[CQ-Contest] WPX Report

[N7MAL]

12 years ago, when I moved here in Arizona, I changed my call. I'm from the old school, IMHO the right school, that says when you move to a new callsign district you get a call for that district. The FCC had just started issuing AB7 calls. This was in April and I figured boy am I going to have fun in WPX. I could not have been more wrong. I found no difference when I was in the run mode. I expected big pile-ups but they never really happened. 
I think a big reason is the casual contester. Psychologically they would rather work a P4 or ZD8Z. An AB7 or 'A' anything is just stateside and not glamorous. I distinctly remember tuning(S&P) and hearing the outrageous pile-ups on the Caribbean stations and ZD8, HC8, etc. The JA run was just average, 2 or 3 a min and never a big pile-up just steady. The AB7 didn't seem to impress anyone even though there were only 2 AB7 stations on that year.
 I kept the call more than a year and found the AB7 never helped. I decided then to get my current 'vanity' call.
 

MAL       
N7MAL
BULLHEAD CITY, AZ
http://www.ctaz.com/~suzyq/N7mal.htm
http://geocities.com/n7mal/
Don't worry about the world coming to an end today.
It's already tomorrow in Australia

  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Bill Coleman 
  To: Radiosporting Fan 
  Cc: CQ-Contest MailList 
  Sent: Thursday, May 25, 2006 12:13
  Subject: Re: [CQ-Contest] WPX Report



  On May 23, 2006, at 11:19 PM, Radiosporting Fan wrote:

  > What you see below is only for the AA0-AL9 prefix
  > block.  It shows the prefix and the number of times
  > that it appeared in other people's logs.
  >
  > It is one of those FWIW things.  I found the data to
  > be most fascinating by importing it into Excel and
  > plotting it.  Apparently, the most rare USA prefixes
  > are those from AD and beyond (in this block, anyway).

  Very likely, this is because of the vanity callsign program. Fifteen  
  or twenty years ago, you'd work a bunch of A* USA prefixes, and a lot  
  of 2x1 callsigns in a contest. Today, most of those have opted for  
  1x2 callsigns beginning with W, K or N.

  I find it most frustrating that, after holding this call for 20  
  years, many hams mistake it for KA4, WA4, PA4, DA4, DD4 or even PP4.  
  The fact that A* prefixes in the USA have become less common has  
  contributed to this recently.

  I'll be one of those extremely "rare" AA4 prefixes on the air this  
  weekend. Hope to supply everyone with the multiplier....

  Bill Coleman, AA4LR, PP-ASEL        Mail: aa4lr at arrl.net
  Quote: "Not within a thousand years will man ever fly!"
               -- Wilbur Wright, 1901

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