Must have been middle of
the night there in Alaska, but I think he did work a couple of N. EU's
eventually.

I don't know if it was DQRM or what, but an Italian stn called me with a few
different callsigns one after the other, but what was weird, was that it sounded
like SSB.  By that I mean I am pretty sure he was playing the audio from
something (a tape recorder? an app on his smart phone?) through a microphone
with lots of distortion.  I left the first QSO in and deleted the rest.  What a
truly ghastly signal, reminiscent of the CB days with speech processing set to
11. (and this in a CW contest folks! )

No 6 band Q's this time around. I don't even know if there are any 5-banders. 
Lotsa 4-banders from the usual suspects however.

A certain F9 stn kept sending P9###, and not F9###.....when we went back and
forth like 4 or 5 times, the P *finally* turned into an F.;.WTH??...I have vague
memories of this happening one other contest.  Almost like his amp or rig
whatever was clipping or his bug was wonky.  Truly a headshaker.

E2A must have terrible local noise.  I was not the only person he couldn't hear.
 An honest 529 on 2 bands and he just CQ'd in my face.  SIGH !...I need an
Eastern EU QROo amplifier.

An A35 stn was overrun with incessant callers.  No chance for a QSO, but he was
moving the S-meter.  Would've been a sure thing with some discipline.

Not one JA heard, nor worked. (but I picked some wonky off times, to sleep and
spend time with the family,etc)

I miss 15m prop...heck, I can still barely recall 10m prop !

Missed some super easy zones on 40m 11-12-13---ugh.

700w is just NOT enough...how big of a chucnk of coax to you need to look after
10kW ?

10m?  What's 10m?  Isn't that a VHF band now?

Pretty dissapointed with my 1.89M score.  Last year was 2.01M and I had hoped to
beat it.  Almost no Q's to speak of on 160 or 10m and 15m was only a paltry121
Q's.  I am short some 450 Q's from last year. Mults were up about 20 as I made a
real effort to use more of my time scavenging for mults instead of running USA
for lower pts.

Speaking of that....USA ops are da best, man.  Easy to run. 
 Go Mike go! Hats off you guys. You make it easy. Loud, call once, don't send
your call again if I call someone totally different.  Give the USA fellas a
round of applause.

Rate meter just hit 300-(last 10)  Woooo!

Lotsa CWOps on.  Go CW Ops !

Hear one (rare?) DX stn working strings of guys and he kept asking them THEIR
callsigns. (like W1 -'call?') but then when he was done the QSO, he would send
'QRZ?..'.  Spent way too long listening to this debacle, only to find out I'd
already worked him before. Blast! A waste of probably a good 5 minutes. ...and
it's not like he even had a long callsign.
Normally I pass these guys right by, but he was really loud and had a
raging/seething pileup, so I wondered if it was an easy dbl mult.  Frigsakes. 
We're not all connnected to packet/telnet/Internet.  I wish sponsors would make
a RULE that you need to ID at least once a minute.  If guys like V47T, ZF1A,
V26K and  TI7W can run 2 pileups and do it, surely the average Joe can realize
it as a possibilty.  

Send your frikkin' call already. Longest I personally go is 3-4 Q's and that's
well under a minute with a small stream of callers.  With no (or one) caller(s)
I ID every single time.

D41CV & 6V7A were pretty gosh darn good copy here on 15m.  I bet some SO2R
guys or MM's  worked them on 10m.  I just betcha!

I feel bad for the Ontario guy in T&T with that callsign.  Ugh. That's a
handful. (mouthful?)

I miss my 2nd radio.  Wow, is it ever annoying having to leave your run
frequency and tune another band to see if it's open, or what?  I held tough and
the 2nd radio never came on this weekend. (even though it almost killed me)

VY1AAA-Gangbusters ! In here like a house on fire.  Wooooo!

Thank goodness for Carib and Cen Amer DXpeditions. My gosh some of them were
loud.  You know who I mean.

15m in much better shape on Sunday.  Even worked some central and N. EU.  NICE! 
Wish more had got on 15m on Sunday.  I worked 99% of everything that moved on
15m (that I could hear) and there's some bonafide bionic hearing going on in EU,
I am pretty sure.

OK, ANTENNAS....(or excuses for antennas), this time out:

No towers here. (KU8E , are you reading this?) ;-D

10m.  CC A2S (that's no typo) at 24'-strapped to a pipe on my shed.  Noisey
-some kind of battery charger in the neighborhood close to that antenna that has
spun its director vertically. SWR 4:1 (varied)

15m. A2S @ 24' SWR 4:1 (again, not a typo).  Shed.  Noise!
-ALSO used what was left of my K1WA/K8UR/K3LR VDA array.  Directions avail to me
this w/e were- South, NE(noisey) and NW(useless direction this
weekend)....however, the pattern is all over the place with open elements and
the SWR is sky high as I think several elements are broken and at least 1 relay
is not working.  Ugh.  It *IS* pretty quiet however. (maybe cuz it's currently a
dummy load?) hi hi

20m. A very forlorn looking aluminum tubing and fencing wire 4-square of
inverted L's that's built a little too small but hears pretty well.  Raised
radials...2-per. I am a good 10dB down from locals that have 3el Tribanders @
48' as evidenced by RBN report comparisons.  It'll have to do.  Wish it was on
par with a Tribander.  Maybe someday I'll rebuild it.
(bigger/wider/stronger/faster) ;-O

40m.  100% wire 4-square in the trees, in the woods, partially on a sloping
hill. Raised radials...2-per...works pretty well.

80m.  An 80m version of a 4-square setup. Inverted L wires. Raised
radials...2-per. Also satisfied with performance of this antenna.

160m.  All that remains is akin to a sloppy/floppy Beverage.  I think the last
storm ruined it.  I checked it 2 weeks ago when I was repairing a slew of raised
radials for my 4-squares and it looked ok, but 2 or 3 recent storms musta killed
it. SWR is up and I hear real well, but I checked it at 3pm local, atfer I was
done my 24hrs and the wire is laying in the bushes.  I think one part of it
might be at 12' above ground.  A certain NP2 stn needs an award for working me
on the first call. WOW...I didn't use up much time on 160m as 95% of the guys I
called couldn't hear me.

OK, if you've read this far - kudos.  Even I had to take a break to type this
all out.  

I really appreciate all the Q's this weekend fellas, and look forward to seeing
you again (all of a sudden)

dit dit

Mike VE9AA in NEW BRUNSWICK, CANADA

IC7410 (just one)
N1MM+ (a wonderful tool that I couldn't live w/o these days)
N3ZN paddle. ( a masterpiece)


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