[CQ-Contest] Secrets of the SS CW - #4

[Tree]

Hello again-

W1YL/4 - Ellen White noticed a lapse in my memory in my last posting:

I said:

"The only person licensed to use 6KW in California was Jack Riggs, who is
now a silent key."

and she writes:

> Perchance did you mean Johnny Griggs, W6KW, radio pioneer and an ARRL
> Director?

And she is correct.  Thanks "ln".  BTW, I found a picture of John here: 
http://www.jplrecclubs.caltech.edu/radio/calling/1978/jun/jun78.html

Well, now that you have figured out your band strategy and got that second 
radio warming up, we can start talking about some of the interesting 
operating techniques that you can use in the SS.  Many of these are different
depending on Saturday versus Sunday, so I will often indicate which applies
to which period in the contest.

Another interesting thing about the SS CW is an attribute that it shares 
with the NCJ sprints, your callsign is part of the exchange.  This means 
that often your exchange can act as a CQ.  This is an important thing to
remember.

On Saturday, you will probably have good success calling CQ.  Part of the 
reason for this is because everyone else who is calling CQ is tuning a second
radio looking for guys to work.  Also, there are a lot of people who will be
operating the contest who are not seeing these posts and are just being nice
by tuning around and handing out some QSOs.  

Let's pretend your rate in the first hour is going to be 90 QSOs.  Let's also
pretend that you spend about 20 seconds exchanging information.  That adds
up to 1800 seconds that you are busy in a QSO, or exactly half of the hour.

Since you don't CQ 100 percent of the time, it is easy to see that you will 
spend more time in a QSO than CQing.  Given a constant probability per unit
of time of having someone tune across your frequency, that means your next
QSO maybe more likely to result from someone tuning in your QSO.

This has many implications.  The difference between an average hour in the 
first hour and an excellent one often turns out to be many minor things - 
added together.  

There are obvious ones - like sending stuff in the right order, not wasting
time sending un-necessary information, copying things the first time without
having to ask for repeats and having a clear frequency.

However, there are some more subtle things you can do.

During the first hours of the contest, you should always be prepared for 
someone to be ready to call you as soon as your QSO is complete.  If you 
listen to the top operators, if they think there might be somoene there,
they will just send "TU" at the end of the QSO.  Many times, there will 
be someone there calling in.  This does three things:

1. Improves your rate - you didn't have to send your call or SS or CQ.

2. Rewards the patient guy who might be weak, but stuck around to call you
a second time.  This is a good thing.

3. Helps relieve the power crises if you are in California (less sending).

If more than one person answered your previous CQ, or your sixth sense 
is telling you someone is listening, just send TU and see what happens.
If nobody calls you after 723 milliseconds (+/- 10 ms), then you can launch
a very quick CQ.  I use something like "SS W5WMU SS".  This will help 
encourage those who didn't figure out that you were ready to be called
after the TU, or they didn't know your call.  Putting the SS in the front
is a good sync character so they are warmed up to hear your call.  Putting
the SS at the end makes it clear that you are ready to be called in case
someone tuned you in during the middle of your call.

If this CQ goes unanswered, you can then launch your CQSS W5WMU W5WMU SS
message and start tuning around on the second radio.

Since your QSO is on display - it needs to happen in such a way to encourage
someone who is listening to it to stick around an work you.  This is an 
art form on SSB, but there are still some things you can do on CW.  You
should be making it clear that the QSO will not take a long time to finish.
You should respond quickly to the station you are working.  You should be 
sending fast (at least 32 WPM if not more), and you need to finish the 
QSO without having to ask for repeats.  Increasing your sending speed
slightly is a good way to signal to the other calling stations that you
heard them, and are trying to hurry so you can pick them up.  Any kind of 
interruption in the normal QSO flow will have people reaching for their VFO 
knobs.  

This brings up another point - there are times where it might not be in 
your best interest to work a really weak station during the first few hours 
of the contest.  We have all had that one killer QSO that takes 2 minutes 
to finish because a weak station gets stomped on by someone trying to 
move in on the frequency.  You should focus on the low hanging fruit 
during the first few hours of the contest, and spend more effort on the
weaker signals when the rate has slowed down on Sunday.

We will talk about what to do when you are weak in another post.  Hint,
do not waste any RF energy on un-necessary information and don't repeat 
stuff until asked.

So - in summary - be aware of how the time spent sending and receiving
the exchange can be used to attract new stations, and do all you can to
optimize your rate as a result.  Don't be afraid to end a QSO with a 
quick TU, see if somoene is there, and then send a quick CQ if not.
This can add a handful of QSOs to your better hours near the start of
the contest.  

73 Tree N6TR
tree at kkn.net