[3830] ARRL Jan VHF K1TEO Single Op HP

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                    ARRL January VHF Contest - 2020

Call: K1TEO
Operator(s): K1TEO
Station: K1TEO

Class: Single Op HP
QTH: FN31/CT
Operating Time (hrs): 23.5

Summary:
 Band  QSOs  Mults
-------------------
    6:  227    61
    2:  217    47
  222:   71    25
  432:  108    32
  903:   23    13
  1.2:   36    14
  2.3:   15     8
  3.4:    7     6
  5.7:    5     4
  10G:    5     3
  24G:           
-------------------
Total:  709   213  Total Score = 274,557

Club: North East Weak Signal Group

Comments:

Hr in CT the January contest is a far different competition that it once was.
Used to be the contest with the highest activity with huge participation by
clubs hr in the Northeast. A 1000 QSO's were normal and 400 or so on 2M. While
the Packrats and lately the Rochester group remain active other clubs have
dropped off as has activity. Another large change for me is terrible noise on 2M
which as the main band to find stations has a great impact on my results. The
noise this time was relentless. On Saturday I had a few hours where 30 degrees
to the SW and 40 to the NE were ok (s5 noise). On Sunday the noise abated to s5
in most directions from 1900z to 2100z. But the rest of the day it was s7 and
more in all directions. Yet all the other bands are fine - in fact several times
I asked stations to QSY to 222 where they were arm chair copy while on 2M they
were non-existent. Ughh.

And of course the other dramatic change now is the use of FT8. It is fantastic
that there are many new stations on using the mode and you can work stations
that would be either non workable or difficult to work. But what happened in
this contest was that normally easily workable SSB stations seemed to spend all
of their time on FT8 and while I tried to get them to QSY to other bands it only
worked out once (Tnx N3MK). Sunday I started listing stations I can easily work
on 6,8 or 10 bands that were on FT8. I counted 15 that I only worked on 6 and or
2 meter FT8. The result - my 222 and up score is the lowest in many years. I
figure an average FT8 hour is 20-25 QSO's and if you're doing that on 6 or 2
that's 20-25 points. If you run 10 bands with a station in 10-15 minutes that's
40+ points. A few years ago I questioned the need to double the microwave point
values in January contests. Now even that incentive doesn't seem to work. 

SSB activity on 6 and 2 was so low at times that I would tune the bands and find
no stations or only a handful most of Sunday. I did work 55 stations in the
first hour on 6 SSB and roughly 55% of my QSO's on 6 were on SSB or cw this
weekend. During the Saturday opening some of the FT8 Stations had signals at the
+DB level. I called and worked one FL station on SSB and heard a couple I'd
already worked on FT8. On Sunday during the 6 meter opening the same thing but
this time I worked 3 Es stations on SSB. But I am sure both days for at least
awhile SSB and CW were usable. So FT8 was great to work weak Es but
opportunities were missed to make faster Q's as well. On 2 meters most of my
QSO's were ssb or cw but there was a large uptick in FT8 activity vs prior
contests. 

One thing that did work well was to have a dedicated rig and laptop for 6 meters
this time. Keeping the rig on 313 allowed me to see the 6M Es earlier than I
might otherwise have caught it. 

Condx here were quite poor with snow on Saturday. Luckily it stayed all snow so
we didn't get iced up like last year. It was nice to work VE1SKY on 2M SSB quite
easily on Saturday. Otherwise not a lot of unusual stations were found. In fact
I missed numerous easily workable grids on 222 and the microwaves with the
change in the mix of activity noted above. 

Overall I'll have to rethink my contest strategy and interest given the current
developments. I love contesting and saying hi to so many friends on the air
during these weekends. If anyone has a cure for 2M noise and getting FT8
operators to QSY I'm all ears (FT8 only contest?).

Tnx for the Q's

Jeff K1TEO


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