[3830] 50SprngSprnt K2DRH Single Op HP

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                    50 MHz Spring Sprint - 2020

Call: K2DRH
Operator(s): K2DRH
Station: K2DRH

Class: Single Op HP
QTH: EN41 IL
Operating Time (hrs): 

Summary:
Total:  QSOs = 103  Mults = 56  Total Score = 5,768

Club: Society of Midwest Contesters

Comments:

Talk about crazy spotlight propagation!  The first hour was all over the map. 
Saw and worked a few FN and FM grids that peaked strong on FT8 but they would be
in for only a few minutes then it would move.  DM and DN grids were also in
evidence so luckily I could point in two directions at once.  Swept out whatever
SSB was there, but at first it was all locals and I saw practically no cw.  The
Es stuff from the east coast on FT8 was up and down like a roller-coaster and I
spent a lot of time spinning my wheels trying and often failing to complete, so
I concentrated on chasing locals, rovers and the grids out west; all of whom
probably would not be there later.  Some Caribbean DX was in and out but mostly
out so I didn’t really go after it this first hour.  Saw some really big
signals pop up on ssb towards the end of the hour and it was K1WHS and WA1T in
FN43, but there was nobody else.  And while I seemed really busy chasing stuff,
the rate doesn’t show it. 
 
The second hour was equally chaotic but the Caribbean came in a lot better so I
was able to work several stations there and concentrated on new grids.  Stuff
kept popping up both East and West but very little on SSB and never from any
population dense area that I could get a decent run going.  I kept wondering
where all the FL boys were but prop to my corner of the world must have been
over their heads.  Of course I chased the rovers and hit any new local grids
that popped up on FT8.  I finally worked K1TEO after trying for a few minutes
and watching for the QSB to bring him up.   It was pretty frustrating. 
Speaking of frustrating, there are still a lot of guys not in contest mode
(including the Caribbean stations).  Ops using WSJT-X take that in stride since
the program is smart enough to just advance them to RRR anyway.  But for those
running JTDX it fails to advance since it HAS no contest mode (damn HF biased
Russkies!).   So many ops will fail open too and just keep Txing TX2 till the
cows come home unless you go into settings and change yours into a funny number
report so they can finish the QSO on auto advance.  This then causes another
problem on my end.  N1MM will only automatically log contest Qs if you are in
contest mode and have the appropriate box checked in WSJT-X.  When you have to
revert to non-contest mode a WSJT window pops up with the QSO information and
prompts you to log it.  If you miss that and go on the next guy it won’t log
it in N1MM.  And sometimes it will hang because it doesn’t have the right
contest report and will freeze WSJT-X until you manually resolve it.  Sometimes
it just doesn’t want to resolve no matter what you do and keeps it hung up
until you hit cancel as a last resort.  Of course it won’t long in N1MM then
either.  I didn’t realize all this mess at first and had to go back later to
find and hand log several FT8 QSOs that I’d made but that didn’t transfer to
N1MM.  This compatibility problem really needs to get resolved!

The third hour actually saw an all too short 15 minute opening where I could run
some W1/W2 stations on SSB at a decent rate.  Never saw much from the Mid
Atlantic grids on SSB though and they were spotty on FT8.  Some DM and DN stuff
came in and even some very weak unworkable one and done’s from the PNW.  I
finally heard and worked W9RM in DM58 but he was the only one and only in for
about 5 -10 minutes.  Nada from FL or TX (it was like that the whole contest). 
My best hour, but it was still pretty sad.
 
The last hour was pretty dismal as I struggled towards 100 Qs (and initially
thought I’d failed).  Pretty much a desert on SSB and CW except for rovers and
such.  Seemed like all the locals I saw on FT8 had already been worked and those
I had seen earlier but were not able to get around to work were gone.   Final
breakdown 52 Qs and 40 grids on FT8.  51 Qs and only 16 grids on SSB/CW.   While
it was really strange, it was still my best sprint to date thanks to whatever
relatively weak and crazy Es I was able to get. 

73 de Bob2 K2DRH


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